[members-discuss] [ncc-announce] [news] RIPE NCC Members and Multiple LIR Accounts - Please Discuss

Hi Nigel,

> ACTION REQUIRED:
> The Board asks the membership to provide their opinion on and discuss
> the following points:
> 
> 1. Is the activity of members opening additional LIR accounts a problem
> that must be prevented?

Yes.

The final /8 policy allows one /22 per LIR so that the RIPE NCC can at least give a small block of IPv4 addresses to each LIR (compared to no IPv4 addresses at all when the final /8 block runs out). This small block is needed so that those entities can at least run DNS, SMTP, NAT etc services on IPv4 for as long as necessary for the internet to migrate to IPv6. This is expected to take a long time, so RIPE NCC should be able to provide such blocks for a long time in the best interest of interoperability on the internet. A single member opening multiple LIRs to get multiple /22s goes against the spirit and purpose of this and if abused on a large scale will cause problems for future RIPE NCC members.

> 2. If this activity is a problem that must be prevented, what action
> should the RIPE NCC take to attempt its prevention?

This is more difficult. Some ideas:

When an organisation is already an LIR don't allow them to open a new LIR.

RIPE NCC membership already has a minimum length of one year. If I understand correctly LIRs that close in the first year still have to pay the full first year's membership fee. Maybe extend this to 2 or 3 years to make it less interesting to create disposable LIRs just to get some resources and then merge them into another LIR.

Any way to prevent such disposable LIRs would be good. RIPE NCC is an association and those wanting to become members should be serious about it.

Cheers,
Sander

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