UK net is "not ready" for future

18 October 2010 Last updated at 03:25 ET

The UK is slowly climbing up the broadband world rankings, but is still not "ready for tomorrow," according to a global study of net services.

The annual report, commissioned by network giant Cisco, looks at how well countries are doing in terms of both quality and penetration of net services.

The UK is now ranked 18th out of 72 countries, up from 25th place last year.

South Korea is once again ranked first.

The annual study, conducted by the University of Oxford's Said Business School and the University of Oviedo in Spain looks at a range of factors, including both the number of homes to have broadband and the quality of the services.

Quality, for the purposes of the study, encompasses the speed of the connection and the latency - the amount of time it takes data to arrive at a machine.

It put 14countries in the elite category of being ready for the "applications of tomorrow", including the obvious; Korea, Japan and Sweden and the less obvious; Latvia, Bulgaria and Portugal.

In 2008, when the first study was commissioned, only one country - Japan - was judged ready for tomorrow.

The applications ascribed to tomorrow's internet include high definition internet TV and high-quality video communications.

The report found that such applications would require an average download speed of 11Mbps and an upload speed of 5Mbps.

The average global upload speed currently is just 1.7Mbps.

In this year's report the UK is categorised as "comfortably enjoying today's applications", alongside 19 others including the USA, France, Canada, Greece and Poland.

A further 19 countries - including Vietnam, Egypt, China and India, are characterised as being "below today's application threshold" while five countries - Algeria, Peru, Nigeria, Kenya and Angola - are viewed as having only the most basic of services.

The report finds that average broadband speeds in the UK now stand at 6.4Mbps (megabits per second), which is more than double that in 2008, when the first report was compiled.

It is also above the global average of 5.9Mbps.

"The UK is not on average ready for tomorrow but there has been significant improvements in the last two years," said Fernando Gil de Bernabe, a senior director at Cisco.

Mr de Bernabe said the UK was likely to experience a "step-change" in its broadband footprint over the next 12 months, because of increased fibre optic roll-outs from BT and extensions of Virgin Media's cable network.

"Where similar fibre roll-outs have happened the download speeds improved by 50 or 60% in just one year," he said.

Those countries which are categorised as ready for tomorrow in the report have one thing in common, according to Mr de Bernabe.

"There is a clear digital strategy. These countries have placed a bet on broadband and think it will have the same impact on their economies as the infrastructures of the past. They want a society that is based on knowledge," he said.

The UK government has ambitions to be the best broadband economy in Europe by 2015, although it has so far only committed to the rollout of basic 2Mbps broadband by that date.

That decision could mean the UK falls foul of European legislation. The European Union wants member states to provide citizens with a minimum of 30Mbps broadband by 2020, with all nations offering basic broadband - generally regarded as 2Mbps - for all by 2013.

Mr de Bernabe said the UK needed to put its pledge into practise.

"What I hear repeatedly is the question about who is going to pay for it. The leadership countries aren't asking those questions," he said.

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Cyber crime among top UK threats

18 October 2010 Last updated at 07:24 ET <!-- Embedding the video player --> <!-- This is the embedded player component -->

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Home Secretary Theresa May: International terrorism and cyber attacks are key threats

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Attacks on computer networks are among the biggest threats to the UK, Theresa May has said ahead of the publication of a new National Security Strategy.

Cyber terrorism was a "new and growing" danger, the home secretary said.

The BBC has learned there will be new money to bolster cyber security, focused on protecting critical infrastructure and defence assets.

The strategy will form the background for Tuesday's Strategic Defence Review, with defence cuts of 8% expected.

The National Security Council, set up by David Cameron in May, is publishing an updated approach to national security which identifies 16 threats to the UK.

The most serious - which they are calling "Tier 1" - comprises acts of international terrorism, hostile computer attacks on UK cyberspace, a major accident or natural hazard such as a flu pandemic, or an international military crisis between states that draws in the UK and its allies.

Intelligence priority

Speaking ahead of the strategy's launch in the Commons on Monday afternoon, Mrs May said she was not prepared to rank these in order of gravity but acknowledged they were of a "different nature" to other potential threats.

On terrorism, she said the threat level to the UK had been at severe - which means an attack is likely - for "some time".

"We are facing a very serious threat from international terrorism... we must all be vigilant," she told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

Rather than focusing on different areas in isolation, she said the security strategy had looked at the overall picture "in the round" and as part of the exercise, officials had identified attacks on government and business IT systems as as a "new and growing threat".

The BBC's security correspondent Frank Gardner said ministers were likely to announce �500m of new money to bolster cyber security, amid evidence that hundreds of malicious e-mails were already being aimed at government computer networks each month.

This would combat concerns that terrorist groups might be able to hack into critical infrastructure such as air traffic control networks and over cases of "cyber espionage" where rogue groups or even foreign states seek to break into computer systems to obtain top secret information.

There would also be extra protection for online business transactions from fraud and theft.

Ahead of Wednesday's Spending Review, Mrs May said the Home Office had to "play its part" in cutting spending to deal with the deficit, stressing that the police could make savings without hitting officers on the beat by cutting bureaucracy and increased collaboration between forces.

While welcoming efforts to tackle cyber attacks, Labour - which developed the first national security strategy in 2008 - said the plan offered little new.

"The government seem to be producing a reheated security strategy to provide cover for a rushed defence review rather that producing a renewed and careful consideration of the UK's defence and security priorities," said shadow foreign secretary Yvette Cooper.

'Re-do' defence?

Two days away from the spending review, Defence Secretary Liam Fox has said personnel numbers in the armed forces will "fall a bit" in future but there would be no weakening of the UK's strategic position.

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Bill Gates: ''People depend on the reliability of the internet''

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The Treasury had wanted cuts of between 10% and 20% to the Ministry of Defence's budget, but it is understood that Mr Fox has negotiated this down to 8%.

The Conservative MP Bernard Jenkin, who is chairman of the Commons Public Administration Committee, said it was difficult to see how an effective National Security Strategy could be developed against the backdrop of cuts.

"We seem to be operating under the imperative of deficit reduction," he said.

"But, there's very little in what's being done now that reflects deep and sustained analysis about what sort of country we want to be in 10 or 20 years time."

In a new report, the cross-party committee said there was a lack of strategic thinking at the heart of government over security, defence and foreign policy and a tendency to "muddle through" rather than be forward thinking.

"And the SDSR [strategic defence and security review] is a case in point because the Ministry of Defence should have done the work, saying 'look, if we are going to have to live within a much smaller envelope, how do we completely re-do the way we do defence?'.

"Instead it's just been about 'what do we have to cut? What do we hang on to and what do we cut?'."

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Satellite to demonstrate UK tech

18 October 2010 Last updated at 04:51 ET By Jonathan Amos Science correspondent, BBC News

The UK is going to develop a satellite to trial innovative space technologies.

It is hoped the components and instruments flying on TechDemoSat (TDS) can prove their worth and go on to win substantial international business.

Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL) will lead the project.

Payload participants are likely to include a novel instrument to measure the state of the sea, another to track ships from orbit, and even one to destroy TDS at the end of its life.

The latter is a "sail" that would be deployed from the satellite to force it out of the sky to burn up in the Earth's atmosphere. Efficient technologies to retire defunct spacecraft are expected to have big markets in the future.

The core mission design of TDM is being funded with a grant of �770,000 from the UK government's Technology Strategy Board (TSB) and the South East England Development Agency (SEEDA).

Assuming that all goes well, a further �2,730,000 will be released to move the project into the build and test phase.

"One of our key philosophies is to help companies overcome barriers to market," said the TSB's Michael Lawrence.

"There are a number of British-based space companies out there that have great technology but they need to demonstrate it in orbit. Hopefully, this initiative will help them prove the technology works and that will open up commercial markets for them," he told BBC News.

Reflected GPS signals

TechDemoSat will have a challenging timetable. SSTL wants to be able to ship the satellite to the launch pad in 18 months' time.

All the companies and academic institutions hoping to fly payloads must pay their own costs.

The participants, while still under final selection, are expected to include Com Dev Europe, SSTL, Selex Galileo, Qinetiq, Aero Sekur, RAL Space, Oxford University, University of Surrey, Leicester University, MSSL and the Langton Star Centre (which will be providing a UK schools experiment).

One of the biggest proposed payloads at 7.5kg is SSTL's own - an Earth observation instrument designed to measure the state of the ocean.

"It makes use of the fact that there are a lot of GPS signals coming down from space and these get reflected off the ocean's surface. The instrument can intercept them to infer things about the sea state. So depending on whether the water is choppy or smooth, you get a different type of return signal," explained Doug Liddle, SSTL's head of science.

One of the smallest payloads, weighing just 750g, is being provided by Selex Galileo. This is a sugar-cube-sized gyroscope that can sense the orientation of the spacecraft.

Aero Sekur is behind the space sail. It takes the form of a deployable membrane. Residual air molecules still present in the spacecraft's low-Earth orbit will catch the sheet and pull TDS out of the sky much faster than would normally be the case - certainly, within the international 25-year-guideline recommended for redundant space hardware.

It is hoped the TechDemoSat project can emulate the Mosaic (Micro Satellite Applications in Collaboration) programme of a decade ago.

Then, �11m of public investment in spacecraft projects led by SSTL ultimately resulted in the company winning almost �300m in export business.

Launch funds

It is just the sort of initiative recommended by the recent Space Innovation and Growth Strategy (Space-IGS) which set out a 20-year plan to maximise the potential of the UK's highly successful space sector.

There are more payload ideas in British industry and academia than can be accommodated on the demonstrator, and Michael Lawrence said it was possible the opportunity could be repeated in the future.

"We'll need to see how this one works - if it delivers to time, to budget," he said. "There will be many factors to consider, but if this goes the way we want it to then I would hope there will be a TechDemoSat-2."

One matter which still needs to be resolved is how TDS-1 gets into orbit.

With the TSB/SEEDA funding and the payload participants carrying their own costs, there is sufficient cash to get the satellite built - but not launched.

The cost of a ride to space for a 150kg spacecraft like TDS can be about �2.5m if the spacecraft shares the rocket with a group of other satellites. This is an issue the UK Space Agency will have to address in due course.

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk

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Internet use campaign under way

17 October 2010 Last updated at 21:20 ET

A major drive to get more people to use the internet has started, with the aim of persuading reluctant users that the web can save them money and time.

The BBC will be involved in the Get Online campaign, which will see some celebrities going online for the first time.

More than nine million Britons have never used the internet, and they tend to be more elderly and less well-off.

Events promoting web use will take place across the UK.

Web training

BBC technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones says the campaign will hammer home a simple message, that the internet can save you money.

Research by UK Online Centres, which was set up by the government to provide public access to computers, found that a third of new internet users reckoned they had already saved more than �100 by being online.

Among the events, companies including Google and McDonalds will descend on Bridlington in Yorkshire to offer free web training in a town where one in four people are not online.

BBC programmes will also take part, with Sir Terry Wogan acting as a web ambassador and a character in Radio 4's The Archers having their first computer lesson.

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Crunch coming for broadband fibre

15 October 2010 Last updated at 06:37 ET By Jason Palmer Science and technology reporter, BBC News

Technology may stretch the capacity of the fibre optic cables used to carry data sooner than has long been thought, according to a report in Science.

The capacity limit has until recently been in the preparation of the light signals that pass through the cables.

But the report reviews recent laboratory results showing data rates that are more than half the ultimate limit of fibre optic cables.

It calls for urgent research to develop higher-bandwidth cables.

A number of innovations have in the past massively increased the data capacity of optical fibres.

The first change improved the transmission of the fibres, so that optical signals did not simply get absorbed as they passed through.

This resulted in fibres with data rates hundreds of times higher and theoretical capacities thousands of times higher than that.

Those improved fibres have become standard and now lie underground and undersea all over the globe; the limitation since then has been in the lasers and electronics that prepare and then translate the optical signals on either side of these "light pipes".

Now, David Richardson of the University of Southampton's Optoelectronics Research Centre says in the Science report that the best data rates measured in laboratory settings challenge the perceived notion that fibres are limitless conduits for data.

Continue reading the main story

"Start Quote

We may all increasingly need to get used to the idea that bandwidth - just like water and energy - is a valuable commodity to be used wisely"

End Quote David Richardson University of Southampton

"The thought that the current fibre technology has infinite capacity is not true - we are beginning to hit the fundamental limits of the current technology," he told BBC News.

"We need to be looking at the next big breakthrough to allow us to continue to scale as we have traditionally done."

He said there are more increases to be had, for instance, in the way the light signals are encoded, but that "radical" gains will likely come from changes in the fibres themselves.

"If you gain a factor of two in bandwidth by developing a whole new amplifier technology, that's perhaps two or three years of capacity growth. To get radical changes - to get factors of 100 or 1000 - it's going to be extremely demanding.

"It's likely we're going to have to go right back to the fundamentals of the optics, the actual light pipes. And if you want to develop the next generation of cable, you want to be doing that 10 years in advance, not for tomorrow."

Market forces

Of course, the point at which the data rates required by internet users outstrip capacity depends only on how fast demand rises - a notoriously difficult figure to predict, as Geoff Bennett of telecoms firm Infinera points out.

"A small change in growth rate makes a big difference to the final numbers," he told BBC News.

"But whichever way it goes, it will be driven by market forces. Today, video is the only application we know that is stressing internet capacity. If people want YouTube or iPlayer video in 3D, '4k' high-definition, then maybe they'll have to pay more for it. And that will limit demand; that's how every other market works."

For his part, Dr Richardson feels that behavioural changes, as much as market forces, could easily push the limitations out later.

"Changes in the way we use the internet may well deal with it very straightforwardly," he said.

Or, as he wrote in the Science paper: "We may all increasingly need to get used to the idea that bandwidth - just like water and energy - is a valuable commodity to be used wisely."

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French to bankroll music-buying

15 October 2010 Last updated at 06:00 ET

French people aged 12-25 are to be encouraged to buy music via a state-subsidised scheme.

The plan attempts to get young people into the habit of buying music rather than stealing it by file-sharing.

The scheme will revolve around pre-paid cards that have a face value of 50 euros (�43) but which will only cost 25 euros when bought.

The French government will pay the other half of the cost when a card is used to buy music on a download site.

The French government estimates that the two-year scheme will cost it about 25 million euros (�22m) if it reaches its target of selling one million cards. Consumers will be limited to one card each per year.

Restrictions will also apply to music download sites that sign up to accept the cards. They will be asked to cut the price of downloads, extend subscription periods and contribute towards the marketing campaign for the cards.

Individual sites will only be allowed to receive a maximum of 5m euros from the scheme.

The European Commission has approved the French plan saying it would not be anti-competitive.

"The scheme will contribute to preserving pluralism and cultural diversity in the online music industry," said EU Competition Commissioner Joaquin Almunia in a statement.

France has been among the nations taking the most extreme actions against those suspected of sharing music illegally.

It has enacted the so-called Hadopi law which will result in suspension of net access for those who ignore three warnings about illegally sharing copyrighted material.

Not every French ISP is complying with the law. Free has said it will not be sending out letters that tell people they have been spotted illegally sharing files.

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Medal of Honor game goes on sale

14 October 2010 Last updated at 19:00 ET By Daniel Emery Technology reporter, BBC News <!-- Embedding the video player --> <!-- This is the embedded player component -->

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Medal of Honor's prequel book author Chris Ryan on the game's realism

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The video game Medal of Honor (MoH) has gone on sale despite calls by the UK defence secretary to ban it.

The game follows the exploits of Special Forces troops battling insurgents in Afghanistan in 2002.

In August, Defence Secretary Dr Liam Fox called for the game to be banned after it emerged that users could fight as The Taliban.

Its developer EA said the game was meant to be realistic, but eventually renamed The Taliban "The Opposition".

This edition, the latest in EA's long running series of games bearing the MoH title, has dispensed with its World War II theme and opted to recreate modern combat in the ongoing conflict in Afghanistan.

But with 150,000 American, British and Allied troops fighting in Afghanistan, many felt taking on the role of the Taliban was a step too far.

Dr Fox described the game as "un-British" and said it was "shocking that someone would think it acceptable to recreate the acts of the Taliban against British soldiers".

The Canadian and Danish Defence Ministers also criticised the game.

EA weathered the storm for a few weeks, but in early October the firm bowed to pressure and took the term "Taliban" out of the multiplayer option.

Despite the change, the game is still banned from sale on military bases, although troops can purchase it elsewhere and play it on station.

'Ploy'

Johnny Minkley, a journalist with video gaming website Eurogamer, told BBC News that he thought EA's decision to allow users to play as the Taliban was a marketing ploy.

"I don't think EA was that naive," he said.

"They knew that this would be controversial, but they needed to do everything to get attention, especially when they are going up against Call of Duty: Modern Warfare - the biggest brand in the world."

The game itself has received mostly positive reviews, scoring an average of 75% according to the review aggregator site Metacritic. Computer and Video Games Magazine described it as "an accomplished, confident online shooter".

Mr Minkley agreed, saying the developers had done "a really good job" but added that the product was some way from being perfect.

"The campaign stands up well and it is a competent and exciting first person shooter.

"But I do have a problem with it, and that is that the single player mode is very short.

"A competent gamer could get through the entire game in under five hours."

Logging on

In the 1990s, single player games usually lasted for days, if not weeks. However, that changed with the 2001 release of Max Payne, which could be completed in under 12 hours.

"This is an ever growing trend - we saw it with Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare - of having an exciting, but short, single player game," said Mr Minkley.

"Developers claim that the multi-player aspect - where players compete on line - extends the life of the game, but the fact remains many people cannot or do not want to play online," he added.

US developer Activision's last modern combat shooter - Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 - grossed over $1bn in sales, and the follow on title Call of Duty: Black Ops, due for release on 9 November this year, is expected to do as well, if not better.

EA's decision to switch the Medal of Honor theme from the Second World War to a modern day conflict has prompted some critics to accuse the US firm of imitation.

Mr Minkley agreed, but said the decision was a financial one and Medal of Honor was not a pale imitation.

"What they've tried to do is focus on the confusion and uncertainty of western forces in Afghanistan and it feels different from a Hollywood style shooter like Call of Duty.

"You also have to bear in mind there is a degree of WWII fatigue and, ultimately, games developers are there to make money," he said.

"This is a commercial decision to follow the success of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 but - other than The Taliban issue - is far less deliberately proactive than Call of Duty."

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Facebook and Skype in social deal

14 October 2010 Last updated at 17:19 ET By Maggie Shiels Technology reporter, BBC News, Silicon Valley

Skype is integrating with Facebook to make it easier to call and video chat with friends and family on the social network.

The deal comes amid fevered rumours that Facebook plans to launch a phone of its own.

Meanwhile Skype is gearing up for a $100m (�62m) share issue.

"The essence of the Skype experience is communicating with the people you care about," said Rick Osterloh, Skype's head of consumer products.

The new Skype for Windows will include a Facebook tab. This means that for the first time Skype users can keep up-to-date and interact with their Facebook news feed including posting status updates, commenting and liking directly from Skype.

Added to that, the Facebook phonebook in Skype allows users to call and text Facebook friends directly on their mobile phones and landlines.

And if your Facebook friend is also a Skype contact, then users can make free Skype-to-Skype calls.

Group video calling is available in beta form as a free trial.

"We're working with companies such as Skype to make it easier to find your friends anytime you want to connect," said Ethan Beard, director of Facebook's developer network.

'New market'

The move is seen as a natural one for the world's biggest social network, which is aiming to be the central communications and messaging platform for its users across a range of media.

Commentator Ben Popper of business technology blog BNET.com told BBC News it is a win-win for both firms.

"For Skype they are getting built right into the conversation. For Facebook, which has the bulk of its users in the US, this is good in terms of expansion because a chunk of Skype users are in Europe and the rest of the world."

Mr Popper also said he believed this points towards "a possible new market".

"The deal makes this space a lot more interesting and indicates a different direction of where communications could go.

"Right now phones are owned by the cellular networks. This partnership is big enough and deep enough, it could point towards a different kind of telco [telecommunications company] in the future."

Skype has around 560 million registered users and 8.1 million paying users. The Luxembourg-based company said that people spend an average of 520 million minutes every day talking to one another on the service.

Facebook has more than 500 million users, helping the two companies close in on around one billion users, though there will be some overlap.

The research company ComScore reported that in August Facebook users spent more than 40 million minutes on the social networking giant.

The new Skype version 5.0 for Windows is available now. There has been no announcement about when Mac or Linux versions will follow.

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Call to define rules of cyber war

14 October 2010 Last updated at 12:24 ET

Nations need to define the rules of engagement for acts of cyber terror.

The call for clarity was issued by Michael Chertoff, former head of the US Department of Homeland Security, at the RSA security conference in London.

He said the lack of direction was giving the initiative to criminals and hampering co-ordinated responses to the growing number of hi-tech attacks.

Countries should be able to defend themselves, he suggested, if an attack posed imminent danger to human lives.

"It's the least understood threat and the one where our doctrine is least developed," said Mr Chertoff.

Graded response

The need for such a doctrine was as pressing now as it was in 1950s, he said, when the emergence of nuclear weapons rendered irrelevant earlier policies governing when and why conflicts were fought.

That vacuum was filled by the policy of deterrence which defined what response could be expected from the US depending on how its territory or citizens were threatened.

"It was very clear to an adversary the consequences of an attack," he said.

In a similar way, said Mr Chertoff, a nation's cyber defence doctrine would lay out a range of responses depending on the severity of the attack.

Continue reading the main story

"Start Quote

The greatest stress you can have on security is when there is uncertainty - we are now in a state of uncertainty"

End Quote Michael Chertoff

"We have to treat espionage as different from attack or massive fraud or theft of information," he said.

Theft and espionage could be dealt with through the legal system, he said, with the strongest responses being reserved for the most serious cases.

"If you cause imminent danger of loss of life by attacking a network that's a different story," he said. "Theft is bad but murder is worse."

International laws of self-defence would allow a nation to respond to remove the threat posed by an imminent or unfolding attack, he said.

He admitted that such serious attacks on national infrastructure, such as rolling blackouts that led to deaths in hospitals, had not happened yet, but added: "I would not like to experience the first one."

"There seem to be very few entities that are perfectly immune from these types of attacks," said Mr Chertoff who now heads the Chertoff Group, which advises nations and governments on risks and security.

By defining a doctrine, he suggested, all nations would be encouraged to police domestic networks better to avoid incurring a strong response.

"The greatest stress you can have on security is when there is uncertainty," he said. "We are now in a state of uncertainty."

The need to develop response scenarios and an over-arching doctrine was becoming pressing, he said, as those involved in hacking for money carried out ever more attacks.

"It's a real problem and it's growing," he said, "If we do not address it then we are going to be confronted by an event that's so catastrophic that it cannot be shrugged off."

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Plan to build &#39;steam-powered PC&#39;

14 October 2010 Last updated at 08:23 ET By Jonathan Fildes Technology reporter, BBC News

A UK campaign to build a truck-sized, prototype computer first envisaged in 1837 is gathering steam.

More than 1,600 people have pledged money and support to build Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine.

Although elements of the engine have been built over the last 173 years, a complete working model of the steam-powered machine has never been made.

The campaign hopes to gather donations from 50,000 supporters to kick-start the project.

"It's an inspirational piece of equipment," said John Graham-Cumming, author of the Geek Atlas, who has championed the idea.

"A hundred years ago, before computers were available, [Babbage] had envisaged this machine."

Computer historian Dr Doron Swade said that rebuilding the machine could answer "profound historical questions".

"Could there have been an information age in Victorian times? That is a very interesting question," he told BBC News.

Number cruncher

The analytical engine was designed on paper by mathematician and engineer Charles Babbage. It was envisaged that it would be built out of brass and iron.

"What you realise when you read Babbage's papers is that this was the first real computer," said Mr Graham-Cumming. "It had expandable memory, a CPU, microcode, a printer, a plotter and was programmable with punch cards.

"It was the size of a small lorry and powered by steam but it was recognisable as a computer."

Although other mechanical machines may predate the Analytical Engine, it is regarded as the first design for a "general purpose computer" that could be reprogrammed to carry out different tasks.

It was the successor to his Difference Engine, a huge brass number-cruncher.

"The Difference Engine is a calculator," said Dr Swade, who was part of a team that spent 17 years painstakingly building a replica. "It is not a computer in the general sense of the word."

He said that it would be "astounding" if the Anaytical Engine could also be built.

"The Difference Engine is already a legendary model, but it is dinky compared to the Analytical Engine," he said.

He said Babbage's many designs for the device suggested that it would be "bigger than a steam locomotive."

"That is with just 100 variables," he said. "He talked about machines with 1,000 variables, which would be an inconceivably large machine."

No one has built an entire Analytical engine, although various people, including Babbage's son and Dr Swade, have created elements of it.

Dr Swade said the most complex - although incomplete - recreations of elements of the machine have been built using Meccano by Briton Tim Robinson.

Confidence boost

Mr Graham-Cumming aims to recreate a design known as Plan 28 if his campaign is successful. However, he said, there would be a lot of work to do before then, including digitising Babbage's papers that are held at the Science Museum in London.

Dr Swade said that a researcher would also be needed to decipher Babbage's drawings and nomenclature.

"We would then need to build a 3D simulation of the engine [on a computer]," said Mr Graham-Cummings. "We can then debug it and it would make it available to everyone around the world."

Dr Swade, agreed that this was the correct approach and said a virtual recreation of the machine could solve "95% of problems" and allow them to use computer to design the thousands of individual parts needed to make the behemoth.

"Building a virtual engine is the only route of certainty to see the engine built in our lifetimes," he said.

When he built the Difference Engine, this route was not available he said.

First, however, Mr Graham-Cumming needs to raise the money to set up the non-profit Plan 28 organisation to oversee the work.

"I was a little worried whether enough people would care about a steam-powered computer, with 1k of memory that was 13,000 times slower than a [Sinclair] ZX81," he said.

However, he told BBC News, an earlier online campaign had helped persuade him that it was possible.

Last year he launched a petition on the No 10 website calling on the government to make a posthumous apology to World War II code-breaker and computer pioneer Alan Turing for his treatment by the authorities for being gay.

In August 2009, then-Prime Minister Gordon Brown wrote a letter in the Daily Telegraph saying that he was sorry for what had happened.

"That gave me the confidence that there are enough people that care about computing to get this kind of thing done," he said.

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