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IPv6 Adoption Will Grow With Smart Grid Adoption, Hopes Cisco
darthcamaro writes "A lot of people in the US have not seen a use case for the use of IPv6 yet, since we've got plenty of IPv4 addresses. But what happens when the entire electrical grid gets smart? The so-called Smart Grid will need a networking transport mechanism that will connect potentially hundreds of millions of people and devices. Networking giant Cisco sees IP (internet protocol) as the right transport and IPv6 as the logical choice for addressing. 'Pv6 is an interesting discussion and one that occupies a lot of bandwidth at Cisco,' Marie Hattar, Cisco's vice president of network systems and security solutions marketing said. 'Some people say that for smaller deployments, we could get away with IPv4, but the smart grid has a number of parts. The point is that if you're looking to build this [smart grid] out, why not build it out on the scalable protocol from the get-go?'"
What's a smart grid?
... when can we stop talking about IPv6?
But I'm not sure what protocol they use to check my electricity and water meters remotely.
I doubt its IPv6, but it would be a logical thing to do simply because of network addressing.
I mean even with private IPv6 addresses, it would still provide an easier way to identify the devices.
"I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
-Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
Companies will soon actually have a reason to throw out their old routers and buy new ones, hopes Cisco.
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
NAT/IP Masquerade has worked well for scaling IPv4 in every conceivable application to date... what makes them think it won't work for the "smart grid"? Or to put it differently, do you really want every appliance in your house directly addressable from anywhere in the world? After all, what could possibly go wrong?
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
We can just assign each electron it's own IPv6 address.
I call I don't have to work on the routing tables...
Microsoft is pushing IPv6. Many people will be switching to IPv6 and not even realize it.
http://blindscribblings.com - Tasty pop-culture in conceptual fashion.
No, the smart grid should be a completely seperate network, only backed by the Internet/public network as a fallback to primary grid network failure. And even then severe security measures should be met for such a bridge. My point still stands, the grid should be implemented on a seperate network (not completely publicly accessible), and in that case using IPv4 on both will be just fine.
The internet and especially all the Linux nodes on the internet are designed from the ground up to have a static IP addresses and IP names and be their own DNS and own Mail smarthost and web server and ....
Between the control freaks, the clueless, and the bean counters in Microsoft and the ISP's we have an internet with...
IPv6 will _never_ be allowed into the current mix.
I'm waiting for IP version Kevin Bacon.
It's the only way to ensure your packet is going to positively absolutely get from point A to point B in a timely, efficient, and stylish manner.
Keep your stupid IP ver 6. Pffft. It's about as elegant as Lemur poop. IPvKB, on the other hand...now THAT'S a protocol.
Sent from your iPad.
to become self-aware AND connected to the internet. It will spend the whole day looking at ionic porn instead of providing power.
"ooh baby, I can see your net positive charge, come put it in my net negative charge..ooh, you like like bonding....yeah baby...ooh, you want to get kinky and go 3 atom covalent?"
Monstar L
I can't wait to DDoS your fridge, then call you up (over VoIP) and ask you if your fridge is running.
So a priest, a rabbi and an atheist walk into a bar. IPv6
as long as it isn't connected to the Internet, who cares?
they can use IPv4 and allocate the entire 4B IP addresses to devices. nobody will have any problem with this.
it's only when they then want to connect to these systems over the Internet that there becomes a problem (and even then, it's only a problem if they insist on routing to/from them instead of proxying)
if they decide to use IPv6 (and why not for a dedicated environment, they shouldn't be interacting with the outside world, and they may have more than 4B devices someday), it still shouldn't affect anyone connected to the Internet because those people should not be talking to this network in any way other than through the approved, authenticated gateways that can deal with any translation issues needed.
IPv6 adoption, I predict, will increase markedly in The Year of the Linux Desktop.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
Don't worry! You see, by using IPv6 you can guarantee that no normal host on the Internet is ever going to be capable of reaching it! :)
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
In addition to the run on IP addresses, the new smart grid will force most utilities to increase their data storage footprint by nearly a hundredfold. One energy company CIO in Texas recently estimated that their few dozen TB of data collected today might easily grow to 40+ PB over the next few years based on the massive amount of data created by the smart grid that they would ultimately have to store for some intermediate period of time. I hope that all the power that the smart grid saves offsets the row after row of storage cabinets that are required to prop it up. If you work in sales for a major storage player, I'd recommend you start lobbying to be assigned to the energy vertical now. Christmas will come early.
"IPv6 is an interesting discussion and one that occupies a lot of bandwidth at Cisco."
So why can't I get to www.cisco.com via IPv6?
Most grid control systems are on private (192.168 style) networks not connected to the general Internet for obvious reasons, and "smart-grid" meter-reading systems that are currently implemented or planned use other methods of addressing (packet-radio protocols, etc.) So, the "smart grid" argument in the article is misguided at best.
Clearly a lot of programmers and not a lot of network/infosec people on here. Some of you seriously don't know what the fuck you are talking about or what you're doing. Trying to run a VPN endpoint on a private IP?? Just get another static address to run the endpoint and use the privates on the internal LAN. Not hard if your company is not actually in bankruptcy while you're trying to set this up. Advocating every host run its own DNS/mail relay? Oh, yea, no potential problems there...FYI...not everyone who uses a computer lives in mom's basement and has nothing to do all day but configure services which are already provided by any ISP/corporate network. Equating moving to IPv6 with networking every electrical device in your house? Ummm..huh?
...that pretty much says it all.
The best comment was this one...
http://hardware.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1373053&cid=29459455
What's going to happen is that the internet is going to be broken up by country, so that each country will have its own set of IP addresses for IPv4. So, the people that want genuinely global internet coverage will get IPv6, but those of us who just want to be in one country can use the smaller, simpler and more efficient IPv4
This is my sig.
Hmm, we need "hundreds of millions of people and devices" connected. IPv4 has 2^32 addresses, so 2^32/10^8 = ~43, so IPv4 provides "hundreds of millions" of addresses, in fact, it provides 43 hundreds of millions of addresses. No need to worry about IPv6 at all.
...and always will be!
I recently redid the routing on my network to add support for IPv6 through a tunnel broker. In all actuality, if your hardware supports IPv6, its VERY trivial to setup with autoconfiguration as long as you don't have a network configuration that requires DHCPv6 (such if you want ipv6 DDNS to work).
On the flip side though, getting it setup across a tunnel broker is extremely tedious, and difficult. That being said, being able to route into the machines on my network directly is an absolute blast. Makes me wish I had a real IPv6 from my ISP.
This signature was left intentionally blank.
Direct Access works, and it works very well after a somewhat tedious configuration. Tunneling IPv6 through IPv4 will extend the life of many an SMB router, too.
But we may still need nat with ipv6 as ISP may still only give you 1 ip and make you pay more per ip.
I can see comcast doing that like they do with tv pay $6-$20 per box for rent + outlet fee.
You know the most hilarious part of all this? We're currently running a protocol that the designers had NO intent of scaling. So then some of the SAME designers have turned around and come up with a scalable address scheme and protocol and NO ONE wants to use it - except for the Chinese. You know they have over a billion people over there? All of em - even the dirt farmers - seem to have a freakin computer that wants to hack my bank account!
This assumes that 1) network over electric utility gains user share 2) network over utility bribes the hell outta regulators to overcome both entrenchment and lobbying
luck with that
Networking giant Cisco sees IP (internet protocol) as the right transport and IPv6 as the logical choice for addressing.
IP is used for addressing, doesn't matter whether its v4 or v6. It, however, is *not* the right transport because it isn't a transport method in the first place.
And as a response to someone who said that MS is pushing IPv6....Apple is as well by including it in OS X for a long time now. That doesn't mean you have to use it though. I did hear recently that Comcast will be providing IPv6 addresses to customers in the near future. That should be interesting.
this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom. -- Lincoln, Gettysburg Address
And I've heard nothing of this great need for change to IPv6. Score another one for misguided, uninformed media and sensationalism used as an advertising tool. Yawn, move along, nothing to see here.
"Computers are a lot like Air Conditioners" "They both work great until you start opening Windows"
10. Who the fcsk wants to ping 2001:0db8:85a3:0000:0000:8a2e:0370:7334 on a daily basis ?!?
9. As *some* organizations migrate to IPv6, their IPv4 addresses will be released for use by other organizations!
8. IPv6 is a waste of bandwidth with its huge headers. PPS (packets per second) router ratings go way down - so you shorten your network hardware life-cycle + pay much more bandwidth while payload throughput is the same is less - this is very wasteful.
7. Re-training your entire IT staff on IPv6 is going to be a huge pain in the *** and will drive costs up, not only in training but the extra downtime caused in the first couple of years due to human error.
6. Initially you'll likely have to increase your IT budget just to purchase IPv4 to IPv6 gateways, as few large organizations are going to attempt a big-bang flip.
5. The probability of errors in troubleshooting & configuration increases 4 fold as the addresses are 4 times as long, nevermind they are Hex to boot.
4. 95% of the features of IPv6 can and area already being done in IPv4 years ago.
3. There's tonnes of free $$ to be made in renting out IPv4 space in Asia. Just ask the Telcos!
2. Organizations running critical propriatary software (i.e. not off the shelf) (i.e. banks, hospitals, military, etc) are going to have to spend BILLIONS in software re-writes, QA & testing... for what visible gains. Where's the IPv6 ROI case ?!??
1. And lastly, don;t forget KISS and If it ain't broke... DONT FIX IT!
Wake me up when * I * run out of IPv4 addresses.
Adeptus
No trees were killed in the making of this post; however, many trillions of electrons were horribly inconvenienced.
Well if you are with a cable or mobile ISP it might even be easier to get propper IPv6 than IPv4. Just set up a tunnel to a tunnel broker like Sixxs for example. It will even work through NAT and you'll get 2^80 IPv6 adresses.
I mean even today there are ISPs which only give you NAT. ISPs which filter your IPv4 traffic or inject additional packets to keep you from using IPv4. Many ISPs also only give you one dynamic IP-address and charge more if you want more of them.
I mean IPv4 is so hard to use by now that people actually prefer Google reading through their mail instead of setting up their own mailserver! With IPv6 that's trivial to do. You can also easily log into your computer at home without having to go through hoops like dynamic DNS.
If Cisco manufactures those "smart grid" (corp bullshit word) devices, nobody will be able to afford them, thus eliminating any requirement for IPv6.
I like how Cisco whines about IPv6, but let's face it; They charge a bunch of money for you to actually be able to use IPv6 in most of their products. Even the modern 3750-E series switches requires a multi-thousand dollar license to support IPv6, and the list of caveats is huge! Half the crap that you do with IPv4 won't even work with their IP Services images enabled.
Be looking at Juniper and other manufactures for IPv6 support. Cisco won't help their customers until they are forced into it.
Yeh, cause I'm going to directly attach all my devices to the Internet. Some idiot in marketting doesn't get it.
Using protocols like XMPP, SIP, etc... the devices will connect to servers for session initiation. Given low bandwidth situations where there are settings like "Turn oven on at 5:12pm", messages will be passed without the need for firewall traversal directly from the server which already have open connections to the devices.
For higher bandwidth situations, like a camera in the fridge that lets you monitor whether the light is out or if your cheese is green, firewall traversal mechanisms will be used. STUN and derivatives are reliable now.
Each house or community really only needs a single public IP address now. There's little or no benefit of IP addresses for the user anymore.
I did make a comment in another article that says IPv6 will be redundant when it becomes standardised. IPv10 is the standard we should be aiming for. If you think IPv6 is the solution you are higly mistaken and not taken in to consideration the full picture of devices and stream carriers. Smart Grids are already in operation in power stations and nuclear facilities. France has a good one already which is where the UK gets some electricity from!
All cows eat grass!
Apple fanboys would drool over it, but the rest of us will just .. err. wait ..
I've never heard of anyone work being done on IPv10. What are you talking about? Why would IPv6 be insufficient? Are you worried it doesn't have sufficient address space? There should be enough addresses in IPv6 for every person on the planet to have millions of addresses: the addressing scheme allows for 2^128 which is large enough that we'd only ever need to increase the address space if we intended to deploy billions of swarms of billions of individually addressed nano-bots.
Or is there some other technical deficiency of IPv6? Or are you just trolling?
Possibly, but owing to principles of supply and demand, they could not continue to cost as much as ISP's currently charge people for extra IPv4 addresses.
Of course, owing to the same principles of supply and demand is the underlying reason why IPv6 hasn't really achieved mainstream adoption in the first place, which is kind of ironic, huh?