Who Manages the Internet?

The Internet has always been the result of collaborative effort. Although it was initially sponsored by the US Department of Defence, from the outset it has involved experts from many fields and many institutions, who have developed a unique collaborative model to build this most dynamic of systems.

The ultimate answer to the question of who runs the Internet is that there are hundreds, or thousands, or tens of thousands, of organisations involved in provisioning for, and shaping, the Internet. These include commercial companies, universities, statutory bodies, government departments, Internet Service Providers, and many more. But for the purpose of this article, the key points are as follows.

The 'Request For Comment' system.

From the earliest days of the Internet, those involved in devising it had to work out a method for eliciting ideas and input from a range of people who had various ideas about how particular aspects of it should work. So they came up with the Request For Comment system, whereby a particular requirement would be circulated among interested parties for feedback and suggestions.

Over a couple of decades, this evolved into the current format overseen by the Internet Engineering Task Force which maintains the library of Request for Comment documents, known as RFC's, that document Internet standards and systems, going right back to the 7th April 1969. RFCs are a tough read as they assume a high level of computing knowledge, however in becoming familiar with the Internet it is important to know about them. And, of course, they are available online.

Important RFCs

There are thousands of RFC documents by now of which the following simply illustrate some key standards:

The Internet Society, ICANN and the W3C

The IETF is part of the Internet Society, the organisation which oversees - as distinct from 'manages' - the overall development of the Internet. Another important part of this body is the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers which oversees the Domain Name System (DNS), the set of numbers behind every Web server.

Another important group is the W3C consortium, the World Wide Web consortium which was founded by Tim Berners-Lee, who devised the World Wide Web concept while working at CERN in Europe in the early 90's. The W3C consortium focuses on issues specific to the Web, as distinct from the Internet - as the Web is really only one aspect of the Internet, albeit a major one.

There are many more bodies that could be listed as either founders or steering partners in Internet development, but for now, have a look at these two excellent sites which present the story of the Internet in an extremely approachable format (NetComm is not responsible for the content of external sites):

Internet Pioneers

The Living Internet

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