Internet in the United Kingdom | Wikipedia audio article
The United Kingdom has been involved with
the Internet since it was created. The telecommunications infrastructure provides
Internet access to businesses and home users in various forms, including cable, DSL, and
wireless. The Internet country code top-level domain
(ccTLD) for the United Kingdom is .uk and is sponsored by Nominet. == History == The UK has been involved in research and development
of packet switching, wide area networks, and Internet protocols since their origins. The development of these technologies was
international from the beginning, although much of the research and development that
led to the Internet was driven and funded by the United States. === Early years of the Internet ===
Beginning in the mid-1960s, Donald Davies and his team at the National Physical Laboratory
pioneered packet switching, now the dominant basis for data communications in computer
networks worldwide.
They developed and implemented the concept
in a local area network, the NPL network, which operated from 1969 to 1986, and carried
out work to analyze and simulate the performance of packet switching networks. Their research and practice were adopted by
the ARPANET in the United States, the forerunner of the Internet, and influenced other researchers
in the UK and Europe. Peter T. Kirstein’s research group at University College London was one
of the first international connections on the ARPANET in 1973, alongside Norwegian Seismic
Array (NORSAR) and Sweden’s Tanum Earth Station. Kirstein co-authored (with Vint Cerf) one
of the most significant early technical papers on the internetworking concept. His research group at UCL adopted TCP/IP in
1982, a year ahead of ARPANET, and played a significant role in the very earliest experimental
Internet work. Kirstein’s group included Sylvia Wilbur who
programmed the computer used as the local node for the network. Post Office Telecommunications developed the
first public packet switching network EPSS in 1977 based on protocols defined by the
UK academic community in 1975.
It was replaced with the Packet Switch Stream
in 1980.Several local and research networks in the 1970s served the Science and Engineering
Research Council community became SRCnet, later called SERCnet. In the early 1980s, a standardization and interconnection
effort started based on X.25 protocols. This became JANET in 1984, the UK’s high-speed
academic and research network that linked all universities, higher education establishments,
and publicly funded research laboratories. In 1991, JANET adopted Internet Protocol on
the existing network. === World Wide Web === In 1989, Tim Berners-Lee, working at CERN
in Switzerland, wrote a proposal for what would become the World Wide Web (WWW). The following year, he specified HTML, the
hypertext language, and HTTP, the protocol. Virtual networking services between the UK and the
The U.S. was being developed in late 1990.BT (British Telecommunications plc) began using
the WWW in 1991 during a collaborative project called the Oracle Alliance Program.
It was founded in 1990 by Oracle Corporation,
based in Redwood Shores CA USA, to provide information for its corporate partners and
about those partners. BT became involved in May 1991. File sharing was required as part of the Program
and, initially, mailed floppy disks were used. Then in July 1991, access to the Internet was
implemented by the BT network engineer Clive Salmon using the BT packet switching network. A link was established from Ipswich to London
for access to the Internet backbone. Access to the Internet for the project leader,
Richard Moulding of BT was established in July 1991 and the first file transfers made
via a NeXT-based WWW interface were completed in October 1991. An early attempt to provide
access to the Web on television was developed in 1995.
=== Dial-up ===
Dial-up Internet access was first introduced in the UK by Pipex in March 1992, having been
established during 1991 as the UK’s first commercial Internet provider, and by November
1993 provided Internet service to some 150 customer sites. One of its first customers was Demon Internet
which popularised dial-up modem-based internet access in the UK. This narrowband service has been almost entirely
replaced by the new broadband technologies and is generally only used as a backup. == Broadband == Broadband Internet access in the UK was, initially,
provided by a large number of regional cable television and telephone companies which gradually
merged into larger groups. The development of digital subscriber line
(DSL) technology has allowed broadband to be delivered via traditional copper telephone
cables.
Also, Wireless Broadband is now available
in some areas. These three technologies (cable, DSL, and wireless)
now compete with each other. More than half of UK homes had broadband in 2007, with an
average connection speed of 4.6 Mbit/s. Bundled communications deals mixing broadband,
digital TV, mobile phone, and landline phone access were adopted by forty percent of UK
households in the same year, up by a third over the previous year. This high level of service is considered the
main driver for the recent growth in online advertising and retail. In 2006 the UK market
was dominated by six companies, with the top two taking 51%, these being Virgin Media with
a 28% share, and BT at 23%. As of July 2011, BT’s share had grown by six percent and the
company became the broadband market leader. The UK broadband market is overseen by the government
watchdog Ofcom. According to Ofcom’s 2007 report the average
UK citizen uses the Internet for 36 minutes every day. The Ofcom Communications Market
2018 report provided updated UK broadband usage statistics. A standout statistic from the 2012 Ofcom report
compared with the 2018 Ofcom report is that the 2012 report showed just 5% of adults had
access to and used a Smart TV, this increased to 42% by 2018 exemplifying the extra bandwidth
required by broadband providers on their networks.
=== Cable ===
Cable broadband uses coaxial cables or optical fiber cables. The main cable service provider in the UK
is Virgin Media and the current maximum speed available to their customers is 350Mbit/s
(subject to change). === Digital subscriber line (DSL) ===
Asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) was introduced to the UK in trial stages in
1998 and a commercial product was launched in 2000. In the United Kingdom, most exchanges, local
loops, and backhauls are owned and managed by BT Wholesale, who then wholesale connectivity
via Internet service providers, who generally provide the connectivity to the Internet,
support, billing, and value-added services (such as web hosting and email). As of October 2012, BT operates 5630 exchanges
across the UK with the vast majority being enabled for ADSL.
Only a relative handful have not been upgraded
to support ADSL products – it is under 100 of the smallest and most rural exchanges. Some exchanges, numbering under 1000, have
been upgraded to support SDSL products. However, these exchanges are often the larger
exchanges based in major towns and cities so they still cover a large proportion of
the population. SDSL products are aimed more at business customers
and are priced higher than ADSL services. ==== Unbundled local loop ==== Many companies are now operating their
services using local loop unbundling. Initially, Bulldog Communications in the London
area and Easynet (through their sister consumer provider UK Online) enabled exchanges across
the country from London to Central Scotland. In November 2010, having purchased Easynet
in the preceding months, Sky closed the business-centric UK Online with little more than a month’s
notice. Although Easynet continued to offer business-grade
broadband connectivity products, UKO customers could not migrate to an equivalent Easynet
service, only being offered either a MAC to migrate provider or the option of becoming
a customer of the residential-only Sky Broadband ISP with an introductory discounted period.
Also, some previously available service features
like fast path (useful for time-critical protocols like SIP) were not made available on Sky Broadband,
leaving business users with a difficult choice particularly where UK Online was the only
LLU provider. Since then, Sky Broadband has become a significant
player in the quad-play telecoms market, offering ADSL line rental and call packages to customers
(who have to pay a supplement if they are not also Sky television subscribers).
Whilst Virgin Media is the nearest direct
competitor, their quad-play product is available to fewer homes given the fixed nature of their
cable infrastructure. TalkTalk is the next DSL-based ISP with a
mature quad-play product portfolio (EE’s being the merger of the Orange and T-Mobile service
providers, and focusing their promotion on forthcoming fiber broadband and 4G LTE products). Market consolidation and expansion have permitted
service providers to offer faster and less expensive services with typical speeds of
up to 24 Mbit/s downstream (subject to ISP and line length). They can offer products at sometimes considerably
lower prices, due to not necessarily having to conform to the same regulatory requirements
as BT Wholesale: for example, 8 unbundled LLU pairs can deliver 10 Mbit/s over 3775
m for half the price of a similar fiber connection. In 2005, another company, Be, started offering
speeds of up to 24 Mbit/s downstream and 2.5 Mbit/sec upstream using ADSL2+ with Annex
M, eventually from over 1,250 UK exchanges. We were taken over by O2’s parent company
Telefónica in 2007. On 1 March 2013 O2 Telefónica sold Be to
Sky has now migrated O2 and Be customers onto the somewhat slower Sky network.
Exchanges continue to be upgraded, the subject
to demand, across the country, although at a somewhat slower pace since BT’s commencement
of FTTC rollout plans and near-saturation in key geographical areas. ==== IPStream ====
Up until the launch of “Max” services, the only ADSL packages available via BT Wholesale
were known as IPStream Home 250, Home 500, Home 1000, and Home 2000 (contention ratio
of 50:1); and Office 500, Office 1000, and Office 2000 (contention ratio of 20:1). The number in the product name indicates the
downstream data rate in kilobits per second. The upstream data rate is up to 250 kbit/s
for all products. For BT Wholesale ADSL products, users initially had to live within 3.5 kilometers
of the local telephone exchange to receive ADSL, but this limit was increased thanks
to a rate-adaptive digital subscriber line (RADSL), although users with RADSL possibly had a reduced
upstream rate, depending on the quality of their line. There are still areas that cannot receive
ADSL because of technical limitations, not least of which networks in housing areas built
with aluminum cable rather than copper in the 1980s and 1990s, and areas served by optical
fiber (TPON), though these are slowly being serviced with copper.
In September 2004, BT Wholesale removed the
line-length/loss limits for 500 kbit/s ADSL, instead employing a tactic of “suck it and
see” — enabling the line, then seeing if ADSL would work on it. This sometimes includes the installation of
a filtered faceplate on the customer’s master socket, to eliminate poor-quality telephone
extension cables inside the customer’s premises which can be a source of high frequency noise.
In the past, the majority of home users used
packages with 500 kbit/s (downstream) and 250 kbit/s (upstream) with a 50:1 contention
ratio. However, BT Wholesale introduced the option
of a new charging structure to ISPs which means that the wholesale service cost was
the same regardless of the ADSL data rate, with charges instead being based on the amount
of data transferred. Nowadays, most home users use a package whose
data rate is only limited by the technical limitations of their telephone line. Initially, this was 2 Mbit/s downstream. Until the advent of widespread FTTC, most
home products were first ADSL Max-based (up to 7.15 Mbit/s), using ADSL G.992.1 and then
later ADSL2+ (up to 21 Mbit/s).
==== Max and Max Premium ====
Following successful trials, BT announced the availability of higher-speed services
known as BT ADSL Max and BT ADSL Max Premium in March 2006. BT made the “Max” product available to more
than 5300 exchanges, serving around 99% of UK households and businesses. Both Max services offered downstream data
rates of up to 7.15 Mbit/s. Upstream data rates were up to 400 kbit/s
for the standard product and up to 750 kbit/s for the premium product.
(Whilst the maximum downstream data rate for
IPStream Max is often touted as 8 Mbit/s, this is misleading because, in a departure
from previous practice, it refers to the gross ATM data rate. The maximum data rate available at the IP
level is 7.15 Mbit/s; the maximum TCP payload rate – the rate one would see for
file transfer – would be about 7.0 Mbit/s.) The actual downstream data rate achieved on
any given Max line is subject to the capabilities of the line. Depending on the stable ADSL synchronization
rate negotiated, BT’s ‘20CN’ system applied a fixed rate limit from one of the following
data rates: 160 kbit/s, 250, 500, 750 kbit/s, 1.0 Mbit/s, 1.25, 1.5, 1.75, 2.0 Mbit/s, then
in 500 kbit/s steps up to 7.0 Mbit/s, then a final maximum rate of 7.15 Mbit/s.
==== Speeds ====
On 13 August 2004, the ISP Wanadoo (formerly Freeserve and now EE in the UK) was told by
the Advertising Standards Authority to change the way that they advertised their 512 kbit/s
broadband service in Britain, removing the words “full speed” which rival companies claimed
was misleading people into thinking it was the fastest available service. In a similar way, on 9 April 2003 the Advertising
Standards Authority ruled against ISP NTL, saying that NTL’s 128 kbit/s cable modem service
must not be marketed as “broadband”. Ofcom reported in June 2005 that there were
more broadband than dial-up connections for the first time in history. In the third quarter
of 2005 with the merger of NTL and Telewest, a new alliance was formed to create the largest
market share of broadband users. This alliance brought about huge increases
in bandwidth allocations for cable customers (minimum speed increasing from the industry
norm of 512 kbit/s to 2 Mbit/s home lines with both companies planning to have all domestic
customers upgraded to at least 4 Mbit/s downstream and ranging up to 10 Mbit/s and beyond by
mid-2006.) along with the supply of integrated services
such as Digital TV and Phone packages.
March 2006 saw the nationwide launch of BT
Wholesale’s up to “8 Mbit/s” ADSL services, known as ADSL Max. “Max”-based packages are available to
end users on any broadband-enabled BT exchange in the UK. Since 2003, BT has been introducing SDSL to
exchanges in many of the major cities. Services are currently offered at upload/download
speeds of 256 kbit/s, 512 kbit/s, 1 Mbit/s or 2 Mbit/s. Unlike ADSL, which is typically 256 kbit/s
upload, SDSL upload speeds are the same as the download speed. BT usually provides a new copper pair for SDSL
installs, which can be used only for the SDSL connection. At a few hundred pounds a quarter, SDSL is
significantly more expensive than ADSL but is significantly cheaper than a leased line. SDSL is marketed to businesses and offers
low contention ratios, and in some cases, a service level agreement. At present, the BT Wholesale SDSL enablement
program has stalled, most probably due to a lack of uptake. Still in the year 2015, it
was common in highly developed areas like the London Aldgate region for consumers to
be limited to speeds of up to 8 Mbit/s for ADSL services.
This had a major effect on the London rental
market as limited broadband service can affect the readiness of prospective tenants to sign
a rental lease. ==== Developments Since 2006 ====
Since 2006, the UK market has changed significantly; companies that previously provided telephone
and television subscriptions also began to offer broadband. TalkTalk offered customers ‘free’ broadband
if they had a telephone package. Orange responded by offering ‘free’ broadband
for some mobile customers. Many smaller ISPs now offer similar packages. O2 also entered the broadband market by taking
over LLU provider Be, while Sky (BSkyB) had already taken over LLU broadband provider
Easynet. In July 2006, Sky announced 2 Mbit/s broadband
to be available free to Sky TV customers and a higher speed connection at a lower price
than most rivals. In 2007 BT announced service trials for ADSL2+. Entanet, BT Wholesale, and BT Retail were chosen
as the three service providers for the first service trial in the West MidlandsIn 2011,
BT began offering 100Mbit/s FTTP broadband in Milton Keynes.
The service in 2014 operated to speeds over 300Mbit/s. Virgin Media stated that 13 million UK homes
are covered by their optical fiber broadband network and that by the end of 2012 would
be able to offer 100Mb broadband. There are currently over 100 towns in the
UK that have access to this service. In October 2011, British operator Hyperoptic launched
a 1Gbit/sec FTTH service in London. In October 2012, British operator Gigler UK launched
a 1Gbit/sec down and 500Mbit/sec up FTTH service in Bournemouth using the CityFibre network. In
contrast to the development in cities, in rural areas certain people even in 2014 still suffered
connection speeds below 256 kbit/s during daytime and only can achieve speeds of more
than 1 Mbit/s during nighttimes. === Wireless broadband ===
The term “wireless broadband” generally refers to the provision of a wireless router with
a broadband connection, although it can also refer to alternative wireless methods of broadband
delivery, such as satellite or radio-based technology.
These alternative delivery models are often
deployed in areas that are physically or commercially unfeasible to reach by traditional fixed methods. === Mobile broadband === Mobile broadband is high-speed Internet access
provided by mobile phone operators using a device that requires a SIM card to access
the service (such as the Huawei E220). A new mobile broadband technology emerging
in the United Kingdom is 4G which hopes to replace the old 3G technology currently in
use and could see download speeds increased to 300Mbit/s. The company EE has the first company
to start developing a full-scale 4G network throughout the United Kingdom. This was later followed by other telecommunications
companies in the UK such as O2 (Telefónica) and Vodafone. == School children’s access to the Internet
== A survey on UK school children’s access to
the Internet commissioned by security company Westcoastcloud in 2011 found:
nearly a third of UK children have a mobile phone,
15% use smartphones regularly, 10% have an iPhone,
5% have an iPad, 16% have access to a laptop computer,
8% have a social networking account, 25% have an e-mail address,
most use their smartphone primarily to make phone calls, but 20% send and receive text
messages, 10% go online, and 5% draft and send email,
50% have no parental controls installed on their internet-connected devices,
5% use their phone or laptop when their parents are out,
50% of parents said they have concerns about the lack of controls installed on their children’s
Internet devices, 68% of parents who bought their children smartphones
said they did so to keep better track of their children,
17% of surveyed parents bought phones after being pestered by their kids, and
most pay around £10 per month on children’s phone bills, although 20% pay £20 or more. The
survey gathered answers from 2,000 British parents of children ages 10 and under.
The survey was used as a marketing tool to
coincide with the release of Westcoastcloud’s new iPad Internet content filtering product. Educational computer networks are maintained
by organizations such as JANET and East Midlands Public Services Network. == Children’s Internet Access ==
According to a 2017 Ofcom report titled ‘Children and Parents: Media Use and Attitudes Report
providing varying age ranges up to age 15 found: Ages of 3-4: 1% own a smartphone
21% own a tablet 96% watch TV on a TV set for around 15hr a
week 41% watch TV on other devices but primarily
on a tablet 40% play games for around 6hr a week
53% go online for around 8hr a week 71% mostly use tablets to go online
48% use YouTube 0% have a social media profile of 5-7: 5% own a smartphone
35% own a tablet 95% watch TV on a TV set for around 13.5hr
a week 49% watch TV on other devices but primarily
on a tablet 66% play games for around 7.5hr a week
79% go online for around 9hr a week 63% mostly use a tablet to go online
71% use YouTube 3% have social media profiles of 8-11: 39% own a smartphone
52% own a tablet 95% watch TV on a TV set for around 14hr a
week 55% watch TV on other devices but primarily
on a tablet 81% play games for around 10hr a week
94% go online for around 13.5hr a week 46% mostly use a tablet to go online, 22%
use a mobile 81% use YouTube
23% have a social media profiles of 12-15: 83% own a smartphone
55% own a tablet 91% watch TV on a TV set for around 14.5hr
a week 68% watch TV on other devices but primarily
on a tablet 77% play games for around 12hr a week
99% go online for around 21hr a week 49% mostly use a tablet to go online, 26%
use a mobile 90% use YouTube
74% have a social media profile === Call for better oversight ===
In June 2018 Tom Winsor, Her Majesty’s chief inspector of constabulary, said technologies
like encryption should be breakable if law enforcers have a warrant.
Winsor said the public was running out of
patience with organizations like Facebook, Telegram, and WhatsApp. Winsor said, “There is a handful of very
large companies with a highly dominant influence over how the internet is used. In too many respects, their record is poor
and their reputation tarnished. The steps they take to make sure their services
cannot be abused by terrorists, pedophiles, and organized criminals are inadequate; the
commitment they show and their willingness to be held to account is questionable.” ==
See also == Digital Britain
Internet censorship in the United Kingdom Illegal file sharing in the United Kingdom
Media in the United Kingdom Internet rush hour.
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