J.C.R. Licklider of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and MIT first described what would become Arpanet, and eventually the internet, as an Intergalactic Computer Network. In a series of memos, Licklider conceived of a “globally interconnected set of computers through which everyone could quickly access data and programs from any site.” These memos were, in part, a response to American scientists’ fears of a Soviet attack on the nation’s telephone system.