Deputy Minister of Information and Communications Phạm Đức Long speaks at the Internet Day 2022. — Photo bnews.vn

HÀ NỘI — The internet is an essential piece of infrastructure to carry out national digital transformation, said Deputy Minister of Information and Communications Phạm Đức Long at Internet Day 2022.

The Việt Nam Internet Association (VIA) and Việt Nam Internet Network Information Centre (VNNIC) co-ordinated to organise the Internet Day 2022, looking back on the 25-year development process of the internet in Việt Nam. The event took place in Hà Nội on Wednesday.

Việt Nam's internet history started on November 19, 1997, when, at the headquarters of the General Department of the Post Office, on behalf of the National Co-ordinating Committee on Internet of Việt Nam, the Director General of the General Department of the Post Office Mai Liêm Trực held an international press conference to officially announce Việt Nam's connection to the global internet.

Deputy Minister Phạm Đức Long said that the decision to open up and connect to the global internet was a brave decision, showing a long-term vision and integration, contributing to a comprehensive change in the country's economic and social life.

Việt Nam started seven years later than other countries, but after 25 years, Việt Nam has risen to catch up with other countries in the region and the world, becoming a strong country in telecommunications.

Vũ Hoàng Liên, Chairman of Việt Nam Internet Association, said that Việt Nam was the country with the 12th highest number of internet users worldwide and sixth out of 35 countries and territories in the Asian region.

Vietnamese users spend an average of nearly seven hours a day participating in internet-related activities and the percentage of internet users in Việt Nam using the internet daily is up to 94 per cent.

Deputy Minister Phạm Đức Long said that after 25 years of development, Việt Nam's internet had transformed from the communication infrastructure into the infrastructure of the digital economy, and the infrastructure of all industries and businesses.

From the role of the internet as a tool for socio-economic development, the internet will create a new way for socio-economic development.

Through 25 years of economic development, the internet is not only a way to connect people, but it has now become intelligent, a way to connect the world of things, so that people can understand the world of things, so that objects understand things better and on the digital environment, people and the world of objects will blend together.

"Now that our world has made the move from the real world to the digital world. The internet will be critical to make this great migration happen and a key element of digital transformation. If in the past social administrators sought to manage the internet, today social administrators use the internet to manage society," said Deputy Minister Long.

Regarding the development of the internet sector, the deputy minister said that telecommunications businesses together with digital technology enterprises would have to transform resources and explore new markets to develop telecommunications infrastructure and information technology infrastructure, especially cloud computing and data centres.

Secondly, we must work together to build a technologically autonomous, widespread, modern and secure internet infrastructure, he noted.

“We must work together to promote and protect the safety and flow of data, which is an important resource that needs to be kept safe," said Long.

The deputy minister also called for the need to join hands in leading the process of integrating the internet into all socio-economic development activities.

"We need to actively and proactively lead the convergence of the internet with all industries, professions and fields in socio-economic development activities," he said.

Statistics from the Ministry of Information and Communications show that there are currently 72.1 million Vietnamese people, accounting for 73.2 per cent of the population, using the internet in daily life, ranking 13th in the world.

Mobile broadband infrastructure covers 99.73 per cent of villages nationwide; 19.79 million households have fiber optic cable, reaching 72.4 per cent.

Fiber optic cable systems have been deployed to 100 per cent of communes, wards and townships, 91 per cent of villages, 100 per cent of schools.

The number of mobile phone subscribers using smartphones is 94.2 million; the number of mobile broadband subscribers is 82.2 million, accounting for 74.3 per cent of the population.

There are more than 564,000 domain names ".vn", ranking second in ASEAN, and top 10 in the Asia - Pacific region.

The level of IP usage (IPv4, IPv6) is in the top 20-30 countries and territories globally. IPv6 application rate in Việt Nam reached 53 per cent with more than 50 million users.

Việt Nam also reached the top 10 leading countries and territories in the world in IPv6 transition. — VNS