Monday, 29 September 2008

2010 Is the Year When We’ll Run Out of IP Addresses

The world could run out of Internet protocol (IP) addresses as early as next year, warned Vint Cerf. Vint Cerf is popularly known as ‘The Father of Internet’ because of his remarkable contribution in developing the ARPAnet.

According to Cerf, out of the 4.2 billion possible addresses that were available in the 70's, now only a mere 600 million are left and with the expected explosion in the number of mobile devices connected to the internet, the world could run out of free addresses as early as late 2009 or early 2010.

The current system is largely based on Internet protocol version four (IPv4), which Cerf helped develop in the late seventies.

He has joined the chorus calling for a move to IPv6, which is already ready. “The technical stuff for IPv6 is done. IPv6 is ready. This is a business issue in the Internet service industry. The ISP community round the world needs to pay attention,” said Cerf.

The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) developed Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6). This provides a space for 340 undecilion IP addresses - that's 340 followed by 36 zeros.

He further added saying that the lack of available IP addresses will mean that there will be no slots for new devices to connect unless the move to IPv6 is accelerated.