[arin-ppml] Draft Policy ARIN-2014-7: Section 4.4 Micro Allocation Conservation Update

[Owen DeLong]

On Feb 6, 2014, at 8:36 AM, David Farmer <farmer at umn.edu> wrote:

> On 2/5/14, 17:36 , Andrew Dul wrote:
>> Hello,
>> 
>> This draft policy will be discussed next week at the nanog PPC, in
>> addition we welcome feedback on this draft on PPML.  Specifically if you
>> could comment on the following two points it would be appreciated.
>> 
>> Thanks,
>> Andrew
>> 
>> 
>> Does the community support raising the minimum requirement for IXPs from
>> 2 to 3?
> 
> I support the change from a two participants to a three participant standard to qualify as an Internet Exchange Point (IXP).
> 
> To date the risk created by allowing the minimum of two participates for an IXP has been extremely low, as the motivation for abuse was also extremely low.  However, as we proceed through run-out of the general IPv4 free pool the motivations for abuse will increase dramatically. Raising the standard to three participants to qualify as an IXP seems like a prudent precaution to ensure that the reservation for IXPs, and other critical infrastructure that was made in ARIN-2011-4, is protected to ensure availability of resources for legitimate IXPs in the future.
> 
> There will be some impact on the start-up of some IXPs, this is unfortunate.  However, the three participant standard is not completely unreasonable, given the potential for increased abuse of the two participant standard.
> 

I oppose the change. Anyone inclined to abuse a two participant standard can easily create or obtain a 3rd participant for said purpose. This is literally a case of change for the sake of change. No, a 3 participant minimum is not an unreasonable standard. However, since it does have some negative impact and is utterly unlikely to be at all effective in deterring abuse, I see no benefit to the change.

Owen