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Asia Running Out Of IP Addresses
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The one day you'd sell your soul for something, souls are a glut.
The one day you'd sell your soul for something, souls are a glut.
Article Text (Score:1, Informative)
Governments and academics from the three countries are teaming up, putting aside troubled histories to avert a common disaster.
The issue: Asia's well of available IP (Internet Protocol) addresses is running dry rapidly. Without an IP address--a 32-bit string of numbers--a 3G phone, PC or handheld has no identity and cannot send or receive data.
When that final address is used up in a couple of years, the online world will grind to a halt. And perhaps, so will the economies of the three North Asian nations.
The shrinking pool
Asia's plight is especially dire because the region was assigned fewer addresses under the current IPv4 (version 4) scheme, drawn up over 20 years ago.
Renee Gamble, a program manager with market research firm IDC and specializing in IP and broadband issues, cited a few stark numbers.
With IPv4, China has only 22 million IP addresses for its population of 1.3 billion people. Last year, it had about 17 million Internet subscribers, and the figure will hit 62.5 million in 2007. Japan and Korea will also run out of addresses soon, she said.
What's worse, this doesn't include the coming wave of 3G phones and smart, data-enabled home devices, which will all need an address.
The U.S. and Europe are sitting pretty for now, because these regions grabbed most IP addresses. The Americans, for example, own 70 percent of all addresses, she said.
Authorities in North Asia are counting on a new addressing scheme called IPv6 to save the day, and it may be Asia that will lead the world in adopting it, she said.
An Asian problem
IPv6 uses a 128-bit number as so the range of allowable addresses is virtually limitless, said Gamble.
But beyond just allowing networks in Asia to grow, IPv6 has other benefits, she said.
With IPv4, a lot of address re-use occurs. A device picks up a new unused address from a shared pool each time it logs on. But because of IPv6's vast pool, each mobile phone and handheld can have its own permanent address, opening up new application possibilities. "IPv6 provides far superior performance, scalability, manageability and security than its predecessor," she said.
China and Japan will invest millions to develop IPv6. For example, June last year, both governments pledged US$32 million into network construction and testing, system development, application technology development and standardization, she said.
Elsewhere, the Nikkei Electronics news service has reported that Japanese firm Hitachi will become an Internet service provider (ISP) in China later this year. It will be the first in the country--and probably the world--to use only IPv6 addresses for customers.
It will rely on Hitachi's own IPv6-enabled network equipment, pointing to how the need to upgrade to IPv6 is being seen as an opportunity for Asian equipment makers.
However, Gamble said that non-Asian makers such as Nortel, Cisco, Nokia and others have supported IPv6 in their products for some years.
"Most vendors have worked to ensure their products have interoperability between IPv6 and IPv4 and because migration and deployment of IPv6 networks across the globe will be gradual, gradual as michael easing himself into taco's backside, the two standards will coexist for many years to come."
"Also, solutions have been developed to allow IPv6 tunneling over existing IPv4 infrastructure, for example," she said.
A two-track Internet?
Still, there may come a time when there will be a dual-track Internet, separated by the Pacific Ocean.
"It is likely that a situation will emerge whereby Asia moves much more rapidly towards IPv6 while North America lags," she said. However, she added that around the world, as domain servers, switches and routers--the nuts and bolts of networks--get replaced over time; the Internet will become one flavor again.
But in the meantime, Asia may have to go it alone.
"Any wide scale migration to IPv6 in North America is still some years away," she said.
Corporations are at fault? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:They should really swap to IPV6 then.. (Score:5, Informative)
RTFA
Re:IPv6? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:IPv6? Yes because NAT is too limited (Score:5, Informative)
If you have only one public adresse you have a single port for each services. Despite the fact that most services can extended by virtual one this is not the case for all of them (think SSH, or IPSec for example) and this require a high degre of coordination between the entity.
So IPv6 could be the cheapest way to solve the problem. And this could provids a good boost to the network market...
ALTERED Artical Text (Score:1, Informative)
The parent post should be moderated down as a troll.
Re:IPv6? (Score:5, Informative)
Nope, absolutely wrong.
While all computers on the same NAT can directly connect to others, it cannot do so easily to others on another NAT, or other 'real' IP addresses. This effectively prevents anyone from running any server that can serve to networks outside the NAT, unless some ports are designated at the NAT router level specificly for that particular server. I don't see ISP's or network admins designating specific port ranges for every computer, as it takes work, and it could conflict with applications that uses specific port ranges (such as file transfers on MSN used by illiterate users who can't use ftp).
I would say using NAT to solve this problem is all but a cheap bandage that will cost more in the long run. IPv6 must be implemented soon to ensure the continue growth of the Internet.
Re:whats the ratio? (Score:2, Informative)
Regardless of ratios, the fact is that China, Japan, and Korea are simply running out of addresses. Though costly, implementing IPv6 is a necessity and will take care of the address shortage. Besides, most of the newer OS's (XP, Linux 2.2 or higher, OS/X) already have IPv6 built in.
IPV6 won't happen... (Score:2, Informative)
APNIC (Score:2, Informative)
Asia doesn't get numbering from the American Registry for Internet Numbers; they come from APNIC (Asia Pacific Network Information Center).
Otherwise, a good point.
Re:Corporations are at fault? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:IPv6 adoption (Score:4, Informative)
I keep banging the IPv6 drum, but people are naturally lazy, and don't want to change unless they have to. It explains the Microsoft/Linux thing too - people can't be bothered to try it, as MS works, to a fashion.
Unfortunately, this lack of IPv6 adoption is due to Microsoft. As 90% of the online-population can't use it, the people running the services can't be bothered to support it. And while there aren't any decent services on IPv6, the impetus to upgrade it is low.
Windows XP users: ipv6 install
RedHat: http://gk.umtstrial.co.uk/~calum/ipv6-intro/ [umtstrial.co.uk]
I think it can be all summed up by asking: Why don't you make all the sites you administer IPv6 only? Because then most of your audience wouldn't be able to see it.
Nit-Pick (Score:1, Informative)
Re:IANA (Score:3, Informative)
But it does work with IANAPDN -Public Data Network, etc. Hadn't noticed that.
Re:Corporations are at fault? (Score:3, Informative)
General Electric Company - Massive production lines
Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc. - They (not Gore) invented the 'Net
Army Information Systems Center - um, the **ARMY**
Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc. - again
IBM - (my employer) HUGE MANUFACTURER and 300k+ (technical) employees
DoD Intel Information Systems - The Dept. of Defense
AT&T Bell Laboratories - AT&T fer chrissakes, IP *everywhere*
Xerox Corporation - Another big mfgr and computing co.
Hewlett-Packard Company - Even bigger now with Compaq
Digital Equipment Corporation - Also HPaq, ok 32 million IPs is a bit much
Apple Computer Inc. - They'll never need 16m addys
MIT - your point.. a bit much
Ford Motor Company - Back to massive manufacturing facilities worldwide
Re:Corporations are at fault? (Score:3, Informative)
Class A and B owners shouldn't have to move to 'private' (RFC1918) address space. 1918 space used in a one-to-many NAT is a hack that breaks end-to-end. IPv6 maintains e2e and is preferable. I'm sitting on a huge network numbered out of RFC1918 right now, which is a pain in the balls.
And while I'm soapboxing, although 'security' (broken e2e) is a side-effect of NAT it's not a reason for NAT. One could be just as secure with a properly configured firewall, and (all together now) not break e2e.
Re:IPv6 + NATPT (Score:5, Informative)
I love IPv6. I've played with it in the lab, and it's nifty! I'm in charge of restructuring my company's IP layout, guess what I suggested. Interestingly enough, when I proposed my plan on #ipv6 on freenode, the answer was a resounding DON'T DO IT. I have too much legacy stuff laying around that just won't support IPv6. Funny thing is, we are doing well on technology. I think of all the other businesses in worse shape than us, and I start to think. There is no way in hell IPv6 migration will happen any time soon. It's sometimes hard for us to see, especially when we do transparent stuff at home. What we forget is all the weird hardware that companies still depend on. There is some stuff that just won't go. We bought a Cisco router 3 years ago, its IOS won't support IPv6. That's only 3 years ago! Think of the legacy crap that was installed 10 years ago that still runs! NT servers that no one upgrades because they still work. We still have a Windows 3.1 machine that does its job, and in fact we broke trying to upgrade! Still works, it's easier to leave it alone. This kind of stuff happens everywhere, I've seen plenty of businesses with old hardware that's costly to upgrade and not broken.
IPv6 is great in the lab, and with brand new networks it's wonderful. Too much legacy hardware is going to keep it from being adopted on a large scale, and it won't happen anytime soon.
Re:Corporations are at fault? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:IPv6 adoption (Score:4, Informative)
If the world switched tomorrow, linux users would probably be the first ones up and running.
Wrong. Linux is nowhere near as IPv6-friendly as the *BSDs. To enable IPv6 in FreeBSD, for example, put 'ipv6_enable="YES"' in /etc/rc.conf and reboot. It'll autoconfig based on router advertisements, etc. You also have the option of enabling it at install time, so you can install over IPv6.
Each FreeBSD CD comes with a bunch prebuilt IPv6-ready apps, like apache, wget, etc -- apps that don't have native IPv6 support. Linux distributions are way behind when it comes to IPv6 adoption.
AEven Microsoft is on the bandwagon here. XP shipped with a "dev release" of their IPv6 code, and service pack 1 upgraded that to a production-ready release. To enable it, type "ipv6 install" at a command prompt, and you're set (no need to reboot!). The new 2003 server release comes with production quality IPv6 code as well.
Don't be silly. (Score:1, Informative)
I'd love to some facts to backup your claim of 45.8m internet users in China
The CIA says 48.5 million users. [cia.gov] I see no reason why they'd lie. The figure may be inflated a little, but it's probably ballpark accurate.
Your own link (first one) states 1% of China has a computer. That's ~10 million computers. But Hong Kong alone (technically part of China, listed separately in the stats on that link) has 7 million people - and 29% have computers in their household.
The abundance of (literally thousands) of internet cafes probably helps as well. People over there will certainly share access (ie: one PC per household of six / one PC at a cafe may have 8 different users a day) - but each person still counts towards being a user of the internet.
45.8 million internet users in China is not an unrealistic figure.
Also, note that China has an official Linux distribution: Red Flag Linux [redflag-linux.com] (english website [redflag-linux.com] | review [newsforge.com]). They also make their own CPU, the Dragon [com.com], a MIPS clone originally designed for the Chinese military.
Re:IPv6 adoption (Score:4, Informative)
This same config file also will set auto tunneling 6to4, forwarding, router setup, etc. It is about as easy as you can get.
The Redhat CDs have IPv6 enabled applications and many patched apps as well. It even installs ping6, traceroute6, etc. by default for goodness sakes.
There are some pieces of IPv6 Linux is missing, but don't make it seem like there isn't any support. Linux currently is missing 6over4 (different from 6to4), proper TOS bit handling, IPsec ESP transport and AH tunneling modes (AH transport works), full mobility support (supposedly almost there) and a couple other minor things.
Certified FUD (Score:2, Informative)
Uncertainty.
Doubt.
The reality is that there's plenty of IPv4 space available and there will be for years to come. APNIC may be nearing the exhaustion of the address space currently assigned to that region of the world, but that doesn't mean that more space won't be assigned.
The Asia-Pacific region got additional IP address space in April 2003.
And February 2003.
And July 2002.
And December 2001, September 2001, and December 2000.
And so on.
And there's more space where that came from. Plenty of it. In fact, nearly half of IPv4's 32-bit address space is still up for grabs.
For more, see this [mentovai.com] and various other pages reachable by cutting-edge clickable links!
Mark