Internet

Mark Zuckerberg sees the Internet as a vital service that should be made available to everyone across the world -- a service that can be as vital as, say, the ability to call for emergency help on a telephone.

In an editorial published Monday in The Wall Street Journal, the Facebook chief outlined his vision for a future of universal Internet access, and the steps he sees to get there. Currently only one-third of the world is connected, he said, with the rest lacking access due to issues like high costs or a lack of infrastructure.

Google plans to spend more than $1 billion to deploy hundreds of low-Earth orbit satellites to provide Internet access to underserved regions of the globe, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Facebook revealed Thursday it has a lab working on using drones, satellites and solar-powered planes to provide web access around the world.

"We've been working on ways to beam Internet to people from the sky," Facebook co-founder and chief Mark Zuckerberg said in a post on the leading social network.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has lent her support to the idea of building out new European data networks to help keep Europeans' email and other data out of the hands of US spies.

In the latest edition of her weekly podcast on Saturday, Merkel said she planned to raise the issue among other topics in a meeting with French President François Hollande this week.

With much trepidation, I must report that there is a pretty good chance that half the visitors to this story will not be human.

According to a recent study by Incapsula, more than 61 percent of all Web traffic is now generated by bots, a 21 percent increase over 2012.

Ever get the feeling all those smart devices you own are talking about you behind your back? There was a time when you'd be considered paranoid if not wholly delusional. Now you're just part of the so-called Internet of things.

Like it or not, the IoT is already here. You can either get on the IoT bus, or you can have the bus update its Facebook status talking about what a Luddite you are after it runs you over. Tomorrow, the FTC is holding a workshop to discuss the Internet of things featuring Google's Vint Cerf as the keynote speaker. There's a lot to discuss.

The leaders who run the internet’s technical global infrastructure say the time has come to end U.S. dominance over it.

In response to leaks by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, Fadi Chehadé, who heads the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, and others have called for “an environment, in which all stakeholders, including all governments, participate on equal footing.”

Imagine a future where your car's not just connected to the road between the tire rubber and tarmac. It's connected to the internet and not only sending a steady stream of data but also receiving signals to speed up or slow down based on the traffic. This futuristic future is already here.

Syria is experiencing an Internet outage similar to a two-day blackout late last fall, according to companies that monitor online traffic around the world.

Jim Cowie, the chief technology officer at Renesys, said his firm saw Syria's networks go offline abruptly at 6:25 p.m. UTC (2:25 p.m. EDT) on Tuesday.

Have you ever stopped to ponder what life would be like in 2013 without the internet? I know, I know — the mere thought of such a thing is akin to thinking about your dog being eaten alive by an alligator before your very eyes, but seriously, think about it.