IPv6

The New Internet Protocol

Integrated Network Services
Almerindo Graziano
 Introduction
• Justification for IPv6
• IPv6 goals
• IPv6 Addressing
• The new Header
– Extension Headers
• Recap
 Justification for IPv6: What is
wrong with IPv4?
• Wasteful of address space
• Not built-in support for hierarchical addressing
– Subnetting
– CIDR
• Large routing tables
• Large administrative workload:
– Changing ISP
– Merger or acquisition Renumbering
or
NAT
 What is wrong with IPv4?
• Routers perform a lot of operations
– Table lookup
– Options
– Checksum
– Fragmentation
• Lack of authentication
– IP spoofing
• Lack of encryption
 IPv6 goals
• Support for a larger number of addresses
• Reduce the size of routing tables
• Simplify the protocol (easier to process)
• Provide better security
• Better support for Quality of Service
• Provide support for mobile users
• Allow the protocol to be extensible
• Be compatible
 IPv6 Addressing scheme
• Designed to be highly scalable and hierarchical
• 16-byte long
– 7x1023 IP addresses per square meter!!!
– It “eliminates” the need for private address space
• IPv6 notation
8000:0000:0000:0000:0123:8219:E42A:DF3E
8000::123:8219:E42A:DF3E
• IPv4 addresses can be written as
::192.31.20.46
 Address Allocation
• IPv6 could support a number of diverse addressing
schemes
– Provider Allocation
hierarchy is based on large service providers,
regardless of their location
– Geographic Allocation
hierarchy is based on the location of subscribers
(similar to the telephony system)
• Both approaches have drawbacks
Large networks do not often conform to provider
and/or geographical boundaries!!
 Aggregation Based Allocation
• Combines provider and geographic allocation
approaches
– Based on the existence of limited number of high-
level exchange points
• Large providers are represented at one or more exchange
points (provider orientation)
– Exchanges are distributed around the globe
(geographic orientation)
• Favoured by the IETF
 IPv6 Address Hierarchy
Long-Haul Long-Haul
Provider Provider

Interexchange
(TLA)
To other
Long-Haul Long-Haul TLA
Provider Provider

Provider

Subscriber Provider
Subscriber Subscriber

Subscriber Subscriber
TLA: Top Level Aggregator
 Aggregation-based Allocation
• First 3 bits identify the type of address
– unicast, multicast, anycast etc..
• International registries assign block to TLA
• TLA allocate block of addresses to NLA
– NLA can be large providers or global corporate
networks
• NLA can create their own hierarchy
IEEE EUI-64 Address
24 bits - Company ID
40 bits - interface ID
3 13 8 24 bits 16 bits 64 bits
001 TLA RES NLA SLA Interface ID
Public Topology Site Local Interface
Topology
 Aggregation-based Allocation

32 bits
NLA
1 Site SLA Interface ID
NLA
2 Site SLA Interface ID

NLA
3 Site SLA Interface ID
 Other Address Types
• Site-Local Addresses
– Similar to IPv4 private addresses
128 bits
• Link-Local Addresses 1111111010 00 . …. 00 Interface ID

– A router doesn’t exist 10 bits 54 bits 64 bits

– Operate over a single link

– Used for temporary bootstrapping
Not propagated outside organizational boundaries
Not allocated by public registry authorities
 Other Address Types
• Multicast Addresses
– Logical addresses to communicate to multiple
nodes
• Anycast Addresses
– Used to communicate to the closest of a class of
nodes (closest DNS, closest router)
– Allocated from the same address space as
Unicast addresses
 Address Autoconfiguration
• A node combines its MAC address with a network
prefix it learns from a neighbouring router
• The autoconfiguration doesn’t need a manually
configured server: stateless address autoconfiguration
– It differs from IPv4’s DHCP (stateful address
configuration). DHCPv6 has been developed
– Great advantage when an enterprise is forced to renumber
because of an ISP change or M&A
– Great support for mobile users and dynamic workgroups
 Header Comparison
IPv4 Header IPv6 Header
Version IHL Type of Total Length Version Priority Flow Label
Service
Flag Fragment Next Hop
Identification Offset Payload Length
Header Limit
TTL Protocol Header Checksum

Source Address
Source Address
Destination Address

Options Padding

32 bits
Destination Address
IPv4 Header = 14 fields
IPv6 Header = 8 fields
32 bits
 The new Header
• Fixed size
• Fewer fields
• No Checksum
– Already performed by other layers
– Reliable networks
• Extension Headers replace Options
– Routers can skip over some extension headers
Faster processing
Extensible
 QoS Support
• Priority field (4 bits)
– Congestion-Controlled traffic (0-7)
• Traffic where the source backs off in case of congestion (e.g.
TCP)
– Non-Congestion-Controlled traffic (8-15)
• Traffic where constant data rate and delay are desirable (real-
time audio/video)
• Flow label field (20 bits)
– A sequence of packets sent from a particular source to a
particular destination for which the source desires special
handling by intervening routers
 Extension Headers
 Hop-by-Hop options header
 Destination options header-1
 Source Routing header
 Fragmentation header
 Authentication header
 IPv6 Encryption header
 Destination options header-2
 Extention Headers
• Hop-by-Hop
– Carries information for all intermediate nodes
– Used for management and debugging
• Destination
– Carries information to be read just by destination
nodes
• Source Routing
– Allows to specify a list of router to traverse
 Fragmentation Header
• Each source is responsible for sending packets of
the right size
– MTU path discovery process
• Packet fragmentation is not permitted by
intermediate nodes (routers)
– Faster processing
• If fragmentation is required, the fragmentation
header is used
 Authentication Header
• It gives network applications a guarantee that a
packet did in fact come from an authentic source
• A checksum is created based on the key and the
content of the packet
• The checksum is re-run at the destination and
validated
 IPv6 Encryption Header
• Encapsulation Security Payload (ESP)
– It provides encryption at the network layer
• Two encryption modes are supported
– Transport mode
– Tunnel mode (steel pipe)
 Encryption modes
Unencrypted Encrypted

IPv6 Extention Transport Header

ESP Header and Payload
Header Headers

Transport Mode

Unencrypted Encrypted

IPv6 Extention ESP IPv6 Extention Transport Header

Header Headers Header Header Headers and Payload

Tunnel Mode Original IP packet

 The Transition to IPv6
• IPv6 offers a robust future-oriented solution to
integrate physical networks
• Possibly use NAT but
– can be a bottleneck
– prevents the use of IP-level security
– breaks Domain Name Servers
• 6Bone
– Experimental world-wide network for testing IPv6
 IPv6 Resources
– Main IPv6 page
http://ipv6.com/
– 6Bone home page
http://6bone.net/
– The case for IPv6 (Internet Draft)
http://www.6bone.net/misc/case-for-ipv6.html