[governance] PP: India wants to abolish BGP and introduce national routing and IP management

Mon Oct 27 03:48:20 EDT 2014

In-line reply. Marked with [Guru]:

Please take the reply in context of the fact that I do not support Proposal
98 - it is unarguably flawed; I am only trying to highlight the concerns
that India may have taken into account.

On Mon, Oct 27, 2014 at 10:50 AM, McTim <dogwallah at gmail.com> wrote:

> Hi Acharya,
>
> On Sun, Oct 26, 2014 at 11:22 PM, Guru Acharya <gurcharya at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > I agree that India's strategy in Proposal 98 is not well thought out.
> > However, I think India's concerns stem from the following:
> >
> > 1) IP addresses are not equitably distributed in the Asia Pacific region.
> > The skewed allocation is reflected in the statistics that Eastern Asia
> holds
> > 2,712,098 of the IPv4/24 addresses while South Asia (including India)
> holds
> > only 170,365 of the IPv4/24 addresses.
>
>
> Yes, it may stem from this, but IP addresses aren't allocated by
> sub-region, but rather by network operators who show need for those
> resources.
>
> Indian entities have more than enough IP addresses at their disposal,
> as do all others across the globe, they just need to implement IPv6 as
> crying over the spilt milk of IPv4 isn't a useful exercise.
>
>
[Guru]: I understand that current allocation is as per "need" (in contrast
to equity between sub-regions). However, the allocation is also
"first-come-first-serve" in addition to "need". Put together, the resource
is allocated to whoever establishes "need on a first-come-first-serve"
basis. As a result, India's late adoption of the Internet exposes it to an
almost empty resource pool of IPv4 addresses. Therefore, it is natural for
India to question the existing institutional arrangement. Obviously those
who have grand-fathered these resources will not suffer due to the
first-come-first-serve allocation and therefore do not have the same reason
to question the institutional arrangement as do late entrants.

Note that I am not suggesting an alternate institutional arrangement to
replace the existing one. Specifically, I am not suggesting fixed rations
for sub-regions or nations as may invariably be introduced in many straw
man arguments. I am only merely suggesting the reasons why some people may
consider the current institution broken.

IPv6 is a distant dream that will overcome the artificial scarcity and will
understandably resolve the current situation. Im talking about IPv4. I
agree that allocation of IPv4 may be spilt milk for some, but its not nice
when others still have a full glass of milk in front of them just because
they were born first.

> >
> > 2) APNIC Executive Council (EC) has remained largely static and arguably
> > captured by the East Asians and Australians for almost a decade. In the
> > APNIC EC elections, the votes allotted to members are in proportion of
> the
> > IP addresses held by them. For example, if the IP holding is up to /22,
> the
> > member has 2 votes; and if the IP holding is between /13 and /10, then
> the
> > member has 32 votes.  Effectively, due to the current skewed allocation
> of
> > IP addresses, representatives of India do not stand much of a chance in
> > APNIC EC elections.
>
> People who run for the APNIC (or any RIR Board) do NOT represent their
> nation state.  They do it to help the Internet develop in their region
> and globally.
>
>
>
[Guru]: I agree that representatives on the APNIC EC do not represent their
nations but an Indian will unarguably have a better understanding of the
requirements/problems of domestic private players from India. Further, who
will represent the people who are yet to connect to the internet (many such
from India) if representation is limited to current resource holders?

>  Notably, India has had just one representative (for one
> > year) on the APNIC EC in the past decade. Additionally, while this
> system of
> > proportional voting creates a bias in favour of incumbent members who
> have
> > grandfathered large IP holdings, the system penalises those members who
> are
> > using IP addresses efficiently (for example by using Network Address
> > Translation) and also penalises the community that is yet to connect to
> the
> > Internet or has connected to the Internet late.
> >
> > 3) There are two options for redistribution of IP addresses.
>
>
> Actually there is no "option" for redistribution of IPv4 addresses.
> Are yoou really going to ask the entire planet to renumber their
> networks?
>
>
[Guru]: Agreed. I agree that "redistribution" sounds rather drastic. Please
take it to mean any instrument that you deem fit for fixing the present
institutional arrangement.

>
>  The first is to
> > go through the APNIC PDP, which is to reform APNIC from within. The
> second
> > is to bypass APNIC and ask ITU to take over the RIR function. India
> seems to
> > have adopted the second path due to lack of trust in the first path,
> which
> > would be slow, bottom-up, and subject to resistance by incumbents.
> Further,
> > APNIC EC plays a crucial role in the consensus building process and I
> doubt
> > any reform of the APNIC EC will not be resisted.
>
>
> It is the SIG Chairs in the APNIC region who administer the PDP, so
> the EC doesn't have much to do with actual policy making besides
> endorsing that the PDP was followed.  of course as individuals, they
> can be involved, but in a multi-equal stakeholder system, they have no
> more sway than any other individual.
>
> I don't believe that APNIC elections are subject to the PDP, though I
> may be wrong.  Normally it is the bylaws of the RIR that set election
> policy.
>
>
[Guru]: Either way, I'm guessing the Indian government perceived the ITU
route to be easier to participate in than the PDP route. Maybe, this
implies that the PDP needs to be more receptive to nation-states as
stakeholders (yes yes, on an equal footing as other stakeholders). Maybe
the PDP can be improved/fine-tuned to address the concerns of nation-states
as stakeholders (yes yes, on an equal footing as other stakeholders).

> >
> > 4) With respect to the IANA transition, the APNIC secretariat drafted a
> > proposal and pushed that proposal top-down onto the community, which was
> > accepted as having consensus without any intelligent discussion in a
> > conference (APNIC38) at a remote location (please read transcripts of
> > APNIC38). This proposal suggests NTIA oversight should be replaced with a
> > SLA/AOC between ICANN and the NRO (combination of the 5 RIRs). An obvious
> > corollary of this extra added responsibility of oversight should be
> enhanced
> > accountability of the RIRs. Notably, APNIC is refusing to accept any
> > discussions on enhancing its accountability as part of the IANA
> transition
> > plan. Enhanced accountability of APNIC would include a measure of
> > representativeness in my opinion.
>
> By "Enhanced accountability" you mean not accountable to the people
> who hold the resources in the region?
>
>
>
[Guru]: I mean accountable not just to the current resource holders but
also to the future resources holders. Yes. The millions of future resource
holders from India.

>
> >
> > While I feel that India's concerns are genuine, I also feel the path
> adopted
> > is incorrect. If this proposal goes through as is, it can fragment the
> > Internet through three routes: First, through alternate (non-IETF)
> standards
> > emerging (from ITU) to address security concerns that are not
> inter-operable
> > with existing standards;
>
> I doubt there would be many network operators willing to take steps to
> implement non-interoperable standards!
>
>
>  Second, through a broken non-unique allocation of
> > IP addresses where ITU and RIRs allocate IP addresses in parallel; Third,
> > through an alternate root zone emerging to address the names part of
> > Proposal 98.
>
>
> Neither of which has a snowball's chance of success.
>
> --
> Cheers,
>
> McTim
> "A name indicates what we seek. An address indicates where it is. A
> route indicates how we get there."  Jon Postel
>
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