Policy Proposal 2007-17: To Be Revised

[Member Services]

Policy Proposal 2007-17
Legacy Outreach and Partial Reclamation

On 9 April 2008, the ARIN Advisory Council (AC), acting under the
provisions of the ARIN Internet Resource Policy Evaluation Process,
determined that this proposal should be revised. The AC will work with
the author of the proposal to revise the text and return the proposal to
the PPML for further discussion.

The policy proposal text is provided below and is also available at:
http://www.arin.net/policy/proposals/2007_17.html

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

Regards,

Member Services
American Registry for Internet Numbers (ARIN)


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Policy Proposal 2007-17
Legacy Outreach and Partial Reclamation

Author: Owen DeLong

Date: 28 March 2008

Proposal type: modify

Policy term: permanent

Policy statement:

Replace section 4.6 as follows:

4.6 Amnesty and Aggregation requests

4.6.1 Intent of this policy

This policy is intended to allow the community and ARIN staff to work
together with holders of address resources in the best interests of the
community by facilitating the return of unused address space and the
aggregation of existing space in a manner which is in the best interests
of both parties.

All transactions under this policy must either create greater
aggregation (a reduction in the number of prefixes) or the return of
address space. ARIN should reject any transaction which staff judges is
not in the interests of the community.

4.6.2 No penalty for returning or aggregating

ARIN shall seek to make the return of address space as convenient and
risk-free to the returning organization as possible. An organization
with several non-contiguous blocks seeking to aggregate and return space
at the same time should be accommodated if possible. If it is possible
to expand one block, for example, to facilitate the return of other
blocks, ARIN should do that where possible.

4.6.3 Return should not force renumbering

An organization shall be allowed to return a partial block of any size
to ARIN. For any return greater than a /24, ARIN shall not require that
the non-returned portion of the block be renumbered unless the returning
organization wishes to do so.

4.6.4 Incentives

The Board of Trustees should consider creating incentives for
organizations to return addresses under this policy.

4.6.5 Timeframe for return

Any organization which is returning addresses under this policy shall
negotiate with ARIN an appropriate timeframe in which to return the
addresses after any new resources are received under this policy. In the
case of a simple return, the timeframe shall be immediate. In the case
where renumbering into new addresses out of existing addresses to be
returned is required, the returning organization shall sign a contract
with ARIN which stipulates a final return date not less than 6 months
nor more than 18 months after the receipt of new addresses. If an
organization misses this return date, but, ARIN believes the
organization is working in good faith to complete the renumbering, ARIN
may grant a single extension of 6-12 months as staff deems appropriate
to the situation. Such an extension must be requested in writing (email
to hostmaster at arin.net) by the organization at least 15 days prior to
the original expiration date.

4.6.6 RSA Required if new addresses received

Any organization which receives any additional addresses under this
policy shall be required to sign an ARIN RSA which will apply to all new
addresses issued and to any retained blocks which are expanded under
this policy.

4.6.7 Annual contact required

Any organization which participates in this policy shall be required to
sign an agreement stipulating that ARIN will attempt contact at least
once per year via the contact mechanisms registered for the organization
in whois. Should ARIN fail to make contact, after reasonable effort the
organization shall be flagged as "unreachable" in whois. After six
months in "unreachable" status, the organization agrees that ARIN may
consider all resources held by the organization to be abandoned and
reclaim such resources. Should the organization make contact with ARIN
prior to the end of the aforementioned six month period and update their
contact information appropriately, ARIN shall remove the "unreachable"
status and the annual contact cycle shall continue as normal. If the
organization pays annual fees to ARIN, the payment of annual fees shall
be considered sufficient contact.

Rationale:

Existing policy supports aggregation (4.7) and provides some amnesty
(existing 4.6) for returning blocks. However, a number of resource
holders have expressed discomfort with the current section 4.6 believing
that they will be forced to return their entire address space and
renumber rather than being able to make partial returns and retain some
of their existing space.

This policy seeks to eliminate those concerns and make the return of
unused address space more desirable to the resource holders.

A very high percentage of underutilized space is in the hands of legacy
holders who currently have no benefit to joining the ARIN process and no
way to return any portion of their address space without incurring
significant disadvantage as a result.

A suggestion to the board would be to adopt benefits along the following
lines for people returning space. These benefits would provide
additional incentive for resource holders to make appropriate returns
and for legacy holders to join the ARIN process:

1. If the organization does not currently pay ARIN fees, they shall
remain fee exempt.

2. If the organization currently pays ARIN fees, their fees shall be
waived for two years for each /20 returned, with any fractional /20
resulting in a one-time single year waiver.

3. Any organization returning address space under this policy shall
continue under their existing RSA or they may choose to sign the current
RSA. For organizations which currently do not have an RSA, they may sign
the current RSA, or, they may choose to remain without an RSA.

4. All organizations returning space under this policy shall, if they
meet other eligibility requirements and so request, obtain an
appropriate IPv6 end-user assignment or ISP allocation as applicable,
with no fees for the first 5 years. Organizations electing to receive
IPv6 allocation/assignment under this provision must sign a current RSA
and must agree that their IPv4 resources are henceforth subject to the RSA.

The overriding intent of this policy proposal is to make it as easy as
possible for both ARIN and resource holders to "do the right thing" with
regard to excess resources or dis-aggregated (fragmented) address
blocks. It is the desire of the author that staff make any judgment
calls necessary under this policy with that ideal clearly in mind. While
the author has made a concerted effort to make the policy as clear as
possible and as concrete as can be, the reality is that these types of
transactions must rely heavily on the judgment and expertise of the ARIN
staff in determining what is in the best interests of the community.

Timetable for implementation: Immediate