; 24 years ago 1992 legal status non profit purpose leadership headquarters reston virginia u.s. geneva switzerland region served worldwide membership 80 000 official language english affiliations public interest registry website www.internetsociety.org internet an opte project visualization of routing paths through a portion of the internet general access censorship democracy digital divide digital rights freedom of information history of the internet internet phenomena net neutrality pioneers privacy sociology usage governance icann internet engineering task force internet governance forum internet society information infrastructure domain name system hypertext transfer protocol internet exchange point internet protocol internet protocol suite internet service provider ip address internet message access protocol simple mail transfer protocol services blogs microblogging email fax file sharing file transfer games instant messaging podcasts shopping television voice over ip world wide web search guides book index outline internet portal v t e the internet society isoc is an international non profit organization founded in 1992 to provide leadership in internet related standards education access and policy . it states that its mission is to promote the open development evolution and use of the internet for the benefit of all people throughout the world . 1 the internet society has its headquarters in reston virginia united states 2 near washington d.c. and offices in geneva switzerland . it has a membership base of more than 140 organizations and more than 80 000 individual members . members also form chapters based on either common geographical location or special interests . there are over 110 chapters around the world . 1 contents 1 history 2 internet society today 3 board of trustees 4 see also 5 references 6 external links history edit the internet society was formed officially in 1992 by vint cerf and bob kahn 3 with one of its purposes being to provide a corporate structure to support the internet standards development process . vint cerf bob kahn lyman chapin released a document announcing isoc which explained the rationale for establishing the internet society . this document also defines the original charter of the organization as follows the society will be a non profit organization and will be operated for international educational charitable and scientific purposes among which are to facilitate and support the technical evolution of the internet as a research and education infrastructure and to stimulate involvement of the academic scientific and engineering communities among others in the evolution of the internet . to educate the academic and scientific communities and the public concerning the technology use and application of the internet . to promote scientific and educational applications of internet technology for the benefit of educational institutions at all grade levels industry and the public at large . to provide a forum for exploration of new internet applications and to foster collaboration among organizations in their operation and use of the internet . 4 many of the main forces of the internet such as the internet engineering task force ietf remain very informal organizations from a legal perspective . there was a growing need for financial support and organization structure . the internet society was incorporated as a non profit educational organization which could provide that support structure as well as promoting other activities that are important for the development of the internet . the internet society is the parent corporation of the ietf ; as such all ietf request for comments documents including those rfcs which describe internet standards are copyrighted by the internet society although freely available to anyone including non members at no charge . however the internet society itself grew out of the ietf to support those functions that require a corporate form rather than simply the ad hoc approach of the ietf . in reality the internet society was formed because the ietf secretariat which had been operated under nsf contract by staff at the corporation for national research initiatives cnri would not be supported beyond 1991 by nsf . the then internet activities board sought to create a non profit institution that could provide financial support for the ietf secretariat among other things . cnri served as the first host for the internet society s operation . in 2012 on isoc s 20th anniversary it established the internet hall of fame an annual award whose purpose is to publicly recognize a distinguished and select group of visionaries leaders and luminaries who have made significant contributions to the development and advancement of the global internet . 5 6 internet society today edit the internet society conducts a great range of activities under three main categories namely standards public policy access and education . the internet society works with countries and community partners to support network development interconnection and internet traffic exchange as well as training individuals who can build and maintain the internet infrastructure in their regions . under the standards category the internet society supports and promotes the work of the standards settings bodies for which it is the organizational home the internet engineering task force ietf the internet architecture board iab the internet engineering steering group iesg and the internet research task force irtf . the internet society also seeks to promote understanding and appreciation of the internet model of open transparent processes and consensus based decision making . 7 under the public policy category the internet society works with governments national and international organizations civil society the private sector and other parties to promote policies about the internet that conform to its core values . the following statement illustrates the foundation for the internet society s policy positions we envision a future in which people in all parts of the world can use the internet to improve their quality of life because standards technologies business practices and government policies sustain an open and universally accessible platform for innovation creativity and economic opportunity . 8 the internet society has a prominent function in internet governance discussions including significant involvement in the world summit on the information society wsis and internet governance forum igf . the internet society works with countries and community partners to support network development interconnection and internet traffic exchange as well as training individuals who can build and maintain the internet infrastructure in their regions . under the category of education the internet society pursues its goals by coordinating and delivering hands on technical training seminars and conferences on topical internet issues ; supporting local and regional internet organisations ; issuing briefings and white papers on internet technologies ; and funding participation opportunities for internet experts in developing countries . 9 the internet society also encourages innovation and fresh thinking by providing grants and rewards to relevant initiatives and outreach efforts that address the humanitarian educational and societal contexts of online connectivity . the internet society is the parent company for the public interest registry which manages the . org top level domain . isoc has joint offices in reston virginia united states and geneva switzerland . it has also established regional bureaus for latin america and the caribbean africa asia north america and europe . the internet society helped organize world ipv6 day which gathered companies such as facebook google yahoo akamai technologies and limelight networks as well as isps to raise awareness of ipv6 issues such as fragmentation . 10 board of trustees edit the internet society is governed by a board of trustees . the current list of trustees and their committee memberships is found on the organization s website . see also edit jonathan b. postel service award references edit this article relies too much on references to primary sources . please improve this by adding secondary or tertiary sources . january 2008 learn how and when to remove this template message a b internet society isoc introduction to isoc contact http www.internetsociety.org history internet society isoc all about the internet history of the internet about page internet hall of fame website . last accessed april 24 2012 internet gets hall of fame al gore honored . cbs news . april 24 2012 . retrieved april 24 2012 . internet society isoc isoc s standards activities internet society public policy isoc s public policy activities internet society isoc isoc s education activities world internet society ipv6 day external links edit official website ietf and isoc by vint cerf authority control worldcat identities viaf 133976499 lccn no92010807 isni 0000 0001 2034 0975 gnd 16223182 9 nla 36013991 nkc xx0134677 retrieved from https en.wikipedia.org w index.php title internet society & oldid 744021425 categories internet society peoplehistory of the internetinternet governance organizationsinternet standardsorganizations established in 19921992 establishments in the united stateshidden categories articles lacking reliable references from january 2008all articles lacking reliable referenceswikipedia articles with viaf identifierswikipedia articles with lccn identifierswikipedia articles with isni identifierswikipedia articles with gnd identifierswikipedia articles with nla identifiers navigation menu personal tools not logged intalkcontributionscreate accountlog in namespaces article talk variants views read edit view history more search navigation main pagecontentsfeatured contentcurrent eventsrandom articledonate to wikipediawikipedia store interaction helpabout wikipediacommunity portalrecent changescontact page tools what links hererelated changesupload filespecial pagespermanent linkpage informationwikidata itemcite this page print export create a bookdownload as pdfprintable version languages catal e tinadeutscheestiespa olesperanto fran ais bahasa indonesiaitaliano nederlands norsk bokm lpolskiportugu srom n srpskisuomisvenska ti ng vi t edit links this page was last modified on 12 october 2016 at 17 03 . text is available under the creative commons attribution sharealike license ; 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