Indonesia Internet Exchange
Encyclopedia
1. Short Background of the Indonesian Internet
The Internet in Indonesia, like most countries, was started at university campuses, but unlike the US, without the involvement of the Military. In the beginning ITB (Institut Teknologi Bandung –- Bandung Institute of Technology) and UI (Universitas Indonesia
) were the pioneering institutions. The University of Indonesia was especially active in the development of the Indonesian internet, with IANA appointing the University of Indonesia's Mr. Rahmat M. Samik Ibrahim as the Top Level Domain
for Indonesia with the country code .id
The basic internet service that was first introduced in Indonesia was UUCP
(Unix to Unix Copy Protocol), for exchanging e-mail
with others in Indonesia as well as the global internet. Without military or other government aid, the high cost of international dedicated transmission was not an option for the connection, and therefore International Direct Dialing (IDD) was used for the UUCP link.
a. ISP's in Indonesia
The first Internet Service Provider
(ISP) in Indonesia was Indonet (http://www.indo.net.id), which started operation at Jakarta in 1994 before the government began issuing licenses for ISP operations. Indonet initiated its internet connectivity with a 9600 bit/s modem dialing through IDD to Singapore. Through this connection, TELNET
and IRC
services were available freely to anyone with a modem.
In 1995, the Indonesian government decided to issue internet service licenses through the Department of Post and Telecommunications, seeing the internet as being an industry tightly connected to the telecommunications industry
. Two licenses was then issued, to Indonet and to RadNet (http://www.rad.net.id), thus marking the beginning of commercial internet services in Indonesia. The two ISPs no longer used IDD dial-up modem to connect to the internet, instead using dedicated International connections through Indosat
’s submarine cable to Sprint
(USA) and SingTel
(Singapore). As the costs for these international connections are high, users were now charged for the connection they used, and in return all services were made available including HTTP
and NNTP
.
By early 1996 the government had issued 27 ISP licenses; the ISPs then formed APJII (Asosiasi Penyelenggara Jasa Internet Indonesia –– Indonesian Internet Service Provider Association) and worked closely with the regulators. Internet Connectivity tariffs for end users were issued in May 1996 and still stand today.
Out of the 27 licenses issued, only 15 ISPs were in operation before 1997. Thus there were 15 International connections from Indonesia to the Internet, which were separated one from the other. Each ISP was therefore burdened with ½ the circuit cost to Indosat and ½ the circuit cost to the US.
By the end of 1997 there were 45 licenses issued by the government, with 35 ISPs actively in operation.
b. The Birth of the Indonesian Internet eXchange (IIX)
With 35 active ISPs, the need for interconnectivity between the ISPs in operation began to be seen as a significant issue. Local traffic was going through international channels and several hops before it came back to Indonesia. A solution was needed to cut down international costs and provide faster access to local Indonesian destinations.
Government-initiated programs such as the Nusantara 21 and Telematika were eagerly awaited by the internet industry, but never came into effect; it had been planned that these programs would solve the local bandwidth and connectivity issues for all internet traffic
in Indonesia.
As the need for local connectivity mounted, the ISPs could no longer wait for the government, so in June 1997 APJII formed a task force to develop an exchange for the internet. The task force, consisting of top technicians from each active ISP and Cisco
, then developed the new Indonesian Internet eXchange (IIX –- http://www.iix.net.id), a logistical network that would connect every ISP in Indonesia to a single exchange point. The IIX was officially launched in August 1997.
Without funding from the government, the IIX was promoted by APJII (http://www.apjii.or.id), a non-profit organization
which sought sponsorship from international vendors to build the much-needed internet exchange. Major vendors contributed routers, switches, hubs, servers, and software to APJII for the IIX. These vendors included Cisco, Hewlett Packard
, Bay, Microsoft
, RAD
, and Digital. IP exchange blocks for routing were provided by Bill Manning of isi.edu. The distance from one ISP in Indonesia to another ISP in Indonesia, which was usually more than 12 hops, has now been shortened to only 4 hops.
The Internet in Indonesia, like most countries, was started at university campuses, but unlike the US, without the involvement of the Military. In the beginning ITB (Institut Teknologi Bandung –- Bandung Institute of Technology) and UI (Universitas Indonesia
University of Indonesia
The Universitas Indonesia, is a state, comprehensive world class university located in Depok, West Java and Salemba, Jakarta, Indonesia. Universitas Indonesia is the oldest tertiary-level educational institution in Indonesia...
) were the pioneering institutions. The University of Indonesia was especially active in the development of the Indonesian internet, with IANA appointing the University of Indonesia's Mr. Rahmat M. Samik Ibrahim as the Top Level Domain
Top-level domain
A top-level domain is one of the domains at the highest level in the hierarchical Domain Name System of the Internet. The top-level domain names are installed in the root zone of the name space. For all domains in lower levels, it is the last part of the domain name, that is, the last label of a...
for Indonesia with the country code .id
The basic internet service that was first introduced in Indonesia was UUCP
UUCP
UUCP is an abbreviation for Unix-to-Unix Copy. The term generally refers to a suite of computer programs and protocols allowing remote execution of commands and transfer of files, email and netnews between computers. Specifically, a command named uucp is one of the programs in the suite; it...
(Unix to Unix Copy Protocol), for exchanging e-mail
E-mail
Electronic mail, commonly known as email or e-mail, is a method of exchanging digital messages from an author to one or more recipients. Modern email operates across the Internet or other computer networks. Some early email systems required that the author and the recipient both be online at the...
with others in Indonesia as well as the global internet. Without military or other government aid, the high cost of international dedicated transmission was not an option for the connection, and therefore International Direct Dialing (IDD) was used for the UUCP link.
a. ISP's in Indonesia
The first Internet Service Provider
Internet service provider
An Internet service provider is a company that provides access to the Internet. Access ISPs directly connect customers to the Internet using copper wires, wireless or fiber-optic connections. Hosting ISPs lease server space for smaller businesses and host other people servers...
(ISP) in Indonesia was Indonet (http://www.indo.net.id), which started operation at Jakarta in 1994 before the government began issuing licenses for ISP operations. Indonet initiated its internet connectivity with a 9600 bit/s modem dialing through IDD to Singapore. Through this connection, TELNET
TELNET
Telnet is a network protocol used on the Internet or local area networks to provide a bidirectional interactive text-oriented communications facility using a virtual terminal connection...
and IRC
Internet Relay Chat
Internet Relay Chat is a protocol for real-time Internet text messaging or synchronous conferencing. It is mainly designed for group communication in discussion forums, called channels, but also allows one-to-one communication via private message as well as chat and data transfer, including file...
services were available freely to anyone with a modem.
In 1995, the Indonesian government decided to issue internet service licenses through the Department of Post and Telecommunications, seeing the internet as being an industry tightly connected to the telecommunications industry
Telecommunication
Telecommunication is the transmission of information over significant distances to communicate. In earlier times, telecommunications involved the use of visual signals, such as beacons, smoke signals, semaphore telegraphs, signal flags, and optical heliographs, or audio messages via coded...
. Two licenses was then issued, to Indonet and to RadNet (http://www.rad.net.id), thus marking the beginning of commercial internet services in Indonesia. The two ISPs no longer used IDD dial-up modem to connect to the internet, instead using dedicated International connections through Indosat
Indosat
PT Indosat Tbk., formerly known as PT Indonesian Satellite Corporation Tbk. is a provider of telecommunication services in Indonesia. It is the third largest telecommunication company for mobile services in Indonesia after defeat by XL Axiata...
’s submarine cable to Sprint
Sprint Nextel
Sprint Nextel Corporation is an American telecommunications company based in Overland Park, Kansas. The company owns and operates Sprint, the third largest wireless telecommunications network in the United States, with 53.4 million customers, behind Verizon Wireless and AT&T Mobility...
(USA) and SingTel
Singapore Telecommunications
Singapore Telecommunications Limited , commonly abbreviated as SingTel, is a Singaporean telecommunications company, with a combined mobile subscriber base of 416 million customers from its own operations and regional associates in 25 countries at end of June 2011 increased by 19 percent from a...
(Singapore). As the costs for these international connections are high, users were now charged for the connection they used, and in return all services were made available including HTTP
Hypertext Transfer Protocol
The Hypertext Transfer Protocol is a networking protocol for distributed, collaborative, hypermedia information systems. HTTP is the foundation of data communication for the World Wide Web....
and NNTP
Network News Transfer Protocol
The Network News Transfer Protocol is an Internet application protocol used for transporting Usenet news articles between news servers and for reading and posting articles by end user client applications...
.
By early 1996 the government had issued 27 ISP licenses; the ISPs then formed APJII (Asosiasi Penyelenggara Jasa Internet Indonesia –– Indonesian Internet Service Provider Association) and worked closely with the regulators. Internet Connectivity tariffs for end users were issued in May 1996 and still stand today.
Out of the 27 licenses issued, only 15 ISPs were in operation before 1997. Thus there were 15 International connections from Indonesia to the Internet, which were separated one from the other. Each ISP was therefore burdened with ½ the circuit cost to Indosat and ½ the circuit cost to the US.
By the end of 1997 there were 45 licenses issued by the government, with 35 ISPs actively in operation.
b. The Birth of the Indonesian Internet eXchange (IIX)
With 35 active ISPs, the need for interconnectivity between the ISPs in operation began to be seen as a significant issue. Local traffic was going through international channels and several hops before it came back to Indonesia. A solution was needed to cut down international costs and provide faster access to local Indonesian destinations.
Government-initiated programs such as the Nusantara 21 and Telematika were eagerly awaited by the internet industry, but never came into effect; it had been planned that these programs would solve the local bandwidth and connectivity issues for all internet traffic
Internet traffic
-Historical Internet Traffic Growth:Because of the distributed nature of the Internet, there is no single point of measurement for total Internet traffic...
in Indonesia.
As the need for local connectivity mounted, the ISPs could no longer wait for the government, so in June 1997 APJII formed a task force to develop an exchange for the internet. The task force, consisting of top technicians from each active ISP and Cisco
Cisco Systems
Cisco Systems, Inc. is an American multinational corporation headquartered in San Jose, California, United States, that designs and sells consumer electronics, networking, voice, and communications technology and services. Cisco has more than 70,000 employees and annual revenue of US$...
, then developed the new Indonesian Internet eXchange (IIX –- http://www.iix.net.id), a logistical network that would connect every ISP in Indonesia to a single exchange point. The IIX was officially launched in August 1997.
Without funding from the government, the IIX was promoted by APJII (http://www.apjii.or.id), a non-profit organization
Non-profit organization
Nonprofit organization is neither a legal nor technical definition but generally refers to an organization that uses surplus revenues to achieve its goals, rather than distributing them as profit or dividends...
which sought sponsorship from international vendors to build the much-needed internet exchange. Major vendors contributed routers, switches, hubs, servers, and software to APJII for the IIX. These vendors included Cisco, Hewlett Packard
Hewlett-Packard
Hewlett-Packard Company or HP is an American multinational information technology corporation headquartered in Palo Alto, California, USA that provides products, technologies, softwares, solutions and services to consumers, small- and medium-sized businesses and large enterprises, including...
, Bay, Microsoft
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
, RAD
RAD Data Communications
RAD Data Communications is a privately held corporation, based in Tel Aviv, Israel, that designs and manufacturers specialized networking equipment.RAD Data Communications is a member of the RAD Group of companies.-History:...
, and Digital. IP exchange blocks for routing were provided by Bill Manning of isi.edu. The distance from one ISP in Indonesia to another ISP in Indonesia, which was usually more than 12 hops, has now been shortened to only 4 hops.