The internet is undergoing rapid internet fragmentation, reshaping how global citizens experience the web and how companies operate within it.
A Decade of Global Connectivity
The last decade focused on connecting billions. In 2005, there were just over one billion internet users. By 2010, that number had doubled. By the end of 2019, over four billion people – about 54% of the global population – were online.
Initially, efforts centered on expanding access in developing countries. As Pranav Dixit wrote in BuzzFeed:
“The only times India came up during product discussions was customizing those products on slow and patchy internet networks in developing countries… What we think of as the ‘internet,’ even 10 years ago, was the American internet, and that is what everybody experienced.”
This massive growth laid the foundation for today’s internet fragmentation, where access and experiences are increasingly shaped by local context.
From One Internet to Many
In recent years, the internet has grown more personalized. As Caesar Sengupta wrote in a 2015 Google blog post:
“Our goal is to bring all Indians online – regardless of income, region, age, gender, or language – and as they come online, we want to make the Internet more relevant and useful for their needs.”
In response, Google started supporting over a dozen Indian languages. They redesigned Android keyboards to better handle Indic scripts. Their voice assistant was trained to understand Hinglish – a mix of Hindi and English that confuses Alexa and Siri.
However, this personalization came with side effects. In The Filter Bubble, Eli Pariser warned that filtering algorithms trap users in echo chambers. Similarly, Bill Gates echoed this concern in 2017:
“Technologies such as social media let you go off with like-minded people, so you’re not mixing and sharing and understanding other points of view… It’s turned out to be more of a problem than I, or many others, would have expected.”
This shift marks the beginning of deeper internet fragmentation—one where experiences and access vary dramatically by region.
Governments and the Rise of Internet Fragmentation
Laws and regulations are splintering the internet. Europe’s right to be forgotten removes data from some regions but not others. China controls its internet through the Great Firewall. Iran and Saudi Arabia exert similar influence. Turkey blocked Wikipedia for two years. And Russia began testing a sovereign internet model that could run independently.
Consequently, governments have seen the power of online coordination. The Arab Spring proved this in the early 2010s. Since then, India and Hong Kong have shut down internet access during protests. As a workaround, people have turned to apps like Bridgefy and FireChat, which use Bluetooth to create local peer-to-peer networks — even when traditional communication is cut off.
These national policies have become the core drivers of internet fragmentation worldwide. As control tightens, offline digital communication will rise.
How Internet Fragmentation Impacts Global Tech
Accordingly, tech companies are already adjusting to this shift. For global businesses, internet fragmentation makes market expansion more complex and politically sensitive.
Google faced backlash for developing a censored search engine in China, known as Project Dragonfly. Apple complied with Russia’s request to display Crimea as Russian territory within its apps — but only when viewed inside Russia.
As the internet fragments, digital products may face smaller addressable markets. Local alternatives could have more space to grow. For this reason, countries are developing their own innovation agendas. A state-controlled internet often favors domestic companies.
This is especially clear in China. Just this week, The Wall Street Journal reported that Huawei received up to $75 billion in tax breaks, financing, and land grants.
We’ll likely see similar support in other countries. It may not be as dramatic — but for U.S. tech companies, the trend is clear: a bifurcating internet is bad news.
For deeper insights into how digital shifts are reshaping global systems, read Shawn DuBravac’s work on emerging tech trends.
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