Using IPv6 with prefixes shorter than a /64 on a LAN

Tue Feb 1 06:26:21 UTC 2011

> In my opinion, RFC 4193 is just a bad idea and there's no benefit to it vs.
> GUA. Just put a good stateful firewall in front of your GUA.
>
> I mean, really, how many things do you have that don't need access
> to/from the internet. Maybe your printers and a couple of appliances.
>
> The rest... All those TiVOs, Laptops, Desktops, iPads, etc. all need
> public addresses anyway, so, why bother with the ULA?

Because the ULA addressing is free, not that hard, and provides an
extra layer of protection to prevent vandals from using up your printer
ink or turning your fridge on defrost during the night.

And some networks will have a lot more stuff that could use an
extra layer of protection like that, for instance SCADA networks.

> Supplying every end site with a /48 of global address space is neither
> stupid or wasteful. It's a good design with some nice future-proofing and
> some very nice features available if people take better advantage of the
> capabilities offered as we move forward.
>
> Just because it's more than you can imagine using today does not mean
> that it is more than you will ever imagine using. I'm very happy that I have
> a /48 at home and I look forward to making better use of it as the
> Consumer Electronics vendors start to catch on that the internet is
> being restored to full functionality for end users.

Agreed. /48 is good for even the smallest home user living in a one bedroom
apartment. They may not fully exploit it, but at the same time, they should not
be treated as second class citizens when there is enough IPv6 address wealth
to share around.

--Michael Dillon