[arin-ppml] Policy Proposal 120: Protecting Number Resources

[Leo Bicknell]

In a message written on Tue, Nov 09, 2010 at 03:55:43PM +0100, Eliot Lear wrote:
> I would very much like to understand the meaning of the term "abandoned"
> in this context.  Does it mean, for instance, that the address space is
> not routed or that there is no NPRM signed to cover that space?

Abandoned is intended to mean more or less what people would assume
it means; space where the resource holder is no longer using it for
any purpose.  It may or may not mean the original resource holder
still exists, however I suspect in the vast majority of these cases
we are talking about resources holders who do not exist any longer.

Examples:
  - A resource allocated to an individual, that person dies.
  - A resource allocated to a sole-propietor business that has
    simply closes.

Let me break that down a bit further.  If space was obtained from
ARIN it was done under an RSA and has a yearly fee attached.  If
the fee is no longer paid ARIN will reclaim the address space.  I
don't think there is a significant issue in this case, and don't
think the policy proposal affects it in any material way.

Now, if space was obtained before ARIN existed (legacy space) there
is no yearly fee.  It is my understanding from staff they will not
reclaim that space under any circumstances at this point in time.
This policy is aimed squarely at space in this situation.

A to target this space is that there are folks out there looking
for these abandoned blocks to use for nefarious purposes, for
instance spamming.  Since the original owner is gone/no longer
interested in them they can hijack and use them fairly easily right
now.  Another reason is with impeneding run-out, I think the community
should make a reasonable effort to insure there are no stranded
blocks in this condition.

I want to be quite clear that "not routed" is an interesting
identifier, but not required.  The low hanging fruit here is not
routed space, and I firmly expect ARIN would start with the easy
stuff.  Imagine a block obtained by an individual in 1993 for his
garage dial-up Internet business.  However before he could get the
modem banks up and running he was hit by a bus.  The space has never
been routed.  There is no more resouce holder, let's get it back
in the free pool and move on.

From there let's construct a more interesting example, we can imagine
that the same space went unrouted until 2005, when a spammer hijacked
it and started spamming from it, which they have been doing ever
since.  The space _is_ routed.  It is also to my mind abandoned by
the original owner, and being used frauduently.  This is why I
included both fraud and abandoned in the policy, I can see folks
might call this space either, or both as I do.  Any way you slice
it though the space should be reclaimed (no longer marked as being
allocated to the original owner) and returned to the free pool.
It's my understanding ARIN would reclaim this as fraud if reported
to them via the web page, just right now staff will spend no time
proactively looking for such things.

Lastly, this policy is not intended to address the problem of space
transferred outside the ARIN process.  If in the previous paragraph
the owner said the space was sold to the spammer in 2005 that's not
abandoned.  ARIN may want to look into that situation using other
policies and tools, but I don't want to wade into that mess with
this policy.  Abandoned here means the original owner does not
exist, or no longer neeeds/uses the space at all.

-- 
       Leo Bicknell - bicknell at ufp.org - CCIE 3440
        PGP keys at http://www.ufp.org/~bicknell/
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