Internet and Its Uses · 4 question types
Past paper frequency (2018 to 2024)
This topic accounts for approximately 3% of your exam marks.
The difference between the internet and the WWW, and cookie/browser functions, are typical questions.
People often use "internet" and "World Wide Web" as if they were the same word. They are not. One is a network; the other is a service that runs on that network.
| The internet | The World Wide Web (WWW) | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | The global network of interconnected computers, cables and routers | A collection of web pages and other resources accessed using the internet |
| Type | Infrastructure (the physical and logical network) | A service running on top of the infrastructure |
| Year it appeared | 1969 (the ARPANET, the internet's ancestor) | 1989, invented by Tim Berners-Lee |
| Accessed using | Many different applications and protocols | A web browser, using HTTP/HTTPS |
| Other examples of what runs on it | Email (SMTP/POP3/IMAP), file transfer (FTP), online gaming, video calls, VoIP | The web is one of many internet services |
The simplest test: if you need a web browser to use it, it is the World Wide Web. Anything you do without a browser (sending email from a mail app, joining a video call, streaming music) is using the internet but not the web.
Another way to put it: the internet could exist without the World Wide Web, but the World Wide Web could not exist without the internet. The web is a service built on top of the internet's networking machinery.
Mark-scheme phrasing: "The internet is the global network of interconnected computers. The World Wide Web is a collection of web pages and resources accessed over the internet using HTTP/HTTPS via a web browser." Vague answers like "the internet is the web" lose marks.