IPv6 is Classless
draft-bourbaki-6man-classless-ipv6-00
The information below is for an old version of the document.
| Document | Type |
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|---|---|---|---|
| Authors | Randy Bush , Brian E. Carpenter , Fernando Gont , Nick Hilliard , Geoff Huston , Chris Morrow , Job Snijders | ||
| Last updated | 2017-05-22 | ||
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draft-bourbaki-6man-classless-ipv6-00
Network Working Group R. Bush
Internet-Draft Internet Initiative Japan
Updates: 4291 (if approved) B. Carpenter
Intended status: Standards Track Univ. of Auckland
Expires: November 23, 2017 F. Gont
SI6 Networks / UTN-FRH
N. Hilliard
INEX
G. Huston
APNIC
C. Morrow
GOOG
J. Snijders
NTT
May 22, 2017
IPv6 is Classless
draft-bourbaki-6man-classless-ipv6-00
Abstract
Over the history of IPv6, various classful address models have been
proposed, none of which has withstood the test of time. The last
remnant of IPv6 classful addressing is a rigid network interface
identifier boundary at /64. This document removes the fixed position
of that boundary for interface addressing.
Status of This Memo
This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute
working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-
Drafts is at http://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.
Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference
material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."
This Internet-Draft will expire on November 23, 2017.
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Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2017 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
Provisions Relating to IETF Documents
(http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info) in effect on the date of
publication of this document. Please review these documents
carefully, as they describe your rights and restrictions with respect
to this document. Code Components extracted from this document must
include Simplified BSD License text as described in Section 4.e of
the Trust Legal Provisions and are provided without warranty as
described in the Simplified BSD License.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2. Suggested Reading . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
3. Identifier and Subnet Length Statements . . . . . . . . . . . 3
4. Recommendations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
5. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
6. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
7. References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
7.1. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
7.2. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1. Introduction
Over the history of the IPv6 protocol, several classful addressing
models have been proposed. The most notable example recommended Top-
Level Aggregation (TLA) and Next-Level Aggregation (NLA) Identifiers
[RFC2450], but was obsoleted by [RFC3587], leaving a single remnant
of classful addressing in IPv6: a rigid network interface identifier
boundary at /64. This document removes the fixed position of that
boundary for interface addressing.
Recent proposed changes to the IP Version 6 Addressing Architecture
specification [RFC4291] have caused controversy. While link prefixes
of varied lengths, e.g. /127, /126, /124, /120, ... /64 have been
successfully deployed for many years, glaring mismatches between a
formal specification and long-standing field deployment practices are
never wise, not least because of the strong risk of mis-
implementation, which can easily result in serious operational
problems.
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This document also clarifies that IPv6 routing subnets may be of any
length up to 128.
2. Suggested Reading
It is assumed that the reader understands the history of classful
addressing in IPv4 and why it was abolished [RFC4632]. Of course,
the acute need to conserve address space that forced the adoption of
classless addressing for IPv4 does not apply to IPv6, but the
arguments for operational flexibility in address assignment remain
compelling.
It is also assumed that the reader understands IPv6 [RFC2460], the IP
Version 6 Addressing Architecture [RFC4291], the proposed changes to
RFC4291 [I-D.ietf-6man-rfc4291bis] and RFC2464
[I-D.hinden-6man-rfc2464bis], [RFC7608] an IPv6 Prefix Length
Recommendation for Forwarding, and the IETF recommendation for the
generation of stable Interface Identifiers [RFC8064].
[I-D.jinmei-6man-prefix-clarify] is also worth reading to clarify
uses of varying prefix lengths on a single link.
For host computers on local area networks, generation of interface
identifiers is no longer necessarily bound to layer 2 addresses
(MACs) [RFC7217] [RFC8064]. Therefore their length, previously fixed
at 64 bits [RFC7136], is in fact a variably-sized parameter as
explicitly acknowledged in Section 5.5.3(d) of [RFC4862] which
states:
Note that a future revision of the address architecture [RFC4291]
and a future link-type-specific document, which will still be
consistent with each other, could potentially allow for an
interface identifier of length other than the value defined in the
current documents. Thus, an implementation should not assume a
particular constant. Rather, it should expect any lengths of
interface identifiers.
3. Identifier and Subnet Length Statements
IPv6 unicast interfaces may use any subnet length up to 128 except
for situations where an Internet Standard document may impose a
particular length, for example Stateless Address Autoconfiguration
(SLAAC) [RFC4862], or Using 127-Bit IPv6 Prefixes on Inter-Router
Links [RFC6164].
Additionally, this document clarifies that a node or router MUST
support routing of any valid network prefix length, even if SLAAC or
other standards are in use, because routing could choose to
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differentiate at a different granularity than is used by any such
automated link local address configuration tools.
4. Recommendations
For historical reasons, when a prefix is needed on a link, barring
other considerations, a /64 is recommended [RFC7136].
The length of the Interface Identifier in Stateless Address
Autoconfiguration [RFC4862] is a parameter; its length SHOULD be
sufficient for effective randomization for privacy reasons. For
example, a /48 might be sufficient. But operationally we recommend,
barring strong considerations to the contrary, using 64-bits for
SLAAC in order not to discover bugs where 64 was hard-coded, and to
favor portability of devices and operating systems.
Nonetheless, there is no reason in theory why an IPv6 node should not
operate with different interface identfier lengths on different
physical interfaces. Thus, a correct implementation of SLAAC must in
fact allow for any prefix length, with the value being a parameter
per interface. For instance, the Interface Identifier length in the
recommended (see [RFC8064]) algorithm for selecting stable interface
identifiers [RFC7217] is a parameter, rather than a hardcoded value.
5. Security Considerations
Assuming that nodes employ unpredictable interface identifiers
[RFC7721], the subnet size may have an impact on some security and
privacy properties of a network. Namely, the smaller the subnet
size, the more feasible it becomes to perform IPv6 address scans
[RFC7707] [RFC7721]. For some specific subnets, such as point to
point links, this may be less of an issue.
On the other hand, we assume that a number of IPv6 implementations
fail to enforce limits on the size of some of the data structures
they employ for communicating with neighboring nodes, such as the
Neighbor Cache. In such cases, the use of smaller subnets forces an
operational limit on such data structures, thus helping mitigate some
pathological behaviors (such as Neighbor Cache Exhaustion attacks).
6. IANA Considerations
This document has no IANA Considerations.
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7. References
7.1. Normative References
[RFC2450] Hinden, R., "Proposed TLA and NLA Assignment Rules",
RFC 2450, December 1998.
[RFC2460] Deering, S. and R. Hinden, "Internet Protocol, Version 6
(IPv6) Specification", RFC 2460, December 1998.
[RFC4291] Hinden, R. and S. Deering, "IP Version 6 Addressing
Architecture", RFC 4291, February 2006.
[RFC7217] Gont, F., "A Method for Generating Semantically Opaque
Interface Identifiers with IPv6 Stateless Address
Autoconfiguration (SLAAC)", RFC 7217,
DOI 10.17487/RFC7217, April 2014,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7217>.
[RFC8064] Gont, F., Cooper, A., Thaler, D., and W. Liu,
"Recommendation on Stable IPv6 Interface Identifiers",
RFC 8064, DOI 10.17487/RFC8064, February 2017,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc8064>.
7.2. Informative References
[I-D.hinden-6man-rfc2464bis]
Crawford, M. and R. Hinden, "Transmission of IPv6 Packets
over Ethernet Networks", draft-hinden-6man-rfc2464bis-02
(work in progress), March 2017.
[I-D.ietf-6man-rfc4291bis]
Hinden, R. and S. <>, "IP Version 6 Addressing
Architecture", draft-ietf-6man-rfc4291bis-07 (work in
progress), January 2017.
[I-D.jinmei-6man-prefix-clarify]
Jinmei, T., "Clarifications on On-link and Subnet IPv6
Prefixes", draft-jinmei-6man-prefix-clarify-00 (work in
progress), March 2017.
[RFC3587] Hinden, R., Deering, S., and E. Nordmark, "IPv6 Global
Unicast Address Format", RFC 3587, August 2003.
[RFC4632] Fuller, V. and T. Li, "Classless Inter-domain Routing
(CIDR): The Internet Address Assignment and Aggregation
Plan", BCP 122, RFC 4632, August 2006.
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[RFC4862] Thomson, S., Narten, T., and T. Jinmei, "IPv6 Stateless
Address Autoconfiguration", RFC 4862, September 2007.
[RFC6164] Kohno, M., Nitzan, B., Bush, R., Matsuzaki, Y., Colitti,
L., and T. Narten, "Using 127-Bit IPv6 Prefixes on Inter-
Router Links", RFC 6164, April 2011.
[RFC7136] Carpenter, B. and S. Jiang, "Significance of IPv6
Interface Identifiers", RFC 7136, DOI 10.17487/RFC7136,
February 2014, <http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7136>.
[RFC7608] Boucadair, M., Petrescu, A., and F. Baker, "IPv6 Prefix
Length Recommendation for Forwarding", BCP 198, RFC 7608,
DOI 10.17487/RFC7608, July 2015,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7608>.
[RFC7707] Gont, F. and T. Chown, "Network Reconnaissance in IPv6
Networks", RFC 7707, DOI 10.17487/RFC7707, March 2016,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7707>.
[RFC7721] Cooper, A., Gont, F., and D. Thaler, "Security and Privacy
Considerations for IPv6 Address Generation Mechanisms",
RFC 7721, DOI 10.17487/RFC7721, March 2016,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7721>.
Authors' Addresses
Randy Bush
Internet Initiative Japan
5147 Crystal Springs
Bainbridge Island, Washington 98110
US
Email: randy@psg.com
Brian Carpenter
Department of Computer Science
University of Auckland
PB 92019
Auckland 1142
New Zealand
Email: brian.e.carpenter@gmail.com
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Fernando Gont
SI6 Networks / UTN-FRH
Evaristo Carriego 2644
Haedo, Provincia de Buenos Aires 1706
Argentina
Phone: +54 11 4650 8472
Email: fgont@si6networks.com
URI: http://www.si6networks.com
Nick Hilliard
INEX
4027 Kingswood Road
Dublin 24
Ireland
Email: nick@inex.ie
Geoff Huston
Email: gih@apnic.net
Chris Morrow
Google, Inc.
1600 Ampitheatre Parkway
Mountain View, California
United States of America
Email: morrowc@google.com
Job Snijders
NTT Communications
Theodorus Majofskistraat 100
Amsterdam 1065 SZ
The Netherlands
Email: job@ntt.net
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