Interplanetary Internet

Cyber and real terrorists who have thought of creating global havoc by destroying the Web's major hardware infrastructure may have to build a spaceship first before they can execute their plan:

Net reaches out to final frontier

A programme to kick-start the use of internet communications in space has been announced by the US government.

The Department of Defense's Iris project will put an internet router in space by the start of 2009.

Launching Iris could also signal the beginning of the development of the internet in space.
It will allow voice, video and data communications for US troops using standards developed for the internet.

Eventually Iris could extend the net into space, allowing data to flow directly between satellites, rather than sending it via ground stations.

"Iris is to the future of satellite-based communications what Arpanet was to the creation of the internet in the 1960s," said Don Brown, of Intelsat General, one of the companies who will build the platform.

...At the moment most satellites have to communicate with one another through ground stations or via radio signals to a relay satellite.

Deploying routers on satellites would allow them to communicate directly with one another using common internet standards, known as internet protocol (IP).

"The Iris architecture allows direct IP routing over satellite, eliminating the need for routing via a ground-based teleport," said Mr Brown.

It also raises the possibility of routinely transferring data through the satellite network, rather than ground based cables.

"This is a logical extension of radio communication between satellites," said Paul Stephens of DMC international imaging, a subsidiary of Surrey Satellites in the UK.

Along with Cisco and US space agency Nasa, it put one of the first routers in space onboard the UK-DMC satellite, part of the Disaster Monitoring Constellation (DMC) used for observing the Earth for major disasters.

The DMC router uses the latest IP networking standards to send critical images to ground stations for use by rescue workers.

With IP becoming more prevalent for use in space, Nasa and internet pioneer Vint Cerf have also investigated the possibility of using internet technology across the solar system.

Although some work has been carried out on the necessary standards and protocols, no definite schedule has been announced for this interplanetary internet.

Apparently, this is part of an idea of "one of the founding fathers of the Internet", Vint Cerf, to build an Interplanetary Internet.