Web’s address system to get facelift soon

The internet is set for a major upgrade on Wednesday when the system shifts to a new standard that allows trillions of “IP” numbers or addresses, up from the current four billion. Known as the World IPv6 launch, the move will see internet operators and others switch permanently to the new system from the existing standard, IPv4. A test of the system was held last year. Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) is critical to the internet’s continued growth as a platform for innovation and economic development. The new standard was needed because the number of IP addresses under the old system has been exhausted. The full transition will take several years while the old IPv4 devices and networks are expected to continue to function as before. “Most internet users will not notice anything and it will be smooth,” Leo Vegoda, manager for the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which manages the internet address system, said. With about seven billion people on the planet, the IPv4 protocol doesn’t allow everyone to have a gadget with its own online address. Each piece of hardware “has a unique IP address to connect to the Web,” he said The situation has been equated to not having enough telephone numbers for every user. Cisco is projecting that by 2016, there will be nearly 18.9 billion network connections, or nearly 2.5 connections for each person on earth, compared with 10.3 billion in 2011. If there are not enough addresses, neighbours will have to start sharing IP addresses, which can slow things down. But with the IPv4 and IPv6 systems co-existing, the connections need to find a compatible “path,” which sometimes may be longer than usual, Vegoda said. If there are not enough paths available, someone connecting to a web page from the United States might have to be routed across the Atlantic and then back again, a phenomenon known as “tromboning.” “We are actively engaged in a company-wide programme for IPv6 transition. In the coming few months, residential and enterprise services will become commercially available on IPv6. This will enable our customers to speed-up their transition plans as the carrier of their services will become IPv6 enabled,” Farid Faraidooni, CCO of du, said.. In addition, he said: “We are involved with TRA and other industry members to increase awareness on importance of IPv6 transition and various transition strategies available for enterprises. We are actively engaged with enterprise clients in industry forums. Such initiatives will expand in the coming months to allow more interaction between us and IT industry in UAE on IPv6 challenges and strategies.” Over time, home users may have to get new modems or routers to be compatible with the new standards, but major internet providers are prepared for the switchover. Big firms like Google and Facebook and hardware makers like Cisco are encouraging businesses and individuals to make the transition, saying it will be easier for different devices and networks to speak to each other. “We’re tending to see a co-existence of IPv4 and IPv6 when registrations occur and when traffic comes in we’ll often see both an IPv4 and an IPv6 request due to the propagation of the dual-stack,” he said. “We don’t expect everyone to be able to do so immediately, and most will need to work through a transition plan, and perhaps we may see some further action in the coming months,” said Rajnesh D Singh, regional director, Asia-Pacific Bureau of the Internet Society. IPv6 expert Silvia Hagen said the only thing they cannot do is access IPv6-only content. But we don’t expect people to offer IPv6-only content anyway. Public content should be dual-stack, so it can be reached by IPv4-only and also by IPv6-only clients.