You’re right to scrutinize this carefully—this draft is ambitious, but it contains multiple *architectural contradictions, deployment impossibilities, and security anti-patterns* that would block real-world adoption. Below is a *Technical Deep Dive + Standards Critique (IETF/RFC-aligned)* focused on flaws, risks, and what’s fundamentally unworkable. ------------------------------ *🔍 Executive Summary (Blunt Reality)* *IPv8 (as written) is not viable as an Internet protocol.* Core reasons: - ❌ Violates layering (L3 ≠ identity, auth, DNS, WHOIS, routing policy) - ❌ Centralizes trust in ways that break Internet resilience - ❌ Claims backward compatibility that is technically impossible - ❌ Reinvents IPv6 poorly (less scalable, less flexible) - ❌ Introduces operational fragility (Zone Server dependency) - ❌ Breaks fundamental Internet design principles (end-to-end, decentralization) - ❌ Ignores decades of deployed standards (RPKI, DNSSEC, BGP policy) ------------------------------ *🧠 1. Architectural Violations (Biggest Problem)* *❌ Layering Collapse (Violates Internet Model)* IPv8 mixes: - L3 (IP) - L7 (OAuth2, JWT) - Control plane (BGP/WHOIS) - Management plane (DHCP, logging, telemetry) This violates the core design principle: 👉 *RFC 3439 – “Some Internet Architectural Guidelines”* - Avoid tight coupling between layers - Prefer modularity *Problem:* - You cannot require *OAuth2 JWT validation for every “manageable element”* at L3 - Routers and NICs cannot depend on identity providers for packet forwarding *Impact:* - Breaks deterministic forwarding - Introduces latency and failure domains - Creates cascading outages (identity → network collapse) ------------------------------ *🔥 2. “Zone Server” = Massive Single Point of Failure* *❌ Centralization Anti-Pattern* Zone Server does: - DHCP - DNS - NTP - OAuth - Logging - Routing validation - ACL enforcement - Translation This is effectively: 👉 “Active Directory + DNS + Firewall + RPKI + SIEM + Router” in one box *Problems:* 1. *Blast radius* - Zone Server failure = total network failure 2. *Scaling* - Cannot scale globally (contrast with DNS hierarchy, BGP federation) 3. *Security* - Single compromise = total control 4. *Latency* - Everything depends on it ------------------------------ *🔐 3. Security Model is Fundamentally Broken* *❌ JWT Everywhere (Misuse of Identity)* Using: - OAuth 2.0 - JSON Web Token *Issues:* - JWT ≠ network identity - Tokens are: - replayable - revocation-problematic - not designed for packet-level enforcement *Missing:* - No equivalent of: - DNSSEC - RPKI - BGPsec ------------------------------ *❌ WHOIS8 for Routing Validation* This is one of the biggest red flags. *Reality:* - WHOIS is: - not real-time - not cryptographically authoritative - inconsistent globally *Existing solution:* - RPKI + ROA (cryptographically signed) 👉 IPv8 ignores the entire modern routing security stack. ------------------------------ *🌍 4. Addressing Model is Inferior to IPv6* *❌ 64-bit Address Space* IPv8: - 64-bit total - 32-bit ASN + 32-bit host Compare: - IPv6 → 128-bit *Problems:* 1. *Too small long-term* - IoT, identity, multi-homing → insufficient 2. *No hierarchy* - ASN-based addressing ≠ aggregation-friendly 3. *Breaks provider-independent addressing* ------------------------------ *❌ ASN = Routing Prefix* This is fundamentally flawed. *Why:* - ASN ≠ topology - ASN ≠ location - ASN ≠ ownership stability *Result:* - Forces tight coupling between: - routing policy - addressing - Eliminates flexibility of CIDR (RFC 4632) ------------------------------ *⚠️ 5. Backward Compatibility Claims Are False* *❌ “No modification required” is incorrect* *Issues:* 1. *Routers MUST translate v8 ↔ v4* - That is NAT-like behavior → breaks end-to-end 2. *Applications rely on IP semantics* - Changing address structure breaks assumptions 3. *ARP8 requirement* - Requires stack changes on all hosts 👉 This is effectively: - A new protocol requiring universal upgrade ------------------------------ *🔄 6. ARP8 Model is Problematic* *❌ Dual-probe (ARP8 + ARP4)* Problems: - Adds latency - Race conditions - Cache poisoning risk increases - Breaks deterministic neighbor discovery Compare: - Neighbor Discovery Protocol - Already solved this cleanly ------------------------------ *📉 7. Routing Model is Unrealistic* *❌ /16 Minimum Prefix Rule* *Problem:* - Breaks traffic engineering - Removes multihoming flexibility - Conflicts with real-world needs ------------------------------ *❌ Cost Factor (CF)* *Issues:* - Requires: - global telemetry sharing - synchronized metrics - Violates: - policy-based routing reality 👉 BGP is policy-driven, not metric-driven ------------------------------ *🌐 8. DNS8 + “DNS Required for All Traffic”* *❌ Blocking IP-only traffic* This breaks: - Security tools - Embedded systems - Emergency fallback systems Also: - DNS is not always trusted or available ------------------------------ *🚫 9. Operational Fragility* *❌ “Everything in DHCP8”* Single DHCP response provides: - identity - routing - DNS - auth endpoints *Problem:* - DHCP becomes critical infrastructure - Any failure → total outage ------------------------------ *⚡ 10. Even/Odd Gateway Model* *❌ Artificial and unnecessary* Problems: - Not topology-aware - Breaks ECMP best practices - Conflicts with modern routing (leaf-spine, SRv6) ------------------------------ *🔬 11. Ignoring Existing Solutions* IPv8 tries to solve problems already addressed by: - IPv6 → address space - Segment Routing over IPv6 → path control - RPKI → validation - Zero Trust Architecture → identity - QUIC → performance + encryption 👉 IPv8 reinvents all of these—poorly and incompatibly. ------------------------------ *🧨 12. Critical Design Contradictions* *Contradiction Examples:* - “No dual stack” vs Requires translation at boundaries - “100% backward compatible” vs Requires ARP8 + DHCP8 + routing changes - “Decentralized Internet” vs Central Zone Server dependency ------------------------------ *🧭 Final Assessment (Your Level – Straight Talk)* From a *real-world IPv6 / BGP / Zero Trust / infrastructure perspective*: *IPv8 is:* - ❌ Over-centralized - ❌ Over-engineered - ❌ Misaligned with Internet architecture - ❌ Ignoring 25+ years of operational reality *The core fatal flaws:* 1. *Layer violation (biggest)* 2. *Centralized control plane* 3. *Incorrect trust model (WHOIS/JWT)* 4. *Inferior addressing vs IPv6* 5. *False backward compatibility* ------------------------------ *🧠 What **Is **Valuable in This Draft* There *are* ideas worth extracting: - Unified telemetry concept - Stronger default security posture - Integrated provisioning vision 👉 But these belong in: - Zero Trust overlays - SDN/SASE architectures - Not a new IP protocol Joe Klein "inveniet viam, aut faciet" --- Seneca's Hercules Furens (Act II, Scene 1) "*I skate to where the puck is going to be, not to where it has been." -- *Wayne Gretzky "I never lose. I either win or learn" - Nelson Mandela On Wed, Apr 29, 2026 at 3:34 PM Job Snijders via NANOG < nanog@lists.nanog.org> wrote:
I thought Brian's "Why IPv6 is so complicated" was interesting, especially the "Why adding bits isn't simple" section.
https://github.com/becarpenter/book6/blob/main/01.%20Introduction%20and%20Fo...
Kind regards,
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