The World Wide Web(www) has list Kenya among some top five developing countries with soaring internet use.
Among the 81 countries surveyed, Kenya was listed third in the category coming after the Philippines and Indonesia while Morocco and Ghana followed Kenya in fourth and fifth place respectively.
Kenya was also listed among countries that have ‘inadequate’ safeguards against government spying. The United States, Canada, Britain, Australia, New Zealand and India, Mali and Yemen were also listed among those with similar safeguards.
“One of the most encouraging findings of this year’s Web Index is how the web and social media are increasingly spurring people to organise, take action and try to expose wrongdoing in every region of the world,” said Tim Berners-Lee – the man credited with creating internet.
Tim was speaking at the launch of his World Wide Web Foundation’s second annual index measuring the Internet’s contribution to social, economic and political development and human rights.
He expressed concern over the growing surveillance and censorship of the Internet saying it threatened the future of democracy. In 80 percent of the 81 countries surveyed, the Internet and social media played a role in public mobilisation in the last year, the foundation said.
China, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are among the worst offenders for censoring politically-sensitive web content and having inadequate safeguards against government surveillance, the report said.
The overall Web Index for developed countries was topped by Sweden for the second year running, largely because of the widespread penetration of broadband, followed by Norway, Britain, the United States and New Zealand. Mexico topped the list of emerging market countries, followed by Colombia, Brazil, Costa Rica and South Africa.
Source: CapitalFM
