This document is an Internet-Draft (I-D). Anyone may submit an I-D to the IETF. This I-D is not endorsed by the IETF and has no formal standing in the IETF standards process.
Yes, and assuming it will not become popular, this will expire / not renew in 6 months.
It’s also worth noting that the author is affiliated with a company based in Bermuda. So it doesn’t feel like it comes from a legitimate institute. For all i know this was vibe-written by an AI in an afternoon.
"Founded in 1998, One Communications Ltd. (formerly KeyTech Limited) is a diverse telecommunications holding company. Its subsidiary companies specialise in cellular voice, high-speed internet, subscription television and data solutions for both residential and corporate customers.
In 2014, One Communications Ltd. began a series of strategic mergers and acquisitions in order to position itself competitively in an industry driven by technological change. The Company acquired internet, cellular and cable television companies in both Bermuda and the Cayman Islands. These transactions have transformed One Communications Ltd. into a robust triple-play service provider with the networks and data access infrastructures needed to meet the demands of ever-growing bandwidth consumption. Through its operating subsidiaries, the Company is positioned as the leading full-service telecommunications provider for corporate and residential customers in both Bermuda and Cayman.
The operating subsidiaries of One Communications Ltd. are Logic Communications Ltd. (trading as One Communications), Bermuda Digital Communications Ltd. (trading as One Communications), Cable Co. Ltd., and WestTel Limited in the Cayman Islands (trading as Logic)."
Why not discuss the contents of the draft and why it's awful. The fact that the author works for a telecom provider in a small country does not by itself mean much. Perhaps the proposal has been trialled there
I believe Bermuda is a tax shelter country, which means people and companies register there to hide identity and income from the nations they live and do business in. Because of that, the vast
majority of businesses registered in bermuda are not legitimate institutions - they are shell companies defrauding their home nations.
And the home nation's governments defraud their people with unnecessary wars, wasteful spending, unpayable debt, and excessive inflation. There comes a time when paying less tax is the right thing to do.
I can think of few groups as likely to support wars than the ultra rich, but if you are very wealthy and don’t like your tax dollars going to military spending just invest in lockheed or raytheon and get it all back as dividends. War spending doesn’t justify tax fraud, unless you’re also out on the protest line when a new war breaks out.
As the top tax rates fell, from 90% in 1950 to under 40% now - the use of tax shelters increased. So unless your “comes a time” is referencing pre 1915 USA, this isn’t a valid justification.
If inflation is the issue, keep your money in a different currency.
I just don’t see actions from the very rich (the ones using tax shelters) that back up your justifications.
I think it’s simply the collapse of any kind of cohesion between the wealthy and the nation in which they live. Or put another way: I’m rich, i shouldn’t have to pay for stuff i don’t use!
Why are you even defending this practice? It's something very wealthy people do, they're not your everyday citizens conscious about how their taxes go.
They evade taxes for financial reasons, not moral reasons.
Why not discuss the I-D itself. Many drafts are garbage but simply being a draft does not by itself tell us about its likelihood of becoming an RFC or standard
> Every manageable element in an IPv8 network is authorised via OAuth2 JWT tokens served from a local cache. Every service a device requires is delivered in a single DHCP8 lease response.
I'm not going to pretend I know all about IP routing and networking. I understand enough of it to have a home server all appropriately set up with IPv4.
But what makes this quote a problem? I mean, it seems a bit excessive, but I don't understand why...
IPv8 does not require dual-stack operation. There is no flag day. 8to4 tunnelling enables IPv8 islands separated by IPv4- only transit networks to communicate immediately.
How is this different from IPv6? We've had 6to4 for ages, the problem is the other direction: how does a IPv4 host initiate a connection to a IPv8 host?
Existing IPv4 applications use the standard BSD socket API with AF_INET and sockaddr_in. The IPv8 compatibility layer intercepts socket calls transparently -- the application has zero IPv8 awareness.
Except many IPv4 applications use the addresses of the source or that they bind to in some form. If it's secretly an IPv8 behind their back that'll break.
This is not a serious proposal and we should not treat it as such. And I apologise in advance for the length of this comment.
"IPv4 is a proper subset of IPv8. No existing device, application, or network requires modification. 100% backward compatible."
This cannot be true. Section 5.1 states that IPv8 uses version number 8 in the IP header Version field and the header is 8 octets longer than IPv4's. Any existing IPv4 router, switch ASIC, NIC, host stack, or firewall that sees a Version=8 packet will fail to parse it (most will drop it). Backward compatibility is logically impossible when the wire format is different.
The spec simultaneously demands sweeping new machinery everywhere: new socket API (AF_INET8), new DNS record type (A8), new ARP (ARP8), new ICMP (ICMPv8), new BGP/OSPF/IS-IS, mandatory certified NIC firmware with hardware rate limits, mandatory Zone Servers, mandatory OAuth2 on switch ports, mandatory persistent TCP/443 to the Zone Server from every end device, and a new IANA version-number assignment. "No modification required" is contradicted on nearly every page.
IP version 8 is already historically assigned (it was PIP, later folded into the IPv6 effort). The draft's IANA request ignores this.
The ASN model conflates identity with location. ASNs are organizational identifiers assigned by RIRs, turning them into the 32-bit routing prefix means an organization cannot change providers, multihome with provider-assigned space, or use PI space the way networks do today. Every organization that wants public IPv8 connectivity must now hold an ASN - roughly a 1000x increase in ASN allocation.
The /16 minimum injectable prefix rule eliminates essentially all of today's BGP traffic engineering and most multihoming patterns.
Cross-AS Cost Factor (CF) requires every AS on Earth to trust the metrics injected by every other AS, including a "economic policy" component. BGP is policy-based precisely because ASes do not trust each other's metrics, this has been understood since the 1990s.
The Zone Server kitchen sink (DNS + DHCP + NTP + OAuth + telemetry + ACL + NAT + WHOIS validation + PVRST root) concentrates a dozen unrelated functions into one box on one hardcoded address (.253/.254). This is an operational and security anti-pattern.
PVRST is mandated. PVRST is a Cisco-proprietary spanning tree variant, mandating a vendor-specific protocol in a Standards-Track draft is a non-starter for IETF.
The companion drafts (WHOIS8, NetLog8, Update8, WiFi8, Zone Server, RINE, routing protocols) are all by the same author, none have working-group review, and the core draft depends on all of them to function.
> East-west security -- traffic between devices within a network -- is enforced by ACL8 zone isolation. Devices communicate only with their designated service gateway. The service gateway communicates only with the designated cloud service. Lateral movement between devices or zones is architecturally prevented by the absence of any permitted route to any other destination.
I must be missing something or misinterpreting that section because if there is no "lateral movement" how do people in an office print a file, access a network drive, connect to the Exchange server? And those are only the most naive scenarios.
> IPv8 also resolves IPv4 address exhaustion. Each Autonomous System Number (ASN) holder receives 4,294,967,296 host addresses. The global routing table is structurally bounded at one entry per ASN
Yes, let's conflate routing and addressing while throwing out decades of IPv6 implementation and design. (/sarcasm)
But more seriously, it gives me a pause when we try to bake more complex, application-centric logic into foundational protocols. The list of assigned IPv4 and TCP option numbers is a graveyard of tech experiments, but at least we had the sense to separate them from the main protocol. Baking JSON web tokens and OAuth into IP seems kinda crazy from that point of view. Is this what we want to commit to for the next 40 years?
I kinda wish that IPv6 just used this ("IPv8") addressing scheme and left everything else the same, though. I think the expectation that IPv6 should entail an architectural rethink for existing networks really slowed us down. Fun fact: at this point, IPv6 is 30 years old, we're still under 50%, and growth is visibly tapering off.
In many regards IPv6 was a change that went too far and didn't go far enough all at the same time, although slowly but surely it is being adopted. Something like this had a better chance at adoption precisely for how little it changed things. The most radical part is the merging of all services into one central blob and I think that is going to be the part most people take exception too especially oauth. It doesn't solve fundamental issues like roaming with mobile devices, something that now is really important to get rid of a lot of complexity that has built up.
One of the main (vocal) issues people seem to have with IPv6 is that the addresses are hard to remember. But having eight different three digit numbers (r.r.r.r.n.n.n.n) does not seem any easier unfortunately.
I hate to be this dismissive, but it feels like an academic with a paternalistic streak looked deeply at how the Internet works, saw lots of different protocols and weird design decisions, and decided: this is not coherent enough. Then he figured, I'll make all the decisions now, that way it'll be coherent. And let's give every subnet a centralised source of trust and management. That'll make the design so much cleaner!
By which I mean to insinuate there's a lot of nuance and learned lessons in the current situation that this design seems not to learn from. Even though it did learn some lessons, I don't think this passes 'Chestertons fence'
At first glance this looks like a joke. But if you look closer, it looks really workable (well, maybe except those "mandatory NIC-enforced security" bits)
I'm hoping someone will be brave (or stupid) enough to actually implement this. I have a personal ASN number that I'm willing to participate with :)
To be clear, when I posted this, the title of the post was "IPv8 Proposal". However, it seems to have been edited at some point to be "Internet Protocol Version 8 (IPv8)" thus becoming a misleading title and seems to have gotten his post flagged. Not sure how that happened, or why.
111 comments
https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-thain-ipv8/
It’s also worth noting that the author is affiliated with a company based in Bermuda. So it doesn’t feel like it comes from a legitimate institute. For all i know this was vibe-written by an AI in an afternoon.
In 2014, One Communications Ltd. began a series of strategic mergers and acquisitions in order to position itself competitively in an industry driven by technological change. The Company acquired internet, cellular and cable television companies in both Bermuda and the Cayman Islands. These transactions have transformed One Communications Ltd. into a robust triple-play service provider with the networks and data access infrastructures needed to meet the demands of ever-growing bandwidth consumption. Through its operating subsidiaries, the Company is positioned as the leading full-service telecommunications provider for corporate and residential customers in both Bermuda and Cayman.
The operating subsidiaries of One Communications Ltd. are Logic Communications Ltd. (trading as One Communications), Bermuda Digital Communications Ltd. (trading as One Communications), Cable Co. Ltd., and WestTel Limited in the Cayman Islands (trading as Logic)."
https://onecomm.bm/investors/
Why not discuss the contents of the draft and why it's awful. The fact that the author works for a telecom provider in a small country does not by itself mean much. Perhaps the proposal has been trialled there
Need more facts (cf. speculation)
$0.02 is that it's Palantir, maybe Meta. OAuth on every packet kills anonymity forever.
https://bernews.com/2016/11/video-two-into-one-equals-new-un...
As the top tax rates fell, from 90% in 1950 to under 40% now - the use of tax shelters increased. So unless your “comes a time” is referencing pre 1915 USA, this isn’t a valid justification.
If inflation is the issue, keep your money in a different currency.
I just don’t see actions from the very rich (the ones using tax shelters) that back up your justifications.
I think it’s simply the collapse of any kind of cohesion between the wealthy and the nation in which they live. Or put another way: I’m rich, i shouldn’t have to pay for stuff i don’t use!
They evade taxes for financial reasons, not moral reasons.
"A well-formed RFC starts with a well-formed Internet-Draft."
https://www.rfc-editor.org/pubprocess/
For example, here is the Internet Draft for IPv6 which eventually became RFC 2460
https://www.ietf.org/archive/id/draft-ietf-ipngwg-ipv6-spec-...
Why not discuss the I-D itself. Many drafts are garbage but simply being a draft does not by itself tell us about its likelihood of becoming an RFC or standard
> Every manageable element in an IPv8 network is authorised via OAuth2 JWT tokens served from a local cache. Every service a device requires is delivered in a single DHCP8 lease response.
Isn't it 2 weeks late for April Fools'?
But what makes this quote a problem? I mean, it seems a bit excessive, but I don't understand why...
How is this different from IPv6? We've had 6to4 for ages, the problem is the other direction: how does a IPv4 host initiate a connection to a IPv8 host?
Existing IPv4 applications use the standard BSD socket API with AF_INET and sockaddr_in. The IPv8 compatibility layer intercepts socket calls transparently -- the application has zero IPv8 awareness.
Except many IPv4 applications use the addresses of the source or that they bind to in some form. If it's secretly an IPv8 behind their back that'll break.
> IPv8 does not require dual-stack operation.
The whole thing isn't a joke because of this. Technically, it's IPv4++ and that about it.
> Every manageable element in an IPv8 network is authorised via OAuth2 JWT tokens
What ?!
I'm not sure it's the path I want to follow.
There's also at least three ipv9s, only one of which was a joke https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_IP_version_numbers
"IPv4 is a proper subset of IPv8. No existing device, application, or network requires modification. 100% backward compatible."
This cannot be true. Section 5.1 states that IPv8 uses version number 8 in the IP header Version field and the header is 8 octets longer than IPv4's. Any existing IPv4 router, switch ASIC, NIC, host stack, or firewall that sees a Version=8 packet will fail to parse it (most will drop it). Backward compatibility is logically impossible when the wire format is different.
The spec simultaneously demands sweeping new machinery everywhere: new socket API (AF_INET8), new DNS record type (A8), new ARP (ARP8), new ICMP (ICMPv8), new BGP/OSPF/IS-IS, mandatory certified NIC firmware with hardware rate limits, mandatory Zone Servers, mandatory OAuth2 on switch ports, mandatory persistent TCP/443 to the Zone Server from every end device, and a new IANA version-number assignment. "No modification required" is contradicted on nearly every page.
IP version 8 is already historically assigned (it was PIP, later folded into the IPv6 effort). The draft's IANA request ignores this.
The ASN model conflates identity with location. ASNs are organizational identifiers assigned by RIRs, turning them into the 32-bit routing prefix means an organization cannot change providers, multihome with provider-assigned space, or use PI space the way networks do today. Every organization that wants public IPv8 connectivity must now hold an ASN - roughly a 1000x increase in ASN allocation.
The /16 minimum injectable prefix rule eliminates essentially all of today's BGP traffic engineering and most multihoming patterns.
Cross-AS Cost Factor (CF) requires every AS on Earth to trust the metrics injected by every other AS, including a "economic policy" component. BGP is policy-based precisely because ASes do not trust each other's metrics, this has been understood since the 1990s.
The Zone Server kitchen sink (DNS + DHCP + NTP + OAuth + telemetry + ACL + NAT + WHOIS validation + PVRST root) concentrates a dozen unrelated functions into one box on one hardcoded address (.253/.254). This is an operational and security anti-pattern.
PVRST is mandated. PVRST is a Cisco-proprietary spanning tree variant, mandating a vendor-specific protocol in a Standards-Track draft is a non-starter for IETF.
The companion drafts (WHOIS8, NetLog8, Update8, WiFi8, Zone Server, RINE, routing protocols) are all by the same author, none have working-group review, and the core draft depends on all of them to function.
> East-west security -- traffic between devices within a network -- is enforced by ACL8 zone isolation. Devices communicate only with their designated service gateway. The service gateway communicates only with the designated cloud service. Lateral movement between devices or zones is architecturally prevented by the absence of any permitted route to any other destination.
I must be missing something or misinterpreting that section because if there is no "lateral movement" how do people in an office print a file, access a network drive, connect to the Exchange server? And those are only the most naive scenarios.
> IPv8 also resolves IPv4 address exhaustion. Each Autonomous System Number (ASN) holder receives 4,294,967,296 host addresses. The global routing table is structurally bounded at one entry per ASN
Yes, let's conflate routing and addressing while throwing out decades of IPv6 implementation and design. (/sarcasm)
I didn't make it past page three. Enjoy responsibly.
But more seriously, it gives me a pause when we try to bake more complex, application-centric logic into foundational protocols. The list of assigned IPv4 and TCP option numbers is a graveyard of tech experiments, but at least we had the sense to separate them from the main protocol. Baking JSON web tokens and OAuth into IP seems kinda crazy from that point of view. Is this what we want to commit to for the next 40 years?
I kinda wish that IPv6 just used this ("IPv8") addressing scheme and left everything else the same, though. I think the expectation that IPv6 should entail an architectural rethink for existing networks really slowed us down. Fun fact: at this point, IPv6 is 30 years old, we're still under 50%, and growth is visibly tapering off.
By which I mean to insinuate there's a lot of nuance and learned lessons in the current situation that this design seems not to learn from. Even though it did learn some lessons, I don't think this passes 'Chestertons fence'
I'm hoping someone will be brave (or stupid) enough to actually implement this. I have a personal ASN number that I'm willing to participate with :)
https://xkcd.com/927/