Bridging the Digital Divide

Digital divide refers to the gap between populations at different socioeconomic levels with respect to their access to the Internet and communication technologies in general. In this chapter, we summarize the recent developments aimed at bridging such inequality from a technical and economic standpoint. After a preliminary discussion on alternative backhaul paradigms, we focus on space-, air-, and ground-based communication paradigms, as well as their integration. Subsequently, we discuss the affordability of these solutions, as it is primarily the economic aspect which hinders digital inclusion.