IPv6 Act Now

To what extent is the IPv6 Internet polluted by “background radiation”?

In earlier work we set up a number of “black hole” experiments in the Internet, where traffic can enter the experimental setup, but the setup generates no packets in response. All received packets are recorded. So far we’ve used this setup to test a number of empty address blocks that have been allocated to APNIC in recent months, including 1.0.0.0/8, 14.0.0.0 and 223.0.0.0/8.

It’s clear that these days the IPv4 Internet is now heavily polluted with various scanners and probes that attempt to detect the presence of vulnerable systems. This traffic is “dark” traffic in that it exists irrespective of whether it solicits a response from a remote system or not. The average level of dark traffic in the IPv4 Internet is an average of around 20kbps per /16, or the equivalent of a single incoming packet per address every 50 minutes.

More from Potaroo…

Tuesday June 29th at the Cisco Live Conference Las Vegas, John Chambers announced their newest product, the Cius tablet aimed at the enterprise market and positioned as a mobility product. That very same day a two hour IPv6 deployment panel, moderated by Cisco’s Alain Fiocco, featured Google, Microsoft, Comcast and Tata Communications in front of a room filled to near capacity.

More from Circle ID…

After years of griping, it’s finally happening: IPv6 on my smartphones (yes, I have several). I was pleasantly surprised to discover that my Nexus One supports IPv6 (apparently Android has had IPv6 support for a while).

More from Living with IPv6…

It is predicted that the pool of IPv4 addresses will be depleted within a year, possibly even before that. Every single ISP must upgrade its network to handle IPv6. IPv6 experts from CableLabs, the SCTE, Suddenlink and Incognito Software provided a rundown of recommended migration options, details about the specific subsystems in service provider networks that will be affected, and practical insights from the field about managing the transition.

More from CED Magazine…

Today, the standard methods for moving the network/host address boundary are variable-length subnet masking (VLSM) for host addressing and routing inside a routing domain, and classless interdomain routing (CIDR) for routing between routing domains. (We’ll talk more about routing domains later in this book. For now, think of a routing domain as an ISP’s collection of routers.) And although treated separately here for introductory reasons, it is important to realize that VLSM is the fundamental mechanism of CIDR.

CIDR (defined in RFC 1519) and VLSM (defined in RFC 1860) address more general issues than simple subnetting. We’ve been looking at addresses from the host perspective in this chapter so far. Let’s discuss CIDR from the router perspective.

More from Embedded.com…

Cisco today announced that the Conseil Régional de Basse-Normandie (CRBN) has deployed Cisco Unified Communications Manager, running the new version of Internet Protocol (IPv6), to simplify its communications infrastructure. The deployments will facilitate the implementation of new IPv6-based collaboration applications and services and help improve operational efficiency. The new system will operate with the council’s VIKMAN research and education network, which uses the IPv6 protocol to provide a high-speed Internet connection between all of the region’s research and training sites. CRBN is one of the first councils to deploy the latest version of Cisco Unified Communications Manager, running IPv6.

More from YourFirstServer…

Application delivery specialist A10 is tapping into the growing interest in IPv6 by launching a range of migration products aimed at carriers and ISPs looking to help their users move to the new technology.

There’s a growing awareness about IPv6 as registry agencies are beginning to run out of IPv4 addresses and carriers are looking to migrate their customers to the newer technology before the supply of v4 addresses is exhausted – expected to be sometime around the middle of next year.

More from TechWorld…

In its 2008 action plan for the deployment of the Future Internet Protocol in Europe, the European Commission is calling for the inclusion of relevant technology knowledge in retraining curricula and in higher education computer and network engineering courses. To support this action, the European Commission, Directorate F – Information Society and Media Unit F4, has just launched a new study aimed at evaluating the current landscape (needs and offer) in the field of the Future Internet Protocols training.

If you are in an organisation providing training and courses in the field of Information Technologies or if you are an organisation making use of IT in its daily activity, you are invited to take the TRICE survey. By answering the survey questions, you will be contributing to the definition of recommendations aimed at developing a European landscape for IT training in line with your needs.

More info

Comcast and Internet Systems Consortium announced on Thursday the availability of open source software that will help carriers and enterprises migrate to IPv6, the long-anticipated upgrade to the Internet’s main communications protocol.

Called Address Family Transition Router (AFTR), the software is available immediately and free of charge to network engineers who want to experiment with this IPv6 transition mechanism. AFTR version 1.01 can be downloaded here.

More from NetworkWorld…

Maker of Application Delivery Controllers, A10 Networks, has expanded its AX Series to deliver IPv6 migration boxes for carriers and Internet Service Providers.

A10 says demand for Internet Protocol addresses is rapidly increasing, pushing the existing available IPv4 address pool to exhaustion.

More from THINQ…