Worldwide mobile data traffic exploding, nearly tripled in 2010, Cisco says

In 2010 alone, the amount of mobile data sent was 2.6 times what it was in 2009. And by 2015, people will send 26 times more mobile data than they do now, according to Cisco's annual Global Mobile Traffic Forecast.

That will mean 6.3 exabytes per month, said Suraj Shetty, Cisco's vice president of worldwide service provider marketing. "That's the equivalent of every man, woman and child on Earth sending 1,000 text messages every second," he said. Cisco says two-thirds of that data traffic will come from mobile video, as more people begin making video calls, sending each other clips they've recorded, and watching longer-form television and movies on their cellphones and tablets. For a little perspective: Mobile traffic in 2010 was three times as large as all the world's combined Internet traffic in 2000. In short, mobile broadband is getting big -- everywhere.