APNIC Member Meeting Seoul, Korea, 3 March 2000

APNIC Open Address policy Meeting

Discussion Paper: Implementation of allocations from Network 61

Problem definition

Should APNIC make allocations from network 61.0.0.0 on a regular basis as part of its total address pool?

1. Motivation

As the amount of traditional 'class C' space available for allocation diminishes, there is an increasing need to use space from other address blocks, such as the former 'class A' space.

Current combined usage rates by the Regional Registries indicate that the remaining C space could be exhausted in just over two years. However, while only 21.9% (seven /8s) of the C space is available for allocation, 62.7% (79 /8s) remains available in the A space.

2. Background

In April 1997, IANA allocated each Regional Registry a /8 from the A space. APNIC received 61/8. At the APNIC Member Meeting in June 1997, it was agreed that APNIC would allocate from 61/8 on a trial basis. Terms of the trial were that an allocation could be received in addition to an existing allocation from C space. The trial ran until December 1999. (Due to lack of resources, APNIC did not actively promote this trial.)

The trial was similar to that of the RIPE NCC, for which the following conditions applied for class A allocations from 62/8:

2 allocations of same size can be held concurrently (one from A, one from C space);
if address allocations from A space are entirely assigned, another A allocation can be requested;
if address allocations from C space are entirely assigned, another A block or C block can be requested;
after the expiration date of the trial, the usual allocation policies apply.

The period of trial was April 1997 to December 1997. There was an option to return the whole range if it was not desired.

3. Current status (including other RIRs)

APNIC
Under the voluntary scheme, only one APNIC member came forward and requested address space. This member was allocated a /19. Recently, APNIC has been proactively asking members if they will take address space from 61/8 as part of their allocation. To date, allocations have been made in China, Hong Kong, India, Australia, Singapore, and the Philippines.

ARIN
Allocations from 63/8 were initially made to the larger members and no experiments were conducted. A breakdown of the allocation statistics shows that two /12s were allocated, one /13, two /14s, one /15, and one /16. There were no allocations longer than /16.

In September 1999, ARIN made a public announcement describing their intention to make allocations from 64/8 as part of their total address pool. The smallest allocation to be made will be a /20 - the minimum allocation that ARIN currently makes.

RIPE NCC
After their trial ended, the RIPE NCC continued to make allocations of class A address space to members who agreed to such an allocation. To date, the RIPE NCC has allocated six /15s, 31 /16s, seven /17s, six /18s, and 27 /19s from class A space.

Additional supporting statistics and graphs are available at [add url to diagrams]

4. Discussion

Feedback was sought from the APNIC member which participated in the trial and received an allocation in 1997. The member reported some problems relating to classful filtering by some ISPs. These problems were overcome by contacting the individual ISPs and requesting them to modify their filters. At that time, old classful equipment was also a problem at a few customer sites, but was overcome by upgrading either software or hardware. More recent feedback has indicated no subsequent problems.

The only feedback received from ARIN members about 63/8 was in terms of ISP filters, but it should be noted that this was in 1997. ARIN posted their intention to make allocations from 64/8 to a number of mailing lists, including NANOG. To date, no negative feedback has been received.

5. Recommendations

Based on the feedback from the RIPE NCC and from ARIN, together with the APNIC members over the last two years since, it is recommended that:

APNIC should include 61/8 as part of its total range of available address space and start making allocations on a regular and ongoing basis across the APNIC membership.
all members of APNIC should be informed three months before class A allocations are implemented and multiple announcements should be made to the Internet community at large (posting on NANOG, apnic-announce, apops, ripe-list etc) as well as a visible area on the APNIC web site.

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