[arin-ppml] ARIN-2012-3: ASN Transfers - Last Call

[Jimmy Hess]

On 5/9/12, William Herrin <bill at herrin.us> wrote:
> On 5/9/12, John Curran <jcurran at arin.net> wrote:
> For folks looking for a reason for AS number transfers, here's a thought:
>
> Implementing BGP communities is a nuisance with a 32-bit AS number.
> The convention is: 16 bits AS number, 16 bits tag. Virtually every
[snip]

What you have shown is a good justification for obtaining a 16-bit AS
number.   It's actually a valid justification,   unlike other poor
excuses such as  "a provider I want to peer with doesn't like 32bit
numbers"

There are other solutions besides AS transfers that do not encourage
spammers to figure out which ASes are unused,  and  bulk mail WHOIS
contacts with solicitations to sell their ASN.


ARIN should assign 32-bit AS numbers to organizations that can use
32-bit AS numbers, reserve  16-bit AS numbers to organizations  who
have a clear technical issue such as use of such communities; which
impacts their network implementation.  16bit numbers should be
available to assign to orgs that have a reason such as that,    and
for ARIN to make sure they are available requires that some of the
16bit numbers  not be available in the absence of a strong technical
reason such as that.



It is not apparent that enabling  specified transfers is the most
efficient way to reclaim AS numbers that are no longer in use,
however.

Since there are only at most 8000 of them, in theory,  and these AS
numbers are subject to RIR policy,  there is not a massive swamp of
"Legacy AS numbers",   I would suggest  an alternate method of
reclaiming unused 16-bit AS numbers:


ARIN can compile a list of  AS numbers  that have been assigned more
than 90 days ago but do not appear as an Origin or Path member in
globally visible BGP prefix listings.      ARIN can  e-mail each
resource holder that has an AS number which does not appear,
requesting   that the resource holder account for and show their usage
of the AS number resource   or  return it.

The same should occur for a previously active AS number that
disappears from the table for more than 90 days.

Responses showing a current private use of the AS number are not reclaimable.
Any returned AS numbers  become part of the allocatable pool.

AS numbers from which no adequate response is received with a
sufficient number of attempts to contact the AS number resource
holder,  place the AS holder  in a "Not in good standing" status,
the WHOIS Records for the AS go to  "Resource not verified",
the matter must be resolved before allocating, or transferring any IP
address resources for the Org in or Out.


If the resource holder cannot be reached / does not respond to the
resource review request within 12 months,  and the AS number still
does not appear in global tables,  the AS assignment is revoked.


--
-JH