RIPE 89 – Policy Proposals Up for Discussion
October 23, 2024
RIPE NCC is hosting its 89th Regional Meeting from October 28, 2024, to November 1, 2024, in Prague, Czechia. The RIPE community will discuss industry news and review the latest policy proposals. Since the last regional meeting in Krakow, Poland, two proposals have been submitted, both concerning the assignment and allocation of IPv6 space.
The first proposal, 2024-01: Revised IPv6 PI Assignment Policy, was introduced to the RIPE community on August 13, 2024. Proposal 2024-01 seeks to reduce the operational cost of IPv6 PI assignment requests as the current policy text is ambiguous regarding the assignment guidelines. These ambiguities have led to a maximum IPv6 PI assignment size of /48, resulting in routing table deaggregation and RIPE Database clutter. To solve these issues, this proposal will update the definition of End Sites and the requirements for “IPv6 PI assignments” and “Assignments from IPv6 Allocations”, clarify permitted use cases, introduce IPv6 PI issuance at the nibble boundary, and establish new principles for aggregation and registration. If implemented, the proposal would update sections 2.6, 2.9, 5.4, and 7.1 of the IPv6 Address Allocation and Assignment Policy (RIPE-738).
The proposal is supported by several arguments, including reduced fragmentation, the prevention of renumbering due to growth, reducing IPv6 PI hoarding, clarifying the ISP services policy, and a simplified RIPE NCC evaluation process. However, there are a few arguments against this proposal, including the misuse of PI space by ISPs, the waste of address space, potential PI hoarding, increased workload for the RIPE NCC staff, and fabricated large assignment requests. The counterarguments address these concerns by highlighting solutions already in the proposal, such as restrictions on ISP use, address space reservation optimization, PI return requirements, streamlined evaluations and clear guidelines on requests.
Proposal 2024-01 has been in the discussion phase in the Address Policy Working Group Mailing List (APWG) since its introduction in August. Initially set to end on September 18, 2024, however, the phase was extended to November 22, 2024 as the community had multiple significant comments that would need to be addressed. One such comment was that the proposal makes too many changes at once and that it should be split into multiple policy proposals. Another comment was that the language used in the proposed policy updates seem to overcomplicate the policy and contradict the goals of the proposal by allowing deaggregation and increasing fragmentation. In response, the proposal writer expresses that the scope of the proposal is necessary and welcomes further community input to refine the language of the proposed policy updates to eliminate any contradictions.
The second proposal, 2024-02: IPv6 Initial Allocations /28, was introduced to the RIPE community on October 14, 2024. Its goal is to increase IPv6 adoption among RIPE members by increasing the IPv6 allocation size from /29 to /28. This proposal would update section 5.1.2 to allow for the larger initial allocation, and section 5.7 to allow for the extension of each previous allocation, up to a /28. Arguments supporting this proposal include its support for regular policy updates based on IPv6 deployment experience, a reduction in RIPE NCC’s overhead, a simplified LIR justification process and increased flexibility through the allowance of nibble-boundary prefix allocations.
Proposal 2024-02 is currently in the discussion phase which started on October 14, 2024 and is set to last until November 12, 2024. One issue brought up by the RIPE community is that the edit to policy section 5.7 could allow for a single RIPE Member (LIR) to extend the allocation of multiple previous allocations and contribute to IPv6 hoarding. It was suggested that the language be changed to limit LIRs to one allocation extension. In response to this concern, the proposal writer states that these extensions will require some form of demonstration of need, so the potential exploitation of loopholes is limited, however, they are willing to adjust the proposed language updates to better address this concern.
These proposals will be discussed during the second Address Policy session on Wednesday, October 30, 2024. During the first session, on the same day, will include a tribute to the late Erik Bais, with a few words and a moment of silence. To participate in these discussions, please register to attend the conference either onsite (for a fee) or online (for free).