Mexico City receives the Guinness Record as the most connected city in the world

Mexico City has received the Guinness Record for the most connected city in the world thanks to its 21,500 free internet points, as announced by the Executive of Claudia Sheinbaum this Wednesday in a statement.

The capital is thus imposed on other large cities such as Moscow (Russia), in second place; Seoul (South Korea), in third place; and Tokyo (Japan), in the fourth.

“We are an innovative city; innovative because we use technology, particularly this digital connectivity technology, to open rights to the inhabitants of Mexico City; The technology would not make sense if it were not for the benefit of the people and, in particular, of the most unprotected in our city ”, declared the Mayor of Mexico City.

Taking advantage of the award, the Government has announced that it will extend the free internet points to the “public primary and secondary schools of the capital, schools of the Institute of Higher Secondary Education (IEMS), universities of the capital administration and in the 1,800 housing units of the city”.

In the last three years, the city has gone from 98 Wi-Fi access zones to 21,500, according to the head of the Digital Agency for Public Innovation, José Antonio Peña Merino, who has assured that the initiative has cost “zero pesos” to its inhabitants. “On the contrary, for two years we have saved $864 million in the city’s connectivity contracts,” he said.

Carlos Tapia Rojas, the official adjudicator of Guinness World Records for Mexico and Latin America, explained in an event that took place at the 21,500 point of free Wi-Fi in the city, that the recognition is due to the fact that Mexico City has the largest number of free internet connections on the same network.

The company in charge of providing the network to the capital is Telmex, a telecommunications giant owned by magnate Carlos Slim, the richest man in Latin America according to the Forbes magazine classification. Slim bought the company, which was previously public, during the administration of Carlos Salinas de Gortari (1988-1994).

More than 2.8 million connections are made weekly at the 21,500 access points, which have allowed the exchange of 3.3 terabytes of information, the equivalent of 58 million high definition videos, 1,289 million songs, or more than 17,500 million photos, according to the Commercial Director of the Telmex Mass Market, Rodolfo Alberto Sánchez García.

“The responsibility that our society has the best connectivity platform is for Telmex a fundamental part of our work, but, above all, our conviction,” added Sánchez García.

In 2020 in Mexico, more than 84 million people used the internet, according to the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI). The survey estimates that 78.3% of residents in urban areas are users, compared to 50.4% in rural areas. 13% of the population used a 2G connection; 56%, 3G; and 31%, 4G. It is expected that by 2025 12% of the country will enjoy 5G technology, according to data from the international association GSMA.

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