Internet traffic

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Internet traffic is the flow of data across the Internet.

Because of the distributed nature of the Internet, there is no single point of measurement for total Internet traffic. Internet traffic data from public peering points can give an indication of Internet volume and growth, but these figures exclude traffic that remains within a single service provider's network as well as traffic that crosses private peering points.

Global Internet traffic

Aggregating from multiple sources and applying usage and bitrate assumptions, Cisco Systems, a major network systems company, has published the following historical Internet Protocol (IP) and Internet traffic figures:[1]

Global Internet traffic by year
 
Year		 IP Traffic
(PB/month)		 Fixed Internet Traffic
(PB/month)		 Mobile Internet Traffic
(PB/month)
1990 0.001 0.001
1991 0.002 0.002 n/a
1992 0.005 0.004 n/a
1993 0.01   0.01   n/a
1994 0.02   0.02   n/a
1995 0.18   0.17   n/a
1996 1.9     1.8     n/a
1997 5.4     5.0     n/a
1998 12       11       n/a
1999 28       26       n/a
2000 84       75       n/a
2001 197       175       n/a
2002 405       356       n/a
2003 784       681       n/a
2004 1,477       1,267       n/a
2005 2,426       2,055       0.9   
2006 3,992       3,339       4      
2007 6,430       5,219       15      
2008 9,927       7,639       38      
2009 14,414       10,676       92      
2010 20,197       14,929       256      
2011 27,483       20,634       597      
2012 - 31,338       885      

"Fixed Internet Traffic" refers perhaps to traffic from residential and commercial subscribers to ISPs, cable companies, and other service providers.
"Mobile Internet Traffic" refers perhaps to backhaul traffic from cellphone towers and providers.
The overall "Internet Traffic" figures, which can be 30% higher than the sum of the other two, perhaps factors in traffic in the core of the national backbone, whereas the other figures seem to be derived principally from the network periphery.

Internet backbone traffic in the United States

The following data for the Internet backbone in the U.S. comes from the Minnesota Internet Traffic Studies (MINTS):[2]

U.S. Internet backbone traffic by year
Year Data (TB/month)
1990 1
1991 2
1992 4
1993 8
1994 16
1995 n/a
1996 1,500
1997 2,500–4,000
1998 5,000–8,000
1999 10,000–16,000
2000 20,000–35,000
2001 40,000–70,000
2002 80,000–140,000
2003 n/a
2004 n/a
2005 n/a
2006 450,000–800,000
2007 750,000–1,250,000
2008 1,200,000–1,800,000
2009 1,900,000–2,400,000
2010 2,600,000–3,100,000
2011 3,400,000–4,100,000

The Cisco data can be seven times higher than the Minnesota Internet Traffic Studies (MINTS) data not only because the Cisco figures are estimates for the global—not just the domestic US—Internet, but also because Cisco counts "general IP traffic (thus including closed networks that are not truly part of the Internet, but use IP, the Internet Protocol, such as the IPTV services of various telecom firms)".[3] The MINTS estimate of US national backbone traffic for 2004, which may be interpolated as 200 Petabytes/month, is a plausible 3-fold multiple of the traffic of the US's largest backbone carrier, Level(3) Inc., which claims an average traffic level of 60 Petabytes/month.[4]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Visual Networking Index", Cisco Systems
  2. ↑ Minnesota Internet Traffic Studies (MINTS), University of Minnesota
  3. ↑
  4. ↑ 2004 Annual Report, Level(3), April 2005, p.1

Further reading

  • Williamson, Carey (2001). "Internet Traffic Measurement". IEEE Internet Computing 5 (6): 70–74. doi:10.1109/4236.968834. 

External links


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