Telecommunications giant Sprint announced plans Tuesday to launch a private IP network aimed at security-conscious U.S. government agencies by late June. The new network, which doesn't yet have a name, will mimic Sprint's SprintLink enterprise-class, IP backbone network and offer . . .
Telecommunications giant Sprint announced plans Tuesday to launch a private IP network aimed at security-conscious U.S. government agencies by late June. The new network, which doesn't yet have a name, will mimic Sprint's SprintLink enterprise-class, IP backbone network and offer most of the same features, except that it won't be connected to the public Internet. Sprint expects government agencies that want to be especially protective of data to be the first customers, said Steve Lunceford, a Sprint spokesman. The "government-grade" private Internet should have one or two government agencies as its customers by its launch in late June, he added.

The Sprint service is designed to ease customer worries that "someone in an Internet cafe in Beijing could get into the network," Lunceford said. Customers using the private network would have to use SprintLink or another public backbone for outside e-mail or Web surfing, but individual users won't be able to tell when they're switching back and forth, he added.

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