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Current network use is dominated by content distribution and retrieval yet current networking protocols are designed for conversations between hosts. Accessing content and services requires mapping from the what that users care about to the network's where. We present Content-Centric Networking (CCN) which uses content chunks as a primitive---decoupling location from identity, security and access, and retrieving chunks of content by name. Using new approaches to routing named content, derived from IP, CCN simultaneously achieves scalability, security, and performance. We describe our implementation of the architecture's basic features and demonstrate its performance and resilience with secure file downloads and VoIP calls. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Internet can bring down physical barriers to commerce, almost immediately giving even the smallest business access to untapped markets around the world. By the same token, consumers can conduct business and make purchases from organizations previously unavailable to them. Armed with these goals, individuals have flocked to the Internet, and most businesses have set out to set up storefronts on the Internet and its World Wide Web. Just about every major business in the U.S., perhaps in the world, has a home page on the Internet on which can be found information about their services and products. As the Internet grew, the community expanded, and the existing security framework was found lacking. Over the past few years, people have seen evidence of this fact, in the form of Internet-based attacks on commercial systems. Awareness of these attacks has spawned the use of network security tools, such as firewalls, to protect individual networks from attack. More sophisticated attacks can take advantage of basic flaws in the Internet's infrastructure. INSET: Basic Flaws in Internet Infrastructure..

Randomized protocols for signing contracts, certified mail, and flipping a coin are presented. The protocols use a 1-out-of-2 oblivious transfer subprotocol which is axiomatically defined. The l-out-of-2 oblivious transfer allows one party to transfer exactly one secret, out of two recognizable secrets to his counterpart. The first (second) secret is received with probability one half while the sender is ignorant of which secret has been received. An implementation of the 1-out-of-2 oblivious transfer, using any public key cryptosystem, is presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The distribution of keys in a computer network using single key or public key encryption is discussed. We consider the possibility that communication keys may be compromised, and show that key distribution protocols with timestamps prevent replays of compromised keys. The timestamps have the additional benefit of replacing a two-step handshake. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author focuses on the Code Red worm, a computer virus which has traveled the Internet and has caused considerable consternation among users of Internet Information Server of Microsoft Corp. These worms work their way through self generated lists of Internet protocol addresses and contact each address's port 80, the standard Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP) port. The problem is created by the companies embedding network servers into products without making them sufficiently robust. The rise of HTTP as a communications common denominator comes from ease of use, fix programmer and customer alike. HTTP traffic is usually allowed through firewalls and other network traffic barriers. Numerous non-HTTP protocols are tunneled via HTTP in order to ease their passage. Given the ease of implementation and small code size of a lightweight web server, it is disturbing that such software is not engineered with greater care. HTTP is easy to implement, easy to use and easy to co-opt. With some diligence and forethought, it is also easy to secure.

The article presents information about the Internet sabotage. A new type of Internet sabotage is spreading and has now occurred at more than a dozen Web sites around the U.S. Attacks which tie up network computers so that other users cannot gain access have created nuisance. Hackers bombard an Internet server with more than 100 requests per second for service, each coming from a randomly generated false address while shutting out legitimate users. The Computer Emergency Response Team formed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency conducts research for improving computing security and drafted an advisory detailing the nature of the attack and its impact on the Internet community. Security officials are concerned because this type of hacking exploits the basic scheme of the Internet, software protocols, routing instructions, on which the Internet has based and they were not designed to prevent message flooding.