BEIJING -- The number of Internet users in China reached 477 million as of end of March while websites registered with the authorities had climbed to 3.82 million, a senior telecommunication official said Monday.

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Wang Jianwen, deputy head of the Telecommunications Administration Bureau under the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology gave the figures while addressing a meeting here on creating a healthy online environment.

At the meeting, representatives from some 140 major Chinese websites signed a self-discipline pact, vowing that they would never organize or take part in any form of illegal publicity activities on the Internet.

The number of people using the Internet in China rose to 457 million at the end of 2010, up 73.3 million from a year earlier, according to an earlier report issued by the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC).