IPv6 or Internet Protocol version 6 is a next-generation communications protocol designed to be used on the public Internet and private service provider infrastructure to support the move and development towards a converged system of voice, video, and data communications i.e. Next Generation Network (NGN).
The previous version used is the Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4). IPv4 is a robust and scalable protocol, but it is not immune to the retrospective poor design and planning considerations when viewed from a current socio-economic environment demand perspective. The design of IPv4 is over 25 years old with little or no changes to the protocol and its communications method has little or no foresight as to the potential growth of the Internet.
IPv6 is introduced mainly to solve the address space issues. With its large amount of addresses and with other features, IPv6 is estimated to replace IPv4 in a very near future. Some of the IP experts said that the bottom line for IPv6 deployment is going to be the worldwide demand for Internet Addresses.
Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) uses 32 bits of address. Currently the most widely implemented version of the internet protocol.
Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) is the next-generation communications protocol designed to succeed the Internet Protocol version 4 exhaustion. IPv6 uses 128 bits of address.
According to Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC), e there are no real fundamental and operational differences between the two protocols per se, IPv6 inherently provides the following enhancements over IPv4:
- extensive IP addresses available;
- plug and play support (PnP);
- inherent security (IPSec) features;
- mandatory quality of service (QoS) standards;
- mobility support;
- future-proofing (via header extensions)
IPv6 addresses are typically composed of two logical parts: a 64-bit network prefix and a 64-bit host part. IPv6 addresses are normally written as eight groups of four hexadecimal digits, where each group is separated by a colon ( : ).
Addresses are n:n:n:n:n:n:n:n, n = 4 digit hexadecimal integer, 16 x 8 = 128-bit address.
There are several features and benefits IPv6 may able to provide.
- Larger address space – IPv6 increases the IP address size from 32 bits to 128 bits, thereby increasing the number of globally routable IP addresses from approximately 4,300,000,000 (4.3×109 ) to 340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456 (3.4×1038).
Theoretically, IPv6 could provide an IPv6 /48 address prefix block (1,208,925,819,614,629,174,706,176 IP addresses) for every 10 square meters on earth. Increasing the address space to 128 bits provides the following additional potential benefits:
- Enhanced applications functionality – Enables peer-to-peer, infrastructure-less applications and networking (vs. client-server model).
- End-to-end transparency – Reduces motivations for address translation technologies.
- Hierarchical addressing – Summarizes and manages routing table growth.
- Auto-configuration – The unicast IPv6 addressing architecture uses one half of the address (64 bits) to embed IEEE extended unique identifiers (EUI-64) in each interface address. The use of globally unique EUI-64s on each interface allows systems to derive globally unique IPv6 addresses automatically from simple announcements from neighboring systems.
- Scalability of multicast routing – IPv6 provides a much larger pool of multicast addresses with multiple scoping options.
- Auto-configuration – Clients using IPv4 addresses use the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) server every time they log onto a network. This process is called ‘stateful auto-configuration.’ IPv6 supports a revised DHCPv6 protocol to support similar stateful auto-configuration, but also supports stateless auto-configuration of nodes that do not require a server to obtain addresses, but uses router advertisements to create an address. This creates a “plug-and-play” environment and can simplify management and administration. IPv6 also allows automatic address configuration and reconfiguration, empowering administrators to renumber network addresses without accessing all clients.
IPv6 provides the platform to support the services in the areas:
