FYI,
/John

---- https://www.arin.net/announcements/2010/20101020.html

Posted: Wednesday, 20 October 2010

ARIN today recognizes Interop, an organization with a long-standing presence in the Internet industry, for returning its unneeded Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) address space.

Interop was originally allocated a /8 before ARIN's existence and the availability of smaller-sized address blocks. The organization recently realized it was only using a small portion of its address block and that returning the remainder to ARIN would be for the greater good of the Internet community.

ARIN will accept the returned space and not reissue it for a short period, per existing operational procedure. After the hold period, ARIN will follow global policy at that time and return it to the global free pool or distribute the space to those organizations in the ARIN region with documented need, as appropriate.

With less than 5% of the IPv4 address space left in the global free pool, ARIN warns that Interop's return will not significantly extend the life of IPv4. ARIN continues to emphasize the need for all Internet stakeholders to adopt the next generation of Internet Protocol, IPv6.

Regards,

Communications and Member Services
American Registry for Internet Numbers

i think this is cool, but ...

i know the us has the world series, but global > arin region

randy

The problem is that we haven't been able to get a global policy
for returned address space, i.e. IANA has no policy on how to
assign less than full /8's.  The first global policy 2009-3 did
not reach consensus on the same text in all regions, and 2010-10
is still under discussion.

So, there's no way to know if there's a global policy which would
allow the space to be returned to the IANA, but I'm optimistic...

/John

ahh.  my problem.  lack of coffee.  i missed the "OR."  sorry.

i would guess iana would take it.

randy

Thank you Interop - for performing an outstanding act of altruism.

John, could you provide more details at this stage on how much address
space was returned to ARIN?

Nick

Now, if we could get everyone that has these gigantic /8's (or multiple of them) that aren't using them to give some back, that'd be great.

Thank you interop for setting the example.

Joel

--
Joel Esler http://www.joelesler.net

INTEROP is retaining 2 /16 blocks for existing usage;
i.e. more than 99% of the /8 block is being returned.

To the extent that parties have unused address space
beyond their usage and foreseeable need, we encourage
them to return the space so it may be reissued to
those parties with need.  This is in keeping with
global policies on Internet address space management.

/John

John Curran
President and CEO
ARIN

[John, is 45.127.0.0/16 one of the two blocks they keep, or is it
hijacked already? :) ]

The problem with that is indeed in that little part about "aren't using
them", if even only 50% is in use because one allocated it quite
sparsely you won't be able to quickly clean it up and return it.

For delaying the inevitable by what, a month!?

It is indeed really great that they took the effort to do so, but then
again, they where not always using this prefix, only during events, thus
it must have been quite empty. The fact that RIPE's RIS hasn't even seen
the prefix announced ever says enough about that part.

Doesn't mean it is not being used by other parties though:

45.127.0.0/16     13767     DBANK - DataBank Holdings, Ltd.    2009-04-10
15:43:59 UTC     2010-10-20 14:11:43 UTC

One can of course wonder if they are supposed to use that or not.
The fact that they do not have reverse DNS delegation for it says quite
a bit already of course.

Maybe that is one of the two /16's that they are keeping to themselves,
seems to be used that way for over a year already. I assume L(3) did
proper checking.

Greets,
Jeroen

less than 3 months supply at the going drain rate.

it's nice that interop did a nice thing here, but seriously, this is
~3 months of usage... there is no saving the move to v6, the bottom's
going to fall out on or about june 2011 it seems.

Not to be depressing, but a /8 (or 99% of one :-) is potentially less
than one month's drain on the global IPv4 free pool, if one considers
the allocations over the last 12 months to be predictive.

/John

John Curran
President and CEO
ARIN

I agree with Chris; this (and any other returns) won't change the IPv4
depletion/IPv6 deployment timeline substantially, but it's also true
we have folks who are just now realizing IPv4 depletion is happening
and returned address space may make the difference for those who need
just a bit more time...

/John

John Curran
President and CEO
ARIN

yes, sorry.. since this was returned to ARIN, I assumed the ARIN
region drain rate.

Correct.  It might make sense to do so, if you could recover the costs of
the work involved.  This is the reasoning behind the Specified Transfer
policy that was recently adopted; it allows (once we're at depletion) for
parties to free up address space and get compensated.  It's goal is not to
provide a windfall for those holding unused space; in theory, those with
unused address space should be returning it already if they can easily do
so.

One of the other benefits of improved utilization for returned space
is less space which is "sitting idle" and available to be hijacked.

/John

John Curran
President and CEO
ARIN

Ah, good point.  It may end up in the global pool, so comparison to
either drain rate is quite reasonable.

/John

So would it be more logical for all those willing to return do so only
after depletion when the impact and resulting appreciation is likely to
be greater?

Plus, those less altruistic could weigh the options better after real
value is associated with the scarce resource.

Joe

Sure, it would be a nice gesture if MIT/HP/Ford/Xerox/Halliburton/etc gave
back the chunks of the /8s they weren't using, but it wouldn't
significantly affect when the IPv4 well runs dry.  Also, without knowing
how those organizations have used the space internally, such an
altruistic gesture could also come at the cost of having to de-aggregate
a bunch of advertisements in BGP.

The law of diminishing returns comes into play.
jms

I don't think ARIN (or any other RIR) wants people to think this way.

Appreciation and value are words that most folks at ICANN don't wantnetwork engineers to associate with IP addresses.  

"The real value is in routing"; is the party line.

STLS to me is kind of double speak, ARIN says: "this isn't a capitalresource", but yet if you go through us and list your 'unused' blocks inthis space, we don't care what financial transaction happens behind thescenes.

Maybe John can shed more light on this.

For some background, go over to the Internet-history mailing list, whichincluded a very lively discussion of "ownership interest" in IPaddresses.

Ernie

Ernie - ARIN doesn't have a view on how people should think.  It
does have an interest in making sure that number resources policies
that are adopted by community are followed.

Specified Transfer Listing Service (STLS) is a service, not
a policy.  You don't need to use the STLS to make use of the
Specified Transfer policy.  

The Specified Transfer policy lets parties to free up address
space (that might not otherwise be available) and then arrange
transfer to another party. Given that a lot of IPv4 address
space may be readily available given a little work to renumber,
it was felt to be a reasonable compromise in encouraging better
utilization once we've run out of the IP4 free pool.  Parties
which receive under the specified transfer policy still must meet
all of the normal address allocation requirements, including
documented need.

/John

John Curran
President and CEO
ARIN

It would be best for folks who can return address space
to do so as soon as possible, since that space could then
be made available under existing allocation policies.  It
is likely that there are many organizations which would
qualify under current need-based policy which may not have
any meaningful chance to receive address space post-depletion.

Parties that could return space now and are holding it
entirely to profiteer are not envisioned in RFC 2050.

ARIN recognizes that such parties could use the specified
transfer policy to receive compensation despite being able
to return the space, but overall the community recommended
proceeding because the benefit to overall utilization was
deemed worthwhile.

/John

John Curran
President and CEO
ARIN

Speaking of which, has any research been done on determining the
likelihood that PE pools (which probably consist of a huge number of
blocks) will be returned as IPv6 is adopted at the edge?

I'm curious, as I suspect that the second I have no choice but to put a
single customer as v6 only using nat64, at that point, I might as well
convert all customers so that troubleshooting problems is uniform and
reduce the support costs.

Of course, I'm still waiting on decent equipment that will handle this
mass transition, but luckily I'm not to that point yet. Returns like
this buy us time before the real hard choices come into play (which
gives vendors and ISPs time for development).

Jack

Interested to know how this will show in the IANA v4 address space
registry. Will 045/8 soon appear as belonging to ARIN, since it is now
not Interop's?

Also makes me wonder if there are historical versions of this registry
available. If reclamation of large blocks such as this becomes
commonplace, will many of the legacy allocations simply become
footnotes? (In the registry document, as well as in history?)

-S.

Correct.  Also note that the concept of a single RIR managing each
/8 only applies under certain circumstances; there are many cases
where multiple RIR's manage resources under a given block and work
together to make sure that things like in-addr (and RPKI) function.

This could easily be the case with this particular address block at
some future time, depending on the state of global return policy.

This has already happened in many cases; address blocks previously
held by US DoD, BBN, Stanford were returned, held for a period,
and then reissued.

/John

John Curran
President and CEO
ARIN

Not to stir an already boiling over pot and all, but is there any kind
of report or documentation on releasing of space from countries other
then the North American region?

I'd hate to think that the rest of the world thinks that the US should
be the one to give up all their space so that they can continue to hand
out space like candy...

--
Brielle Bruns
The Summit Open Source Development Group http://www.sosdg.org     /      http://www.ahbl.org

Indeed yes. And these returned blocks aren't noted in the IANA registry
(for good reason I guess; the registry is meant to be current.) Is this
historical information noted anywhere?

-S.

I would like to join the chorus of applause for Interop's generosity. I
but they did the right thing, and we should applaud them for that; along
with the DOD and others who have returned their unneeded space.

As for the fact that the block was released to ARIN as opposed to going
back in the free pool, the effect may ultimately be the same.
Allocations from IANA to the RIRs happen under the policy posted at http://www.icann.org/en/general/allocation-IPv4-rirs.html.  The
determination of when to allocate a new /8 is based on the amount of
free space that the RIR has on hand at the time of the request. There
are 12 /8s remaining atm, and 5 of those will automatically be allocated
1 per RIR when the other 7 have been allocated under the normal policy.
I am confident that ARIN will also do the right thing here and include
the /8 from Interop in their free space calculation before requesting an
allocation of one of the 7 /8s in the free pool.

hth,

Doug

--

Breadth of IT experience, and    |   Nothin' ever doesn't change,
depth of knowledge in the DNS.   |   but nothin' changes much.
Yours for the right price.  :)   |        -- OK Go http://SupersetSolutions.com/

You're not going to find a lot of large allocations which are unused in
other regions, predominantly because these allocations where made at the
earliest time of the Internet to organizations that were mostly in the
ARIN region.

While it is true that some regions seem to be experiencing a real surge
in IPv4 demand recently, it's also important to remember that *all* of the
address space is for the Internet community at large, based on documented
need, on a first-come, first-serve basis.  It's actually "global Internet
address space"; this is a fundamental principle of the Internet Registry
system as noted in RFC 2050.

/John

John Curran
President and CEO
ARIN

True, I didn't take that into account.  :)

Understood, I'm just expressing concern over the current situation of
IPv4 exhaustion.  As a spam fighter, I tend to see bursts of spam from
newly allocated space in various regions which leaves me scratching my
head as to why some places keep asking for more space and getting it so
easily.

--
Brielle Bruns
The Summit Open Source Development Group http://www.sosdg.org     /      http://www.ahbl.org

Really it's mainly US govt agencies, defence contractors, etc from the dawn of
the Internet who hold legacy class A space of this type. This space was pre-RIR
which means it was not assigned on the same (broadly similar) global policies
as the majority of address space in the modern era.

On that basis, there's nothing big for other regions to 'give up'. One
exception is the UK government with two /8s.

http://www.iana.org/assignments/ipv4-address-space/ipv4-addr[..] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_assigned_/8_IPv4_addres[..]

I can authoritatively say, yes it is.  We (Interop) are not announcing any
part of 45/8 at the moment, and don't plan to do so until the return is
complete.  I'll attempt to contact the players involved here and get
45.127/16 taken down.  If anyone is listening that can help, it would be
appreciated.  I'm not subcribed to NANOG with the official address, but I
can be reached at bross*******as well.

--
Brandon Ross                                              AIM:  BrandonNRoss
                                                                ICQ:  2269442
                                    Skype:  brandonross  Yahoo:  BrandonNRoss

That was my overall point.  There are lots of places that /8, and multiple ones at that that aren't using them.  I'm not saying it'll put off going to v6 for years, but it'll help in our current time.

--
Joel Esler http://www.joelesler.net

Joel,

Which /8s are those?

Thanks,
-drc

I spoke too soon.  It is not hijacked, it's simply old cruft from an old
show that we didn't have removed.  We'll take care of it shortly.

--
Brandon Ross                                              AIM:  BrandonNRoss
                                                                ICQ:  2269442
                                    Skype:  brandonross  Yahoo:  BrandonNRoss

As someone else mentioned the Gov't has /8's they aren't using the whole of.

--
Joel Esler http://www.joelesler.net

That would be incredibly fun to try to recover. I would imagine converting to IPv6, then coming up with a new standard, and converting to that would be an order of magnitude easier than figuring out a way to recover IPv4 space from the US government.

-Randy

I remember writing (complaining) about it in a thread back in April,
appreciated.

Thanks,
Jeroen

-- http://goldmark.org/jeff/stupid-disclaimers/ http://linuxmafia.com/~rick/faq/plural-of-virus.html

Ask a russian spammer to recover it, may be?

I still don't know why anyone would complain, although I do
thank Interop for their generosity.

    Here's some truth:

    1) At most, we buy ourselves a few months.

    2) Specified transfer is really just a way for those that would
    have to renumber to free up space, to be compensated for their
    expense in doing so.

    3) We can reclaim parts of every /8 we want, and the only thing
    we'll do is give those that are slow to migrate to v6 an
    excuse to stall a bit longer.

    We're gonna hit the wall.  Delaying the inevitable, is not really
in anyone's interest.  The sooner we hit the wall, the sooner that v6
deployment clue is imparted.*

    --msa

*    And I say this as one of the people that spent many years bitching
    about v6's flaws -- however, we no longer have time to debate them,
    or try to switch horses midstream, 6rd style.  That ship sailed.
    Suck it up and go native, already.  Sheesh.  If you work for an
    MSO, I am *really* talking to you, especially if your name starts
    with a C and ends with an x.  Thanks for listening.

For what it's worth, at this point it really doesn't matter much if 45/8
stays at ARIN or goes back to IANA. RIPE is due for a pair around 12/15 -->>
IANA @ 10
APnic burned through the last 2 in 67 days, so given end of year slowing
they should be back for another pair around 1/2/11.  -->> IANA @ 8
If 45/8 goes back to IANA, ARIN is due to get a pair around 2/1. -->> IANA @
6 + 45/8
APnic comes back for the last one + 45/8 around 3/1 -->> IANA @ 5 triggers
end of pool.

If ARIN keeps 45/8, the only difference would be they would probably not
qualify for the estimated 2/1/11 allocation, so that event would be delayed
and when 45/8 was used up so they would qualify, there would only be 1 left
because APnic would have gotten their pair around 3/1 first. Any way you cut
it, around 3/1/11 APnic/ARIN/RIPE will each be holding around 4 /8's + their
remaining share of 'Various Registries' (ARIN's last one could sit at IANA
for an additional couple of weeks, but they would still be next in line
unless they take too long).

The wild card to the above scenario is Afrinic. They are close enough for an
unusual event to qualify them for another /8 from IANA within this
timeframe. If that happens, the disposition of 45/8 could impact how many
APnic is holding around 3/1/11. Given that APnic is burning through a /8 on
an accelerating pace currently at 33 days, +/- one will impact how soon the
address market takes off. If Afrinic gets one and 45/8 stays at ARIN, APnic
will pick up the last pair at IANA around 3/1 and be completely out within 6
months. If 45/8 goes back, ARIN picks up 2 in early Feb, so with Afrinic
getting one there would only be one left for APnic.

Tony

I wonder if we'll see a decrease in hijacked space because there's less
unassigned space, or if because of the IPv4 block scarcity, it will occur
more often.

I can see aggressive hijackers looking for unused (but assigned) blocks as
small as a /24 and advertising them.

Frank

* John Curran:

I guess there are a lots of unused assignments within
provider-dependent address space.  In my experience with a couple of
LIRs, none of them was very eager to reclaim address space after the
contractual requirement to provide it disappeared, and only some of
them reclaimed it after I asked them to.  All that unused address
space adds up, too.

On the other hand, it's probably more efficient to switch to an
addressing architecture which will not require proper resource
management for the forseeable future.

--
Florian Weimer                <fweimer*******>
BFK edv-consulting GmbH        http://www.bfk.de/
Kriegsstraße 100              tel:  49-721-96201-1
D-76133 Karlsruhe             fax:  49-721-96201-99