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Worldwide Marketing Statement of Position
IPv6 Support – US Government Regulation requiring for Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6)
May 05, 2009
Abstract: All major US government Federal agencies' infrastructure (network backbones) have migrated to using IPv6 and all agency networks are able to interface with this infrastructure effective June 2008. The US Government Chief Information Officers require that all new IT procurements be IPv6 compliant. An IPv6 compliant product or system must be able to receive, process, and transmit or forward (as appropriate) IPv6 packets and should interoperate with other systems and protocols on both IPv4 and IPv6 modes of operation.
Key Business Issues:
The continuous growth of the global Internet requires that the architecture evolve to accommodate new technologies that support increasing number of users, internet hosts, services and applications. Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6) IPv6 (http://www.ipv6forum.com/, http://www.ipv6tf.org/, http://www.go6.net/) or IP Next Generation (IPNG) is the successor to the existing internet addressing protocol, IPv4, and enables the continuing expansion of internet technologies. In addition to expansion of the internet address range, IPv6 includes designed security and privacy enhancements, dynamic auto-configuration semantics and quality of service enhancements for optimized throughput services. There are a number of implementation, migration and coexistence issues that will affect hardware and software vendors deployment of IPv6.
Position:
- Factors which may inhibit IPv6 conversion:
- Significant infrastructure costs to migrate hardware and software to IPv6.
- Limited selection of IPv6-capable security and management products.
- Network Address Translation (NAT) and VPN semantics mitigate some IPv4 limitations and restrictions.
- Secure Sockets (SSL) is prevalent throughout internet services which negates some of the advantages of IPSec in IPv6.
- Stricter control of IPv4 addresses and Classless inter-domain routing will conserve IP address ranges.
- Conversion strategies are well-defined and can be adopted at a measured rate.
- Factors which may accelerate IPv6 conversion:
- Recent projections estimate the exhaustion of IP addresses in the 2011-2012 time frame.
- The major hardware and software vendors support IPv6 semantics in network devices and operating systems.
- The US Department of Defense (DoD) mandate that resulted in IPv6 being in place and that all IT product acquisitions be IPv6 enabled.
- Effective January 2009 the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) added IPv6 testing to its regular IT product evaluation process required by the DoD.
- As of June 2008 all the major Federal agencies network backbones were IPv6-enabled.
- Much of the current US Federal IPv4 infrastructure is IPv6 capable with approximately one-third of the deployed desktop systems IPv6 capable.
- The US Government is encouraging all Federal agencies to move forward with IPv6 integration as part of their enterprise architecture planning.
- Europe, Japan, and other Asian countries have IPv6 roadmaps in place.
- Features of this new protocol include:
- Expanded Address Ranges.
- Efficiencies in Routing.
- Integrated IPSec Semantics.
- Improved Quality of Service.
- IPv6 adoption by operating system vendors that SAS supports includes Microsoft, HP, IBM, and Sun. Infrastructure vendors such as Cisco have also announced support for this technology.
- Hewlett-Packard Support:
- z/OS V1.4 Announcement:
- Sun Java 2, J2SE 1.4 Support:
- Microsoft Windows XP SP1, Windows Server 2003, J2SE 1.5 Support:
- Hewlett-Packard & Cisco IPv6 Collaboration:
- Cisco IPv6 Support:
Bottom Line:
Many governments have already moved to, or are mandating, IPv6 compliance within the next twelve to eighteen months. Additionally, internet hardware vendors and operating system vendors are now actively supporting IPv6. SAS implemented support for IPv6 beginning with SAS Version 9.2.
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Federal Government