[address-policy-wg] Summary of the PI Task Force's recent discussions

Dear Colleagues,

Below is a summary of the recent discussions on the PI TF mailing list.
The policy for portable address space is on the draft agenda for the 
Address Policy WG's session at RIPE 46 on 3 September.

Kind regards,

-- 
leo vegoda
RIPE NCC
Registration Services Manager



A summary of the PI TF's initial discussions was agreed and posted
to the <lir-wg at ripe.net> mailing list on 6 May 2003. It can be found
at:

http://www.ripe.net/ripe/mail-archives/lir-wg/2003/msg00265.html

Gert Döring presented on the discussion at the RIPE 45 LIR WG
session. His slides can be found at:

http://www.ripe.net/ripe/meetings/ripe-45/presentations/ripe45-lir-pi-tf.
pdf

At RIPE 45 there was an agreement that the Task Force should
continue its work. There was also an agreement that the PI policy is
tied to the qualifying criteria for an initial IPv4 allocation.

Discussion focused around a straw-man proposal to make four related
policy changes. The proposed changes are outlines below along with a
summary of comments received on them.

1. Reduce the minimum allocation size from /20 to /21

  - There was some support for this point. There were requests for
    /21 allocations to come from a new and separately identified
    address blocks.

2. Remove the requirement to show an immediate need for 25% of the
    allocated address space (a /23 in this case)

  - There was no objection to this point. It was pointed out that
    with a lower barrier to entry the overhead of checking each
    requester is ready to use 512 IP addresses straight away would be
    unlikely to be equal to the value of the work.

3. No longer assign PI (Portable) address space to End Users

  - There some support for to this point. The issue of Root DNS
    Servers was raised but it was noted that all Root DNS Servers
    operating in this region already have address assignments.

4. End Users requiring a portable address block could become an LIR
    and receive a /21 allocation.

  - There was some support for this point. The costs of operating an
    LIR were raised as an issue. It was also noted that everyone may
    become an LIR. There is no barrier to membership of the RIPE NCC.
    There was a suggestion for a one-time service fee.

There were also some additional comments:

It was noted that if the policy allows for address allocations based
on other criteria than prior demonstrated need some providers may
filter those allocations. It was also noted that the RIPE NCC cannot
provide any guarantee as to whether address space will or will not
be routed of filtered by network operators.

Some statistics were requested and provided for the first half of
2003:

ASN assignments: 599
Allocation: 377
PI Assignments: 408

Number of /20s allocated per month for the same period:

200301  7
200302 20
200303 14
200304 16
200305 35
200306 24

Finally, it was noted that there is a requirement for globally
unique addresses that will not be routed on the Internet.