IXP
IXP means Internet Exchange Point. It is also known as a Network Access Point or NAP. An IXP is a physical point where different ISPs meet to exchange their data and hence different networks are connected together to form the Internet. IXPs are perhaps the most important part of the Internet, as without them the concept of global wide area networking would not be possible.[1]
History edit
The first IXPs established were as Metropolitan Area Ethernet in Washington D.C., Commercial Internet Exchange in Palo Alto, Federal Internet Exchange in San Jose and Hong Kong Internet Exchange at Chinese University of Hong Kong.[2]
There are 91 countries with 1 or more IXPs. However 106 countries of the world depend on others for data transfer and need to develop their own IXPs.[3] You can see the list of all the IXPs present in the world here.
Benefits edit
Their are three major advantages IXPs provide to the region:
- Cost
- Latency
- Speed
An IXP reduces the ISP's cost of data interchange to a great extent. If a region has its own IXP, the ISPs connecting to it do not have to pay anything. However if IXPs are not present ISPs would have to pay third party networks to do the same job.[4]
Due to the presence of an IXP, the network paths are increased therefore increasing the routing efficiency. It becomes easy for ISPs to connect to other ISPs across the border.[5]
Further the speed of data transfer through an IXP is much more because of the greater bandwidth. Absence of IXPs in under developed regions creates a poor network and quality of data transfer is not so good.[6]