The Internet and Beyond

This book gives a comprehensive coverage of Internet technologies. It provides both an extensive and contemporary review of developments in the field and also gives details of current research. Consideration is given to the likely impact upon communications, business, entertainment and education. Areas covered include: developments in the network protocols on which the Internet is based; the evolving capability of the Internet to carry audio and video traffic and the developments in security and payment technologies which are opening up a wide range of commercial electronic applications. §As the importance of the Internet continues to increase, this book will be of interest to most businesses. Several case studies of on-line services are are included. §This book will prove useful not only to reesearchers in the communications and computing sectors working directly in the development of the technology, but also to people working in banking and finance. Business users of the Internet will also find this book to be invaluable in the development of such applications as Internet trading and corporate Intranets.