Arnes, the first provider of internet services, which are nowadays indispensable

The public institute has assumed a number of important functions during its 22 years of operation

26. januar 2015 ob 13.34 • Ljubljana - MMC RTV SLO

Arnes is active on three fields: 1. Research infrastructure, 2. Communication-information infrastructure for educational institutes, 3. Strategic functions the state wishes to keep in public ownership - register of domains, mapping between IP-numbers to web addresses, management of Si-CERT. Foto: www.arnes.si

"In spite of our enthusiasm for internet we had never imagined that the web would infiltrate into all pores of the society," general manager Marko Bonač admits after leading Arnes for 22 years.

The institute has been decorated by the President of the State for development of the Slovenian information and communications technologies.
Today it is impossible to imagine a life without access to World Wide Web, e-mail, and other internet services. The times three decades ago seem much more distant than they actually are, due to the speed of development. The setting up of internet connections had only begun at that time. The driving force of the development in the European countries were scientific institutes, in Slovenia Jozef Stefan Institute, and Marko Bonač, general manager of the Academic and Research Network of Slovenia, was among the first enthusiasts.
During the war foreign countries were kept informed by e-mails
Soon after the Slovenian war for independence had started, internet and e-mail played an important role. The Slovenian researchers used e-mails to inform the world of the happenings in Slovenia, and to express their outrage against the aggression directed towards the newly emerging country. "It was the first war of this kind, and internet was a novelty, which made our contribution quite noticeable in the world. We wrote to our colleagues, to researchers in foreign countries, and they forwarded the information to media houses and to their politicians."
The impact e-mail had during the war was the main reason the state founded the public institute Arnes in 1992, with the purpose of establishing and maintaining the academic and research network. Today 1,200 research and government institutes are connected to Arnes network, while Arnes is also performing a number of strategic functions the state wishes to keep in public ownership. They administer the Slovenian .si domain, lead the extrajudicial arbitration board in domain proprietors disputes, and the national response centre for network security incidents Si-CERT. They investigate the possible problems, repair what can be repaired, but mostly take preventive actions through their efforts to educate with their "Safe on the internet" programme.
Arnes has been recently decorated for its contribution for development and research in the field of introducing new information and communications technologies in Slovenia, awarded by President of the State Borut Pahor.