ULA and RIR cost-recovery

Thu Nov 25 00:11:59 UTC 2004

--On Wednesday, November 24, 2004 12:52 -0800 Crist Clark 
<crist.clark at globalstar.com> wrote:

> Owen DeLong wrote:
>>> I have never been a fan of the registered ULAs, and have argued against
>>> the IETF's attempts to state specific monetary values or lifetime
>>> practice as a directive to the RIRs; but I am equally bothered by the
>>> thought that the operator community would feel a need to fight against
>>> something that really doesn't impact them.
>>
>>
>> Perhaps it is because in the perception of the operator community, we do
>> not believe it will not impact us.  The reality is that once registered
>> ULAs
>> become available, the next and obvious step will be enterprises that
>> receive
>> them demanding that their providers route them.  Economic pressure will
>> override IETF ideal, and, operator impact is the obvious result.
>
> Do customers demand that their ISPs route RFC1918 addresses now? (And
> that's an honest question. I am not being sarcastic.) Wouldn't the IPv6
> ULA answer be the same as the IPv4 RFC1918 answer, "I could announce
> those networks for you, but no one else would accept the routes. (And
> I would be ridiculed straight off of NANOG.)" I presume everyone will
> be filtering the ULA prefix(es), link local, loopback, and other
> obvious bogons from their tables. How does this enterprise demand that
> other providers route the ULA prefixes too?
>
Yes, they do.  However, today, with RFC-1918, we can at least give them a
good technology reason why not.  With ULA, we have no such defense... 
There's
simply no reason a unique prefix can't be routed.

> If we're talking about routing ULAs within a providers network, I'd
> think providers would love them. Right now, an enterprise can buy a
> "corporate VPN" or layer two network to route "private" addresses.
> Wouldn't providers be happy to offer the same service, for the same
> extra $$$, in IPv6? Especially when you consider that you can just
> drop the routes for the ULAs in your interior routing tables since
> ULAs are well, unique, and you're done. No tunnelling or other levels of
> indirection required. Charge the same or more for the "business-level
> service" that you offer now, but there is less work for you to do it.

Right, but, the problem comes when the customers expect you to also announce
the ULAs at your borders.  Believe me, this will occur.  It will probably
start with "Well, we've got this connection to you and this connection to
ISP B, and, you guys peer, so, can you pass our ULA prefixes along to each
other?"  The slippery slope will continue until market economics have 
blurred
or completely erased the line between PI and ULA.

Owen
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