The Evolution of Internet interconnections

In 1995, the NSF officially shut down the NSFNet backbone, thereby ending the nascent Internets early architecture as a single backbone network. Today, the Internet is a group of loosely interconnected networks run by many diverse companies. These interconnections are in no way controlled by any industry or government agency, and are therefore held together only by the market demands of the Internet community. Although the FCC has traditionally maintained a stance of unregulation of all information and computer networks, they have increasingly show interest in ensuring the rapid deployment of Internet access. In addition, as more and more critical elements of communication are implemented on the Internet, some safeguards ensuring end-to-end connectivity, and therefore on maintaining the interconnection between networks, are needed. This paper discusses the history and evolution of Internet interconnections, compares and contrasts them to traditional telephony interconnections, and explores the possibility of regulation over such connections. This paper covers events up to the end of 1999