A recent Oftel survey highlighted that the number of Britons using mobile phones has increased from 14.8 million to over 33 million in the last eighteen months. Other statistics show that nearly half of the adult population also use the Internet.

These figures were taken from 'The Official Yearbook of the United Kingdom', a 568-page book containing official facts and figures from the Office of National Statistics.

It also stated that by July 2000, 20.4 million adults, (45%) had accessed the internet with the proportion steadily decreasing with age, from 69% of 16 to 24-year olds to only 6% of over 75's. This highlights the divide that appears to be growing between the young and the old.

A report produced from Internet research company MMXI also show that Britain have most users, around 12.5 million accessing the Internet from home, closely followed by Germany with 11.3 million logging in.

The main reason stated for Britain having the highest proportion of population online has a lot to do with a language issue. The majority of websites are in English, owing to the huge Internet market in America.