NextGen Net

When the Internet came into being, no one, not even the founding fathers,
thought that there would be more than a few thousand computers connected to it.

But what has happened is a Big Bang. And like the Big Bang theory, which is
credited with the creation of planet earth, this one has changed the way the
world works. From e-mail to blogs and wikis and blikis...the Net is reinventing
itself every minute. Visions of being connected-anytime, anywhere, on any
device-have been hammered at us by every tech company worth its code or chip.
That includes computers, phones, TVs, refrigerators, gaming consoles, cars...the
list is endless. And the Internet space is running out of addresses for them.
IPv4 handles 32-bit addressing, while IPv6 takes the 128-bit mode. That makes a
move from 4.3 bn IPv4 addresses, to 3.4 x1038 IPv6 ones.  And, if each
address weighed one gram, the IPv4 would weigh one seventh of the Empire State
Building. By contrast the IPv6 addresses would weigh 6 times the weight of
planet earth.

IPv6 also promises enhanced security. IPv4 uses what is called Network
Address Translation (NAT), which, proponents of IPv6 say, is an expensive way of
handling security. They get an endorsement from the US Department of Commerce
which said in a Feb 2006 report that IPv6 has demonstrable cost savings by way
of increased security, mobility, enhancement of existing applications and
creation of new ones. The report also mentions that the move from IPv4 to IPv6
will cost US companies $1 bn per year for the next 25 years! Of this, 8 cents
per dollar will go toward the infrastructure, the rest would be for creating
applications and solutions to take advantage of it. Clearly what is being
foreseen is an avalanche of new applications that will want to use the enhanced
infrastructure.

The nextgen Internet will ensure seamless mobility. Staying connected to a
colleague, or your office network while working in your car, or the airplane,
the airport, in another city or at home-will not require endless handovers,
broken connections and security issues. The new protocol will also help many
applications to grow to their full potential. For instance, VoIP, which still
reels under dropped connects and unreliable quality, is meant to come into its
real form with IPv6. The networks will have the intelligence to detect voice
packets from data packets and transfer them on priority thus ensuring better
call quality.

So, where does the world stand in the IPv6 adoption? China leads the pack,
with close to $200 mn already invested. Japan, Korea and Taiwan are also

committed to the protocol. The early adopters are counting on the fact that with
the next generation infrastructure in place, they will be home to the new wave
of Internet services. Europe too has been investing in IPv6 since 2002. Wake up
calls are being sounded in the US to get going the IPv6 way. The US Department
of Defense has mandated that everything delivered as part of its $4 bn contract
for the infrastructure modernization project must be IPv6 compatible. In India
the TRAI released its recommendations for the move to IPv6 in January this year,
which include creating a test bed for experimentation, creating a National
Internet Registry and bringing in awareness through government agencies.

The protocol IPv6 has been around for a while. Now it looks ready to move to
the mainstream, and give the industry the ability to offer new products and
services. And as usual there will be some who monetize the concepts earlier than
the others. Who? Or, which organizations? For those answers one has to wait a
little more.

Shyam malhotra

editor-in-chief VOICE&DATA

shyamm@cybermedia.co.in