
UK sells off unused net addresses - mattvot
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-32826353
======
radiowave
Oddly enough, while the DWP's class A address range is used internally, in all
written communications the leading octet of such IP addresses must be redacted
for "security" reasons, despite being (a) a matter of public record, and
therefore (b) displayed on the xkcd map of the IPv4 address space (as "UK
Social Security").

[https://xkcd.com/195/](https://xkcd.com/195/)

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longwave
For anyone interested the block that has been sold is 51.174.0.0/15\. The
remainder of 51.0.0.0/8 still belongs to the Department of Work and Pensions
though none of it is publically routable.

~~~
pascalmemories
Department of Work & Pensions. Ho Ho Ho ! No-one seriously believes the DWP
uses a /8\. The whole UK Gov can use the block for internal purposes as it was
allocated at a time before RFC1918 was a thing and everyone worked on the
basis you needed to get an IPv4 allocation for your IP network. Several other
public bodies in the UK got smaller blocks too (you can find them without too
much digging on Google) but most of these were never externally routable
either. You can bet traffic arriving from 51/8 is not about any pension.

Background: there were some pretty forward thinking people in the UK Gov at
the early stages of 'the internet'; Parliament got it's own TLD when it was a
case of sending an email to be allocated a TLD and various bodies got IPv4
allocations before they even had any sort of working networking going on.
There are bits of the stories around if you look hard enough, but I've never
seen it pulled together - I'm sure it would make interested (and probably
classified) reading.

~~~
eli
I think it's a mistake to assume anything malicious or untoward took place. A
/8 is quite a lot of addresses, but at one point it was assumed a) the total
pool of addresses would last a very very long time and b) that every network
connected device would have a publicly routable IP.

~~~
pascalmemories
I wasn't suggesting anything malicious. [edit: OK, perhaps I should have
suggested someone's name had to go on the allocation record and DWP would look
most benign. My recollection is the allocation was once listed as being NHS
but that may be due to one too many whiskies and/or conflating another
allocation.]

I was suggesting it was a throwback to the very early days of the internet
expansion when people had a much simpler understanding of how it would all
work and were excited to get involved. I think there are some enlightening
stories to be told from various UK governmental departments which are not
normally the source of such forward thinking.

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jgalt212
This is interesting in that if IP addresses are allowed to trade freely
(currently 4 quid per IP), I'd argue that we'll never run out of them. And
this whole transition to IPv6 may never be necessary.

~~~
michaelt
Well, presumably if blocks of IP addresses get radically smaller, routing
tables will get large enough that not every system can handle them. Given how
sluggish people are about upgrading to IPv6 people obviously aren't upgrading
often, so there must be a lot of legacy equipment out there.

So it's not like I can just buy an one or two IP addresses, like I could in a
liquid marketplace.

~~~
Nexxxeh
Weren't there already problems last year because the BGP tables got too big
for some ISP equipment to handle? [http://www.zdnet.com/article/internet-
hiccups-today-youre-no...](http://www.zdnet.com/article/internet-hiccups-
today-youre-not-alone-heres-why/)

~~~
scurvy
Heaven forbid you use a router that was actually designed to be a router,
rather than a switch with a henky supervisor card thrown into it.

Also help us if the routing manufacturers actually put more than 2GB of memory
on the routing engine.

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TazeTSchnitzel
That was a well-written article. Someone who's not a tech expert might
understand it, and wouldn't be mislead. Unusual.

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justincormack
Still waiting for an ipv6 address for gov.uk

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dinosammy
Is there any way to purchase IPv4 addresses as an investor? It seems like they
will be an appreciating asset over the next few years, if you are willing to
make the gamble that IPv6 adoption will be on a longer timeframe, rather than
a shorter timeframe

~~~
scurvy
IP networks acquired via purchase are still subject to local IRR use
regulations. You can't just gobble up IP space without using them nor without
using what you've currently got (80% utilization).

Even if you managed to acquire them, the IRR's could claw them back (in
theory).

~~~
eeeeeeeeeeeee
That's not true. Leased space is very different from IPv4 space you own,
specifically legacy space that pre-dates the creation of these RIRs. You can
definitely buy IPv4 space and use it however you want and re-sell it, split it
up, etc.

ARIN has the most ridiculous policies on IPv4 space and RIPE actually has the
best, in my experience.

IPv6 is coming no matter what and a healthy IPv4 market is not going to stop
that. The IPv4 market improves efficiency by re-distributing the addresses to
people that actually need them.

Right now there are millions of addresses in the hands of people that don't
even need a single IPv4 address and often don't even remember registering the
space in the 90s (IPs that have not been publicly announced on the Internet
for decades). They gave out too many addresses to the wrong people in the 90s
and an open market will help distribute it to the people that have a technical
need for them.

------
growse
I didn't think that RIPE let you sell off IP address space, given that RIPE
'owns' the actual addresses and just allocates them to members. Has the govt
effectively 'sold' these addresses in the same way that my ISP has 'sold' me a
static IP address on my DSL connection?

How can the buyers do anything useful with these addresses given that they'll
still be tied to the original ASN through RIPE?

~~~
adventured
You definitely can. They're referred to as a "transfer," as of course you're
not selling ownership.

[http://v4escrow.net/v4escrow-completes-the-largest-ip-
addres...](http://v4escrow.net/v4escrow-completes-the-largest-ip-address-
transfer-in-ripe-europe-russia-and-the-middle-east/)

[http://globenewswire.com/news-
release/2014/07/21/652140/1009...](http://globenewswire.com/news-
release/2014/07/21/652140/10090186/en/European-RIPE-Region-IP-Addresses-To-
Sell-On-IPv4Auctions-com.html)

