H & R Block & Co’s CompuServe Inc, Columbus, Ohio, has a new family of Internet and Internet Protocol networking services in a bid to capitalise on growing business interest in the Internet. From November CompuServe’s Network Services Division will offer commercial customers high-speed dedicated Internet and Internet Protocol access via its FRAME-Net Frame Relay service, and asynchronous access via the Point-to-Point Protocol. The firm says the CompuServe Information Service will expand its current Internet access offering to include both Telnet and File Transfer Protocol sessions, and is out in late 1994, with additional Internet access features and capabilities scheduled for 1995. Dial up Point-to-Point Protocol sessions will enable Mosaic and other front-ends to connect across CompuServe’s global asynchronous network at speeds up to 14.4Kbps, it says. Testing is also said to be under way for 28.8Kbps and ISDN access, and pricing will reportedly be similar to CompuServe’s current dial up service offerings. CompuServe says it will also offer dedicated T1 services across its FRAME-Net and X.25 services, enabling users to access both their private TCP/IP networks, and the Internet. Pricing will be competitive with other providers of dedicated access, according to a company source. To address users’ Internet security requirements, CompuServe says it will also provide secure ‘firewall’ offerings for multiple environments, ranging from self-administering ‘point-and-click’ firewall graphical user interfaces to more advanced security servers for ‘networks-within-networks’ campuses. CompuServe further announced a commitment to deliver access to World Wide Web and Gopher servers on the Internet, beginning in the first half of 1995, and announced a plan to offer World Wide Web consulting and management services to Information and Service Providers who wish to establish a presence on the Internet. A letter of intent has been signed for CompuServe to fund a new company dedicated to Web services, and a formal announcement of this relationship will occur later this month. CompuServe is also committed to making some of its Information Service products available in Web format to Internet users and will expand on the existing prototype Web page over the next few months.
