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On Jun 14, 2016, at 3:40 PM, John Curran <<a href="mailto:jcurran@arin.net" class="">jcurran@arin.net</a>> wrote:<br class="">
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<div class="">Jim Smith gets an /24 for his networking company “Sprockets” in 1994, </div>
<div class="">so that he can connect to the Internet. He gets /24) and connects to</div>
<div class="">the Internet via one the early commercial ISPs. </div>
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<div class="">The netblock reads as follows:</div>
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<div class=""><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"></span>Sprockets</div>
<div class=""><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"></span>4131 El Camino Real, Palo Alta CA</div>
<div class=""><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"></span>X.Y.Z/24</div>
<div class=""><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"></span>Jim Smith</div>
<div class=""><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space:pre"></span><a href="mailto:jim@well.com" class="">jim@well.com</a></div>
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<div class="">Apparently, Jim left Sprockets sometime in the late 90’s… </div>
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Twenty years later, Jim has called and is very upset with ARIN for having
<div class="">“munged it" all up - ...</div>
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<div class="">Jim’s not a happy camper, and wants to know why ARIN disassociated him</div>
<div class="">with his address block randomly sometime after 2010. Jim says that he’s </div>
<div class="">been been using the address block for his house since leaving Sprockets </div>
<div class="">(no public IP, but he just uses NAT and connects via his public cable modem </div>
<div class="">IP address.) ...Because we no longer allow him</div>
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<div class="">as a abuse contact to update the DNS servers, he can’t even use “his” IP</div>
<div class="">block now that he’s getting a nice new Internet connection.</div>
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<div>Now on to the more dangerous variation of this story - it starts the same, sounds </div>
<div>the same to ARIN, and it is only in a few (unknown to us) details that it differs - </div>
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<div> - Spockets was sold to Widgets, Inc sometime in late ‘90s </div>
<div> - Widgets renumbered the servers when they moved them to Widgets </div>
<div> HQ and promptly forgot about the X.Y.Z/24 IP address block...</div>
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<div>It’s highly likely (absent a transaction to the contrary) that the rights to the </div>
<div>X.Y.Z/24 IP address block are held by Widgets Inc.</div>
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<div>This hasn’t prevented technical contacts for long-lost companies from trying </div>
<div>to hijack unused address blocks and monetize them (i.e. if ARIN would just </div>
<div>play along…) </div>
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<div>The change of tech contact to abuse significantly reduces the risk of hijack,</div>
<div>although it could be argued that it excessively impacts legacy address holders</div>
<div>(those who have not been updating their IP address records over time.) </div>
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<div>/John</div>
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