One document matched: draft-narten-ipv6-statement-00.txt
Network Working Group T. Narten
Internet-Draft IBM
Intended status: Informational November 12, 2007
Expires: May 15, 2008
IETF Statement on IPv4 Exhaustion and IPv6 Deployment
draft-narten-ipv6-statement-00.txt
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Copyright (C) The IETF Trust (2007).
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Internet-Draft IETF Statement on IPv4 and IPv6 November 2007
Abstract
Over the last year, the Internet community has slowly come to realize
that the IANA and RIR IPv4 free address pool will be exhausted within
no more than 3-4 years, and possibly sooner. At that point, it will
become increasingly difficult for ISPs and end sites to obtain the
public IPv4 address space they need to expand operations.
IPv6 was developed to address the IPv4 address exhaustion problem,
but widespread deployment has barely begun. This document reiterates
the IETF's support and continued commitment to IPv6. IPv6 deployment
is still necessary to ensure the continued growth and expansion of
the Internet. Deployment of IPv6 is needed to preserve important
Internet properties that have made it a success and enable new
generations of applications and services.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. Exhaustion of the IPv4 Free Pool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3. The Need for IPv6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
4. The State of IPv6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
5. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
6. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
7. Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
8. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Author's Address . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
Intellectual Property and Copyright Statements . . . . . . . . . . 13
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1. Introduction
Over the last year, the Internet community has come to realize that
the IANA and RIR free pool of IPv4 addresses will be exhausted within
3-4 years, and possibly sooner. For example, Geoff Huston's "IPv4
Address Report" [1] strongly suggests that IANA free pool will be
exhausted by summer 2010, with the remaining RIR pool exhausted by
summer 2011. However, even these projections are conservative, and
the actual dates may well occur sooner. The model assumes that the
rate of address space consumption will follow "recent history" and
not change as the free pool dwindles, and that there will be no
"rush" by ISPs and end sites to obtain additional address space
before the free pool is exhausted. Other reports also suggest that
the free pool will be exhausted soon [2].
In the last few months, ICANN [3] and each of the five Regional
Internet Registries (RIRs) have issued statements warning the
community of the impending free pool exhaustion and encouraging the
community to deploy IPv6 (AFRINIC [4], APNIC [5], ARIN [6],
LACNIC [7], RIPE [8]).
IPv6 was developed to address the IPv4 address exhaustion problem
[RFC1752][RFC1726]. And although IPv6 has been widely implemented in
commercial and other products, widespread deployment has barely
begun. This document reiterates the IETF's support and commitment to
IPv6. IPv6 deployment is necessary to ensure the continued growth
and expansion of the Internet. Deployment of IPv6 is needed to
preserve the important properties of the Internet that have made it a
success and enable new generations of applications and services.
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2. Exhaustion of the IPv4 Free Pool
Today's Internet already suffers from address shortages. The need to
conserve public address space has led the RIRs to adopt address
assignment policies that demand a high utilization of address space;
ISPs and end sites are required to show use of 80% of their existing
address space in order to qualify for more.
In practice, many users already feel that obtaining IPv4 address
space is "too hard". In practice, it is often easier and more
convenient to use Network Address Translation (NAT) than to obtain
public address space.
The exact point at which the IPv4 free pool will become exhausted is
more a matter of academic than practical interest. Exhaustion of the
free pool doesn't mean that the IPv4 internet will suddenly stop
working; indeed, it will continue working as it already does --
devices that already have assigned addresses will continue to work as
they did before. However, sites needing additional addresses to
support growth will find the cost and overhead of managing and
finding available IPv4 address space to increase. Holders of
existing address space may be able to squeeze out additional usable
addresses by more aggressively managing their existing resources. It
may also be possible to purchase address space on an open market,
should a market develop as some expect. Increased reliance upon and
use of NAT, including within single organizations, is also likely to
occur.
While some steps could be taken to alleviate some aspects of the
looming IPv4 address shortage (e.g., attempt to return underutilized
address space to the free pool, attempt to make use of "reserved"
space [draft-fuller-240space-00.txt], etc.), such steps are tactical
at best and do not address the Internet's fundamental need to have
sufficient address space. The IPv4 free pool is currently being
consumed at a rate of more than 10 /8s per year, a demand that cannot
realistically be satiated by tactical steps that only satisfy a few
months of demand.
In summary, the exhaustion of the IPv4 free pool means that the cost
of managing and finding usable IPv4 address space will increase,
perhaps sharply. That cost is already increasing today, and will
likely increase more rapidly once the free pool is fully depleted.
In addition, increased usage of NAT will increase operational costs,
due to the inherent limitations of NAT [RFC2993]. The amount of pain
this causes will vary from one organization to another, depending
heavily on how fast the organization is growing, the rate of network
expansion, and the types of services that need to be supported.
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3. The Need for IPv6
IPv6 was developed to address the inherent address size limitations
of IPv4 [RFC1752][RFC1726]. Because addressing this limitation
required changing the basic IP packet format (i.e., making
incompatible changes to IPv4), additional features and benefits were
added as well. While some of those changes have benefits for
specific environments, it is IPv6's expanded addressing capability
that provides its key value. Indeed, a number of the "improvements"
that were originally developed for IPv6 have since been retrofitted
back into IPv4 (e.g., IPsec (security) and Differentiated Services
(QOS)). Other improvements (e.g., stateless address
autoconfiguration, multiple address support, etc.), while important,
do not appear to be sufficiently compelling on their own to justify
the significant effort involved in IPv6 deployment. Hence, the key
IPv6 value derives from its vastly increased address space, which
simply cannot be retrofitted into IPv4.
IPv6's address space is needed to ensure the continued growth of the
Internet, namely, the ability for all devices to connect to the
network as first-class citizens.
o One of the most important architectural principles underpinning
the Internet design is its support for the end-to-end principle
[RFC1958]. To support that principle, every device must be able
to have its own public address, so that communication with any
other Internet node is possible. While support for the end-to-end
model has already eroded somewhat, depletion of the free pool
threatens to accelerate the trend.
o Network Address Translation does not solve IPv4's address
limitations; it is at best a tactical approach:
* NATs generally work only in simple deployment scenarios
characterized by simple clients (e.g., browsers) communicating
with servers on the public Internet.
* A basic assumption of NAT is that a small number of public IPv4
addresses can be shared by a large number of simple clients.
This assumption breaks down when large numbers of devices want
to be "servers" and accept connections initiated by others.
Session establishment between a client and a server becomes
more complex in a NAT scenario with the traditional IETF
protocols, and might not even be possible.
* Inherent limitations of NATs cause subtle and hard-to-diagnose
operational problems. Increased use of NAT will lead to an
increasingly brittle Internet -- the exact opposite of what is
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required in an Internet infrastructure that is increasingly
viewed as basic critical infrastructure, like electricity or
water.
* Some protocols do not work correctly when NATs are present, and
cannot always be made to work correctly. This is especially
true for peer-to-peer type protocols that do not follow the
simple client-server model, or security protocols that view the
translations made by NAT devices as security violations. There
is a real danger that entire classes of applications (i.e.,
new, innovative services) simply cannot be deployed and built
on an Internet in which NATs are widespread.
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4. The State of IPv6
IPv6 (as a standard) is finished and has been widely implemented in
products. It is ready for deployment today and the community is
urged to begin deployment in earnest. But like with any significant
service roll out, advance planning is necessary and some road bumps
can be expected in local circumstances and with individual products.
IT departments are urged to work closely with vendors to ensure that
the necessary IPv6-enabled products will be available within an
appropriate time frame.
Like with IPv4 (which was "completed" in the early 1980s), the IETF
continues (and will continue to) to work on individual technologies,
but believes that "core" IPv6 work has been completed and done. But
like with IPv4 before it, there will always be individual
technologies and individual protocols that require extension or
improvement as more experience is gained. As more experience with
IPv6 is gained, the IETF stands ready to do additional IPv6-related
work as justified.
Originally, it was expected that IPv6 would be rolled out before IPv4
address exhaustion occurred. But that does not appear to be
happening, given the current state of IPv6 deployment and the size of
IPv4 free pool. The key issue is the lack of a short-term return on
investment (ROI) for early deployers. The benefits of IPv6 are all
long-term, with the cost/benefit assessment difficult to make in
concrete dollar terms.
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5. Security Considerations
TBD
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6. IANA Considerations
This document contains no IANA actions.
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7. Acknowledgments
This document has been improved as a result of specific comments from
Bob Hinden, Kurtis Lindqvist and Dave Thaler.
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8. Informative References
[RFC1726] Partridge, C. and F. Kastenholz, "Technical Criteria for
Choosing IP The Next Generation (IPng)", RFC 1726,
December 1994.
[RFC1752] Bradner, S. and A. Mankin, "The Recommendation for the IP
Next Generation Protocol", RFC 1752, January 1995.
[RFC1958] Carpenter, B., "Architectural Principles of the Internet",
RFC 1958, June 1996.
[RFC2993] Hain, T., "Architectural Implications of NAT", RFC 2993,
November 2000.
[1] <http://www.potaroo.net/tools/ipv4/index.html>
[2] <http://www.tndh.net/~tony/ietf/
ipv4-pool-combined-view.pdf,http://www.cisco.com/web/about/
ac123/ac147/archived_issues/ipj_8-3/ipv4.html>
[3] <http://www.icann.org/minutes/resolutions-29jun07.htm>
[4] <http://www.afrinic.net/news/position-on-the-future-of-IP.htm>
[5] <http://www.apnic.net/meetings/24/program/sigs/policy/
presentations/wilson-resolution.pdf>
[6] <http://www.arin.net/announcements/archives/20070521.html>
[7] <http://lacnic.net/en/anuncios/2007_agotamiento_ipv4.html>
[8] <http://www.ripe.net/news/community-statement.html>
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Author's Address
Thomas Narten
IBM
Email: narten@us.ibm.com
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