MANILA, Philippines – A blog post by Buffered VPN, a virtual private network provider in Europe, illustrated how national happiness may be linked to net freedom and internet speed. 

Comparing the top 15 countries to have scored the best from Freedom House’s “Freedom On The Net 2016” report and those from United Nation’s (UN) “World Happiness Report 2017,” the blog found that 7 of the countries are found on both lists. Iceland topped both lists with a net freedom score of 94 and a national happiness score of 7.50.

The blog also found there was some data showing countries with high internet speeds also had high happiness scores. The top five in average broadband speeds (Iceland, Australia, United Arab Emirates, South Korea, Canada) all find themselves with high happiness scores too, with Iceland topping them all.

Australia and Canada are second and third in terms of happiness with scores of 7.32 and 7.28 while U.A.E. (United Arab Emirates) is at seventh with a 6.65 score. South Korea fails to crack the top 15 though with a sub-6 score. The blog derived its insight from data from Speedtest.net’s October 2017 Global Broadband Rankings and UN’s World Happiness Report 2017. 

Other correlations the blog made are between national happiness and gender equality and between Internet freedom and GDP per capita.

For the former, it was found that 10 of the world’s happiest countries also found themselves in the list of top countries boasting high gender equality according to the UN Human Development Reports 2015. The blog said that high Internet freedom equates to higher gender equality as well. 

As for the latter, the blog also found that the top countries on the Central Intelligence Agency’s (CIA) World Factbook’s GDP Per Capita figured into the list of top countries with high Internet freedom. Buffered VPN claimed this may show Internet freedom may have a positive effect on GDP per capita. – Rappler.com