Internet 2003: Industrial-Strength Net

By the year 2003, Internet commerce could hit $3.2 trillion and represent 5 percent of the world's economy. But is the Internet ready? When investment sites such as Charles Schwab & Co. and consumer auction sites such as eBay have difficulty handling existing levels of online activity, it's clear that the Net and the electronic merchants that use it have a long way to go if they're to handle millions, if not billions, of around-the-clock transactions without fail. Still to come are redundancy, self-healing networks, a new Internet communications protocol and deeper security ñ because e-commerce sites will be required not only to handle hundreds of millions of customers and billions of different devices, but also to fend off crackers and electronic terrorists along the way.