When IANA ran out of IPv4 blocks in February, the belts tightened yet another notch in the IPv4 world. Regional registries such as ARIN have changed how they are allocating additional IPv4 blocks to ISPs, including performing more stringent reviews to ensure efficient utilization of current allocations and reducing future allocation sizes to more fairly distribute the remaining addresses. In turn, ISPs such as SoftLayer have to more closely monitor how we assign our IPv4 space to ensure efficient utilization by our customers. In order to maximize this limited resource, we have to make changes to the way customers order and receive additional IPv4 IPs.

Being down the line from ARIN, SoftLayer’s networking department has to ensure we abide by all updated ARIN policies when we issue IPv4 addresses from our available pool in order to remain eligible to receive additional resource allocations. In addition to policy compliance, we are also focused on IPv4 conservation methods such as those referenced in RFC2050. Accordingly, we’ve made improvements to the way that we handle IPv4 requests to better streamline the process of collecting and reviewing usage and justification details.

Every SoftLayer server comes with one public IPv4 address, and until recently was assigned 4 additional IPs (/30) statically routed to that server. Our first step of IP conservation took place earlier this year, when we ceased the practice of automatically assigning the 4 additional IPs, and only issued them by customer request.

As we move forward, we’re trying to be as transparent with our customers about the IPv4 justification process as we can, so we’re letting you know that additional justification requirements have been imposed on all ISPs by ARIN, and the best way we can meet those requirements is to have our customers follow the same guidelines. Being SoftLayer, we’re doing what we can to automate and streamline the IPv4 justification process where possible, and are therefore implementing changes in the ordering system. Beginning on June 1, you will now be presented with a brief questionnaire whenever requesting additional IPv4 addresses. We must collect the requester’s contact details, number of IPs that are expected to be used immediately and within the next year, as well as a brief description of how the IPs will be used. What happens next depends on the information you have provided as well as the current IP usage on your account: either the request is automatically approved and fulfilled, or a ticket is spawned for additional manual review by one of the folks in our networking team.

When a ticket is spawned for our network folks, we will get back to you within one business day, and let you know whether we need additional details from you in order to consider the request. These manual reviews will take additional time, depending on the size and complexity of request, as well as the quality of information provided. Please be prepared that there will be some cases where we will not be able to approve a request, such as when name-based virtualization can be used for IP conservation, or when services such as SEO, email campaigns, or VPN termination are the intended use for the additional IPv4 addresses.

If you’re familiar with SoftLayer’s previous method of ordering additional IPv4 addresses, you might feel like we’re making you jump through hoops. These “hoops” are not intended to make the process arbitrarily more difficult. Rather, they’re being put in place specifically to make sure we’re in the best position possible to meet customer demands with our current IPv4 allocations, and get additional allocations from ARIN before they are completely depleted.

The ISPs that have no problems giving away IPv4 addresses right now without more stringent review are also going to be the providers that have the hardest time getting additional IPv4 blocks from ARIN, and therefore will have a hard time fulfilling future customer needs. At SoftLayer we are going by the philosophy that the more cautiously we approach IPv4 depletion by justifying our customers’ needs for each IPv4 address, the longer our IPv4 pool will last to meet those needs.

This is a good opportunity to mention IPv6 as the long-term solution for IPv4 address depletion. The sooner that the public Internet becomes fully IPv6-enabled, the better off the resource constraint will become. The SoftLayer network is enabled for IPv6, and you may place an order for 18.4 quintillion free IPv6 addresses for your server via our web portal today!

-Dani