In spite of the economic crisis and continued deterioration of an obsolete telephone infrastructure, Cuban networks have grown substantially since 1992.{footnote 3} Today, there are four networks with international connectivity, CENIAI, Tinored, CIGBnet, and InfoMed:
CENIAI began networking in 1982, and has had a UUCP link to the Internet since 1991. They currently offer email, database access, mail lists, and programming and consulting services, and maintain a presence on a Gopher server located in Uruguay. CENIAI has long wished international IP connectivity and a national backbone, and has a registered class-b IP address. They plan to offer dial-up PPP access in the near future.
Tinored (Tino Network -- Tino, a Cuban cartoon character, is the logo, and "red" means "network") was the established by the Cuban Youth Computer Clubs, an organization with explicit support of Fidel Castro, that operates 150 walk-in computer centers throughout the nation [8]. One hundred of these have Tinored email accounts, and approximately 80 have working (2400 bps) modems. Tinored is also a gateway for Red David, which supports at least 31 NGOs.
CIGBnet is the network of the Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology and affiliated institutions [1]. They have a central site in Havana and three remote sites. CIGBnet began in 1991 and has grown to 900 users. They provide email, database access, a biological sequence server, mailing lists, and Gopher and Web servers (accessible only from the main center). CIGB staff have developed their own mail-based database server, off-line mail package, and sequencing server software, and they are continuing such work.
InfoMed, the network of the National System of Health Information of the Cuban Ministry of Health, has been operating since 1992. They have 500 accounts, 80% of which are shared by more than one person within an organization, and provide email, discussion groups, file retrieval, database search, and consultation. While they currently operate a single node in Havana, they are building a distributed network with 13 servers in Cuban medical schools with support from the Pan American Health Organization and UNESCO.
Table 1 summarizes the four networks with international gateways, and the more important subnetworks they serve.
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Table 1
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It should be stressed that these networks are not comparable to
large university and corporate networks in North America or
Western Europe. The smaller networks are typically time-sharing
systems -- PCs running UNIX -- with accounts for local and remote
individuals and organizations. Larger networks, like CENIAI and
CIGBnet have Ethernet LANs, with Netware file servers and UNIX
application servers. For example, the CIGB central location has
four 486-based servers running Netware and four running UNIX. Local users may have IP connectivity to the servers, but remote users have dial-up shell accounts or make UUCP transfers. Clients are nearly all PCs running DOS or Windows. They have 150 386 and 486-based client systems with 4-8 MB of RAM and 40-120 MB disks. (These are shared by 850 central-office users). Each of their three remote locations has a single PC running DOS, and communicating with the central office via UUCP over X.25 or 2400 bps dial-up. (These machines are shared by 100 remote users).
CENIAI, CIGBNet, and Tinored route their international traffic through Web/NIRV. According to Riff Fullan, Web/NIRV International Cooperation Coordinator, they call CIGBnet six times per day and Tinored twice daily [2]. CENIAI calls Web/NIRV 2-4 times daily, depending on needs. They plan to increase the Tinored call frequency to 6 shortly. Cuban traffic volumes in a typical month are shown in Table 2. InfoMed links through GreenNet, an APC affiliate in the UK. They have not yet responded to my request for traffic figures.
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Table 2
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There is also X.25 connectivity for interactive applications and
the exchange UUCP traffic between networks. In 1992 CENIAI was
Cuba's connection to IASnet, an X.25 network for socialist
countries operated by VNIIPAS (The All Union Scientific Research
Institute for Applied Computerized Systems) in Moscow. VNIIPAS
had multiple links to Western data networks, including a link to
Sprint. The link to IASnet has been discontinued, but there are
three X.25 networks in Cuba today, Cubanet, RENACYT, and the
tourism network.Cubanet is a commercial network serving joint-venture enterprises and some tourism. It was formed by the people who had operated the original IASNet link at CENIAI, and is operated by Intertel, S. A., the international arm of the Cuban phone company, ETECSA, Empresa de Telecomunicaciones de Cuba, S. A.{footnote 4} Cubanet connects through an X.75 backbone to DATAPAC in Canada. The prices are such that it out of reach by the Cuban academic community. A dialup connection to Cubanet costs $32.00 per month plus usage charges of $0.31 per minute plus $0.34 per kilocharacter. These rates are high, but they provide reliable, interactive communication needed for financial transactions, credit card verification, hotel reservations, and so forth.
RENACYT, the National Network of Science and Technology belongs to the Ministry of Sciences, Technology and Environment, as does CENIAI. It is an academic/research network for UUCP exchange and limited interactive access, for example to the CIGBnet Gopher server. InfoMed, Tinored, CENIAI, CNCnet, Biomundi, ICIDnet, all use RENACYT as well as dial-up for UUCP exchange. For example, CIGBnet uses RENACYT for exchanges with CENIAI, InfoMed, and Tinored, and some sub-networks. In return, CIGBnet is their international UUCP gateway. The tourism network also exchanges traffic with RENACYT. RENACYT currently covers Ciudad Santiago de Cuba, Havana, and Matanzas, and they plan to expand to the Camaguey and Las Villas provinces.
The tourism network connects tourist hotels, providing credit card verification and financial transactions and reservation support, but I have been unable to determine details. I assume this connectivity is expensive, and that it could be carried more economically over an IP network if one were available. Furthermore, modern client-server tools such HTTP servers would seem to be more powerful both for marketing and reservations and for secure transaction and credit card processing
For perspective, Table 3 shows traffic figures and user estimates for Caribbean networks, compiled by Daniel Pimienta [6]. These estimates are quite conservative, and are challenged by Hahn [3] who estimates over 2,600 registered Caribbean users {footnote 5}.
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Table 3
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By either estimate, Cuban networks are significant. Without
counting InfoMed, international Cuban traffic is 37.7% of the
rest of the Caribbean. The Cuban active user counts in Table 1
total 3,386, and that table is incomplete. (I would expect
internal Cuban traffic to be much higher than other Caribbean
nations). So, in spite of the current economic blockade and
crisis, Cuba is a major Caribbean networking nation.{footnote 6} Cuba will eventually have IP connectivity, the only questions are when, and how it will be administered. Cuban networking began at CENIAI, and they have consistently worked for international IP connectivity. In February, 1995, they received permission from the Ministry of Science and Technology to establish an IP link for the academic community, and have a proposal pending, but it has not been funded [4, 5]. CENIAI and CIGBnet have both been using IP and IP-based servers internally for some time, and have sent people abroad for training.
More important, Cuba has developed a sizable user community, with networking skills and applications. This has grown out of a long standing commitment to education throughout the society, and major research, development, and therapy programs in biotechnology and medicine. Cuba has the expertise to operate an international IP link, and permission of the government. They are missing funding and a working agreement or plan for cooperation between the various networks, but these will be achieved.
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Footnotes:
Such differences are not idle speculation. Network statistics are similar to census data, telephony statistics of the ITU, or economic statistics, and they are used to set policy and allocate resources. Of course they are not the entire picture, and we also need studies of the actual impact of networks are having on the intellectual and economic life of nations.
Table 1: Four International Networks and Selected Sub-Nets
1. CIGBnet (950)
UOnet: Oriente University Network
COMUH: University of Havana network
ICID (280): Institute for Digital Research
RENACYT: ICIMAF/CIDET Center for Research on Telematics
CNCNet (250): Network of the National Neurosciences Center
CRC: Center for Clinical Research
IMRE: Reagents and Materials for Electronics Institute
Binanet: The network of the National Library
2. CENIAI (732)
ISPJAE/CUJAE: Instituto Superior Politecnico Jose A.
Echevarria
REDUNIV: University Network for Scientific and Technological
Information of the Ministry of Education
BIOMUNDI (39): Biological Information Network
UCLV: Las Villas University network, using CENIAI
Red Granma: Center of Documentation and scientific and
technological information
Red Yayabo (50): A regional network based in Ciudad Sancti
Spiritus, providing UUCP services to 6 institutions in that
province. Has a PC XT with 640 K RAM, a 20 MB hard drive,
and a 9600 bps modem.
Red Holguin: A regional network based in Ciudad Holguin,
providing services to institutions in that province.
Red Perla (62): A regional network based in Ciudad Cienfuegos,
providing services to institutions in that province.
3. TinoRed (413)
Red David: NGO Network
4. InfoMed (500)
Red Principe: based in Ciudad Camaguey, it provides service
for Camaguey University, Camaguey Medical Sciences Faculty,
and some other enterprises and institutions.
Four Cuban networks have dial-up, international connectivity.
This table lists them and some of the larger, more important
subnets for which they are international gateways. The numbers
shown in parenthesis are the number of accounts which have been
active at least once per month during the last 3 months.
Sources: Carlos Armas, CIGBnet, Jesus Maritnez, CENIAI, Carlos
Valdes, Tinored, and Pedro Urra, InfoMed. Sub-network user
counts were obtained by Armas.
Table 2: Monthly Cuabn Internet Traffic (K bytes)
Receive Transmit Total
Tinored 4689.29 12019.97 16709.26
CENIAI 3945.366 12535.36 16480.72
INGEN 4542.856 8897.882 13440.73
Total 13177.51 33453.22 46630.73
Source: Fullen [2]
Table 3: Caribbean Internet Traffic
Country Traffic Users Population
(MB/month) (millions)
Antigua and Bermuda 1.06 2 0.07
Bahamas 4.15 8 0.25
Barbados 8.59 17 0.26
Belize 13.74 28 0.19
Dominican Rep CUNET 3.62 7 7.00
Dominican Rep REDID 60.00 120 7.00
Grenada 0.63 1 0.10
Guyana 0.10 1 0.80
St. Lucia 11.72 24 0.14
Vincent and Gren. 0.79 2 0.11
Suriname 2.29 5 0.42
Trinidad/Tobago 17.14 34 1.30
Total 123.83 249 17.64
The user counts are estimates based on per-user traffic
assumptions.
Source: Daniel Pimienta, Carribean Network Traffic
Figures, gopher://rip.psg.org/, June 12, 1995.
The estimates of numbers of Caribbean users shown
in Table 4 were made by Daniel Pimienta, director of REDID, Red
Dominicana de Intercambio para el Desarrollo, a pioneering
Caribbean academic network.
The first is: gopher://rip.psg.com/0R26740-40227-/networks/connect/caribbean by Archie_MARSHALL@umail.umd.edu, which states that: "The addition of new UUCP nodes in Belize, Guyana, St. Vincent and Trinidad has driven user levels well above the two thousand (2,000) mark." Then in gopher://rip.psg.com/0R0-24217-/networks/connect/caribbean, Daniel makes very differnt estimates based on assumptions of traffic per user and CUnet traffic figures. 3. Goodman, S., Press, L., Ruth, S., and Rutkowski, A., "The Global Diffusion of the Internet: Patterns and Problems," Communications of the ACM, Vol 37, No 8, pp 27-31, August, 1994. 8. Mesher, G., Briggs, R., Goodman, S, Press, L., and Snyder, J., "Cuba, Communism, and Computing," Communications of the ACM, November, 1992. 5. Marshall, Archie, private email, July 23, 1995. 10. Pimienta, Daniel, personal email message, xxxx, 1995.Table 1: Cuban NGOs with Tinored (Red David) Accounts
Centro de Estudios de Africa y Medio Oriente
Centro de Estudios Europeos
Casa de las Americas
Centro de Estudios Martianos
Centro de Estudios sobre Estados Unidos
Centro de Estudios sobre Alternativas Politicas
Centro de Investigaciones de la Economia Mundial
Centro de Estudios de la Economia Cubana
Movimiento Cubano por la Paz
Grupo de Desarrollo Integral de la Capital
Memoria de los Movimientos Populares de America Latina
Centro Memorial "Martin Luther King"
Centro "Felix Varela"
Asociacion por la Unidad de Nuestra America
Radio Habana-Cuba
Centro de Estudios sobre Asia y Oceania
Grupo de Desarrollo de la Bicicleta en Cuba
Catedra "Pablo de la Torriente Brau"
Consejo de Iglesias de Cuba
Centro de Investigacion y Estudios de las Relaciones Interamericanas
Centro de Investigacion de la Economia Internacional
Centro de Informacion para la Prensa
Federacion de Mujeres Cubanas
Grupo para la Educacion sobre el SIDA
Instituto Superior Latinoamericano de Ajedrez
Asociacion Cubana de Esperanto
Alcoholicos Anonimos
Union de Escritores y Artistas de Cuba
Federacion de mujeres cubanas
Editorial Jose Marti
Consejo ecumenico de Cuba
Source: Carlos Valdes, Tinored System Administrator. (Valdes
states there are some others, but he did not have their names at
hand at the time of this message).