Product Code Database
Internet access is a facility or service that provides connectivity for a computer, a computer network, or other network device to the Internet, and for individuals or organizations to access or use applications such as email and the World Wide Web. Internet access is offered for sale by an international hierarchy of Internet service providers (ISPs) using various networking technologies. At the retail level, many organizations, including municipal entities, also provide cost-free access to the general public. Types of connections range from fixed-line cable (such as DSL and fiber optic) to Mobile broadband (via Cellular network) and satellite.
The availability of Internet access to the general public began with the commercialization of the early Internet in the early 1990s, and has grown with the availability of useful applications, such as the World Wide Web. In 1995, only percent of the world's population had access, with well over half of those living in the United States and consumer use was through dial-up. By the first decade of the 21st century, many consumers in developed nations used faster broadband technology. By 2014, 41 percent of the world's population had access, broadband was almost ubiquitous worldwide, and global average connection speeds exceeded one megabit per second.
In the early to mid-1980s, most Internet access was from personal computers and directly connected to local area networks (LANs) or from dial-up connections using and analog . LANs typically operated at 10 Mbit/s while modem data-rates grew from 1200 bit/s in the early 1980s to 56 kbit/s by the late 1990s. Initially, dial-up connections were made from terminals or computers running terminal-emulation software to on LANs. These dial-up connections did not support end-to-end use of the Internet protocols and only provided terminal-to-host connections. The introduction of network access servers supporting the Serial Line Internet Protocol (SLIP) and later the point-to-point protocol (PPP) extended the Internet protocols and made the full range of Internet services available to dial-up users; although slower, due to the lower data rates available using dial-up.
An important factor in the rapid rise of Internet access speed has been advances in MOSFET (MOS transistor) technology. (2026). 9781424438310 ISBN 9781424438310 The MOSFET invented at Bell Labs between 1955 and 1960 following Carl Frosch and Derick discoveries, (2026). 9783540342588, Springer Science & Business Media. ISBN 9783540342588 is the building block of the Internet telecommunications networks. The laser, originally demonstrated by Charles H. Townes and Arthur Leonard Schawlow in 1960, was adopted for MOS Light systems around 1980, which led to exponential growth of Internet bandwidth. Continuous MOSFET scaling has since led to online bandwidth doubling every 18 months (Edholm's law, which is related to Moore's law), with the bandwidths of telecommunications networks rising from bits per second to terabits per second.
Broadband Internet access, often shortened to just broadband, is simply defined as "Internet access that is always on, and faster than the traditional dial-up access" and so covers a wide range of technologies. The core of these broadband Internet technologies are CMOS (CMOS) digital circuits, (2026). 9781475737240, Springer Science & Business Media. ISBN 9781475737240 the speed capabilities of which were extended with innovative design techniques. Broadband connections are typically made using a computer's built in Ethernet networking capabilities, or by using a NIC expansion card.
Most broadband services provide a continuous "always on" connection; there is no dial-in process required, and it does not interfere with voice use of phone lines. Broadband provides improved access to Internet services such as:
In the 1990s, the National Information Infrastructure initiative in the U.S. made broadband Internet access a public policy issue. In 2000, most Internet access to homes was provided using dial-up, while many businesses and schools were using broadband connections. In 2000 there were just under 150 million dial-up subscriptions in the 34 OECD countriesThe 34 OECD countries are: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Chile, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Korea, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, the Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States. OECD members , accessed 1 May 2012 and fewer than 20 million broadband subscriptions. By 2004, broadband had grown and dial-up had declined so that the number of subscriptions were roughly equal at 130 million each. In 2010, in the OECD countries, over 90% of the Internet access subscriptions used broadband, broadband had grown to more than 300 million subscriptions, and dial-up subscriptions had declined to fewer than 30 million. The Future of the Internet Economy: A Statistical Profile , Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD), June 2011
The broadband technologies in widest use are of digital subscriber line (DSL), ADSL, and cable Internet access. Newer technologies include VDSL and optical fiber extended closer to the subscriber in both telephone and cable plants. Fiber-optic communication, while only recently being used in premises and to the curb schemes, has played a crucial role in enabling broadband Internet access by making transmission of information at very high data rates over longer distances much more cost-effective than copper wire technology.
In areas not served by ADSL or cable, some community organizations and local governments are installing Wi-Fi networks. Wireless, satellite, and microwave Internet are often used in rural, undeveloped, or other hard to serve areas where wired Internet is not readily available.
Newer technologies being deployed for fixed (stationary) and mobile broadband access include WiMAX, LTE, and fixed wireless.
Starting in roughly 2006, mobile broadband access is increasingly available at the consumer level using "3G" and "4G" technologies such as HSPA, EV-DO, HSPA+, and LTE.
Wireless Internet access points are available in public places such as airport halls, in some cases just for brief use while standing. Some access points may also provide coin-operated computers. Various terms are used, such as "public Internet kiosk", "public access terminal", and "Web payphone". Many hotels also have public terminals, usually fee based.
Coffee shops, shopping malls, and other venues increasingly offer wireless access to computer networks, referred to as hotspots, for users who bring their own wireless-enabled devices such as a laptop or PDA. These services may be free to all, free to customers only, or fee-based. A Wi-Fi hotspot need not be limited to a confined location since multiple ones combined can cover a whole campus or park, or even an entire city can be enabled.
Additionally, mobile broadband access allows and other digital devices to connect to the Internet from any location from which a mobile phone call can be made, subject to the capabilities of that mobile network.
Broadband technologies supply considerably higher bit rates than dial-up, generally without disrupting regular telephone use. Various minimum data rates and maximum latencies have been used in definitions of broadband, ranging from 64 kbit/s up to 4.0 Mbit/s. In 1988 the ITU-T standards body defined "broadband service" as requiring transmission channels capable of supporting greater than the primary rate which ranged from about 1.5 to 2 Mbit/s. A 2006 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) report defined broadband as having download data transfer rates equal to or faster than 256 kbit/s. And in 2015 the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) defined "Basic Broadband" as data transmission speeds of at least 25 Mbit/s downstream (from the Internet to the user's computer) and 3 Mbit/s upstream (from the user's computer to the Internet). The trend is to raise the threshold of the broadband definition as higher data rate services become available.
The higher data rate dial-up modems and many broadband services are "asymmetric"—supporting much higher data rates for download (toward the user) than for upload (toward the Internet).
Data rates, including those given in this article, are usually defined and advertised in terms of the maximum or peak download rate. In practice, these maximum data rates are not always reliably available to the customer. Actual end-to-end data rates can be lower due to a number of factors. In late June 2016, internet connection speeds averaged about 6 Mbit/s globally. Physical link quality can vary with distance and for wireless access with terrain, weather, building construction, antenna placement, and interference from other radio sources. Network bottlenecks may exist at points anywhere on the path from the end-user to the remote server or service being used and not just on the first or last link providing Internet access to the end-user.
When traffic is particularly heavy, an ISP can deliberately throttle back the bandwidth available to classes of users or for particular services. This is known as traffic shaping and careful use can ensure a better quality of service for time critical services even on extremely busy networks. However, overuse can lead to concerns about fairness and network neutrality or even charges of censorship, when some types of traffic are severely or completely blocked.
On April 25, 1997, due to a combination of human error and a software bug, an incorrect routing table at MAI Network Service (a Virginia Internet service provider) propagated across backbone routers and caused major disruption to Internet traffic for a few hours.
Although a connection to a LAN may provide very high data-rates within the LAN, actual Internet access speed is limited by the upstream link to the ISP. LANs may be wired or wireless. Ethernet over twisted pair cabling and Wi-Fi are the two most common technologies used to build LANs today, but ARCNET, Token Ring, LocalTalk, FDDI, and other technologies were used in the past.
Ethernet is the name of the IEEE 802.3 standard for physical LAN communication and Wi-Fi is a trade name for a wireless local area network (WLAN) that uses one of the IEEE 802.11 standards. Ethernet cables are interconnected via switches & routers. Wi-Fi networks are built using one or more wireless antenna called access points.
Many "modems" (, or Optical Network Terminals (ONTs)) provide the additional functionality to host a LAN so most Internet access today is through a LAN such as that created by a WiFi router connected to a modem or a combo modem router, often a very small LAN with just one or two devices attached. And while LANs are an important form of Internet access, this raises the question of how and at what data rate the LAN itself is connected to the rest of the global Internet. The technologies described below are used to make these connections, or in other words, how customers' modems (Customer-premises equipment) are most often connected to internet service providers (ISPs).
Operating on a single channel, a dial-up connection monopolizes the phone line and is one of the slowest methods of accessing the Internet. Dial-up is often the only form of Internet access available in rural areas as it requires no new infrastructure beyond the already existing telephone network, to connect to the Internet. Typically, dial-up connections do not exceed a speed of , as they are primarily made using modems that operate at a maximum data rate of 56 kbit/s downstream (towards the end user) and 34 or 48 kbit/s upstream (toward the global Internet).
Basic rate ISDN, known as ISDN-BRI, has two 64 kbit/s "bearer" or "B" channels. These channels can be used separately for voice or data calls or bonded together to provide a 128 kbit/s service. Multiple ISDN-BRI lines can be bonded together to provide data rates above 128 kbit/s. Primary rate ISDN, known as ISDN-PRI, has 23 bearer channels (64 kbit/s each) for a combined data rate of 1.5 Mbit/s (US standard). An ISDN E1 (European standard) line has 30 bearer channels and a combined data rate of 1.9 Mbit/s. ISDN has been replaced by DSL technology, and it required special telephone switches at the service provider.
T-carrier technology dates to 1957 and provides data rates that range from 56 and (DS0) to (DS1 or T1), to (DS3 or T3). A T1 line carries 24 voice or data channels (24 DS0s), so customers may use some channels for data and others for voice traffic or use all 24 channels for clear channel data. A DS3 (T3) line carries 28 DS1 (T1) channels. Fractional T1 lines are also available in multiples of a DS0 to provide data rates between 56 and . T-carrier lines require special termination equipment such as Data service units that may be separate from or integrated into a router or switch and which may be purchased or leased from an ISP. pp 312–315. In Japan the equivalent standard is J1/J3. In Europe, a slightly different standard, E-carrier, provides 32 user channels () on an E1 () and 512 user channels or 16 E1s on an E3 ().
Synchronous Optical Networking (SONET, in the U.S. and Canada) and Synchronous Digital Hierarchy (SDH, in the rest of the world) are the standard multiplexing protocols used to carry high-data-rate digital bit-streams over optical fiber using lasers or highly coherent light from light-emitting diodes (LEDs). At lower transmission rates data can also be transferred via an electrical interface. The basic unit of framing is an OC-3c (optical) or STS-3c (electrical) which carries . Thus an OC-3c will carry three OC-1 (51.84 Mbit/s) payloads each of which has enough capacity to include a full DS3. Higher data rates are delivered in OC-3c multiples of four providing OC-12c (), OC-48c (), OC-192c (), and OC-768c (). The "c" at the end of the OC labels stands for "concatenated" and indicates a single data stream rather than several multiplexed data streams. Optical transport network (OTN) may be used instead of SONET for higher data transmission speeds of up to per OTN channel.
The Gigabit Ethernet, 10, 40, and 100 Gigabit Ethernet IEEE standards (802.3) allow digital data to be delivered over copper wiring at distances to 100 m and over optical fiber at distances to . "IEEE 802.3 Ethernet Working Group" , web page, IEEE 802 LAN/MAN Standards Committee, accessed 8 May 2012
Downstream, the direction toward the user, bit rates can be as much as 1000 Mbit/s in some countries, with the use of DOCSIS 3.1. Upstream traffic, originating at the user, ranges from 384 kbit/s to more than 50 Mbit/s. DOCSIS 4.0 promises up to downstream and upstream, however this technology is yet to have been implemented in real-world usage. Broadband cable access tends to service fewer business customers because existing television cable networks tend to service residential buildings; commercial buildings do not always include wiring for coaxial cable networks. p 323. In addition, because broadband cable subscribers share the same local line, communications may be intercepted by neighboring subscribers. Cable networks regularly provide encryption schemes for data traveling to and from customers, but these schemes may be thwarted.
DSL originally stood for "digital subscriber loop". In telecommunications marketing, the term digital subscriber line is widely understood to mean asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL), the most commonly installed variety of DSL. The data throughput of consumer DSL services typically ranges from 256 kbit/s to 20 Mbit/s in the direction to the customer (downstream), depending on DSL technology, line conditions, and service-level implementation. In ADSL, the data throughput in the upstream direction, (i.e., in the direction to the service provider) is lower than that in the downstream direction (i.e. to the customer), hence the designation of asymmetric. "ADSL Theory" , Australian broadband news and information, Whirlpool, accessed 3 May 2012 With a symmetric digital subscriber line (SDSL), the downstream and upstream data rates are equal. "SDSL" , Internetworking Technology Handbook, Cisco DocWiki, 17 December 2009, accessed 3 May 2012
Very-high-bit-rate digital subscriber line (VDSL or VHDSL, ITU G.993.1) is a digital subscriber line (DSL) standard approved in 2001 that provides data rates up to 52 Mbit/s downstream and 16 Mbit/s upstream over copper wires and up to 85 Mbit/s down- and upstream on coaxial cable. VDSL is capable of supporting applications such as high-definition television, as well as telephone services (voice over IP) and general Internet access, over a single physical connection.
VDSL2 (ITU-T G.993.2) is a second-generation version and an enhancement of VDSL. Approved in February 2006, it is able to provide data rates exceeding 100 Mbit/s simultaneously in both the upstream and downstream directions. However, the maximum data rate is achieved at a range of about 300 meters and performance degrades as distance and loop attenuation increases.
The use of optical fiber offers much higher data rates over relatively longer distances. Most high-capacity Internet and cable television backbones already use fiber optic technology, with data switched to other technologies (DSL, cable, LTE) for final delivery to customers. "FTTx Primer" , Fiopt Communication Services (Calgary), July 2008 Fiber optic is immune to electromagnetic interference.
In 2010, Australia began rolling out its National Broadband Network across the country using fiber-optic cables to 93 percent of Australian homes, schools, and businesses. "Big gig: NBN to be 10 times faster" , Emma Rodgers, ABC News, Australian Broadcasting Corporation, 12 August 2010 The project was abandoned by the subsequent LNP government, in favor of a hybrid FTTN design, which turned out to be more expensive and introduced delays. Similar efforts are underway in Italy, Canada, India, and many other countries (see Fiber to the premises by country). "Italy gets fiber back on track" , Michael Carroll, TelecomsEMEA.net, 20 September 2010 "Pirelli Broadband Solutions, the technology partner of fastweb network Ngan" , 2 August 2010 "Telecom Italia rolls out 100 Mbps FTTH services in Catania" , Sean Buckley, FierceTelecom, 3 November 2010 "SaskTel Announces 2011 Network Investment and Fiber to the Premises Program" , SaskTel, Saskatchewan Telecommunications Holding Corporation, 5 April 2011
Because these systems use parts of the radio spectrum allocated to other over-the-air communication services, interference between the services is a limiting factor in the introduction of power-line Internet systems. The IEEE P1901 standard specifies that all power-line protocols must detect existing usage and avoid interfering with it.
Power-line Internet has developed faster in Europe than in the U.S. due to a historical difference in power system design philosophies. Data signals cannot pass through the step-down transformers used and so a repeater must be installed on each transformer. In the U.S. a transformer serves a small cluster of from one to a few houses. In Europe, it is more common for a somewhat larger transformer to service larger clusters of from 10 to 100 houses. Thus a typical U.S. city requires an order of magnitude more repeaters than a comparable European city. "North American versus European distribution systems" , Edvard, Technical articles, Electrical Engineering Portal, 17 November 2011
While still widely used, with the advent of Ethernet over optical fiber, MPLS, and broadband services such as cable modem and DSL, ATM and Frame Relay no longer play the prominent role they once did.
Satellites in geostationary Earth orbit (GEO) operate in a fixed position above the Earth's equator. At the speed of light (about ), it takes a quarter of a second for a radio signal to travel from the Earth to the satellite and back. When other switching and routing delays are added and the delays are doubled to allow for a full round-trip transmission, the total delay can be 0.75 to 1.25 seconds. This latency is large when compared to other forms of Internet access with typical latencies that range from 0.015 to 0.2 seconds. Long latencies negatively affect some applications that require real-time response, particularly online games, voice over IP, and remote control devices.
Satellite internet constellations in low Earth orbit (LEO, below ) and medium Earth orbit (MEO, between ) operate at lower altitudes, and their satellites are not fixed in their position above the Earth. Because they operate at a lower altitude, more satellites and are needed for worldwide coverage. This makes the initial required investment very large which initially caused OneWeb and Iridium to declare bankruptcy. However, their lower altitudes allow lower latencies and higher speeds which make real-time interactive Internet applications more feasible. LEO systems include Globalstar, Starlink, OneWeb and Iridium. The O3b constellation is a medium Earth-orbit system with a latency of 125 ms. COMMStellation™ is a LEO system, scheduled for launch in 2015, that is expected to have a latency of just 7 ms.
New mobile phone technology and infrastructure is introduced periodically and generally involves a change in the fundamental nature of the service, non-backwards-compatible transmission technology, higher peak data rates, new frequency bands, wider channel frequency bandwidth in Hertz becomes available. These transitions are referred to as generations. The first mobile data services became available during the second generation (2G).
The download (to the user) and upload (to the Internet) data rates given above are peak or maximum rates and end users will typically experience lower data rates.
WiMAX was originally developed to deliver fixed wireless service with wireless mobility added in 2005. CDPD, CDMA2000 EV-DO, and MBWA are no longer being actively developed.
In 2011, 90% of the world's population lived in areas with 2G coverage, while 45% lived in areas with 2G and 3G coverage. "The World in 2011: ITC Facts and Figures" , International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Geneva, 2011
5G was designed to be faster and have lower latency than its predecessor, 4G. It can be used for mobile broadband in smartphones or separate modems that emit WiFi or can be connected through USB to a computer, or for fixed wireless.
With the increasing popularity of unrelated consumer devices operating on the same 2.4 GHz band, many providers have migrated to the 5GHz ISM band. If the service provider holds the necessary spectrum license, it could also reconfigure various brands of off the shelf Wi-Fi hardware to operate on its own band instead of the crowded unlicensed ones. Using higher frequencies carries various advantages:
Proprietary technologies like Motorola Canopy & Expedience can be used by a WISP to offer wireless access to rural and other markets that are hard to reach using Wi-Fi or WiMAX. There are a number of companies that provide this service. "Member Directory" , Wireless Internet Service Providers’ Association (WISPA), accessed 5 May 2012
LMDS has been surpassed in both technological and commercial potential by the LTE and WiMAX standards.
Grassroots efforts have also led to wireless community networks widely deployed in numerous countries, both developing and developed ones. Rural wireless-ISP installations are typically not commercial in nature and are instead a patchwork of systems built up by hobbyists mounting antennas on radio masts and towers, agricultural , very tall trees, or whatever other tall objects are available.
Where radio spectrum regulation is not community-friendly, the channels are crowded or when equipment can not be afforded by local residents, free-space optical communication can also be deployed in a similar manner for point to point transmission in air (rather than in fiber optic cable).
For those who do not have access to or can not afford broadband at home, downloading large files and disseminating information is done by transmission through workplace or library networks, taken home and shared with neighbors by sneakernet. The Cuban El Paquete Semanal is an organized example of this.
There are various decentralized, delay tolerant peer to peer applications which aim to fully automate this using any available interface, including both wireless (Bluetooth, Wi-Fi mesh, P2P or hotspots) and physically connected ones (USB storage, Ethernet, etc.).
Sneakernets may also be used in tandem with computer network data transfer to increase data security or overall throughput for big data use cases. Innovation continues in the area to this day; for example, AWS has recently announced Snowball, and bulk data processing is also done in a similar fashion by many research institutes and government agencies.
Dial-up users pay the costs for making local or long-distance phone calls, usually pay a monthly subscription fee, and may be subject to additional per minute or traffic based charges, and connect time limits by their ISP. Though less common today than in the past, some dial-up access is offered for "free" in return for watching as part of the dial-up service. NetZero, BlueLight, Juno, Freenet (NZ), and are examples of services providing free access. Some Wireless community networks continue the tradition of providing free Internet access.
Fixed broadband Internet access is often sold under an "unlimited" or flat rate pricing model, with price determined by the maximum data rate chosen by the customer, rather than a per minute or traffic based charge. Per minute and traffic based charges and traffic caps are common for mobile broadband Internet access.
Internet services like Facebook, Wikipedia and Google have built special programs to partner with mobile network operators (MNO) to introduce zero-rating the cost for their data volumes as a means to provide their service more broadly into developing markets.
With increased consumer demand for streaming content such as video on demand and peer-to-peer file sharing, demand for bandwidth has increased rapidly and for some ISPs the flat rate pricing model may become unsustainable. However, with fixed costs estimated to represent 80–90% of the cost of providing broadband service, the marginal cost to carry additional traffic is low. Most ISPs do not disclose their costs, but the cost to transmit a gigabyte of data in 2011 was estimated to be about $0.03. "What is a fair price for Internet service?" , Hugh Thompson, Globe and Mail (Toronto), 1 February 2011
Some ISPs estimate that a small number of their users consume a disproportionate portion of the total bandwidth. In response some ISPs are considering, are experimenting with, or have implemented combinations of traffic based pricing, time of day or "peak" and "off peak" pricing, and bandwidth or traffic caps. Others claim that because the marginal cost of extra bandwidth is very small with 80 to 90 percent of the costs fixed regardless of usage level, that such steps are unnecessary or motivated by concerns other than the cost of delivering bandwidth to the end user. "On- and Off-Peak Quotas" , Compare Broadband, 12 July 2009
In Canada, Rogers Hi-Speed Internet and Bell Canada have imposed . In 2008 Time Warner began experimenting with usage-based pricing in Beaumont, Texas. In 2009 an effort by Time Warner to expand usage-based pricing into the Rochester, New York area met with public resistance, however, and was abandoned.
On August 1, 2012, in Nashville, Tennessee and on October 1, 2012, in Tucson, Arizona Comcast began tests that impose data caps on area residents. In Nashville exceeding the 300 Gbyte cap mandates a temporary purchase of 50 Gbytes of additional data. "Comcast Begins Capping Data in the U.S." , Sean Patterson, Web Pro News, 19 September 2012
Government policies play a tremendous role in bringing Internet access to or limiting access for underserved groups, regions, and countries. For example, in Pakistan, which is pursuing an aggressive IT policy aimed at boosting its drive for economic modernization, the number of Internet users grew from 133,900 (0.1% of the population) in 2000 to 31 million (17.6% of the population) in 2011. Definitions of World Telecommunication/ICT Indicators, March 2010 , International Telecommunication Union, March 2010. Accessed on 21 October 2011. In North Korea there is relatively little access to the Internet due to the governments' fear of political instability that might accompany the benefits of access to the global Internet. The U.S. trade embargo is a barrier limiting Internet access in Cuba. The state of the Internet in Cuba, January 2011 , Larry Press, Professor of Information Systems at California State University, January 2011
Access to computers is a dominant factor in determining the level of Internet access. In 2011, in developing countries, 25% of households had a computer and 20% had Internet access, while in developed countries the figures were 74% of households had a computer and 71% had Internet access. The majority of people in developing countries do not have Internet access. About 4 billion people do not have Internet access. When buying computers was legalized in Cuba in 2007, the private ownership of computers soared (there were 630,000 computers available on the island in 2008, a 23% increase over 2007). "Changes in Cuba: From Fidel to Raul Castro" , Perceptions of Cuba: Canadian and American policies in comparative perspective, Lana Wylie, University of Toronto Press Incorporated, 2010, p. 114,
Internet access has changed the way in which many people think and has become an integral part of people's economic, political, and social lives. The United Nations has recognized that providing Internet access to more people in the world will allow them to take advantage of the "political, social, economic, educational, and career opportunities" available over the Internet. Several of the 67 principles adopted at the World Summit on the Information Society convened by the United Nations in Geneva in 2003, directly address the digital divide. "Declaration of Principles" , WSIS-03/GENEVA/DOC/4-E, World Summit on the Information Society, Geneva, 12 December 2003 To promote economic development and a reduction of the digital divide, national broadband plans have been and are being developed to increase the availability of affordable high-speed Internet access throughout the world. The Global Gateway, the EU's initiative to assist infrastructure development throughout the world, plans to raise €300 billion for connectivity projects, including those in the digital sector, between 2021 and 2027.
There were roughly 0.6 billion fixed broadband subscribers and almost 1.2 billion mobile broadband subscribers in 2011. Giga.com Nearly Half a Billion Broadband Subscribers In developed countries people frequently use both fixed and mobile broadband networks. In developing countries mobile broadband is often the only access method available.
For example, only 0.4% of the African population has a fixed-broadband subscription. The majority of internet users use it through mobile broadband.
Wireless Internet service providers (WISPs) are rapidly becoming a popular broadband option for rural areas. Wireless World: Wi-Fi now in rural areas July 7, 2006 The technology's line-of-sight requirements may hamper connectivity in some areas with hilly and heavily foliated terrain. However, the Tegola project, a successful pilot in remote Scotland, demonstrates that wireless can be a viable option.
The Canadian Broadband for Rural Nova Scotia initiative public private partnership is the first program in North America to guarantee access to "100% of civic addresses" in a region. It is based on Motorola Canopy technology. As of November 2011, under 1000 households have reported access problems. Deployment of a new cell network by one Canopy provider (Eastlink) was expected to provide the alternative of 3G/4G service, possibly at a special unmetered rate, for areas harder to serve by Canopy. "Broadband for Rural Nova Scotia" , Economic and Rural Development, Nova Scotia, Canada, access 27 April 2012
In New Zealand, a fund has been formed by the government to improve rural broadband, and mobile phone coverage. Current proposals include: (a) extending fiber coverage and upgrading copper to support VDSL, (b) focusing on improving the coverage of cellphone technology, or (c) regional wireless.
Several countries have started Hybrid Access Networks to provide faster Internet services in rural areas by enabling network operators to efficiently combine their XDSL and LTE networks.
Several countries have adopted laws requiring the state to work to ensure that Internet access is broadly available or preventing the state from unreasonably restricting an individual's access to information and the Internet:
In December 2003, the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) was convened under the auspice of the United Nations. After lengthy negotiations between governments, businesses and civil society representatives the WSIS Declaration of Principles was adopted reaffirming the importance of the Information Society to maintaining and strengthening human rights:
The WSIS Declaration of Principles makes specific reference to the importance of the right to freedom of expression in the "Information Society" in stating:
A poll of 27,973 adults in 26 countries, including 14,306 Internet users,For the BBC poll Internet users are those who used the Internet within the previous six months. conducted for the BBC World Service between 30 November 2009 and 7 February 2010 found that almost four in five Internet users and non-users around the world felt that access to the Internet was a fundamental right. "BBC Internet Poll: Detailed Findings", BBC World Service, 8 March 2010 50% strongly agreed, 29% somewhat agreed, 9% somewhat disagreed, 6% strongly disagreed, and 6% gave no opinion. "Internet access is 'a fundamental right'", BBC News, 8 March 2010
The 88 recommendations made by the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression in a May 2011 report to the Human Rights Council of the United Nations General Assembly include several that bear on the question of the right to Internet access: "VI. Conclusions and recommendations" , Report of the Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of the right to freedom of opinion and expression, Frank La Rue, Human Rights Council, Seventeenth session
Agenda item 3, United Nations General Assembly, 16 May 2011
One way natural disasters impact internet connection is by damaging end sub-networks (subnets), making them unreachable. A study on local networks after Hurricane Katrina found that 26% of subnets within the storm coverage were unreachable. Inference of Network-Service Disruption upon Natural Disasters , accessed 5 December 2012. At Hurricane Katrina's peak intensity, almost 35% of networks in Mississippi were without power, while around 14% of Louisiana's networks were disrupted. Impact of Hurricane Katrina on Internet Infrastructure , Renesys Report, 9 September 2005, accessed 5 December 2012. Of those unreachable subnets, 73% were disrupted for four weeks or longer and 57% were at "network edges were important emergency organizations such as hospitals and government agencies are mostly located". Extensive infrastructure damage and inaccessible areas were two explanations for the long delay in returning service. The company Cisco has revealed a Network Emergency Response Vehicle (NERV), a truck that makes portable communications possible for emergency responders despite traditional networks being disrupted. Cisco trucks help restore internet after disasters, ABC News report, 30 October 2012, accessed 5 December 2012.
A second way natural disasters destroy internet connectivity is by severing submarine cables—fiber-optic cables placed on the ocean floor that provide international internet connection. A sequence of undersea earthquakes cut six out of seven international cables connected to Taiwan and caused a tsunami that wiped out one of its cable and landing stations. Taiwan’s Earthquake and Tsunami Caused Internet access’s Interference , Telkom Indonesia Press Release, 27 December 2006, accessed 5 December 2012. Impact of Taiwan Earthquake on Internet Access , Choy, C. (2007). Channel, The Hong Kong University of Science & Technology, 46. Accessed 5 December 2012. The impact slowed or disabled internet connection for five days within the Asia-Pacific region as well as between the region and the United States and Europe. Understanding and Mitigating Catastrophic Disruption and Attack , Masi, D., Smith E., Fischer M. Telecommunications and Cybersecurity, Noblis. Accessed 5 December 2012.
With the rise in popularity of cloud computing, concern has grown over access to cloud-hosted data in the event of a natural disaster. Amazon Web Services (AWS) has been in the news for major network outages in April 2011 and June 2012. Summary of the Amazon EC2 and Amazon RDS Service Disruption in the US East Region , AWS message, 29 April 2011, accessed 5 December 2012. Summary of the AWS Service Event in the US East Region , AWS message, 2 July 2012, accessed 5 December 2012. AWS, like other major cloud hosting companies, prepares for typical outages and large-scale natural disasters with backup power as well as backup data centers in other locations. AWS divides the globe into five regions and then splits each region into availability zones. A data center in one availability zone should be backed up by a data center in a different availability zone. Theoretically, a natural disaster would not affect more than one availability zone. AWS is down: Why the sky is falling , justinsb's posterous, 21 April 2011, accessed 5 December 2012. This theory plays out as long as human error is not added to the mix. The June 2012 major storm only disabled the primary data center, but human error disabled the secondary and tertiary backups, affecting companies such as Netflix, Pinterest, Reddit, and Instagram. Amazon Web Services June 2012 Outage Explained , Cloud Computing Today, 18 June 2012, accessed 5 December 2012. Will Natural Disasters Kill the Cloud? , CrashCloud, 21 August 2012, accessed 5 December 2012.
Joseph N. Pelton (2026). 9781931695480, Professional Education International, Inc.. ISBN 9781931695480 TCP tuning and TCP acceleration techniques can mitigate some of these problems. GEO satellites do not cover the Earth's polar regions. HughesNet, Exede, AT&T and Dish Network have GEO systems.
Mobile broadband
Mobile broadband is the marketing term for wireless Internet access delivered through mobile phone towers () to computers, (called "cell phones" in North America and South Africa, and "hand phones" in Asia), and other digital devices using . Some mobile services allow more than one device to be connected to the Internet using a single cellular connection using a process called tethering. The modem may be built into laptop computers, tablets, mobile phones, and other devices, added to some devices using , , and USB sticks or dongles, or separate can be used.
Second generation (2G) from 1991: Speeds in kbit/s
! colspan=2 style="font-weight:normal; border-bottom:solid 1px #888888;" down and up GSM CSD 9.6 kbit/s CDPD up to 19.2 kbit/s GSM GPRS (2.5G) 56 to 115 kbit/s GSM EDGE (2.75G) up to 237 kbit/s Third generation (3G) from 2001: Speeds in Mbit/s
! style="font-weight:normal; border-bottom:solid 1px #888888;" down
! style="font-weight:normal; border-bottom:solid 1px #888888;" up UMTS W-CDMA 0.4 Mbit/s UMTS HSPA 14.4 5.8 UMTS-TDD 16 Mbit/s CDMA2000 1xRTT 0.3 0.15 CDMA2000 EV-DO 2.5–4.9 0.15–1.8 Evolved EDGE 1.6 0.5 Fourth generation (4G) from 2006: Speeds in Mbit/s
! style="font-weight:normal;" down
! style="font-weight:normal;" up HSPA+ 21–672 5.8–168 Mobile WiMAX (802.16) 37–365 17–376 LTE 100–300 50–75 LTE-Advanced: moving at higher speeds 100 Mbit/s not moving or moving at lower speeds up to 1000 Mbit/s MBWA (802.20) 80 Mbit/s
Fixed wireless
Fixed wireless internet connections that do not use a satellite nor are designed to support moving equipment such as smartphones due to the use of, for example, customer premises equipment such as antennas that can't be moved over a significant geographical area without losing the signal from the ISP, unlike smartphones. Microwave wireless broadband or 5G may be used for fixed wireless.
WiMAX
Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) is a set of interoperable implementations of the IEEE 802.16 family of wireless-network standards certified by the WiMAX Forum. It enables "the delivery of last mile wireless broadband access as an alternative to cable and DSL". The original IEEE 802.16 standard, now called "Fixed WiMAX", was published in 2001 and provided 30 to 40 megabit-per-second data rates. Mobility support was added in 2005. A 2011 update provides data rates up to 1 Gbit/s for fixed stations. WiMax offers a metropolitan area network with a signal radius of about 50 km (30 miles), far surpassing the 30-metre (100-foot) wireless range of a conventional Wi-Fi LAN. WiMAX signals also penetrate building walls much more effectively than Wi-Fi. WiMAX is most often used as a fixed wireless standard.
Wireless ISP
Wireless Internet service providers (WISPs) operate independently of mobile phone operators. WISPs typically employ low-cost IEEE 802.11 Wi-Fi radio systems to link up remote locations over great distances (Long-range Wi-Fi), but may use other higher-power radio communications systems as well, such as microwave and WiMAX.
Traditional 802.11a/b/g/n/ac is an unlicensed omnidirectional service designed to span between 100 and 150 m (300 to 500 ft). By focusing the radio signal using a directional antenna (where allowed by regulations), 802.11 can operate reliably over a distance of many km(miles), although the technology's line-of-sight requirements hamper connectivity in areas with hilly or heavily foliated terrain. In addition, compared to hard-wired connectivity, there are security risks (unless robust security protocols are enabled); data rates are usually slower (2 to 50 times slower); and the network can be less stable, due to interference from other wireless devices and networks, weather and line-of-sight problems.
Local Multipoint Distribution Service
Local Multipoint Distribution Service (LMDS) is a broadband wireless access technology that uses microwave signals operating between 26 GHz and 29 GHz. "Local Multipoint Distribution Service (LDMS)" , Vinod Tipparaju, November 23, 1999 Originally designed for digital television transmission (DTV), it is conceived as a fixed wireless, point-to-multipoint technology for utilization in the last mile. Data rates range from 64 kbit/s to 155 Mbit/s. "LMDS: Broadband Out of Thin Air ", Niraj K Gupta, from My Cell, Voice & Data, December 2000 Distance is typically limited to about , but links of up to from the base station are possible in some circumstances., S.S. Riaz Ahamed, International Journal of Engineering Science and Technology, Vol. 1(1), October 2009, pp. 1–7
Hybrid Access Networks
In some regions, notably in rural areas, the length of the copper lines makes it difficult for network operators to provide high-bandwidth services. One alternative is to combine a fixed-access network, typically XDSL, with a wireless network, typically LTE. The Broadband Forum has standardized an architecture for such Hybrid Access Networks.
Non-commercial alternatives for using Internet services
Grassroots wireless networking movements
Deploying multiple adjacent Wi-Fi access points is sometimes used to create city-wide wireless networks. It is usually ordered by the local municipality from commercial WISPs.
Packet radio
Packet radio connects computers or whole networks operated by radio amateurs with the option to access the Internet. Note that as per the regulatory rules outlined in the HAM license, Internet access and email should be strictly related to the activities of hardware amateurs.
Sneakernet
The term, a tongue-in-cheek play on net(work) as in Internet or Ethernet, refers to the wearing of sneakers as the transport mechanism for the data.
Pricing and spending
Internet access is limited by the relation between pricing and available resources to spend. Regarding the latter, it is estimated that 40% of the world's population has less than US$20 per year available to spend on information and communications technology (ICT). In Mexico, the poorest 30% of the society spend an estimated US$35 per year (US$3 per month) and in Brazil, the poorest 22% of the population merely has US$9 per year to spend on ICT (US$0.75 per month). From Latin America, it is known that the borderline between ICT as a necessity good and ICT as a luxury good is roughly around the "magical number" of US$10 per person per month, or US$120 per year. This is the amount of ICT spending people esteem to be a basic necessity. Current Internet access prices exceed the available resources by large in many countries.
Digital divide
Despite its tremendous growth, Internet access is not distributed equally within or between countries. "Internet Users" , Key ICT indicators for the ITU/BDT regions, International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Geneva, 16 November 2011Amir Hatem Ali, A. (2011). "The power of social media in developing nations" , Human Rights Journal, Harvard Law School, Vol. 24, Issue 1 (2011), pp. 185–219 The digital divide refers to "the gap between people with effective access to information and communications technology (ICT), and those with very limited or no access". The gap between people with Internet access and those without is one of many aspects of the digital divide.Wattal, S.; Yili Hong; Mandviwalla, M.; Jain, A., "Technology Diffusion in the Society: Analyzing Digital Divide in the Context of Social Class ", Proceedings of the 44th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (HICSS), pp.1–10, 4–7 January 2011, Whether someone has access to the Internet can depend greatly on financial status, geographical location as well as government policies. "Low-income, rural, and minority populations have received special scrutiny as the technological 'have-nots'."McCollum, S., "Getting Past the 'Digital Divide'" , Teaching Tolerance, No. 39 (Spring 2011), pp. 46–49, and Education Digest, Vol. 77 No. 2 (October 2011), pp. 52–55
Growth in number of users
Access to the Internet grew from an estimated 10 million people in 1993, to almost 40 million in 1995, to 670 million in 2002, and to 2.7 billion in 2013. "ITC Facts and Figures 2013" , Brahima Sanou, Telecommunication Development Bureau, International Telecommunication Union (ITU), Geneva, February 2013. Retrieved 23 May 2015. With market saturation, growth in the number of Internet users is slowing in industrialized countries, but continues in Asia, "The lives of Asian youth" , Change Agent, August 2005 Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, and the Middle East. Across Africa, an estimated 900 million people are still not connected to the internet; for those who are, connectivity fees remain generally expensive, and bandwidth is severely constrained in many locations. The number of mobile customers in Africa, however, is expanding faster than everywhere else. Mobile financial services also allow for immediate payment of products and services.
Bandwidth divide
Traditionally the divide has been measured in terms of the existing numbers of subscriptions and digital devices ("have and have-not of subscriptions"). Recent studies have measured the digital divide not in terms of technological devices, but in terms of the existing bandwidth per individual (in kbit/s per capita). As shown in the Figure on the side, the digital divide in kbit/s is not monotonically decreasing, but re-opens up with each new innovation. For example, "the massive diffusion of narrow-band Internet and mobile phones during the late 1990s" increased digital inequality, as well as "the initial introduction of broadband DSL and cable modems during 2003–2004 increased levels of inequality". This is because a new kind of connectivity is never introduced instantaneously and uniformly to society as a whole at once, but diffuses slowly through social networks. As shown by the Figure, during the mid-2000s, communication capacity was more unequally distributed than during the late 1980s, when only fixed-line phones existed. The most recent increase in digital equality stems from the massive diffusion of the latest digital innovations (i.e. fixed and mobile broadband infrastructures, e.g. 3G and fiber optics FTTH).SciDevNet (2014) How mobile phones increased the digital divide; As shown in the Figure, Internet access in terms of bandwidth is more unequally distributed in 2014 as it was in the mid-1990s.
Rural access
One of the great challenges for Internet access in general and for broadband access in particular is to provide service to potential customers in areas of low population density, such as to farmers, ranchers, and small towns. In cities where the population density is high, it is easier for a service provider to recover equipment costs, but each rural customer may require expensive equipment to get connected. While 66% of Americans had an Internet connection in 2010, that figure was only 50% in rural areas, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project.
Virgin Media advertised over 100 towns across the United Kingdom "from Cwmbran to Clydebank" that have access to their 100 Mbit/s service.
Access as a civil or human right
The actions, statements, opinions, and recommendations outlined below have led to the suggestion that Internet access itself is or should become a civil or perhaps a human right. "Can the Internet be a Human Right?" , Michael L. Best, Human rights & Human Welfare, Vol. 4 (2004)
Network neutrality
Network neutrality (also net neutrality, Internet neutrality, or net equality) is the principle that Internet service providers and governments should treat all data on the Internet equally, not discriminating or charging differentially by user, content, site, platform, application, type of attached equipment, or mode of communication. Advocates of net neutrality have raised concerns about the ability of broadband providers to use their last mile infrastructure to block Internet applications and content (e.g. websites, services, and protocols), and even to block out competitors.Lessig, L. 1999. Cyberspace’s Architectural Constitution , draft 1.1, Text of lecture given at www9, Amsterdam, Netherlands Opponents claim net neutrality regulations would deter investment into improving broadband infrastructure and try to fix something that isn't broken. "Letter to FCC commissioners and U.S. Senate and Congressional leaders expressing strong opposition to proposals to classify broadband as a 'Title II' service from a wide range of technology companies" , 10 December 2014. Retrieved 23 May 2015. In April 2017, a recent attempt to compromise net neutrality in the United States is being considered by the newly appointed FCC chairman, Ajit Varadaraj Pai. The vote on whether or not to abolish net neutrality was passed on December 14, 2017, and ended in a 3–2 split in favor of abolishing net neutrality.
Natural disasters and access
Natural disasters disrupt internet access in profound ways. This is important—not only for telecommunication companies who own the networks and the businesses who use them, but for emergency crew and displaced citizens as well. The situation is worsened when hospitals or other buildings necessary for disaster response lose their connection. Knowledge gained from studying past internet disruptions by natural disasters could be put to use in planning or recovery. Additionally, because of both natural and man-made disasters, studies in network resiliency are now being conducted to prevent large-scale outages. Measuring the Resilience of the Global Internet Infrastructure System, 2009 3rd Annual IEEE Systems Conference, 156–162.
See also
External links
|
|
