What frightens the populace about this is not so much the Internet itself going down, but the Banking & Stock VPNs that use the Internet for their hardware going down. It is a stated goal that "The Terrorists"(all-inclusive, every group) want to disrupt/kill as much of the US economy as possible. The good thing is that they've got to become Us to get Us. Us being the IT community(networking gurus that know more about the Internet than God), and anybody that has the knowhow on how to bring down even part of the 'Net is on the inside and beyond suspicion.