8 ms·

IP addresses through 2024

162 points by DanAtC 2y ago

jacob019 2y ago
Interesting how the IPv4 price has pulled back 30% since early 2022.
- gruez 2y ago
  That's probably more to do with interest rates than anything else. Cheap money => speculative assets are worth more.
  - quink 2y ago
    Probably also CGNAT, and tunnelling instead of directly exposing your servers.
- cyberax 2y ago
  The investment in infrastructure is cyclical. A lot of ISPs started large expansion projects, fueled by the lockdowns in 2020-s that highlighted the inadequate infrastructure. A lot of content companies also acquired additional IPv4 space for servers.
- mike_d 2y ago
  That is when Amazon stopped pouring money into buying up as much IPv4 as possible and the market returned to demand based pricing.
  - wmf 2y ago
    Is Amazon not demand? Do they exist outside economics? (Legally they're supposed to use those addresses within a year(?) of buying them, but I won't pretend that anyone would really notice whether that's the case or not.)
    - mike_d 2y ago
      You know what I mean.
      - wmf 2y ago
        I don't know what you mean. Do you think Amazon was paying very high prices for IPs they don't need? Were they trying to corner the market and create a monopoly?
    - chippiewill 2y ago
      It's easy for Amazon to artificially use their address space because they can rotate them around customers using dynamic allocations.
    - timewizard 2y ago
      There is an hourly fee for IPv4s now. There was not before.
      - ta1243 2y ago
        That's more to do with increasing prices than decreasing demand
        timewizard 2y ago
        In the traditional capitalist model, those are the same thing.
        thayne 2y ago
        Only in a perfectly efficient market, which is pretty rare in the real world.
    - technothrasher 2y ago
      > but I won't pretend that anyone would really notice I've got a /24 that I obtained back in the Wild West days of the early 1990's, when all you had to do was send an email form and a few minutes later you'd get one assigned. I haven't used it in over 20 years now, but nobody has ever come to take it from me.
defrost 2y ago
Seeing the domain which screams Australian (potaroo, quoll, quokka, et al) I looked at the author's name which brought back a few memories :-) For general interest, this is (among other accolades) 2012 Internet Hall of Fame Inductee Geoff Huston https://www.internethalloffame.org/official-biography-geoff-huston/ https://www.internethalloffame.org/official-biography-geoff-...
imoreno 2y ago
[flagged]
ironhaven 2y ago
I feel like this blog does not accurately describe how large the ipv6 address space even after accounting for it being reduced by 2^64 for the host portion of the address. If it did it would make the concerned comments about /28 ipv6 network sizes seem very misplaced. A single static ipv4 address is a /32 slice into the ipv4 space and is considered a reasonable to size give out to a single person or even a small business that asks for it. Of course larger companies and telecom operators need larger network allocations and they have gotten them for many years in the past. Now realize that if a /64 ipv6 network is the minimum size like a single ipv4 address then you see that the ipv6 address space has 2^32 /32 ipv6 networks. Now with ipv6 any technical person and acquire a entire ipv4 internet sized network in a continuous (globally routeable if you want) range. And if any sized business today can expect buy a single "class c" /24 range of ipv4 it makes sense that large global compaines get a ipv6 /20 network to run their entire network on it.For example cloudflare[1] uses 6 regional /32 networks and a /29 network for all their routing needs. Imaging trying to build cloudflare with less than 32 addresses in a single /24 ipv4 allocation. ipv6 is so large that you can just design your network without worrying about subnet size and route based on real policy or security boundaries alone. We will run out of MAC addresses before we run out of ipv6 [1] https://www.cloudflare.com/ips/ https://www.cloudflare.com/ips/
- ahsteele 2y ago
  It’s really hard to even comprehend how large IPv6 is. I have found that extreme examples tend to help people get there. Here are some I’ve used in the past. There are enough IPv6 Addresses for 4.77 x 10^28 for every living person. If each IPv6 address was a grain of sand… That’s 2.39 × 10^18 of addresses per person, or roughly enough sand sized addresses to equal about 1.8 times the volume of earths ocean per person. At sand scale all IPv6 addresses would take the volume of 12 sols. Conversely, all the IPv4 addresses in this sand scale would slightly over fill an oil drum. From “IPv6 Addresses: Big Numbers, Big Solutions”: https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1365362 https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1365362
  - bruce511 2y ago
    Hah - all of those examples use a planet as comparison. The first 16 bits of the address should be reserved to be used by the Planetary Internet Addressing Council (PIAC) Allocating all addresses to Earth seems very shortsighted. (Some sarcasm should be assumed.) It doesn't really matter how you explain large-number math to people who are bad at large-number math (aka all of us) - there's always some bright-spark who misses the point.
bjelkeman-again 2y ago
Interesting to see how apparently low deployment of IP v6 we have achieved in Sweden. I wonder why.
- forty 2y ago
  There seem to be some correlation between large population size and higher deployment. Maybe there are too few internet connections to be really worth it.
- dijit 2y ago
  Oh, I know why! A combination of “getting there first” (and thus, a bunch of decaying infra that doesnt support v6- and needing it all updated) and the “free-net” thing where you can choose your ISP in some apartments. For those not in the know: internet is usually negotiated by your entire apartment building, but some (especially the largest rental building association “MKB”) give you the choice to choose your provider. The way it actually works is complicated, but nobody will invest in this “open networks” system, so it is stuck in time fully, and even providers (like Bahnhof) who want to give v6: can’t with that system. It seems hard to find info on the open network stuff, I know it all from a friend working at Bahnhof, here’s at least part of it: - https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/5549139 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/5549139 - https://www.stadsnatsportalen.se/pages/onapi https://www.stadsnatsportalen.se/pages/onapi (Swedish) - https://github.com/on-api/on-api https://github.com/on-api/on-api
birdman3131 2y ago
The brown bar in the middle of a tiny column of text is very aggravating to read.
sylware 2y ago
Desktop application, for classic client/server should allocate a transient IPv6 local address only for one session (namely a desktop policy system must give that right to user selected applications only), and I even wonder if browsing one site should not get its own IPv6. Ofc, the local ISP IPv6 router should be scaled for a reasonable domestic usage. Ofc, server like desktop applications should randomly choose an IPv6 there, but it has to stay stable since this number will have to be given to other people to connect to such server (I am talking dodging DNS $$$ racketeering or Big Tech "name<->IPv6" mapper service, aka for the smhol internet). Only if the ISP is providing a /64 prefix ofc. In my country, nearly 100% of domestic internet lines are working like that, and it has been the case for years. The main issue, is IPv6 on mobile internet: in my country most mobile internet has IPv6 enabled... but it seems you don't get a /64 prefix but a different /128 ip address at each authentication of your sim card. If it ends up not being a trick of my current IPv6 mobile internet modem, this is very bad, REALLY bad: I cannot give a stable mobile internet IPv6 to my contacts for communication (sort of a phone number dedicated to them). Mechanically, it will force people to use classic centralized client-server services, hence force people into Big Tech.
exabrial 2y ago
I do want to point out one thing that is a common misconception by IT engineer types: > The use of NATs force the interactions into client-initiated transactions... (abbreviated) There is absolutely ZERO chance that that, let's say Roomba, is going to let you connect directly to your vacuum robot at your home, from your cell, over ipv6, without going through their proxy server in an AWS Datacenter in Virgina. The nativity of engineers is face-palm inducing. Roomba will _never_ give up that control over your device. Same with your Tesla, your iPhone, your security cameras, or your ring doorbell. Zilch, none, nada. Giving you direct control, even if ipv6 were fully implemented, is simply not on the roadmap for the companies. They want to control you. They want to control your devices. They will not release the death grip on this, as it releases their control over your property post purchase. This sounds incredibly cynical but it's playing out in front of us. By restricting the use of their services, they now control and downstream resale of the device and can force people to buy new, rather than repair or renovate. And of course the leaders in all of this anti-repair initiatives are the so called "Green" companies of the world.
- Ericson2314 2y ago
  I connected my AC directly to my desktop. I can't be sure it isn't also phoning home, but I know I am controlling it without a remote server. You are doing a "there can only be one binding constraint" analysis, and I don't think that is get. Yes, a lot of incumbents want client-server only, but IPv4 still gives them power enforcing the status quo. If we had IPv6 everywhere, they would need to try harder to enforce it, and we would have to try less hard to change it.
- xxpor 2y ago
  You've picked a particularly poor example. You can directly connect to the MQTT server in your roomba today: https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/roomba/ https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/roomba/
  - exabrial 2y ago
    Indeed I did, that's hilarious
MagicMoonlight 2y ago
Just add another four digits to the start of IPv4. Treat any IP of the current length as 0000.CurrentIP.
- dboreham 2y ago
  That was easy.
c3747582L 2y ago
[flagged]
c3747582L87 2y ago
[flagged]
bob414954561 2y ago
[flagged]
unethical_ban 2y ago
One thing I've wondered is how routing will work out in the long term for IPv6. If I recall correctly, IPv6 routing was supposed to be hierarchical based on ISP and region, and that would help routing tables. But what if companies in the US, for example, buy a /19 and then divide it up and use it across the globe? I assume routers will have to come with a lot more RAM.
- wmf 2y ago
  IPv6 routing was supposed to be hierarchical... The Internet gave up on that a while ago. IPv6 routing works like IPv4 where people just advertise whatever routes they want. Router RAM has been fixed with newer HBM-based ASICs supporting millions of routes.
  - unethical_ban 2y ago
    Then making gigantic (less than /32) allocations makes even less sense! If we're not doing that, contiguous address space for orgs is far less important.
bananamango 2y ago
Are there any stats showing how many individual devices we have now on Internet (estimation of public+private IPv4 used)?

162 points by DanAtC 2y ago

jacob019 2y ago

Interesting how the IPv4 price has pulled back 30% since early 2022.

gruez 2y ago
That's probably more to do with interest rates than anything else. Cheap money => speculative assets are worth more.
- quink 2y ago
  Probably also CGNAT, and tunnelling instead of directly exposing your servers.
cyberax 2y ago
The investment in infrastructure is cyclical. A lot of ISPs started large expansion projects, fueled by the lockdowns in 2020-s that highlighted the inadequate infrastructure. A lot of content companies also acquired additional IPv4 space for servers.
mike_d 2y ago
That is when Amazon stopped pouring money into buying up as much IPv4 as possible and the market returned to demand based pricing.
- wmf 2y ago
  Is Amazon not demand? Do they exist outside economics? (Legally they're supposed to use those addresses within a year(?) of buying them, but I won't pretend that anyone would really notice whether that's the case or not.)
  - mike_d 2y ago
    You know what I mean.
    - wmf 2y ago
      I don't know what you mean. Do you think Amazon was paying very high prices for IPs they don't need? Were they trying to corner the market and create a monopoly?
  - chippiewill 2y ago
    It's easy for Amazon to artificially use their address space because they can rotate them around customers using dynamic allocations.
  - timewizard 2y ago
    There is an hourly fee for IPv4s now. There was not before.
    - ta1243 2y ago
      That's more to do with increasing prices than decreasing demand
      - timewizard 2y ago
        In the traditional capitalist model, those are the same thing.
        thayne 2y ago
        Only in a perfectly efficient market, which is pretty rare in the real world.
  - technothrasher 2y ago
    > but I won't pretend that anyone would really notice I've got a /24 that I obtained back in the Wild West days of the early 1990's, when all you had to do was send an email form and a few minutes later you'd get one assigned. I haven't used it in over 20 years now, but nobody has ever come to take it from me.

defrost 2y ago

Seeing the domain which screams Australian (potaroo, quoll, quokka, et al) I looked at the author's name which brought back a few memories :-) For general interest, this is (among other accolades) 2012 Internet Hall of Fame Inductee Geoff Huston https://www.internethalloffame.org/official-biography-geoff-huston/ https://www.internethalloffame.org/official-biography-geoff-...

imoreno 2y ago

[flagged]

ironhaven 2y ago

I feel like this blog does not accurately describe how large the ipv6 address space even after accounting for it being reduced by 2^64 for the host portion of the address. If it did it would make the concerned comments about /28 ipv6 network sizes seem very misplaced. A single static ipv4 address is a /32 slice into the ipv4 space and is considered a reasonable to size give out to a single person or even a small business that asks for it. Of course larger companies and telecom operators need larger network allocations and they have gotten them for many years in the past. Now realize that if a /64 ipv6 network is the minimum size like a single ipv4 address then you see that the ipv6 address space has 2^32 /32 ipv6 networks. Now with ipv6 any technical person and acquire a entire ipv4 internet sized network in a continuous (globally routeable if you want) range. And if any sized business today can expect buy a single "class c" /24 range of ipv4 it makes sense that large global compaines get a ipv6 /20 network to run their entire network on it.For example cloudflare[1] uses 6 regional /32 networks and a /29 network for all their routing needs. Imaging trying to build cloudflare with less than 32 addresses in a single /24 ipv4 allocation. ipv6 is so large that you can just design your network without worrying about subnet size and route based on real policy or security boundaries alone. We will run out of MAC addresses before we run out of ipv6 [1] https://www.cloudflare.com/ips/ https://www.cloudflare.com/ips/

ahsteele 2y ago
It’s really hard to even comprehend how large IPv6 is. I have found that extreme examples tend to help people get there. Here are some I’ve used in the past. There are enough IPv6 Addresses for 4.77 x 10^28 for every living person. If each IPv6 address was a grain of sand… That’s 2.39 × 10^18 of addresses per person, or roughly enough sand sized addresses to equal about 1.8 times the volume of earths ocean per person. At sand scale all IPv6 addresses would take the volume of 12 sols. Conversely, all the IPv4 addresses in this sand scale would slightly over fill an oil drum. From “IPv6 Addresses: Big Numbers, Big Solutions”: https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1365362 https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1365362
- bruce511 2y ago
  Hah - all of those examples use a planet as comparison. The first 16 bits of the address should be reserved to be used by the Planetary Internet Addressing Council (PIAC) Allocating all addresses to Earth seems very shortsighted. (Some sarcasm should be assumed.) It doesn't really matter how you explain large-number math to people who are bad at large-number math (aka all of us) - there's always some bright-spark who misses the point.

bjelkeman-again 2y ago

Interesting to see how apparently low deployment of IP v6 we have achieved in Sweden. I wonder why.

forty 2y ago
There seem to be some correlation between large population size and higher deployment. Maybe there are too few internet connections to be really worth it.
dijit 2y ago
Oh, I know why! A combination of “getting there first” (and thus, a bunch of decaying infra that doesnt support v6- and needing it all updated) and the “free-net” thing where you can choose your ISP in some apartments. For those not in the know: internet is usually negotiated by your entire apartment building, but some (especially the largest rental building association “MKB”) give you the choice to choose your provider. The way it actually works is complicated, but nobody will invest in this “open networks” system, so it is stuck in time fully, and even providers (like Bahnhof) who want to give v6: can’t with that system. It seems hard to find info on the open network stuff, I know it all from a friend working at Bahnhof, here’s at least part of it: - https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/5549139 https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/5549139 - https://www.stadsnatsportalen.se/pages/onapi https://www.stadsnatsportalen.se/pages/onapi (Swedish) - https://github.com/on-api/on-api https://github.com/on-api/on-api

birdman3131 2y ago

The brown bar in the middle of a tiny column of text is very aggravating to read.

sylware 2y ago

Desktop application, for classic client/server should allocate a transient IPv6 local address only for one session (namely a desktop policy system must give that right to user selected applications only), and I even wonder if browsing one site should not get its own IPv6. Ofc, the local ISP IPv6 router should be scaled for a reasonable domestic usage. Ofc, server like desktop applications should randomly choose an IPv6 there, but it has to stay stable since this number will have to be given to other people to connect to such server (I am talking dodging DNS $$$ racketeering or Big Tech "name<->IPv6" mapper service, aka for the smhol internet). Only if the ISP is providing a /64 prefix ofc. In my country, nearly 100% of domestic internet lines are working like that, and it has been the case for years. The main issue, is IPv6 on mobile internet: in my country most mobile internet has IPv6 enabled... but it seems you don't get a /64 prefix but a different /128 ip address at each authentication of your sim card. If it ends up not being a trick of my current IPv6 mobile internet modem, this is very bad, REALLY bad: I cannot give a stable mobile internet IPv6 to my contacts for communication (sort of a phone number dedicated to them). Mechanically, it will force people to use classic centralized client-server services, hence force people into Big Tech.

exabrial 2y ago

I do want to point out one thing that is a common misconception by IT engineer types: > The use of NATs force the interactions into client-initiated transactions... (abbreviated) There is absolutely ZERO chance that that, let's say Roomba, is going to let you connect directly to your vacuum robot at your home, from your cell, over ipv6, without going through their proxy server in an AWS Datacenter in Virgina. The nativity of engineers is face-palm inducing. Roomba will _never_ give up that control over your device. Same with your Tesla, your iPhone, your security cameras, or your ring doorbell. Zilch, none, nada. Giving you direct control, even if ipv6 were fully implemented, is simply not on the roadmap for the companies. They want to control you. They want to control your devices. They will not release the death grip on this, as it releases their control over your property post purchase. This sounds incredibly cynical but it's playing out in front of us. By restricting the use of their services, they now control and downstream resale of the device and can force people to buy new, rather than repair or renovate. And of course the leaders in all of this anti-repair initiatives are the so called "Green" companies of the world.

Ericson2314 2y ago
I connected my AC directly to my desktop. I can't be sure it isn't also phoning home, but I know I am controlling it without a remote server. You are doing a "there can only be one binding constraint" analysis, and I don't think that is get. Yes, a lot of incumbents want client-server only, but IPv4 still gives them power enforcing the status quo. If we had IPv6 everywhere, they would need to try harder to enforce it, and we would have to try less hard to change it.
xxpor 2y ago
You've picked a particularly poor example. You can directly connect to the MQTT server in your roomba today: https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/roomba/ https://www.home-assistant.io/integrations/roomba/
- exabrial 2y ago
  Indeed I did, that's hilarious

MagicMoonlight 2y ago

Just add another four digits to the start of IPv4. Treat any IP of the current length as 0000.CurrentIP.

dboreham 2y ago
That was easy.

c3747582L 2y ago

[flagged]

c3747582L87 2y ago

[flagged]

bob414954561 2y ago

[flagged]

unethical_ban 2y ago

One thing I've wondered is how routing will work out in the long term for IPv6. If I recall correctly, IPv6 routing was supposed to be hierarchical based on ISP and region, and that would help routing tables. But what if companies in the US, for example, buy a /19 and then divide it up and use it across the globe? I assume routers will have to come with a lot more RAM.

wmf 2y ago
IPv6 routing was supposed to be hierarchical... The Internet gave up on that a while ago. IPv6 routing works like IPv4 where people just advertise whatever routes they want. Router RAM has been fixed with newer HBM-based ASICs supporting millions of routes.
- unethical_ban 2y ago
  Then making gigantic (less than /32) allocations makes even less sense! If we're not doing that, contiguous address space for orgs is far less important.

bananamango 2y ago

Are there any stats showing how many individual devices we have now on Internet (estimation of public+private IPv4 used)?