Understand
When a service moves online, it gets simpler for most people and unworkable for a few. Owning a phone is not enough: you need a plan that lasts the month, a network that reaches your home, an email address you can actually recover, and the ease to start over when it fails. This is not only about age, and when the counter closes, there is often no other way in.
Take action
- When you help someone, leave their hands on the keyboard. Doing it for them solves today's problem and nothing beyond it.
- Write the steps down on paper, using the exact words that appear on screen. One approximate word is enough to stall everything.
- Never create an account for someone using your email or phone number: the day the password needs recovering, they are locked out.
- Whenever you organize something, keep one route that needs no internet, a phone number, a sheet of paper, an in-person time.
- Don't say "it's simple, just click there". Nothing is simple the first time, and that line ends every question that would have followed.
Resources and help
Organizations
Tools
Did you know?
Go further
The world is getting connected and the divide is wideningSix billion people online, a record. And the ITU's headline says the divides are worsening. Both are true.7 min read
96% of the world has a network. A quarter is not online.We picture blank spots on a map. The ITU measures something else: the network reaches almost everyone.8 min read
280 million more men than women are onlineThe number of internet users has grown by nearly 45% since 2019. The gap between women and men is exactly the same.7 min read
Myth and reality
"It's a generational thing, it will sort itself out."
The gap has as much to do with the cost of a plan, network coverage and the state of the device as with anyone's age. And every redesign resets the counter: what had been learned is no longer where it was.
Recognize yourself in this page? You can talk to someone right now, free and without judgment: dial 811 and press 2 (Info-Social), answered 24/7. If things are really bad, 988 answers too, by call or text. Talk to someone now And if you are looking for resources near you instead, the directory is here. Open the directory