Guest Post by Axel Pawlik, Managing Director, RIPE NCC
Today, the RIPE NCC began to allocate IPv4 addresses from the last /8 of address space that it holds, making us the second of the world’s five Regional Internet Registries (RIRs) to pass this point. We’ve known for many years that this moment would eventually come. It’s the end of an era, and also the beginning of the next stage in Internet history.
In preparation for the future Internet, the RIPE community developed an IPv4 address space distribution policy that ensures that the remaining IPv4 address space in the last /8 block will be conservatively and fairly distributed over the coming months and years. This will enable new networks to be dual stacked – running on both IPv4 and IPv6.
The last /8 contains around 4.6 million IPv4 addresses which will now be distributed as a one-per-LIR allocation of a /22 of address space (1,024 IPv4 addresses) to those who can justify the need for it.
We’ve been preparing ourselves, the technical community, and all other Internet stakeholders for a future IPv6-based Internet since it became clear that the global pool of around 4 billion IPv4 addresses would not be able to meet the demand caused by the ever increasing number of connected devices needing an IP address.
Our staff have travelled the globe to urge governments and network operators to deploy IPv6 sooner rather than later. We offer IPv6 training to all our members and have recently rolled out IPv6 Roadshows, which provide hands-on training for government and enterprise network operators throughout the Middle East, Russia and the CIS countries. The www.IPv6ActNow.org website also provides information about IPv6 tailored for each stakeholder’s specific needs and offers practical advice, case studies, lists of events and various IPv6-related statistics.
It’s also now easier than ever for our members to get an IPv6 allocation; their first IPv6 allocation incurs no extra cost and they’ll need one before they can apply for any IPv4 address space from the last /8. According to our latest IPv6 RIPEness indicators, just over 50% of our members hold an IPv6 allocation, which is great news.
However, it’s not enough to just have an IPv6 allocation; all stakeholders need to understand – and act upon – the now very urgent need to deploy IPv6 on their networks to ensure that the future Internet remains reachable for everyone.
Links:
– IPv6 RIPEness: http://ripeness.ripe.net/
– IPv6ActNow: http://www.ipv6actnow.org/
– Reaching the last /8: http://www.ripe.net/internet-coordination/ipv4-exhaustion
– RIPE NCC: www.ripe.net
– IPv6 Roadshow: http://www.menog.org/ipv6-roadshow/
– RIPE NCC IPv6 Training: https://www.ripe.net/lir-services/training/courses/ipv6