Internet Addressing and Architecture

The Internet is based on the TCP/IP networking protocol suite described ear­lier in this chapter. Every device connected to the Internet (or another TCP/IP network) is assigned a unique Internet Protocol (IP) address consisting of a string of numbers.

When a user sends a message to another user on the Internet or another TCP/IP network, the message is first decomposed into packets. Each packet contains its destination address. The packets are then sent from the client to the network server and from there on to as many other servers as necessary to arrive at a specific computer with a known address. At the destination address, the packets are reassembled into the original message.

1. The Domain Name System

Because it would be incredibly difficult for Internet users to remember long strings of numbers, an IP address can be represented by a natural language con­vention called a domain name. The Domain Name System (DNS) converts domain names to IP addresses. DNS servers maintain a database containing IP addresses mapped to their corresponding domain names. To access a computer on the Internet, users need only specify its domain name, such as Expedia.com, DNS has a hierarchical structure (see Figure 7.6). At the top of the DNS hi­erarchy is the root domain. The child domain of the root is called a top-level domain, and the child domain of a top-level domain is called a second-level domain. Top-level domains are two- and three-character names you are famil­iar with from surfing the web; for example, .com, .edu, .gov, and the various country codes such as .ca for Canada or .it for Italy. Second-level domains have two parts, designating a top-level name and a second-level name-such as buy.com, nyu.edu, or amazon.ca. A host name at the bottom of the hi­erarchy designates a specific computer on either the Internet or a private network.

The following list shows the most common domain extensions currently available and officially approved. Countries also have domain names such as .uk, .au, and .fr (United Kingdom, Australia, and France, respectively), and there is a new class of internationalized top-level domains that use non-English characters. In the future, this list will expand to include many more types of organizations and industries as follows:

.com Commercial organizations/businesses

.edu Educational institutions

.gov U.S. government agencies

.mil U.S. military

.net Network computers

.org Any type of organization

.biz Business firms

.info Information providers

2. Internet Architecture and Governance

Internet data traffic is carried over transcontinental high-speed backbone networks that generally operate in the range of 155 Mbps to 2.5 Gbps (see Figure 7.7). These trunk lines are typically owned by long-distance telephone companies (called network service providers) or by national governments. Local connection lines are owned by regional telephone and cable television com­panies in the United States and in other countries that connect retail users in homes and businesses to the Internet. The regional networks lease access to ISPs, private companies, and government institutions.

Each organization pays for its own networks and its own local Internet con­nection services, a part of which is paid to the long-distance trunk line owners. Individual Internet users pay ISPs for using their service, and they generally pay a flat subscription fee, no matter how much or how little they use the Internet. A debate is now raging on whether this arrangement should continue or whether heavy Internet users who download large video and music files should pay more for the bandwidth they consume. The Interactive Session on Organizations explores this topic by examining the pros and cons of net neutrality.

No one owns the Internet, and it has no formal management. However, worldwide Internet policies are established by a number of professional organizations and government bodies, including the Internet Architecture Board (IAB), which helps define the overall structure of the Internet; the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which manages the domain name system; and the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), which sets Hypertext Markup Language and other programming standards for the web.

These organizations influence government agencies, network owners, ISPs, and software developers with the goal of keeping the Internet operating as effi­ciently as possible. The Internet must also conform to the laws of the sovereign nation-states in which it operates as well as to the technical infrastructures that exist within the nation-states. Although in the early years of the Internet and the web there was very little legislative or executive interference, this situation is changing as the Internet plays a growing role in the distribution of informa­tion and knowledge, including content that some find objectionable.

3. The Future Internet: IPv6 and Internet2

The Internet was not originally designed to handle billions of users and the transmission of massive quantities of data. Because of sheer Internet popula­tion growth, the world is about to run out of available IP addresses using the old addressing convention. The old system based on 32-bit addresses is being replaced by a new version of IP addressing called IPv6 (Internet Protocol ver­sion 6), which contains 128-bit addresses (2 to the power of 128), or more than a quadrillion possible unique addresses. IPv6 is compatible with most modems and routers sold today, and IPv6 will fall back to the old addressing system if IPv6 is not available on local networks. The transition to IPv6 will take several years as systems replace older equipment.

Internet2 is an advanced networking consortium representing more than 500 U.S. universities, private businesses, and government agencies working with 94,000 institutions across the United States and international network­ing partners from more than 100 countries. To connect these communities, Internet2 developed a high-capacity, 100 Gbps network that serves as a test bed for leading-edge technologies that may eventually migrate to the public Internet, including large-scale network performance measurement and man­agement tools, secure identity and access management tools, and capabilities such as scheduling high-bandwidth, high-performance circuits.

Source: Laudon Kenneth C., Laudon Jane Price (2020), Management Information Systems: Managing the Digital Firm, Pearson; 16^th edition.