Most Americans these days take the Internet for granted. People are always connected, whether it’s at home, in the office, on their smartphones, they rarely miss a status update. But that’s not the case everywhere in the world – in some places, Web access is few and far between. That’s why companies like Google are trying to deliver Wi-Fi via hot air balloons, to give more people in developing countries the opportunity to get online. And now, a startup called LotusFlare has burst on the scene to take advantage of that trend.

Founded by three former Facebook engineers, Sam Gadodia, Terry Guo, and Shao Xia, LotusFlare is hoping to build out the mobile Internet in developing countries to get more people online. Now the company has just emerged from stealth with a $6 million funding round led by the Social+Capital Partnership, Google Ventures, Metamophic Ventures, plus others who previously funded its seed round.

LotusFlare aims to deliver mobile Internet access in the more remote corners of the world, by leveraging existing infrastructure and technologies to generate data signals for local carriers.

In an interview with VentureBeat, Gadodia said that those people who aren’t yet online generally fall into two categories – those who live in areas where there is access to cell phone signals (and therefore, the Internet), but lack the skills or experience to get online; and those who simply don’t have the money to do so. It’s the second group that Gadodia is targeting.

What LotusFlare aims to do is become a kind of next-generation carrier that can deliver services people want at a lower cost than is currently available.

To do so, LotusFlare is helping to run a number of initiatives. In the Philippines for example, LotusFlare has worked with local carrier Globe Telecom to create the DataEye app, which allows people to see how their smartphones are using data and control which apps have access to it and which don’t. Essentially, what DataEye does is to turn off those apps that run in the background, consuming expensive data that can often cost people as much as 10 percent of their disposable income.

The idea is to help people understand exactly what their mobile data budget is being spent on. LotusFlare is also working with app makers and mobile carriers to create new packages where they could, for example, pay a set fee for unlimited Facebook access, with a limited amount of data per month for other apps.

“Internet access is quickly becoming a basic human right,” said LotusFlare’s new board member, Chamath Palihapitiya, of Social + Capital. “The question isn’t why but how. LotusFlare represents the next generation of wireless products and services who can bring this to massive populations around the world at increased capability and lower cost.”

Image credit: Cgiarclimate via Flickr.com