In last February, IANA (the institution that regulates the use of IP throughout the world) announced the IPv6 to replace the IPv4 address.
Actually since 1999, there are agreement forum among expertise in charge of making a new standard called IP (Internet Protocol) version 6 (IPv6) when IPv4 runs out space. The change of entire Internet infrastructure, the process is fairly complicated and requires quite a bit of money.
IPv6 was developed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) to deal with the long-anticipated IPv4 address exhaustion, and is described in Internet standard document RFC 2460. Like IPv4, IPv6 is an Internet Layer protocol for packet-switched internetworking and provides end-to-end datagram transmission across multiple IP networks.
While IPv4 allows 32 bits for an Internet Protocol address, and can therefore support 232 (4,294,967,296) addresses, IPv6 uses 128-bit addresses, so the new address space supports 2128 (approximately 340
undecillion or 3.4×1038 ) addresses. This expansion allows for many more devices and users on the internet as well as extra flexibility in allocating addresses and efficiency for routing traffic.
To help us a better understanding about the IPv6, let’s take a closer look on learning this internet protocol.
What is Internet Protocol?
Internet Protocol (IP) is the standard that governs how and through which information packets sent from the Internet or intranet network. In order for data packets to the correct destination, each device connected to the Internet must have an IP address (IP address) is unique. If two devices have the same IP, there will be a so-called “IP Conflict” will be confused because the package would lead to nowhere.
What is the problem of IPv4?
When created in 1981, IP version 4 uses 32-bit addresses, or “only” about 232 (4.3 billion) addresses. Of that amount, about 18 million addresses used for private network and 270 million for multicast addresses, so it can not be used for the public. Actually, the remaining amount is available, but much more devices connected to the internet. As a result, the allocation of IPv4 addresses would not be sufficient anymore. That’s why we need the IP version 6 which have more addresses.
When IPv4 Address will be out of quotes?
Depending on the area, but at least 1 to 3 years ahead. The APNIC (the organization that governs the use of IP in Asia Pacific) has requested two additional blocks of IP addresses to the IANA (which regulates the use of the IP world). That request led to block IP addresses remaining 5 (one block has 16.8 million addresses). By law, if the IP blocks are remaining five, it must immediately be divided into five boards IP on every continent.
How long IP Address will run out depending on the rate of Internet use on the Continent. Continent with the huge Internet use, such as Asia Pacific or North America may be able to spend the remaining blocks within a
year. But for the continent’s internet penetration is widespread as Europe, or the penetration of internet is still slow, such as Africa and Latin America, the remaining time can be annual.
What is IPv6?
IPv6 or Internet Protocol Version 6 is the next generation protocol for the Internet. It’s designed to provide several advantages over current Internet Protocol Version 4 (or IPv4). IPv6 contains addressing and control information to route packets for the next generation Internet. The expansion of the Internet is important and
upgrades are sometimes warranted. IPv6 is documented in several RFCs (or request for comments) starting from RFC 2460. Although IPv6 is the successor of IPv4, both protocol versions will continue to be data-oriented protocols for the Internet in the coming years.
IPv6 Benefits
One of the main benefits of Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) over previously used Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) is the large address-space that contains (addressing) information to route packets for the next generation Internet.IPv6 supports 128-bit address space and can potentially support 2128 or 3.4W1038 unique IP addresses (as opposed to 32-bit address space of IPv4). With this large address-space scheme, IPv6 has the capability to provide unique addresses to each and every device or node attached to the Internet.
Types of IPv6
IPv6 addresses are broadly classified into three categories:
• Unicast addresses A Unicast address acts as an identifier for a single interface. An IPv6 packet sent to a Unicast address is delivered to the interface identified by that address.
• Multicast addresses A Multicast address acts as an identifier for a group/set of interfaces that may belong to the different nodes. An IPv6 packet delivered to a Multicast address is delivered to the multiple interfaces.
• Anycast addresses Anycast addresses act as identifiers for a set of interfaces that may belong to the different nodes. An IPv6 packet destined for an Anycast address is delivered to one of the interfaces
identified by the address.
Special Addresses in IPv6
• ::/96 The zero prefix denotes addresses that are compatible with the previously used IPv4 protocol.
• ::/128 An IPv6 address with all zeroes in it is referred to as an unspecified address and is used for addressing purposes within a software.
• ::1/128 This is called the loop back address and is used to refer to the local host. An application sending a packet to this address will get the packet back after it is looped back by the IPv6 stack. The local host address in the IPv4 was 127.0.0.1.
• 2001:db8::/32 This is a documentation prefix allowed in the IPv6.
All the examples of IPv6 addresses should ideally use this prefix to indicate that it is an example.
• fec0::/10 This is a site-local prefix offered by IPv6. This address prefix signifies that the address is valid only within the local organization. Subsequently, the usage of this prefix has been discouraged by the RFC.
• fc00::/7 This is called the Unique Local Address (ULA). These addresses are routed only within a set of cooperating sites. These were introduced in the IPv6 to replace the site-local addresses. These addresses also provide a 40-bit pseudorandom number that reduces the risk of address conflicts.
• ff00::/8 This prefix is offered by IPv6 to denote the multicast addresses. Any address carrying this prefix is automatically understood to be a multicast address.
• fe80::/10 This is a link-local prefix offered by IPv6. This address prefix signifies that the address is valid only in the local physical link.
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