A backbone network is the part of a hierarchical network that occupies the top level of that hierarchy: it connects to nothing but itself, or nodes at lower levels in the hierarchy.
Backbone networks often exist solely to provide connectivity between other lower-level networks. In the early days of the Internet, a single backbone network existed in the form of first the ARPANET and later the NSFNET. All other networks connected with one another via the Internet backbone, and routing information was conveyed between the backbone and the other networks via the Exterior Gateway Protocol (EGP). The Internet backbone was the central network that linked all the parts of the Internet together. ...
Today, there is no single backbone network for the Internet. Rather, each ISP has its own backbone network, and exchanges traffic with other networks by peering, or by transit agreements. ISP may stand for: Internet service provider. ... Peering is the practice of exchanging Internet traffic between Internet service providers networks. ...
With the decommissioning of the NSFNet Internet backbonenetwork on April 30, 1995, the Internet now consists entirely of the various commercial ISPs and private networks (as well as inter-university networks), as connected at their peering points.
With the advent of the dot-com bust of 2002, a number of major telecommunications carriers were threatened by bankruptcy, and some failed completely: for example, the EBONE network was decomissioned in its entirety.
Backbonenetworks are usually commercial, educational or government owned, such as military networks.
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