Expanding the Internet for Mobile Broadband and IPTV

Singapore (CommunicAsia) 18 June 2009 — Rapid expansion of the Internet to accommodate new users and new applications, such as IPTV and Mobile broadband, is rapidly depleting the reserves of unallocated IPv4 addresses.

However, to address this, the Internet industry is already preparing for wider deployment of the new IP version 6 (IPv6) addressing protocol. Respondents to a recent survey by the Asia Pacific Network Information Centre (APNIC) indicates that 37 per cent already have, or can immediately roll-out, IPv6 on their networks.

APNIC calls on corporates, governments, and end users to also begin preparing for a migration to IPv6 in order to avoid potential connectivity problems in the future and to take advantage of the innovative point-to-point Internet applications which are expected to become possible with the larger address space.

In the case of IPv4, the number of data bits used to represent the
address limits the number of addressable devices. While IPv6 is
similarly limited, using a larger number of addressing bits increases
the number of addresses by orders of magnitude.

Miwa Fujii, IPv6 Program Manager for APNIC, explained APNIC believes the
deployment of IPv6 is the best outcome for the future of the Internet.
Without it the Internet will be unable to expand and innovate and will
become increasingly complex and costly to manage, she said.

“There is an increasing trend for individual users to maintain multiple
connections to the Internet. Combined with wider adoption in developing
economies, this is accelerating demand for IP Addresses” said Miwa Fujii,
IPv6 Program Manager at APNIC.

“It is common today for people to connect to the Internet via their
desktop, via a wireless LAN, while also using mobile broadband on their
mobile phone or accessing new application services such as real-time
location aware services that deliver traffic updates for their GPS
navigation device for example.”

“This explosion in demand for mobile connectivity represents a new use
of Internet resources. People are connecting in multiple ways, picking
up a second or even a third simultaneous connection to the Internet –
each needing a globally unique identifier” said Ms Fujii.

Managing Shared Resources
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As with any other infrastructure service like transportation, water, or
electricity, the Internet has certain critical resources without which
it cannot operate. In the case of the Internet, these are numerical
resources (such as IP addresses) and domain names.

Organizations in the Asia Pacific region manage these resources so that
everyone has fair access to them.

As the final exhaustion of IPv4 addresses nears, Regional Internet
Registries such as APNIC are responsible for ensuring availability and
responsible management of numeric resources.

CommunicAsia stand partner, the DotAsia Organisation, is a
not-for-profit, membership-based organization incorporated in Hong Kong.
DotAsia is the sponsoring organization and registry operator for the
.Asia sponsored generic Top-Level Domain (TLD). DotAsia oversees the
policies and governance of the “.Asia” TLD Registry.

For More Information
——————–

The Asia Pacific Network Information Centre (APNIC) and its CommunicAsia
stand partners, DotAsia, Asia & Pacific Internet Association (APIA) and
the Information Society Innovation Fund (ISIF) are exhibiting at this
week’s CommunicAsia event in Singapore.

To arrange an interview with Sanjaya, Service Manager, APNIC; Miwa Fuji,
IPv6 Program Manager, APNIC, or Ching Chiao, Vice President Community
Relations, DotAsia contact Louise Flynn, APNIC Marketing & Public
Relations Manager on the APNIC stand.

The APNIC stand is located at booth 5L3-07 in Exhibition Hall 5.

About APNIC
———–

APNIC is one of five Regional Internet Registries (RIRs) charged with
ensuring the fair distribution and responsible management of IP
addresses and related resources. http://www.apnic.net

About DotAsia Organisation
————————–
DotAsia Organisation is a not-for-profit corporation with a mission to
promote Internet development and adoption in Asia. The organization
oversees the “.Asia” top-level Internet domain name, and is formed as an
open consortium of 20 official top-level-domain authorities around the
region, including .CN (China), .JP (Japan), .KR (Korea), .IN (India),
.NZ (New Zealand), .PH (Philippines), etc., and five regional Internet
organizations including APNIC, APNG, APCERT, PAN and APTLD.
http://www.dotasia.org

About APIA
———-
Asia & Pacific Internet Association (APIA) is a
non-profit trade association established in 1997. APIA’s aim is to
promote the common business interests of the Internet-related service
industry in the Asia Pacific region. http://www.apricot2010.net/

About ISIF
———-
The Information Society Innovation Fund (ISIF) is
a grants program aimed at stimulating creative solutions to ICT
development needs in the Asia Pacific region, placing particular
emphasis on the role of the Internet in social and economic development
in the region, towards the effective development of the Information
Society throughout. http://www.isif.asia