Rising number of Indian users access Facebook via mobile

An increasing number of Indian users of Facebook access the social networking site through the mobile thanks to a higher penetration, a top official of the social networking site here today.

While for other countries it was the desktop which was first used to get in to the portal, in case of India it was the mobile phone, said Kirthiga Reddy, Director-Online Operations and Head of Office-India, Facebook.

"Because if you think about it in US, most of the people started on desktop and moved to mobile. It is India that is causing us to rethink our model. Because many people are going to Facebook first on mobile and they might never go to desktop again," Reddy said on the sidelines of a seminar.

She said the situation prompted Facebook to come out with many innovations so that the site can be accessed through any mobile phone.

Reddy also said currently language translation is available in eight languages (for India users) in Facebook.

"Globally, we have 300,000 users that contributed for translation of local languages. Translate tool is open for a few other languages," she said.

Replying to a query, she said as per studies children below 13 are accessing Facebook when their parents are using the site.

"Our policy is that children below 13 years of age are not allowed...we have taken that very seriously. Anytime someone is being reported being under 13 (of age), we immediately look into that and take action. There is a lot of education and initiatives we engage in," she added.

Facebook had a user-base of 8 million when it started its office in India in 2010. It has grown to 50 million users since then, she added.

According to her, 50 per cent of the active users log into their account every single day.