[arin-ppml] Draft Policy 2011-1 - Inter-RIR Transfers - Shepherd's Inquiry

[John Curran]

On Jun 24, 2011, at 4:45 AM, Mike Burns wrote:
> ...
> Where is any reclamation of legacy space which is not associated with actual hijacking, voluntary return, or dissolution? Spamming or child porn? Any examples?

Given that there is now the recognized ability to transfer one rights as a 
registrant of an address block to another party in accordance with policy, 
it is perfectly understandable that ARIN would prioritize pursuing number
reclamation in the cases you list above (hijacking, dissolution, etc.)

> The bankruptcy judge, need I remind you, found that Nortel had the exclusive right to transfer addresses which were allocated to other companies, and for which no ARIN transfer had ever taken place, and this was after all the companies involved were bankrupt.

The judge did indeed find that Nortel had that right, but approved a sale 
order which stated:

 "For the avoidance of doubt, this Order shall not affect the LRSA AND THE 
  PURCHASER’S RIGHTS IN THE INTERNET NUMBERS TRANSFERRED PURSUANT TO THIS 
  ORDER SHALL BE SUBJECT TO THE TERMS OF THE LRSA." (emphasis added)

Please keep this in mind when trying to consider this particular specified
transfer any form of precedent.

> As a test example, I was back at my alma mater last June and I spoke with one of the campus computer engineers, who told me although he had 16 million ip addresses to work with, most of the campus is Natted. Do you think I should open up a ticket and inform ARIN that they should institute a section 12 review of MIT? Would you like to confront ARIN with that knowledge and see if it nets the free pool a sizeable chunk of a /8?

It would be best if you encouraged them to return the unused resources 
or make them available via specified transfer.

> John Curran referencing ex post facto transfer requests demonstrates that unreported transfers have occurred where the IP addresses worked fine after they were transferred to another party.

Transfers occur when the request is approved and the Whois database is 
updated.  You're free to try and purchase anything that you like including
the number 3, the letter Q, the color blue, or a new york bridge, but if 
you'd like to transfer your rights as a registrant of an address block, 
then you should keep in mind the that transfer occurs when the registration
changes.  I'd definitely get a receipt from anyone who suggests otherwise...

> If ARIN has no control over routing, and no legal ability to stop ip address sales, their leverage is little. If the benefits of the transfers outweigh the little costs which ARIN can apply, the transfers will happen.

ARIN maintains the database accordingly to the community developed policies;
the community seems to value this and makes use of the database accordingly.

/John

John Curran
President and CEO
ARIN