Mouli,
You asked, “what would be the major component required?” I’d say the most fundamental major requirement would be the physical layer that connects all network devices, supporting the electronic communication. With absolute control over the means of transmitting the content, the controlling entity would be in a position to control and protect much more reliably the many aspects of the logical layer. If the entire network can be based on wires, control is much better. More likely, much of the physical layer will have to be based on radio waves, making the external connections (or lack thereof) much more tricky. See the discussion below for more about the physical and logical layers of the network.
As for your question about recall that the DNS is only a translator table to provide nominally human-understandable identifiers for the many network components. The network itself does not need a DNS at all, because it uses either all digital identifiers for each device on the network, which might be human-encoded as numeric or alpha-numeric sequences.
I'm not sure how well versed you are in the intricacies of network architectures, so I will cover some basics that you may well already understand. Please don't be offended if it seems too basic, but feel assured that many Community members who have expertise in areas other than network technology may appreciate the discussion.
To begin with, every network, whether a single network or an inter-network set of collected networks, must have both a physical layer and a logical layer. The physical layer provides the electronic connection between computing devices. The logical layer provides the identification of all of the connected devices, as well as handling the routing of the electronic (nominally digital) traffic among those devices.Â
Once upon a time the physical layer was based completely on wires. Today, the physical layer of a network may include any or all of the following technologies: wires, optical fiber, and radio waves in a variety of wavelength groups. The radio waves may be microwave, shortwave, WiFi, Bluetooth, 3rd, 4th (LTE), and 5th Generation (3G/4G/5G) cell phone, and several others, defined by international conventions on frequency management.
Today the most common logical layer is based on the conventions and protocols for the Transmission Control Protocol / Internet Protocol (TCP/IP). Most legacy TCP/IP networks are based on TCP/IP version 4, but we are seeing a rapid adoption of version 6, especially in Asia. Further, many networks are using a combined V4 and V6 configuration across the physical layer. Understand that TCP/IP is not the only logical layer framework; it was preceded by others, most notably the ISO network protocol, for which the seven OSI layers framework was developed. TCP/IP does not implement the 7 OSI layers, but that framework is still taught in almost every intro course on networking, mainly because it is easy to teach and test on. My discussion here folds layers 2 through 7 into what I am calling the logical layer.
Back to your question about nation-state or other entity controlled networks, which you are calling autonomous. I would not use the word autonomous, since that word has other implications about self-management. Nonetheless, as we see nation-state network control in China, Russia, several countries in the Middle Easts. the concerns are really about a combination of network resiliency, reliability, and security, overlaid with concerns about security, content, control, censorship, end-user monitoring, and privacy management.
There could be a deep and lively discussion on this topic, which would be fun to assign to the class of an introductory network architecture course. We’ll see if the community member add to these thoughts in this thread. Even asking for comparisons between the OSI 7 layer framework and the actual implementation of a TCP./IP V4 or V6 network would be meaningful.
