What is IPv6?
When it became clear that IPv4 addresses would eventually run out, a new Internet Protocol, IP version 6, was developed. Whereas IPv4 addresses are based on 32 bits, IPv6 addresses are based on 128 bits.
IPv6 has been available to Internet users for several years now, but its deployment poses some challenges. Because IPv6 is a different protocol to IPv4, IPv6 hosts can't talk directly to the IPv4 hosts that make up most of the existing Internet.
For direct communication over IPv6, both parties must have deployed IPv6 across their networks, and so far only a relatively small number of networks have done this. Indirect communication methods mean that today, IPv6 and IPv4 networks can communicate with each other.
| Learn more about IP Addresses | When you use the Internet, you are sending and receiving information between one point on the network and another. These points are identified using a system of addresses. This address system has been based on Internet Protocol version 4 or 'IPv4'. Under this system, addresses are 32-bit numbers, which means that the total number of addresses is two to the thirty-second power or just over four billion. Example of 32-bit number 2001:0db8:3c4d:0015:0001:0002:1a2f:2a3b As the Internet has grown, however, these addresses have been given out to Internet users and organizations around the world. So many have been given out that now less than 11% of the original 4 billion addresses remains available. IPv4 Addresses remaining at IANA (56.4 KB) as at 13 August 2009 |
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