All information of this topic (History of Internet) were obtained on the Internet and books. To make it easier to read, all information collected was re-arranged and simplified.

Some Basic Background of Internet

Year 1957

The United States forms the Advanced Research Project Agency (ARPA), a segment within the Department of Defense, to ensure U.S. leadership in science and technology, applicable to the military.

Year 1962

The U.S. Air Force launched a study on how to maintain its command and control over its missiles and bombers, particularly after a nuclear attack.

Forerunner of Internet

Year 1969

ARPA established ARPANET, the forerunner of the Internet.

Actually, ARPNET was designed to allow continued communication if one or more sites were destroyed.

The physical network of ARPANET was linking to four nodes and was wired together via 50 kbps circuit then. The four nodes are :

  1. University of California (at Los Angeles)
  2. Standford Research Institute (at Standford)
  3. University of California (at Santa Barbara)
  4. University of Utah (at Utah)

First E-mail Program

Year 1972

The first e-mail program was developed.

By that time, ARPANET was using the Host-to-Host protocol, called Network Control Protocol (NCP) to transfer data. This only allowed communications between hosts running on the same network.

TCP/IP Protocol Was Developed

Year 1973

TCP/IP was begun to develop. This new protocol allow different computer networks to inter-connect and communicate with each other.

Year 1974

The term “Internet” was first used.

Ethernet Was Developed

Year 1976

Ethernet was developed which allowed coaxial cable to transfer data extremely fast.

Year 1979

Usenet newsgroups had been born.

CSNET and BITNET

Year 1981

CSNET backbone was created. This was a 56 kbps network for institutions, not connected to ARPANET.

BITNET was created. It was used for email and list servs.

TCP/IP Was The Core Internet Protocol.

Year 1983

TCP/IP became the core Internet Protocol. Every machine connected to ARPANET had to use TCP/IP.

Domain Name System (DNS) Was Developed

Year 1984

Domain Name System was created. The DNS translate host names into numerical IP addrresses.

ARPANET was divided into two networks :

  • MILNET, which serve military, and
  • ARPANET, which support research

T1 Lines Was Deployed

Year 1985

The National Science Foundation (NSF) began to deploy the new T1 lines, 1.5 Mbps, in National Science Foundation Network (NSFNET).

Year 1987

BITNET and CSNET merged to form the Corporation for Research and Education Network (CREN).

Year 1988

The deployed of T1 lines on NSFNET backbone was completed. The traffic was increased drastically.

In view of the increased traffic, a Corporation called Advanced Network Systems (ANS) was formed to conduct research for high speed networking. And the concept of T3, 45Mbps line was proposed

ARPANET Was Disbanded

Year 1990

The mission of ARPANET was finished and ARPANET was disbanded. The original 50 kbps line were taken out of service.

World-Wide-Web Was Invented

Year 1991

WWW was invented by Berners Lee and CERN team.

CSNET was discontinued.

NSF established a new network, NREN.

Year 1992

World-Wide-Web was released by CERN.

NSFNET backbone was upgraded to T3.


First Browser Was Released

Year 1993

The first browser, Mosaic, was released.

InterNIC was created by NSF to provide the following Internet Services :

  • Directory and Database Services – by AT & T
  • Registration Services – by Network Solutions Inc.
  • Information Services – by General Atomics/CERFnet

ATM Backbone Was Installed

Year 1994

Many new networks were added to the NSF backbone.

Hundreds of thousands of new hosts were added to the Internet.

ATM (Asynchronous Transmission Mode, 155 Mbps) backbone was installed on NSFNET.

Domain Registration Fee Is Required

Year 1995

Beginning from September, registration of domain name is no longer free, a US$50 annual fee is required, excluding the .edu and .gov domains.

Rapid Growth Of Internet

Year 1996

Many new backbones had been installed by independent ISP, including the MCI, AT & T, Sprint, UUnet, BBN planet, ANS, etc..

WWW browser war between Netscape and Microsoft was very keen. New versions were released almost every three months.

Year 1997

Over one hundred thousand Name Servers was registered in whois database.

Year 1998

From March, Network Solutions (InterNIC) no longer handled geographic domain registration. And the American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN) was established to handle the registration of geographical areas.

On May, Network Solutions registered its 2 millionth domain.

Year 1999

MCI start upgrading the US backbone to 2.5 Gbps.

Future Of the Internet

Year 2000

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Year 2001

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Blog Admin Review:
This article was written in year 1999. Therefore the history of the Internet was only up to 1999. This is clear that the development of Internet during the past 10 years was much faster than any period before.