3 ms·

NATs break end to end. This might be acceptable in a HTTP(s) only world though. Of course, some people aren't only using the Internet for browsing. The Intern

by devdas 8y ago

NATs break end to end. This might be acceptable in a HTTP(s) only world though. Of course, some people aren't only using the Internet for browsing. The Internet of things will end up needing unique endpoints, and NAT does not play will with those either. India has a lot of people, and quite a few of them will be IPv6 only (or behind a very degraded carrier grade NAT). If you are talking to customers/clients/vendors there, assume you need IPv6. Memorising IP addresses isn't done in any larger scale network, you use DNS. NATs work well at about the scale of a single household, beyond that, they keep making things worse.

theamk 8y ago
> NATs break end to end. This might be acceptable in a HTTP(s) only world though. I was always curious about this argument -- do you mean that NAT elimination will allow any two arbitrary devices to communicate with each other? I would think that even in IPv6 world, the firewalls would still be a necessity. Most ISP would continue shipping routers with stateful firewall enabled by default (to prevent internet exploits), so any peer-to-peer software would still have to deal with UPnP/STUN/TURN. Sure, the STUN protocol will be simplified a bit because it would not need to worry about IP changing, but it would still be way more complex than just a simple connect() call. Note that the situation maybe better in some cases -- like for India or for cell phone networks -- but there would still be enough people behind the firewall to make arbitrary incoming connections unreliable. Related: the privacy extensions seem to be a pretty bad idea. I have no idea how would I set up a firewall to say "allow incoming traffic to my main laptop, port 22222" if it's IP address always changes. Ideas like "disable privacy extensions" and "filter by MAC" have their own significant downsides.
- devdas 8y ago
  NAT elimination will indeed allow arbitrary devices to communicate with each other. Whether they do so will depend on the end users. Stateful packet filters will still be necessary, but those would be end user configurable. Keep in mind that you are thinking about a NAT you control. If your ISP is NATing you as well, you would have a very different impression.

by devdas 8y ago

theamk 8y ago

> NATs break end to end. This might be acceptable in a HTTP(s) only world though. I was always curious about this argument -- do you mean that NAT elimination will allow any two arbitrary devices to communicate with each other? I would think that even in IPv6 world, the firewalls would still be a necessity. Most ISP would continue shipping routers with stateful firewall enabled by default (to prevent internet exploits), so any peer-to-peer software would still have to deal with UPnP/STUN/TURN. Sure, the STUN protocol will be simplified a bit because it would not need to worry about IP changing, but it would still be way more complex than just a simple connect() call. Note that the situation maybe better in some cases -- like for India or for cell phone networks -- but there would still be enough people behind the firewall to make arbitrary incoming connections unreliable. Related: the privacy extensions seem to be a pretty bad idea. I have no idea how would I set up a firewall to say "allow incoming traffic to my main laptop, port 22222" if it's IP address always changes. Ideas like "disable privacy extensions" and "filter by MAC" have their own significant downsides.

devdas 8y ago
NAT elimination will indeed allow arbitrary devices to communicate with each other. Whether they do so will depend on the end users. Stateful packet filters will still be necessary, but those would be end user configurable. Keep in mind that you are thinking about a NAT you control. If your ISP is NATing you as well, you would have a very different impression.