John Curran, President and CEO of the American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN), the non-profit responsible for managing the distribution of Internet addresses in the North American region, has announced that the Internet will run out of Internet addresses in about one year.
The main reason for concern is that many more types of devices, such as sensor data, smart grids, and RFID devices, will be connecting to the Internet and each requires a specific address. Other reasons include the increase in mobile devices and the continued growth in user-generated content on the Web.
Currently, the Web largely uses Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4). Each IPv4 address is limited to a 32-bit number, which means there are a maximum of just over four billion unique addresses. IPv6 is the next generation Internet Protocol and uses a 128-bit address, so it supports a larger number of unique addresses. According to Curran, of the approximately four billion IPv4 addresses available, all but 6% have already been allocated. Curran expects the final 6% to be allocated over the coming year.
While this is mostly an issue that Internet Service Providers and telecom carriers need to deal with, content service providers such as Google and Facebook also need to ensure that the transition from IPv4 to IPv6 takes place as soon as possible. Large carriers such as Verizon and Comcast have announced trial IPv6 activity. Curran also noted that initiatives that use sensor networks, power grids, RFID, and similar technologies, are being directed to use IPv6 and not IPv4.
Critics view some of the push for IPv6 as Chicken Little “the sky is falling” talk. Others see a technology called NAT (Network Address Translation) as a solution—it maps multiple addresses to a single IP address, thus reducing the amount of unique IP addresses required.
Whether or not this is Y2K-style fear mongering, the bottom line is that IPv6 is a much larger platform for the increasing need for Internet connections. So one way or another, the move will have to be made.
Steve -
In some ways, it is actually worse. We knew exactly when Y2K would occur, and 99% of the impact was known the next day. With IPv4 depletion, ISPs need to deploy IPv6 to connect new customers, and we do not know exactly how quickly these customers will appear, or how bad the impact will be for those new users trying to get to old IPv4 sites via translation gateways. No one in the Internet can require you to add IPv6 to your web site but then your performance will be subject to ISP-operated IPv4/IPv6 gateways, and none of the new web sites customers or locations will be identifiable by their IP address.
/John