Companies starting to get IPv6 message

Organisations are getting more savvy about upgrading to IPv6 although there are still barriers to overcome according to a new survey.

Research conducted by GNKS Consult and TNO) and funded by the European Commission has found that 84 percent of organisations worldwide have taken steps to adopt the new protocol, either by already having IPv6 addresses or by considering requests for them. Requests are set to accelerate in the coming months as IPv4 addresses become more depleted, although the remaining 16 percent of organisations have no plans to adopt IPv6.

However, not all organisations are geared up for the change. According to the survey, just 70 percent of ISPs offer or plan to offer within the next year IPv6 addresses even though IPv4 addresses will have been used up by then. Furthermore, 10 percent of ISPs have no plans to offer IPv6 at all.

Axel Pawlik, managing director of RIP NCC, the European Internet registry, said: "It's great to see that as we move toward complete IPv4 exhaustion, more organisations worldwide are waking up to the need to adopt IPv6 and are sourcing IPv6 addresses from the RIRs.

But, he pointed out that there could be greater urgency. "There is still a distinct lack of Internet traffic over the next addressing protocol, with not enough ISPs offering IPv6 services and 30 percent of ISPs saying the proportion of this traffic is less than 0.5 percent. It's critical that ISPs now take the next step in the global adoption effort by offering IPv6 services to their customers to help boost traffic over IPv6," added Pawlik, who is also chairman of the Number Resource Organisation.

According to a spokesman for British ISP Virgin Media, which does not currently offer Ipv6, said "Our work preparing the network for ever faster broadband speeds also means we will be able to offer IPv6 on an as-needed basis. As such, there is very little demand at present."