Bing is the primary search engine for Facebook's Internet.org app in India

Hammad Saleem

Bing is the primary search engine for Facebook's Internet.org app in India

Internet.org is a global partnership between the social networking juggernaut Facebook and six other mobile companies who are popular in their respective fields including Samsung, Ericsson, MediaTek, Microsoft, Opera Software, and Qualcomm. The initiative aims to provide affordable internet access to people across the globe, and has launched in several developing nations across the globe.

The initiative has already launched in several other regions including Zambia, Kenya, Tanzania, Columbia and Ghana, with India being the most recent addition to the list. Today, Internet.org app launched in India, in partnership with Reliance communications, providing access to 38 different services ranging from news, health, travel, local jobs, sports, communication, and local government information, with Bing as the primary search engine for the app in India. The services will be accessible in English alongside several local languages, including Hindi, Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Gujarati, and Marathi.

Microsoft said in a blog post,

Today, Facebook introduced the next phase of Internet.org, a global initiative aimed at making the benefits of the internet more accessible to people around the world and, starting today, Bing is proud to be a part of the effort. We are proud that Bing is the primary search engine for the Internet.org app in India, which will be made available later today to Reliance customers in India. Together with Facebook, and many others across the industry, we are working to make the internet more accessible through a set of free basic services.

India is one of the faster growing markets in the world, and providing easy access to internet will give users the ability to share their thoughts and creativity with the rest of the world. Reliance customers will be able to access the services in six states, including Tamil Nadu, Mahararashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Kerala, and Telangana.

The services can be accessed through Internet.org Android app, at www.internet.org, from the start screen of the Opera Mini mobile web browser, and using the Android app UC Browser for Internet.org.