Number of Internet users in the country to reach 500 million this year: Ravi Shankar Prasad

Telecom Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad has said that the number of Internet users in the country is likely to reach 500 million this year from around 400 million Internet users now. He added that India has now over 100 crore mobile subscribers. The total mobile subscriber base at the end of February has 98.2 crore GSM mobile users and 4.45 crore subscribers on CDMA network.

Prasad while launching Digital Desh Drive 2 said that people in India specially at grass root levels are using technology to transform their lives. The Digital Desh 2.0 has incorporated insights of small Indian businesses who are using Internet to transform their businesses.

Earlier Prasad had said that the government is setting up a centralised monitoring system (CMS) to automate process of lawful interception and monitoring of phones and internet. The aim and objective of CMS include electronic provisioning of target number by government agency without any manual intervention from telecom service providers (TSPs) on a secured network, thus enhancing the secrecy level and quick provisioning of target.