In reply to a post by behuk:

Breaking out from the (now closed) Swish Fibre megathread: has anyone heard any news about Swish Fibre's "IPv6 project"? Their lack of support for modern IP is by far my biggest bugbear.

Same here. It's not an absence of functionality it just begs the question of why any newcomer ISP wouldn't implement IPv6 from day one. Is it ignorance? Is it a lack of technical ability or resources? Or do they just not care enough about the service they are providing?

My own ISP - IDNet - has been offering dual stack IPv4/6 for nearly twenty years now. It's not a new protocol. Any ISP that doesn't currently offer and support it is a poor ISP. Even the excuse of a network needing to be upgraded or support staff being trained no longer washes for me.

My mail server is accessible via both IPv4 and IPv6 just like any proper server should be.

Edited by Andrue (Sun 11-Jun-23 10:39:31)

I've managed to get an update from Swish's customer service team:

Swish Fibre are currently in the process of merging with other Full Fibre ISP's under Fern Trading Group and at this stage, IPv6 works and testing has come to a halt at the time being. This does not mean this will not be worked on in the future, as once the necessary changes to streamline all of the companies network builds, equipment and departments are completed, there should be more scope and understanding as to when this will become available. In addition to this, Giganet (one of the companies we are merging with) currently offer IPv6 to their customers, which essentially brings us a step closer to implementing this on to our network once the merge is completed.

I wonder if Giganet's new network (which users on other forums have commented on) will be used by all of the Fern Fibre ISPs...

I'm at the point now where I will not spend time justifying why I need IPv6 - if people are curious about the advantages there are many written resources that explain the technology and presentations from the UK IPv6 council where its implementation is discussed. If I ask an ISP if they support IPv6 I want a yes or no answer (preferably a yes), but my requirements are not up for debate.

In reply to a post by Andrue:

In reply to a post by behuk:

Breaking out from the (now closed) Swish Fibre megathread: has anyone heard any news about Swish Fibre's "IPv6 project"? Their lack of support for modern IP is by far my biggest bugbear.

Same here. It's not an absence of functionality it just begs the question of why any newcomer ISP wouldn't implement IPv6 from day one. Is it ignorance? Is it a lack of technical ability or resources? Or do they just not care enough about the service they are providing?

The majority of altnets I've encountered have not got v6 support. Some of them have implemented CGNAT, but for whatever reason still not v6. It is alarmingly common.

From what has been discussed I can see it as a nice to have at least until the IPv4 addresses run out although this has been a topic for 20 years.

I was curious as I have never had a requirement to use it, I don't feel that not having it has restricted any internet usage and from a corporate perspective it is completely non-existent in our organisation, probably disabled for complexity or security reasons.

In reply to a post by smouty:

From what has been discussed I can see it as a nice to have at least until the IPv4 addresses run out although this has been a topic for 20 years.

I was curious as I have never had a requirement to use it, I don't feel that not having it has restricted any internet usage and from a corporate perspective it is completely non-existent in our organisation, probably disabled for complexity or security reasons.

You are right: if you have an IPv4 connection, then the whole of the Internet is reachable, apart from a few insignificant hobby sites. You won't get to see any more with IPv6.

However if you're behind an IPv4 CGNAT, that does apply a lot of limits to what you can do with your Internet connection. Not only can you not receive *any* inbound connections at all, but you are sharing a public IP address with other people: so if one of them does something bad, Plod may come knocking at your door.

So in an ideal world:
1. All end users would get IPv6 in addition to IPv4, so that more and more of their traffic bypasses NAT/CGNAT
2. All web sites would make themselves available over IPv6 in addition to IPv4.
Then slowly, the need for IPv4 would drain away.

In practice, there's a chicken-and-egg problem. The end user ISPs feel the lack of IPv4 addresses acutely, but are forced to provide IPv4 access because without it, their customers wouldn't be able to reach most websites. However, the web sites know that the whole world can reach them over IPv4, so they have no incentive to spend time enabling IPv6.

Even major organisations like the BBC, who are both well-funded and traditionally recognised for their technical leadership, have not IPv6-enabled their sites.

Most websites are concerned about user tracking and advertising and monetising. I suspect that when they already have all that stuff working on IPv4, they are worried that it might not work properly on IPv6, and are not inclined to invest the time making sure that it does.

Also, websites are not worried about lack of availability of IPv4 addresses. They have been sharing IPv4 addresses for years - via virtual hosting, reverse proxies, and content delivery networks. The cost of an IPv4 address is trivial compared to the cost of a good domain name, and especially the cost of lost business if they weren't visible to the majority of Internet users.

In reply to a post by candlerb:

You are right: if you have an IPv4 connection, then the whole of the Internet is reachable, apart from a few insignificant hobby sites. You won't get to see any more with IPv6.

If you insert the words English-language before "Internet" in the first sentance, and after more in the second sentance add "English-language internet" you will be correct.The Asia Pacific region had the least number of IPv4 addresses in the 1970s, which means companies that do business with AP often have to enable IPv6.

Same here, my own servers are all available on IPv6 and I have IPv6 only systems for work that require me to have an IPv6 address.

The award for the company taking the most time to get their implementation of IPv6 working has to be Uno, as its been "coming soon" for a decade or more! They've lost at least one customer due to just not sorting it out.

If an ISP can't get IPv6 working this day and age then you have to question a) Just how good is their kit b) Just how good is their networking knowledge.

If an ISP can't get IPv6 working this day and age then you have to question a) Just how good is their kit b) Just how good is their networking knowledge.

Or also c) question whether there is any actual demand from their customers.

In reply to a post by E300:

If an ISP can't get IPv6 working this day and age then you have to question a) Just how good is their kit b) Just how good is their networking knowledge.

Major popular ISPs such as Plusnet and Virgin Media don’t support IPv6… no demand and probably some cost they don’t see it worth incurring.