The IPv6 Matrix project, proudly supported and hosted by 2020Media, was featured in a presentation at London INET this week. The ISOC project looks at the entire internet for take up of next generation IPv6 addresses. IPv4 addresses are due to run out in under a year so adoption of IPv6 addresses is crucial to the future growth of the internet.
INET is a worldwide set of conferences looking at the future of the internet. Opportunities, threats and challenges to business were examined and discussed by the participants. Matthew Ford, technology program manager from the Internet Society spoke about the current state of internet penetration and how ISPs are constantly increasing capacity to keep up with demand. The big 6 ISPs who account for 94% of UK broadband services now use an arsenal of technological techniques to manage, control, and limit their users internet use. These include traffic shaping, deep packet inspection, acceptable use policies (AUP) and limits hidden deep in their terms and conditions.
2020Media’s broadband has clear up-front quotas on bandwidth use, no deep packet inspection or traffic shaping, and a clear indication of the line speed you can expect. View our broadband site for more information.
Other comments of interest included one likening the internet to the large banks – “too big to fail”. The internet is now such a essential part of the way services are delivered to the public that it is now considered essential infrastructure. ISOC warned that in the future the freedoms and accessability of the entire internet we have now, may not exist. Their Future Scenarios videos demonstrate some of the problems we are internet users and providers may face.
The imminent end of the Internet as we know it approaches – our IPv4 addresses are running out fast. Less than 10% of the original 4 billion remain. Internet service providers will have to ration their stocks of existing address blocks and growth will become more difficult.