Kazakhstan DSL Net Costs $3,355 Per Month

The next time you complain about the high prices of Indian ISPs, think about Kazakhstan where the 4% of that population that even has an internet connection has to pay between $111 (dial-up) to $22,032 (6 Mbps cable) per month for their internet connection.

Most users (and only four percent of the country even has access) hook up through state-owned Kazakhtelecom, a company not concerned with competitive pricing for its services. An unlimited dial-up plan costs about €82 ($111) in a country where the average monthly wage is €292 ($399). As for DSL, an unlimited 1.5Mbps connection costs €2,458 ($3,355) a month, and doesn't even included the required ADSL modem. Want a 6Mbps cable connection? It'll cost you, to the tune of €16,144 ($22,032) a month. As the OSCE report drily notes, this is more than a thousand times the price of such a connection in Western Europe.

This information was reported by Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, but you can get the complete dope on it at ars technica.

I wonder if they have internet downtime at those rates.