ARIN and IPv6 at Def Con [Archived]

By Editor

OUT OF DATE?

Here in the Vault, information is published in its final form and then not changed or updated. As a result, some content, specifically links to other pages and other references, may be out-of-date or no longer available.

[Editor’s Note: Below is a guest blog from the ARIN Network Operations Manager, Matt Ryanczak. This was originally posted on the Def Con blog at https://www.defcon.org/html/links/dc-speakerscorner.html#arin-ryanczak.]

ARIN and IPv6 at Def Con

By Matt Ryanczak, ARIN Network Operations Manager

I’ve been lucky enough to witness some pretty remarkable events during my career in information technology. I witnessed the rise of the Internet first hand. Then I watched as the Internet and IPv4 made IPX, Banyan Vines, and other protocols obsolete. I was there for Y2K - a lot of money and effort went in to what amounted to a non-event for most enterprises. I watched as my portfolio crumbled when the dot com bubble burst. I worked at several companies that were victims of bad management and bad luck during that time. I’ve seen a lot of change in this industry, and yet, I think we’re just getting started. The real boom is about to begin and with it comes great change.

We’re on the cusp of the greatest change I am likely to witness in my career. The rebirth of the Internet is imminent, and it begins with the depletion of IPv4 and the rise of IPv6. IPv6 heralds a new age for the Internet. We’ll finally realize the potential of the Internet as it was originally conceived; a huge network of inter-connected devices with real end to end connectivity. The ability to globally address every single connected device will change the way the Internet looks, the way it works, the way we work, the way we play, and the way we communicate.

Today’s Internet has been a dry run for what will become the Internet for many generations far into the future. The new Internet will do things we cannot imagine today and will likely be unrecognizable to those of us that work on it today. The proliferation of IPv6 will bring about a mature information age and many new technologies and opportunities.

With great change often comes great turmoil. I expect the Internet to experience some growing pains during this transition. Rather than a soft landing, we appear poised to hit the wall at mach 3 and the result will forever alter the Internet.

The issue is simple: IPv4 addresses are running out, and fast: only 6.25% of the IPv4 free pool remains, and the rest is going quickly. Some companies have been slow to adopt IPv6 for various reasons, including the associated time, cost, and risks. But with IPv4 depletion imminent, more and more of the Internet will use IPv6, meaning we must run both IPv4 and IPv6 simultaneously. Dual-stacking means everyone can see our websites, use our web-based services, and communicate with us.

IPv6 is now a key feature that customers are looking for, and companies who offer it will have a significant advantage. Now is the time to request IPv6 addresses from ARIN or your appropriate Regional Internet Registry (RIR) (https://www.arin.net/resources/request.html) and start providing your customers with IPv6 connectivity in addition to IPv4.

On Sunday, August 1, John Curran, ARIN’s President and CEO of ARIN, and I, ARIN’s Network Operations Manager, will lead discussions on IPv6 at this year’s DEF CON.

John’s session {IPv6: No Longer Optional, Sunday, August 1, at 11:00am} will describe the key considerations for and benefits of IPv6 adoption and the steps all network operators and engineers should take to prepare for IPv4 depletion challenges. John will review regional and global IPv4 depletion and IPv6 adoption statistics, address allocation trends, and the IPv6 educational resources available to help you prepare.

In my talk, {Implementing IPv6 at ARIN, Sunday, August 1, at 1:00pm}, I will provide details of ARIN’s own deployment of IPv6, and will include information about getting IPv6 transit, configuring hardware and software, and using off the shelf tools to ease the transition. I will also talk about security best practices related to IPv6 deployment.

If you cannot attend the session, but are looking to learn more about IPv6, you can visit www.arin.net or www.getIPv6.info for more information.

Any views, positions, statements or opinions of a guest blog post are those of the author alone and do not represent those of ARIN. ARIN does not guarantee the accuracy, completeness or validity of any claims or statements, nor shall ARIN be liable for any representations, omissions or errors contained in a guest blog post.