Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that a total of 166,300 households had used the Internet in 2015, accounting for 86.3% of the total households, up by 2.0 percentage points year-on-year. Households using mobile broadband to access the Internet increased by 1.5% year-on-year to 141,400, while those using fibre optic broadband connection doubled, at 36,200. Internet users aged 3 and above totalled 470,800; the Internet penetration rate was 77.6%, up by 7.8 percentage points year-on-year. The penetration rate for population aged 15-24 took the lead at 96.1%, up slightly by 0.2 percentage points year-on-year. Moreover, 94.3% of the Internet users had accessed the Internet daily, up by 0.9 percentage points year-on-year. Regarding purpose of using the Internet, 90.4% of the Internet users used the Internet for communication and 76.8% for web entertainment, up by 3.5 and 1.2 percentage points respectively year-on-year; meanwhile, online shoppers increased by 7.0% to 62,300. Median spending on online shopping was MOP 1,000 in the fourth quarter of 2015, similar to that in the same quarter of 2014; median spending on travel services and electronic products stood at MOP 5,000 and MOP 1,125, up by 53.8% and 127.3% year-on-year. Mobile phone users increased by 0.6% year-on-year to 559,500; the mobile phone penetration rate was 92.2%, similar to that in 2014. With the popularity of smartphones, the proportion of population using mobile phone to access the Internet (91.3%) rose by 11.8 percentage points year-on-year. Owing to the greater variety of functions available on mobile phones and other devices, the proportion of households having computer equipment (152,200) decreased by 2.1 percentage points year-on-year to 79.0%. The computer penetration rate for population aged 3 and above increased by 0.5 percentage points year-on-year to 61.1%. Survey on Information Technology Usage in the Household Sector for 2015 was conducted in the fourth quarter of 2015 through a supplementary questionnaire of the Employment Survey, to collect data on information technology usage among population aged 3 and above.
