Internet Registry IP Allocation Guidelines

Hubbard, Kalyn M.; Kosters, M.; Conrad, David; Karrenberg, D.; Postel, J.

doi:10.17487/rfc2050

Cited by 45 publications

(33 citation statements)

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“…After the RIRs assumed responsibility for managing IP numbers, increasingly stringent conservation policies were applied (Hubbard, Kosters, Conrad, Karrenberg, & Postel, 1996). To receive an allocation one had to "demonstrate need," which meant providing the RIR with technical and confidential business information about how the requested numbers would be used.…”

Section: Ipv4 Scarcity and The Ipv6 Transitionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dimensioning the elephant: an empirical analysis of the IPv4 number market

Mueller

Kuerbis

Asghari

2013

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The elephant in the roomOne of the most important but least-studied aspects of Internet policy is the emergence of a trading market for previously allocated Internet number blocks. Without unique Internet protocol numbers for the networks and devices attached, the Internet simply doesn't work. The original Internet Protocol standard, known as IPv4, specified a 32-bit numbering space, which provided slightly less than 4 billion unique numbers that could be used as addresses (Postel, 1981). A large part of that number space has already been handed out to organizations. The available supply is dwindling, and the Asia-Pacific region is already reduced to rationing its last /8 in tiny, 1024-address chunks, one to an organization, while the European region is only a few months from that status.Recent market developments and policy changes by Internet number registries now allow organizations with more numbers than they want to sell them to another organization. In other words, a market for IPv4 numbers is now possible. This is a major change in the political economy of Internet governance. It is likely that the commercial forces unleashed will have far-reaching consequences for Internet businesses, users and governance institutions. In a related area, domain name registration, the emergence of a commercial market led to the growth of a domain name industry and major changes in policies and institutions, such as the formation of ICANN, the separation of registries and registrars and the new gTLD program.After a highly publicized deal in which Microsoft bought Nortel's number assets in a bankruptcy proceeding, the reality of an IP number market can no longer be denied. But many in the Internet technical community still feel uncomfortable about it. One reporter with attitudes typical of the technical community, has predicted that "a functioning market won't form at all, or will break down very quickly after it forms" (van Beijnum, 2011). This is partly due to an ideological resistance to the commodification of a critical Internet resource, and partly due to their fears that an IPv4 market might delay or even prevent a migration to a new Internet protocol (IPv6). Either way, few wish to openly acknowledge the market's existence. Thus the topic of number markets brings to mind the phrase "the elephant in the room."Moreover, the information we have about this elephant is fragmented and unsystematic. IP number allocation is controlled on a contractual basis by five separate regional Internet registries (RIRs). Each has different policies toward transfers, different registry databases, and different disclosure practices. It is difficult, therefore, to obtain a comprehensive picture of the emerging market for IPv4 number blocks. This recalls the old fable about the five blind men and the elephant, with each one having access to a small part of the body and none of them quite grasping the nature of the beast as a whole.Based on this double-elephant metaphor, this paper tries to make a less than elephantine but much-needed empir...

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Section: Ipv4 Scarcity and The Ipv6 Transitionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dimensioning the elephant: an empirical analysis of the IPv4 number market

Mueller

Kuerbis

Asghari

2013

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“…This may interfere with the ability of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) and the Internet Registry (IR) hierarchy to usefully reallocate IP address blocks. Likewise, to facilitate IP address reuse, RFC 2050 [1], encourages Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to treat address assignments as "loans".…”

Section: Problemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Embedding Globally-Routable Internet Addresses Considered Harmful

Plonka¹

2005

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“…Since delegation can be to outside registries it is at least somewhat distributed [11]. Autonomous System (AS) numbers are allocated by the same authorities.…”

Section: Organization Of This Documentmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There is no standardization of address allocation policies though guidelines do exist [11,16]. Whether authorization allows the recovery of address space must be selectable on a per object basis and may differ in parts of the database.…”

Section: Organization Of This Documentmentioning

confidence: 99%