APNIC 30: IP Addressing Conference Visits Australia

[Brisbane, Australia – Friday, 20 August 2010] The regional conference discussing Internet policy and implementation issues in the region will be held at the Gold Coast Marriott, from 24-27 August 2010.

“Telstra is proud to support this year’s APNIC 30 conference, particularly as it is being held in Australia for the first time,” said Mike Wright, Executive Director, Networks and Access Technology.

“APNIC 30 is an opportunity for our industry to come together to discuss the important issues we face such as IPv6 transition and best practice internet resource management. As Australia’s leading telecommunications provider, Telstra is pleased to provide connectivity services for this event that will allow conference attendees and those participating from overseas to actively join in these important discussions,” Mr Wright said.

Less Than a Year to IPv4 Exhaustion
It is now less than a year before the Internet industry expects the IANA (Internet Assigned Numbers Authority) to distribute the last of the available Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) address space.

The Asia Pacific region is gathering for a “Community Consultation” to discuss the finer points of how the last of these addresses should be managed, and what can be done to accelerate the adoption of the new addressing protocol IPv6.

The transition to IPv6 will significantly affect businesses across the Asia Pacific. The region’s network operators and service providers are preparing for the deployment.

“As a provider of more than 90% of the IPv6 connectivity into Australia, Vocus is delighted to be the Diamond and IPv6 Connectivity Sponsor for APNIC 30 on the Gold Coast this year. We see this as a real opportunity to engage with the APNIC community and develop new strategies and policies that will help strengthen the entire industry,” said James Spenceley, Vocus CEO, who recently started trading on the ASX under Stock Code VOC.

Policies Promote IPv6 Adoption
Following policy adjustments earlier this year, the Asia Pacific Network Information Centre (APNIC) has recorded a significant increase in the number of organizations requesting IPv6 addresses. Acquiring address space is seen as a key first step to a business IPv6 Deployment plan.

“Vocus continues its support for APNIC as we see its critical importance to the development of community policy. As a wholesale provider, we believe it is important to give back to the industry that supports us,” said Spenceley.

With more than 300 separate IPv6 allocations already made across the region since February, a new program to be launched at APNIC 30 will make obtaining IPv6 addresses fast and easy for end-user organizations such as corporates and government departments.

World Class Training
The event also includes a substantial Training and Professional Development program targeted at local and regional networking engineers. Popular seminar topics include DNS Security (DNSSEC), Resource Certification, and Network Security.

In addition to the policy discussions and training, other sessions will cover network engineering operational issues in the Asia Pacific Operators forum (APOPS).

As the last of the IPv4 address space is distributed, resource holders could face increased routability and reachability problems with these “bottom of the barrel” address blocks. APNIC will report on what steps are being taken to identify those worst-affected addresses and what is being done to help ensure distributed address blocks are freely usable.

Remote Participation
Network operators need to be aware of activities in the Internet numeric resource space and that they have their say on policy decisions that could directly affect their business, explained APNIC Director General Paul Wilson.

APNIC 30 will take place on the Gold Coast, but the event will be broadcast globally. See http://meetings.apnic.net/30/remote for more information about sessions.

“Participation is the most important factor in effective Internet governance, so we want to ensure that everyone is able to participate in this event. The sponsorship of Telstra and Vocus is allowing us to deliver a high quality remote participation program to all interested participants through the region” Mr Wilson said.

APNIC 30 is the first of two upcoming local industry events. The Australian Network Operators Group (AUSNOG) will also meet on 16-17 September at the Four Seasons Hotel, Sydney.