NIDA plays central role in Internet development

The state-run National Internet Development Agency has a central role in the designing the framework of policies regarding the public use of the Internet in Korea. Established in 1999, the agency overlooks the management of Internet address resources, while designing policies to effectively cope with the rapidly-changing network environment and participating in various kinds of international activities.

"The National Internet Development Agency will continue to establish its function and role as the center for managing Internet address resources, which can be trusted by the general public and truly responsive to the world community," said National Internet Development Agency President Song Kwan-ho.

"We expect to reinvent ourselves as the representative organization for the Internet by realizing fair and effective management of Internet address resources and providing customer-oriented services. We expect to establish ourselves as the core organization that leads the international Internet community through substantial international activities," he said.

Korea is among the world`s leading countries in Internet penetration. Korea`s Internet penetration rate passed the 70 percent mark at the end of last year, with about 31.6 million people of the country`s 44 million people over the age of six said they access the Internet at least once a month. This accounts for a penetration rate of 70.2 percent.

When applying the standards of the International Telecom Union for penetration rate per population, Korea`s rate is adjusted to 65.2 percent. In a report issued by the ITU in September last year, Korea`s then-Internet penetration rate of 63.3 percent was the second-highest in the world behind Iceland`s 67.5 percent.

The rapid increase in the Internet population is raising concerns over the possible depletion of Internet addresses. The current Internet platform standard, the Internet protocol version 4, is capable of creating 4.3 billion addresses. Industry watchers estimate there are about just 500 to 600 million IPv4 addresses currently available.

With the demand for Internet addresses expected to explode with the introduction of new technologies such as the broadband convergence network (BcN), portable Internet, radio-frequency identification (RFID)-based solutions and home networking services among others, the depletion of IPv4 addresses has become an immediate concern.

To cope with the expected shortage, the National Internet Development Agency has been leading the government`s initiatives of adopting the next-generation Internet platform Internet protocol version 6 (IPv6). IPv6, which uses 128 bit addresses, is capable of providing practically limitless addresses.

Along with the huge address space, IPv6 also offers enhanced features such as streamlined header format, extensibility of protocols and built-in security functions.

In accordance to the ``IPv6 Promotion Master Plan" adopted by the Ministry of Information and Communication last year, the National Internet Development Agency has been committed in designing a deployment plan for IPv6. The agency has currently acquired a total of 31 IPv6 addresses and allocated them to local Internet service providers. This makes Korea the eighth-largest holder of IPv6 addresses in the world and only second to Japan in the Asia-Pacific region.

The agency has also adopted an IPv6 domain name system pilot program that enables a provsion of existing IPv4-based applications such as Web and e-mail services upon the IPv6 format.

The National Internet Development Agency is also developing an integrated code search system for data gathered through radio-frequency identification (RFID)-based networking systems.

RFID describes a method of identifying items using radio waves through an electronic reader communicating with a microchip embedded on objects that hold information.

The technology is designed to improve efficiency in supply chain management and inventory for companies in the manufacturing and retail sectors, while opening new market opportunities for electronic equipment and semiconductor industries.

The National Internet Development Agency introduced in November last year an RFID code search system, dubbed the `multiplex directory system (MDS),` which could reads RFID-based data used in other countries including the United States and Japan. The multiplex directory system is designed to be compatible with the international code standard such as EPC, U-Code and ISO-IC.

The multiplex directory system will be applied to the RFID pilot projects pushed by the government under the national info-tech strategy IT839.

The agency recently signed a memorandum of understanding with government authorities in Japan and China to jointly develop RFID technologies and establish standards to achieve compatibility in codes.

"To foster the RFID industry, we need to develop a standard code that could cover different codes used by other countries," said Song.

(thkim@heraldm.com)



By Kim Tong-hyung