[136587] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: And so it ends...
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (David Conrad)
Thu Feb 3 15:53:14 2011
From: David Conrad <drc@virtualized.org>
In-Reply-To: <765C578E-3EB4-4C73-ADD8-D3A175FE5371@delong.com>
Date: Thu, 3 Feb 2011 10:42:06 -1000
To: Owen DeLong <owen@delong.com>
Cc: NANOG list <nanog@nanog.org>
Errors-To: nanog-bounces+nanog.discuss=bloom-picayune.mit.edu@nanog.org
On Feb 3, 2011, at 8:59 AM, Owen DeLong wrote:
> That remains to be seen. If they give up their space, it is unclear =
that they have any right to transfer it to another
> organization rather than return it to the successor registry. There is =
no precedent established showing that
> this is allowed.
Right. Like Compaq returned 16/8 when they acquired Digital (and HP =
returned 16/8 when they acquired Compaq).=20
> That remains to be seen. IANA has declared them the successor =
registries
No. First, "IANA" does not exist. The term "IANA" now refers to a =
series of functions currently performed under contract from the US Dept. =
of Commerce, NTIA by ICANN. As such it can't declare anything.
Second, neither ICANN nor the USG has (to my knowledge) declared the =
RIRs to be "successor registries" (whatever they are). The IPv4 =
registry continues to exist and will undoubtedly be maintained as it =
always has been. The only real difference is that there aren't any more =
IPv4 /8s tagged with "UNALLOCATED".
> The other thing to consider is that the RIR doesn't really need to =
"reclaim" the block, per se. They can simply stop providing uniqueness =
to the organizations that don't have a contract with them and issue =
those numbers to some other organization that has a contract. The other =
organization would know that their uniqueness is limited to those =
cooperating in the registry system.
>=20
> Does an organization that has no contract with an RIR have a right to =
expect that RIR to continue to provide them a unique registration?
The RIRs are self-defined geographical monopolies that provide a set of =
public infrastructure services to the Internet community at large. It's =
an interesting question whether that service is limited to only those =
folks who pay -- my guess if the RIRs took this stance, they'd be =
looking down the barrel of numerous governmental =
anti-monopoly/anti-cartel agencies.
However, pragmatically speaking, the folks who matter in any of this are =
the ISPs. The RIRs exist primarily as a means by which ISPs can avoid =
doing a myriad set of bilateral agreements as to who "owns" what address =
space to ensure uniqueness. If the RIRs reduce their value by no longer =
providing that service in an effective way (e.g., by doing what you =
suggest), I suspect the ISPs would find other entities to provide global =
uniqueness services.
Regards,
-drc
