United States General Accounting Office _____________________________________________________________________________ GAO Report to Congressional Requesters _____________________________________________________________________________ August 1991 HIGH-PERFORMANCE COMPUTING High-Speed Computer Networks in the United States, Europe, and Japan Note: This report uses the # character to represent a fat line over the top of major headings. The upper ASCII 220 character would draw a better fat line that would be more like the line in the printed report. You can use your word processor to search for 21 #'s and replace them with 21 ASCII 220 characters. If you change the #'s your printer must be able to print the ASCII 220 character. This report represents an effort to make it appear as close to the printed version as ASCII will allow. To obtain a printed copy of this report call call GAO report distribution at 202/275-6241 (7:30 a.m.-5:30 p.m. EST) or write to GAO, P.O. 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Brock, Jr. Director, Government Information and Financial Management Issues Information Management and Technology Division i _____________________________________________________________________________ GAO United States General Accounting Office Washington, D.C. 20548 ______________________________________________________ Information Management and Technology Division B-245190 September 4, 1991 The Honorable Ernest F. Hollings Chairman, Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation United States Senate The Honorable Albert Gore Chairman, Subcommittee on Science, Technology, and Space Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation United States Senate The Honorable George E. Brown, Jr. Chairman, House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology House of Representatives The Honorable Robert S. Walker Ranking Minority Member House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology House of Representatives The Honorable Tim Valentine Chairman, Subcommittee on Technology and Competitiveness House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology House of Representatives The Honorable Tom Lewis Ranking Minority Member Subcommittee on Technology and Competitiveness House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology House of Representatives Page 2 GAO/IMTEC-91-69 High-Speed Networks _____________________________________________________________________________ B-245190 _____________________________________________________________________________ In letters dated October 2, 1990, and March 11, 1991, you requested that we review United States and foreign efforts to develop high-speed computer networks. In response to your requests, this report provides information on United States, European, and Japanese efforts to develop high-speed computer networks. Because high-speed computer networks used for research and education are of primary interest in the United States, the report specifically focuses on these types of applications. In conducting our review, we identified high-speed networks, or in cases where none existed, lower-speed networks that were considered to be important for research and education. We defined high-speed networks as those capable of transmitting data at, or greater than, T1 speeds of 1.544 megabits per second, or E1 speeds of 2.048 megabits per second.#1 European and Japanese networks were identified with the assistance of experts familiar with their use of computer and communications technology.#2 Detailed descriptions of the United States, European, and Japanese networking initiatives we observed are contained in appendixes I, II, and III, respectively. Appendix IV provides additional information on the objectives, scope, and methodology of our review, and appendixes V and VI identify the government entities and other organizations that we contacted in Europe and Japan. #####################________________________________________________________ RESULTS IN BRIEF Currently, the United States leads Europe and Japan in the development of high-speed computer networks for research and education. Efforts to increase data transmission speeds on a major portion of the United States' Internet to 1.544 megabits per second (T1) and 45 megabits per second (T3), and plans to develop a National Research and Education Network (NREN) operating at gigabit speeds,#3 exceed most plans and initiatives occurring in Europe and Japan at this time. Although some questions concerning the development and operation of NREN must still be ______________________________________________________ 1 T1 is the term commonly used for the high- speed digital standard in the United States and other countries such as Japan and Korea. Europe has standardized on E1, which differs from T1 in speed, signalling methods, and number of voice circuits supported. 2 We limited our review to five European countries--France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. 3 A gigabit equals one billion bits. Page 3 GAO/IMTEC-91-69 High-Speed Networks ______________________________________________________________________________ B-245190 ______________________________________________________________________________ answered, federal and academic sponsors of this networking initiative are nonetheless moving aggressively on this effort. Although their networks are generally less developed than those in the United States, Europe and Japan clearly recognize the importance of high-speed networks, and have plans and projects under way to enhance the speed and capability of these networks. Some European participants, in particular, believe the United States' proposed NREN represents the kind of network that is needed in Europe. Presently, however, Europe and Japan face a number of financial, organizational, and other issues, which if not addressed, could prevent the development or expansion of their network infrastructures. European and Japanese officials told us they are working to resolve these issues. If they are successful in these efforts, Europe and Japan may be able to strengthen their positions in advancing research and education through the use of high-speed computer networks. #####################________________________________________________________ BACKGROUND Computer networks enable both local and long distance communication between computers, often over public telephone lines, but also via dedicated switching and transmission systems. Computer networks transmit data at various speeds to meet the needs of many different user communities throughout the world. Traditionally, computer networks transmitted data at relatively low speeds measured primarily in kilobits per second. The early 1980s, however, saw a growing demand for increasingly higher-speed computer networks. Currently, regional and wide-area national networks operate at T1 speeds of 1.544 megabits per second in the United States or E1 speeds of 2.048 megabits per second in some European countries. Local-area networks transmitting data at speeds of between 10 megabits per second and 100 megabits per second also exist. These higher-speed networks have fueled the market for a variety of applications, including electronic mail, distributed data base access, large file transfer, and graphics transmission. Although regional and wide-area networks transmitting data at speeds of between 1 and 2 megabits per second are generally considered sufficient for many network applications, sophisticated advances in computer and communications technologies and increased volumes and complexity of data traffic have contributed to a growing demand for higher-capacity networks that are capable of transmitting data at T3 speeds of 45 megabits per second, and up to a gigabit per second. One sector of society expressing a need for the higher-speed networks is the research and education Page 4 GAO/IMTEC-91-69 High-Speed Networks ______________________________________________________________________________ B-245190 ______________________________________________________________________________ community. Scholars, researchers, executives, and politicians in both the United States and overseas recognize the importance of networking to access unique experimental data, share results and publications, and run models on remote supercomputers. ###################__________________________________________________________ NETWORKING IN THE The United States research and education communities UNITED STATES are served primarily by the Internet, a loosely organized system of interconnected, unclassified computer networks linking over 500,000 computers nationwide and overseas. The United States' portion of the Internet includes government-funded national backbone networks and publicly and privately funded regional networks operating at 1.544 megabits per second (T1), as well as private local-area networks transmitting data at speeds of 10 megabits per second to 100 megabits per second. One of the major backbone networks comprising the United States' portion of the Internet is the National Science Foundation Network (NSFNet).#4 NSFNet links more than 3,000 networks at university and college campuses, business and industrial research laboratories, and governmental research centers throughout the world. Currently, the United States' portion of the Internet is experiencing rapid growth in the number of networks and host computers connected to it, and is unable to satisfy all requirements of the research and education community. Traffic on NSFNet, alone, has increased by more than 25 times in the last 2 years. Approximately 3 million researchers worldwide actively use the academic networks connected to the