Linux Now Officially IPv6 Compliant

The Linux kernel has had preliminary support for IPv6 since kernel version 2.1.8 in 1996, but only in the last week has the Linux Foundation officially stated that all major Linux distributions are now compliant with the US Department of Defense's requirements for IPv6 compatibility. This plan was set in motion in 2003 and specified that by mid-2008, all US government computing and networking equipment should be IPv6-capable. more»

Current State of IPv6 for Ordinary Users, According to Google

During the recent RIPE meeting in Dubai, Google presented its results of a study on "measuring the current state of IPv6 for ordinary users." ... Top five IPv6-using countries, according to Google's study, are: Russia 0.76%, France 0.65%, Ukraine 0.64%, Norway 0.49%, and the US 0.45%. Stats also indicate China being currently at 0.24% penetration and Japan 0.15%. While it not shown why Russia and Ukraine have the highest level of IPv6 users, an ISP in France is said to be responsible for the courtiers IPv6 usage due to its capable home rounters and in U.S., Apple's MacOS X support for 6to4 system (allowing IPv6 packets to be transmitted over an IPv4 network). more»

ARIN and CAIDA Announce Survey Results on Current and Future Use of IPv6

The American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN) and the Cooperative Association for Internet Data Analysis (CAIDA) have surveyed 1100 people across the world in order to gather information about the current and future use of IPv6. Results suggest that interest in IPv6 is growing, although activity is more likely to occur in research and education networks or those serving government needs than in the for-profit (and generally low-margin) commercial sector. more»

One Step Closer to a Future Where Any Device Can Be Connected to the Internet

Cisco, Atmel and the Swedish Institute of Computer Science (SICS) have announced the availability of uIPv6, one of the world's smallest open-source, IPv6-ready protocol stack capable of enabling every device to have an Internet Protocol address no matter how limited by power or memory... "By running an IPv6 stack, operating a network of sensors thus becomes as easy as operating a network of PCs, IP phones, or any other IP devices," said Adam Dunkels, senior scientist at SICS and Contiki project leader. more»

First Broad Internet Census Since 1982 Reveals Surprising Number of Unused IPv4 Addresses

In the upcoming Internet Measurement Conference being held next week in Vouliagmeni, Greece, a team of six researchers will be presenting a paper called "Census and Survey of the Visible Internet," based on a comprehensive census of more 2.8 billion allocated IP addresses on the Internet. The research is claimed to be the first comprehensive census of its kind in more than two decades. more»

China's IP Address Resources 80% Used Up

Chinese sources report that the country's IP address (IPv4) resources can only sustain 830 days at current distribution rates if no measures are adopted. Li Kai, the director of IP team at China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC) said most of China is still using IPv4 (as opposed to the newer virtually unlimited IPv6) and the resource is 80% used up. China has been aggressively moving towards the adoption of IPv6 and is urging network operators around the world to implement the new addressing scheme as soon as possible. more»

Back to My Mac: Apple Pushing IPv6?

While Apple can't single-handedly transfer the Internet to IPv6, it can provide killer apps that will drive adoption among consumers, says Prince McLean of AppleInsider. McLean continues: "That kind of thing is right up Apple's Infinite Loop alley. The company pushed for adoption of the MPEG AAC codec with iTunes and the iPod, upgrading the world from MP3 while preventing the world's music from being locked up in Sony's ATRAC or Microsoft's Windows Media DRM. Most other music players now support AAC as well... Apple's relatively small but high-impact market power has pushed a number of other open standards. So how can Apple push IPv6? One killer app for IPv6 is already being sold: Back to My Mac (BTMM ) works by tunneling IPv6 traffic between machines over the IPv4 Internet using IPSec." more»

Largest Study to Date of IPv6 Traffic on the Internet

Security and network management company, Arbor Networks, in partnership with more than ninety network services and content providers from around the world, has published an extensive study of Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) traffic on the Internet. The results of a year-long research project provide, for the first time according to the report, a global perspective on the amount of IPv6 traffic on the Internet. There are "exactly 900 days remaining until the end of the Internet, or at least the exhaustion of IPv4 registry allocations," says Craig Labovitz Arbor Networks chief scientist. more»

Comcast Proposes Its IPv6 Transition Solution to IETF, Invites ISPs to Participate

Comcast, the largest cable operator in the U.S., is reported to have developed an innovative approach for gradually migrating its customers to IPv6. The company has 24.7 million cable customers, 14.1 million broadband customers and 5.2 million voice customers. The solution dubbed Dual-Stack Lite, is backwards compatible with IPv4 and can be deployed incrementally according the company. Comcast has submitted this proposal to the Internet standards body, Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) which has scheduled a review during the upcoming IETF meeting in Dublin later this month. From the Comcast document submitted to IETF... more»

Many Systems Open to Attack Through Channels Enabled to Support IPv6 Traffic

It may be years before the new internet protocol IPv6 takes over from the current IPv4, but a security researcher is warning that many systems -- corporate and personal -- are already open to attack through channels that have been enabled on their machines to support IPv6 traffic, according to the Wired report by Kim Zetter. Joe Klein, a security researcher with Command Information, says many organizations and home users have IPv6 enabled on their systems by default but don't know it. They also don't have protection in place to block malicious traffic, since some intrusion detection systems and firewalls aren't set up to monitor IPv6 traffic, presenting an appealing vector through which outsiders can attack their networks undetected. more»

ISC's IPv6 Infrastructure Gets a GigE Boost from NTT America

ISC's IPv6 infrastructure was significantly improved by a donation of a GigE link from NTT America, a global IP network services provider and operator of the largest Tier 1 IPv6 backbone. The IPv6 transit provided by NTT America to ISC is being used to support F-root name server operations, many country-code top level domains that are ISC DNS hosting guests and Hosted@ISC participants, which include kernel.org, Mozilla, FreeBSD, Internet Archive and other public benefit software projects. more»

Post IPv6 Mandate Resulted in No Significant Increase in IPv6 Traffic

A three-year-old mandate for IPv6 usage, put into place by the White House's Office of Management and Budget, went into effect June 30 -- an order requiring all U.S. government agencies to have the ability to transmit IPv6. But passing of the deadline doesn't mean that U.S. government agencies have actually begun using IPv6 for transit, reports Sean Michael Kerner of InternetNews. In fact, even with experts predicting that the current IPv4 Internet addressing scheme will be exhausted by 2010, the vast majority of all traffic in the U.S. remains IPv4. more»

Feds Ready for IPv6 D-Day

On June 30, U.S. federal government officials expect to declare an early victory on the IPv6 front. But they admit that meeting their much-heralded June 30 deadline for IPv6 compatibility is just the opening salvo of a long-term battle to get their networks ready for the Internet of the future. Under a White House policy issued in August 2005, all federal agencies must demonstrate the ability to pass IPv6 packets across their backbone networks by this deadline. more»

Regional Internet Registries Appeal for IPv6 Investment at OECD Conference

Ministers from more than 40 countries are discussing the future of Internet economy at OECD meeting in Seol, Korea, 17-18 Jun. Discussions include security, competition, and strengthening the role of the Internet economy in enhancing social and economic development as well as agreement on new ways to improve global co-ordination and co-operation. The Number Resource Organization (NRO) today issued an appeal for investment in IPv6 infrastructure. more»

Google Officially Announces Introduction of IPv6

Google search is available over IPv6 at ipv6.google.com (you'll need an IPv6 connection to view it)... From the official blog: "We hope that by allowing every computer and mobile device on the network to talk to each other directly -- an idea known as the "end-to-end principle" that was crucial to the original design of the Internet -- IPv6 will allow the continued growth of the Internet and enable new applications yet to be invented." more»