The shortage of IPv4 addresses has reached a critical stage, according to the registries that allocate internet numbers around the world.

The Number Resource Organization (NRO), which represents the registries, said on Tuesday that less than 10 percent of all IPv4 addresses remain available, threatening the future network operations of all businesses and organisations unless ISPs and businesses step up their migration to IPv6.
Complete info at ZDNet, V3 and ISP Review.

New IPv6 Lab Is Part of International Network of Training Facilities.

Cisco and the Georgian Research and Educational Networking Association (GRENA) today announced the opening of the first laboratory for training and research in Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) in the Caucasus region. Cisco donated the lab's networking and communications equipment.
Complete info at PRdomain.

ISOC Argentina, in cooperation with the 6DEPLOY project, has released a new IPv6 Book "IPv6 for All: Usage and Application Guide for different environments".

It is targeted to different types of readers, including end users, SOHO, enterprise, education and research networks, and ISPs. It also includes a section on how to deploy several IPv6 services.
The first edition is available in Spanish and can be downloaded here. Soon a new edition will be released in English and other languages being considered.

A survey commissioned by the European Commission (EC) and conducted by TNO and GNKS Consult in cooperation with the RIPE NCC, a not-for-profit organisation that supports the infrastructure of the Internet, reveals that organisations in Europe, Middle East and parts of Central Asia have been slow to adopt IPv6, the next-generation of Internet addressing protocol.

This is jeopardising Internet growth and socio-economic development in these regions.
Complete info at eGov, V3 and PublicTechnology.

The EU Agency ENISA [i.e. the European Network and Information Security Agency] now delivers its web site content over the new Internet protocol IPv6. With this action, ENISA is the first EU Agency to implement the European Commission IPv6 Action Plan.

All computer and electronic devices that connect to the web and other online services uses Internet Protocol Addresses. The current Internet Protocol, IPv4, provides a limited number of such addresses. According to estimates will be exhausted by 2011. The new Internet Protocol, IPv6, allows every citizen and organization to have as many Internet Addresses as they need to connect every conceivable device to the Internet: mobile phones, car navigation systems, home appliances, industrial equipment, etc.
Complete info at EurActiv, Computing and ComputerWeekly.

6DEPLOY has released an IPv6 E-Learning package. It is a complete IPv6 course with English speech. A version with subtitles in Portuguese is also available.

There is also a short "5 minutes" introduction to IPv6 "What is IPv6?", available only in English.
Complete information at the 6DEPLOY web site.

The United States has lost one of its most ardent proponents of IPv6, the next generation Internet protocol, with the death of Jim Bound earlier this week.

Bound was a Senior Fellow with HP, Chair of the North American IPv6 Task Force and CTO of the IPv6 Forum.
Complete info at NetworkWorld.

Advisor to the European Commission, Detlef Eckert, to stress the need to deploy the new Internet protocol now and highlights importance of public sector leadership at RIPE NCC Roundtable meeting for governments and regulators.

Detlef Eckert, senior advisor in the Directorate General Information Society and Media of the European Commission (EC), is today emphasising the crucial role of EU governments in leading the way to IPv6 migration, at a roundtable meeting for governments and regulators, hosted by the RIPE NCC.
Complete info at eGov Monitor, IT Pro and PublicTechnology.

Internet Governance Forum, Hyderabad, India, 3rd December 2008 - The Number Resource Organization (NRO), which is made up of the five Regional Internet Registries (RIRs), announces today that the rate of new entrants into the IPv6 routing system has increased by approximately 300 percent over the past two years.

This growth has been helped by the active promotion of IPv6 by the five RIRs and their communities; and developing economies, such as India, are playing an increasingly important role in generating demand for global IPv6 deployment.
Complete info at TMCnet, VNUnet and CIOL.

The Africa Network Information Center's 9th Open Policy Meeting (AfriNIC-9), held last week in Mauritius, saw the launch of international collaboration and IT training initiatives to benefit African techies.

Presenting research at the meeting, Japanese and South Korean professors announced a joint online collaboration and exchange program on Internet research between African and Asian technology experts.
Complete info at ComputerWorld.

Have a walk through the aisles of the ICT208 International Village and stop at the booth of the Global e-Infrastructure (Booth Number D 05)! You can meet representatives of 13 major e-Infrastructure projects and discover more about their state-of-the-art developments and global outreach.

Get to know how e-Infrastructures can open new frontiers for your business and research activities by allowing you to merge global resources and knowledge. Our Global e-Infrastructure team will be happy to answer all your questions and feed your curiosity.
Complete info at the Belief project web site.

Representatives of 42 member states in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) issued a declaration in which they expressed their support for the next-generation internet protocol.

At its Ministerial Meeting on the Future of the Internet Economy, held in Seoul, Korea, on Wednesday, the organisation said the switch to the new version of IP was necessary to connect billions of people to the internet. IPv4 addresses are quickly running out, so the signatories want to have the new version of the internet protocol, IPv6, adopted quickly. In one of the items in the declaration that is more political than technical, they call on governments and private companies that use a large number of IPv4 addresses to lead the switch over.
Complete info at Heise online.

More than 100 technical experts from English-speaking countries in Africa have gathered in Nairobi for IPv6 (Internet Protocol version 6) training. The training is geared toward improving the capacity of IT managers in Africa in deployment of IPv6 networks.

Kenya will embark on a plan to deploy IPv6 mainly through the national Network Operations Center (NOC) that is currently being setup, said Information and Communication Minister Samuel Poghisio in his keynote address. He added that NOC will support ongoing initiatives to encourage IPv6 deployment.
Complete info at CIO, NetworkWorld and ComputerWorld.

Increasing demand for Internet based services means that there would not be enough addresses to support this expected growth, if no action is taken. Encouraging internet users and providers to adopt the latest Internet Protocol (IP version 6 or IPv6) will provide a massive increase in address space, much in the same way as telephone numbers were lengthened in the 20th century.
Complete info at Europa web site, in all the official languages.

The Commission or the European Communities has released a Communication to the European Parliament, The Council, The European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions, regarding the advancement of Internet.

The objective of the Action Plan is the support of the widespread introduction of the next version of the Internet Protocol (IPv6).
The complete Communication is available at the Europa web site, including a short video clip.

The European Commission has set a target of getting at least a quarter of EU industry, public authorities and households to switch to IPv6 internet addressing by 2010. A recent report from the OECD had warned that the shortage of older IPv4 internet addressing threatened the rise of mobile internet services.

"This is very much a case of a stitch in time saves nine", said Viviane Reding, EU Commissioner for Information Society and Media. "In the short term, businesses and public authorities might be tempted to try to squeeze their needs into the strait jacket of the old system, but this would mean Europe is badly placed to take advantage of the latest internet technology, and could face a crisis when the old system runs out of addresses."
Complete info at Cellular News, 7th Space and CRN.

Businesses alone are not doing enough to avert an impending shortage of Internet Protocol addresses, and governments must work with them to secure the future of the Internet economy, according to a report published Thursday by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

The number of IP addresses, needed for Web sites, servers and PCs to communicate with one another over the Internet, is limited, and almost 85 percent of addresses are now in use. At the current rate of growth, the pool of available addresses will be exhausted by 2011.
Complete info at NetworkWorld, PCWorld and ComputerWorld.

Twenty-five per cent of all European users should have the opportunity to use IPv6 by the end of 2010, and should be able to access most of their normal services and content with it.

The EU Commission will set this goal in a statement, to be published at the end of May, on the new internet protocol and progress in the net.

Detlef Eckert of the General Directorate for Information Society and Media presented the key points of the statement and a related action plan at the RIPE meeting in Berlin.

The Commission is joining organisations like the Réseaux IP Européens Network Coordination Centre (RIPE) in calling for rapid action in the face of dwindling reserves of IP addresses.
Complete info at Heise Online.

The Information Society and Media Directorate General of the European Commission is pleased to invite you to the "European IPv6 Day" that will take place in Brussels, Belgium, on the 30th of May of 2008 at the Robert Schuman room inside the Berlaymont building. The event will see the launch of the Communication "Advancing the Internet action plan for the deployment of Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) in Europe".

The main goal of the Communication is to promote IPv6 adoption through a wide range of actions encouraging public administration, users and industrial stakeholders to take decisive steps to accelerate the implementation of IPv6, so as to ensure Europe's readiness to face the expected depletion of the IPv4 addresses. Moreover, the prompt and efficient adoption of IPv6 offers Europe significant opportunities to boost innovation and develop a leading role in advancing the Internet.
Complete information and registration available at the Policy/IPv6 web page of the European Commission.

The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) put a spotlight on the next generation of Internet addressing when it switched off attendees’ access to IPv4 during its meeting this week. For an hour, Internet engineers at the meeting could only access the Internet using an IPv6 network.
Complete info at Earthtimes, StreetInsider and Business Wire.