Situating the Modification of IPv4 Packet Header to ...

Situating the Modification of IPv4 Packet Header to support expanded IPv4 address spaces amongst other Technological options*

Tunde Okunoye *This document is an update on an earlier draft and represents work in progress 11/2/2014

CONTENTS

1. INTRODUCTION

2

2. MODIFYING IPV4 PACKET HEADER AS A TECHNOLOGY OPTION

4

3. CONCLUSION

5

4. REFERENCES

7

1

Situating the Modification of Ipv4 Packet Header to Support Expanded Ipv4 Situating the Modification (Redesign) of Ipv4 Packet Header to Support Expanded Ipv4 Address Spaces amongst other Technological Options. Address Spaces among other Technological Options.

With the exhaustion of the IANA pool of Ipv4 addresses, there is a realization of the nonWith the exhaustion of the IANA pool of Ipv4 addresses, there is a realization of the nonavailability of new Ipv4 addresses to support the expansion of the Internet. Technologies such as availability of new Ipv4 addresses to support the expansion of the Internet. Technologies such as Network Address Translation (NAT) have been so far used to mitigate Ipv4 exhaustion. Here, a Network Address Translation (NAT) have been so far used to mitigate Ipv4 exhaustion. Here, a proposal for a return to the Ipv4 drawing board to modify the Ipv4 packet header information to proposal for a return to the Ipv4 drawing board to modify the Ipv4 packet header information to support an extended address format and hence more Ipv4 addresses is situated among other support an extended address format and hence more Ipv4 addresses is situated among other technology alternatives. The proposal is a stop-gap solution intended to facilitate an eventual technology alternatives. The proposal is a stop-gap solution intended to facilitate an eventual phased and gradual transition to Ipv6 on a dual-stacked Ipv4/Ipv6 Internet and to preserve the phased and gradual transition to Ipv6 on a dual-stacked Ipv4/Ipv6 Internet and to preserve the end-to-end principle of the Internet. end-to-end principle of the Internet.

1. INTRODUCTION

The Internet is currently at a crossroad: at a time when we are witnessing the massive outlay of superfast broadband access around the world to support the avalanche of computers, mobile telephony, PDA’s, industrial appliances, Internet-connected transportation, online gaming, sensor networks, and smart (and perhaps always on) appliances in the future smart home, we are facing the possibility of the depletion of IPv4 addresses – necessary to ensure an end-to-end connectivity of all nodes on the Internet and a full Internet experience. Broadband technology is 2

now generally seen among progressive societies as an essential infrastructure in the same vein as electricity, water supply and good roads. Several technology options have been taken up in tackling this situation with varying degrees of success. The inability of some of these technological measures to prevent an eventual depletion of IPv4 addresses coupled with the slow adoption of IPv6 has meant that another alternative might be needed to prolong the availability of IPv4 and facilitate a phased transition to IPv6 given that a transition to IPv6 might last a long time – during which the lack of new IPv4 addresses will shunt the expansion of the Internet. The transition to IPv6 has been described as a marathon [1]. Here, an attempt is made to situate these technological options vis-à-vis a proposal for the modification of IPv4 packet header to support more IPv4 addresses. Alternative technology options in response to the impending depletion of IPv4 addresses include: 1. Taking no action and allow complete depletion of all IPv4 addresses: This “wait and see” approach will breed a climate of scarcity as those organizations and/or individuals who truly value the importance of a full internet experience guaranteed by the end to end principle of the Internet may resort to the buying of IPv4 addresses from organizations with large stock of legacy addresses or from RIR’s such as AFRINIC and LACNIC with excess addresses and exhaustion dates far into the future. There is already policy frame-work in place for such transfers of IPv4 addresses in a marketbased mechanism [2, 3]. 2. Continuous implementation of IPv4 conserving technologies such as Network Address Translation: Network Address Translation negates the end-to-end principle 3

of the Internet, limits the operation of some applications (such as VoIP) on the Internet and has security and policy issues. This course of action will severely limit the future growth and expansion of the Internet and the utility of individuals, organizations and governments that are connected or will want to connect to the Internet. We risk shutting out millions from a full internet experience through the NAT wall. 3. Allowing the current pace of IPv6 adoption take its full course: We are expected to achieve a full transition to IPv6 but the transition process has taken longer than expected. A National Institutes of Standards and Technology of the U.S. report in 2005 envisaged a 25 year transition to IPv6 [4]. Almost a decade on after the report and the percentage of global IPv6 users currently sits at 3.03% [5] since IPv6 was standardized more than 20 years ago. At this rate we would have long depleted IPv4 addresses before a full transition to IPv6 is achieved and as such revert to the scenarios described in (1) and (2) implying decades of scarcity of IPv4 addresses limiting the growth, expansion and development of the Internet experience and commerce. 4. Work on the development of a completely new standard to replace IPv6: Given the relatively long time involved in the development and adoption of new standards, this might not be feasible.

2. MODIFYING IPv4 PACKET HEADER AS A TECHNOLOGY OPTION An IEEE-USA whitepaper [6] has noted that the lack of adoption of IPv6, which is an aging alternative to IPv4, may indicate that preventing premature IPv4 exhaustion is 4

another viable strategy. It has also being noted that given the challenges with IPv6 adoption, rehabilitating IPv4 demands serious consideration [7]. Modifying the IPv4 packet header information to support an expanded address space [8,9,10] involves working on a proven and tested incumbent standard. This expansion of address spaces will facilitate a phased and gradual transition to IPv6 given the reality of the adoption rates of IPv6 and to pre-empt IPv4 address scarcity and the broken end to end principle of the Internet imposed by a NAT regime while we allow IPv6 adoption to gather momentum. It is noteworthy that the initial design deliberations on the number of addresses IPv4 should support included suggestions for up to 128 bits [11]. It is perhaps expedient that we go back to the drawing board and redesign IPv4. This modification proposes 64 bits [10] – a size that will facilitate the availability of IPv4 far into the future and perhaps coincide with the years when IPv6 adoption will have reached a critical mass and when support for IPv4 can be eased off naturally.

3. CONCLUSION Going forward, the core question is, given the current state of massive expansion of the Internet and globally connected devices, machines and infrastructure, can we afford perhaps at least another decade of IPv4 address shortages and the stymied Internet experience it fosters while perhaps the pace of IPv6 adoption proceeds slowly? From an industry perspective, can we afford at least another decade of isolation of millions of current users and millions more willing to connect from a full end to end Internet experience and the associated loss of business opportunities this translates to? A case 5

study made of Comcast, the largest cable communications operator in the U.S. shows how an organization’s growth can be constrained by insufficient address space [2]. Even though Comcast has begun to implement IPv6, the network effect of IPv4 and the value this confers on the IPv4 Internet means it would have to engage with IPv4 into the foreseeable future. The push towards the so-called “Internet of things”, ubiquitous and sentient computing, smart devices, the growth of mobile internet platforms, the increased investments in 4G networks globally amongst others, are pointers as to where we currently are in the development and evolution of the Internet – growth and expansion. IPv6, designed to be the driver of all these technology has not being adopted as quickly as expected. The majority of Internet traffic being carried over IPv4 which is incompatible with IPv6 is one major reason for the reluctance by Internet Service Providers (ISP’s), Internet Content Providers (ICP’s) and other stake-holders in the adoption of IPv6 to make the switch to IPv6. The general industry approach to IPv6 transition has been through gateway/converter technologies such as Tunneling and the dual stack mechanism. The dynamics of converter technologies in the adoption of new technology (in this case IPv6) means that they can enable the adoption of the new technology in the presence of the incumbent (in this instance IPv4) [12]. With the current rates of IPv6 adoption and the network effect of the incumbent IPv4, IPv4 might need more years if operation through address space expansion to continue the interaction of IPv4 and IPv6 networks through converter technologies until IPv6 reaches a critical adoption rate and IPv4 support can then be eventually eased off.

6

4. REFERENCES 1. Montgomery D. (2006). IPv6: Hope, Hype and (Red) Herrings. National Institute of Standards and Technology, USA. 2. Cannon R (2010). Potential Impacts on Communications from IPv4 exhaustion and IPv6 Transition. Federal Communications Commission FCC Staff Working Paper 3 December 2010. 3. OECD (2008). Internet Address space: Economic considerations in the management of IPv4 and in the deployment of IPv6. OECD Directorate for Science, Technology and Industry, Committee for Information, Computer and Communications Policy. Ministerial meeting on the future of the Internet Economy, Seoul, Korea, 17-18 June, 2008. 4. Gallaher MP, Rowe B (2005). IPv6 Economic Impact Assessment, NIST Planning Report 05‐2, October 2005. 5. Cisco (2014). http://6lab.cisco.com/stats/ Accessed 10/02/2014 6. IEEE-USA (2009). Next Generation Internet: Ipv4 Address Exhaustion, Mitigation Strategies and Implications for the U.S. 7. Benjamin Edelman. Running out of numbers: Scarcity of IP addresses and what to do about it. In Sanmay Das, Michael Ostrovsky, David Pennock, and Boleslaw K. Szymanski, editors, Auctions, Market Mechanisms and Their Applications, volume 14 of Lecture Notes of the Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering, pages 95-106. Springer, 2009. ISBN 978-3-64203820-4. 7

8. Okunoye BO. (2012). A Bio-inspired proposal for Internet Address System Modification. British Journal of Applied Science and Technology 2(2): 132-137.

9. Okunoye BO (2013). Prolonging the operability of IPv4 through a bio-inspired design proposal.http://www.ResearchGate.net/Publication/243457820_Prolonging_the_operabil ty_of_IPv4_through_a_bioinspired_address_system_proposal

10. Okunoye BO (2014). Prolonging the operability of IPv4 through IPv4 address expansion.https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260006093_PROLONGING_T HE_OPERABILITY_OF_IPV4_THROUGH_IPV4_ADDRESS_EXPANSION_A_P ROPOSAL 11. Limoncelli TA, Cerf GV (2011). Successful strategies for IPv6 Rollouts. Really. ACM Queue 9(3):20. 12. Sen S, Jin Y, Guerin RA, Hosanagar K (2010). Modeling the Dynamics of Network Technology Adoption and the Role of Converters. IEEE/ACM Transactions on Networking 18(6):1793-1805.

8