Policy Proposal: PIv6 for legacy holders with RSA and efficient use

[Member Services]

ARIN received the following policy proposal. In accordance with the ARIN
Internet Resource Policy Evaluation Process, the proposal is being
posted to the ARIN Public Policy Mailing List (PPML) and being placed on
ARIN's website.

The ARIN Advisory Council (AC) will review this proposal at their next
regularly scheduled meeting. The AC may decide to:

   1. Accept the proposal as a formal policy proposal as written. If the
AC accepts the proposal, it will be posted as a formal policy proposal
to PPML and it will be presented at a Public Policy Meeting.

   2. Postpone their decision regarding the proposal until the next
regularly scheduled AC meeting in order to work with the author. The AC
will work with the author to clarify, combine or divide the proposal. At
their following meeting the AC will accept or not accept the proposal.

   3. Not accept the proposal. If the AC does not accept the proposal,
the AC will explain their decision. If a proposal is not accepted, then
the author may elect to use the petition process to advance their
proposal. If the author elects not to petition or the  petition fails,
then the proposal will be closed.

The AC will assign shepherds in the near future. ARIN will provide the
names of the shepherds to the community via the PPML.

In the meantime, the AC invites everyone to comment on this proposal on
the PPML, particularly their support or non-support and the reasoning
behind their opinion. Such participation contributes to a thorough
vetting and provides important guidance to the AC in their deliberations.

The ARIN Internet Resource Policy Evaluation Process can be found at:
http://www.arin.net/policy/irpep.html

Mailing list subscription information can be found at:
http://www.arin.net/mailing_lists/

Regards,

Member Services
American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN)


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Policy Proposal Name: PIv6 for legacy holders with RSA and efficient use

Author: Scott Leibrand

Proposal Version:   1.0

Submission Date:   7/28/2007

Proposal type:   new

Policy term:   permanent

Policy statement:

Modify NRPM section 6.5.8.1 (Direct assignments from ARIN to end-user
organizations: Criteria), to read:

To qualify for a direct assignment, an organization must:

    1. not be an IPv6 LIR; and
    2. qualify for an IPv4 assignment or allocation from ARIN under the
       IPv4 policy currently in effect, or demonstrate efficient
       utilization of a direct IPv4 assignment or allocation covered by a
       current ARIN RSA.

Rationale:

Current policy allows direct IPv6 allocations and assignments to nearly
all organizations with IPv4 allocations or assignments from ARIN.  As a
result, such organizations can get IPv6 space just as easily as they can
get IPv4 space, making it easy for them to transition to IPv6 as soon as
they're ready to do so.  However, there are some organizations who
received IPv4 /23's and /24's prior to the formation of ARIN, and use
that space in a multihomed, provider-independent fashion.  Under current
policy, such organizations cannot get IPv6 PI space without artificially
inflating host counts, and are therefore discouraged from adopting IPv6.
  This policy proposal aims to remove this disincentive, and allow such
organizations to easily adopt IPv6.

In addition, pre-ARIN assignments were issued through an informal
process, and many legacy resource holders have not yet entered into a
formal agreement with ARIN, the manager of many such IP numbering
resources.  This policy proposal would require that such assignments be
brought under a current ARIN Registration Services Agreement, thereby
formalizing the relationship.

Some pre-ARIN assignments may not be used efficiently.  As unallocated
IPv4 numbering resources are approaching exhaustion, it is important to
ensure efficient utilization of IPv4 assignments, and to arrange for
reclamation of unused space.  Therefore, this policy would require that
the organization wishing to receive IPv6 PI space demonstrate efficient
utilization of their IPv4 assignment.  (Efficient utilization is already
defined elsewhere in policy, and the exact mechanism for achieving and
determining efficient use is a matter of procedure, not of policy, so
detailed procedures are not included in the policy statement above.  The
intent is that any organization with an assignment of /23 or larger
which is less than 50% utilized would renumber and return whole unused
CIDR blocks as necessary to bring the remaining CIDR block to 50%
utilization or higher.  A /24 should be considered efficiently utilized
as long as it is in use for multihoming, as /25's and smaller are not
routable for that purpose.)

It has been suggested that this policy would be useful only until the
growth of  IPv6 exceeds the growth of IPv4.  I would agree with this,
and would further posit that the existing "qualify ... under the IPv4
policy currently in effect" language should also be modified at that
time.  I have therefore proposed this policy with a policy term of
"permanent", with the expectation that this section of policy (6.5.8.1)
will be rewritten at the appropriate time to entirely remove all IPv4
dependencies.

Timetable for implementation:   immediate