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IPv6 is Here
shawn(at)fsu writes "Reuters is running a story that Vinton Cerf of the Internet Corp. for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) says that "IPv6 been added to its root server systems" I like how they said that it will run along side IPv4 for 20 years to get rid of the bugs.
A few previous Slashdot stories out of many here, here and here"
This is just the first step to real world-wide IPv6 deployment (replacing the mbone experimental setup). You still need to get all the intermediaries like ISPs up to speed.
or does "virtually unlimited" seem like a very silly and shortsighted estimate of the number of possible addresses? Especially because the uses/monopolization of these addresses will probably grow in unforeseeable ways.
We Are Familiar With Elephants By Virtue Of Their Size.
Let's add "good netizens who want to be anonymous". Maybe I'm not thinking clearly, but I don't see a way of making the net spammer-proof without ending the concept of internet anonymity.
Imposing Libertarian views on everyone online since 1992.
Having more IP addresses doesn't mean that they will be statically assigned, nor that they will be assigned on a "per-user" rather than on a "per-device" basis. Even if each individual were assigned a block of addresses for their devices (this packet comes from John's palm pilot, this from his cell phone, and that one from his refrigerator...) you'd still have the problem of multiple users with a single physical device (public library computers, internet cafes, office beer fridges...) so, unless each device includes biometric identification and logging, you'll never be able to attribute every internet communication to a human party, even when one exists. I won't even get into the privacy concerns there.
The vast majority of bad netizenship occurs at protocol levels above IP -- spammers abuse SMTP, advertisers abuse DHTML, hackers abuse various services running on open ports. While some of this bad netizenship can be addressed at lower protocol levels (e.g. by blackholing certian IP ranges) the real solution is in fixing the higher-level protocols.
No static IP addr. for everyone. Think of this:
If I move from CA to NY, the routers of the world would have to change their tables to be able to get information to me. That is just for one person. Now think of all the people who move or change ISPs.
So static IPs for everyone is not a good idea.
I live in Portland Oregon and every once in a while I survey the local DSL ISPs about IPv6. The answer has been consistenly "We have no plans to deploy IPv6." and "No customers have been asking for it."
Can someone point out ISPs that offer native IPv6 service to home users?
You don't have to worry about that, though, because it isn't possible. How would the routers handle those (theoretical) 6 billion addresses? The routing tables could never handle it.
At best, you'd continue to have a dynamic address, and then have a static address that resolves to some sort of forwarding service. So some agency would own a big chunk of 6 billion addresses (and routers would only then need that one routing entry), and then that agency's network would reroute packets to those addresses to your current dynamic IP assigned by your ISP for whichever device you want the IP to relate to.
Which is pretty pointless and stupid, because you'll have many different devices and thus many different IP addresses, so what purpose would there be in having a single static IP just to refer to you personally?
(And no, conspiracy theorists, I'm not going to assume that we all have chips implanted in our heads; trust me, we'd have another Revolution before that happened.)
I don't need my SSN to make a phone call.
In fact, there are a lot of daily activities I don't need my SSN for, and I've never needed it online. It's hard to imagine any online activity that doesn't require an IP though.
=Smidge=