International Networking Working Group

The International Networking Working Group (INWG) was a group of prominent computer science researchers in the 1970s who studied and developed standards and protocols for computer networking. Set up in 1972 as an informal group to consider the technical issues involved in connecting different networks, its charter was to develop international standard protocols for internetworking. INWG became a subcommittee of the International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP) two years later. Concepts developed by members of the group contributed to the original "Protocol for Packet Network Intercommunication" proposed by Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn in 1974 and the Transmission Control Protocol and Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) that emerged later. The International Networking Working Group formed in October 1972 at the International Conference on Computer Communication held in Washington D.C. Its purpose was to study and develop "international standard protocols for internetworking". The group was modelled on the ARPANET "Networking Working Group" created by Steve Crocker. Vint Cerf was the first Chair of the INWG. Other active members included Alex McKenzie, Donald Davies, Roger Scantlebury, Louis Pouzin and Hubert Zimmermann. These researchers represented the American ARPANET, the French CYCLADES project, and the British team working on the NPL network and European Informatics Network. In January 1974 Pouzin arranged affiliation with the International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP). INWG became IFIP Working Group 1 under Technical Committee 6 (Data Communication) with the title "International Packet Switching for Computer Sharing" (WG6.1). This standing, although informal, enabled the group to provide technical input on packet networking to CCITT and ISO. In September 1973, Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn (who was not a member of INWG) gave a paper at an INWG meeting at the University of Sussex in England. Their ideas were refined further in long discussions with Davies, Scantlebury, Pouzin and Zimmerman.