IPv6

Suvarna Joshi
IPv6

Why IPv6?

Shortage of IPv4 addresses

Internet is expanding very rapidly in developing
countries like India, China
New devices like phones need IP address

End-to-End Reachability is not possible

without IPv6

New Features like Autoconfiguration, better

support for QoS, Mobility and Security, Route
Aggregation, Jumbo Frames
IPv6

IPv6 Address

IPv4: 32 bits or 4 bytes long

4,200,000,000 possible addressable nodes

• IPv6: 128 bits or 16 bytes

• 3.4 * 1038 possible addressable nodes
• 340,282,366,920,938,463,374,607,432,768,211,456
• 5 * 1028 addresses per person
Figure 19.14 IPv6 address in binary and hexadecimal colon notation

19.4
Figure 19.15 Abbreviated IPv6 addresses

19.5
IPv6

IPv6 Address Representation

x:x:x:x:x:x:x:x, where x is a 16-bit hexadecimal
field
Leading zeros in a field are optional:
2031:0:130F:0:0:9C0:876A:130B
Successive fields of 0 can be represented as ::,
but only once per address.

Examples:
2031:0000:130F:0000:0000:09C0:876A:130B
2031:0:130f::9c0:876a:130b
FF01:0:0:0:0:0:0:1 >>> FF01::1
0:0:0:0:0:0:0:1 >>> ::1
0:0:0:0:0:0:0:0 >>> ::
IPv6

IPv6 Address Types

Unicast
Address is for a single interface.
IPv6 has several types (for example, global and IPv4 mapped).
Anycast
One-to-nearest (allocated from unicast address space).
Multiple devices share the same address.
All anycast nodes should provide uniform service.
Source devices send packets to anycast address.
Routers decide on closest device to reach that destination.
Suitable for load balancing and content delivery services.
Multicast
One-to-many
Enables more efficient use of the network
Uses a larger address range
Designated a block for multicasting
IPv6

IPv6 Address Scope

Link-local: The scope is the local link (nodes on

the same subnet)

Unique-local: The scope is the organization

(private site addressing)

Global: The scope is global (IPv6 Internet

addresses)
19.9
IPv6

IPv6 Address Representation: Link Local

Hosts on the same link (the same subnet) use
these automatically configured addresses to
communicate with each other.

Neighbor Discovery provides address resolution.

The prefix for link-local addresses is FE80::/64.

The following illustration shows the structure of a

link-local address.
                                                 
IPv6

IPv6 Address Representation: Link Local

Remaining 54 bits

Mandatory address for communication between

two IPv6 devices
Automatically assigned by router as soon as IPv6
is enabled
IPv6

IPv6 Address Representation: Unique Local

IPv6 unicast unique-local addresses are similar

to IPv4 private addresses.

The scope of a unique-local address is the

internetwork of an organization’s site. (You can
use both global addresses and unique-local
addresses in your network)

The prefix for unique-local addresses is

FC00::/7.
                                                
 Global Unicast Addresses
• Block used for unicast communication
• CIDR 2000::/3- Leftmost 3 bits 001
• Size of block 2125
 Global Unicast Address
• Global Routing Prefix
• To route packet to site
• 245
• Global router route packet according to n.
• Subnet Identifier
• Subnet in organization
• 216
• Interface Identitier
• Similar to host-id in IPV4
• Defines interface
• 64 bits
IPv6

IPv6 Address Representation: Global

Unicast

Global unicast and anycast addresses are defined

by a global routing prefix, a subnet ID, and an
interface ID.
 Link Layer Addressing Schemes
• In IPV4 no relation between hosi-id and link
layer address
• IPV6 allows
• Link layer address<64 bits ,embedded as a
whole or part on interface identifier
• 64 bit extended unique identifier EUI-64
defined by IEEE
• 48- bit Link layer address defined by
ethernet
IPv6

IPv6 Address Representation EUI 64

IPv6 uses the extended universal identifier (EUI)-
64 format to do stateless autoconfiguration.
This format expands the 48-bit MAC address to 64
bits by inserting “FFFE” into the middle 16 bits.
To make sure that the chosen address is from a
unique Ethernet MAC address, the universal/local
(U/L bit) is set to 1 for global scope (0 for local
scope).
• When a host in IPv6 joins a network, it can
configure itself using the following process:
• Creation a link local address for itself.
• Done by taking the 10-bit link local prefix (1111
1110 10), adding 54 zeros, and adding the 64-bit
interface identifier, which any host knows how to
generate from its interface card.
• 128-bit link local address.
• Testing to see if this link local address is unique
• Host sends a neighbor solicitation message and
waits for a neighbor advertisement message.
• If any host in the subnet is using this link local
address, the process fails and the host cannot
autoconfigure itself; it needs to use other means
such as DHCP for this purpose.
• If the uniqueness of the link local address is
passed, the host stores this address as its link local
address (for private communication), but it still
needs a global unicast address.
• The host then sends a router solicitation message to a
local router.
• If there is a router running on the network, the host
receives a router advertisement message that includes
the global unicast prefix and the subnet prefix that the
host needs to add to its interface identifier to generate its
global unicast address.
• If the router cannot help the host with the configuration,
it informs the host in the router advertisement message
(by setting a flag).
• The host then needs to use other means for configuration.
IPv6

Stateless Autoconfiguration

Stateless Address Configuration (IP Address,

Default Router Address)
Routers sends periodic Router Advertisement
Node gets prefix information from the Router
advertisement and generates the complete
address using its MAC address
Global Address=Link Prefix + EUI 64 Address
Router Address is the Default Gateway
IPv6

Stateless Autoconfiguration Example

MAC address: 00:0E:0C:31:C8:1F
EUI 64 Address: 20E:0CFF:FE31:C81F
Router Solicitation is sent on FF01::2 (All Router
Multicast Address) and Advertisement sent on
FF01::1 (All Node Multicast Address)
Transition to IPv6
IPv6

Transition Mechanism

No fixed day to convert; no need to convert all

at once.

Transition Options:
Dual Stack
IPv6-IPv4 Tunnel
IPv6-IPv4 Translation
IPv6

Transition Mechanism
IPv6

6/4 Dual Stack Hosts and Network

This allows all the end hosts and intermediate
network devices (like routers, switches, modems
etc.) to have both IPv4 and IPv6 addresses and
protocol stack.
If both the end stations support IPv6, they can
communicate using IPv6; otherwise they will
communicate using IPv4.
This will allow both IPv4 and IPv6 to coexist and
slow transition from IPv4 to IPv6 can happen.
Use of DNS(domain name system)
IPv6

6/4 Dual Stack Hosts and Network

IPv6

Tunneling IPv6 via IPv4

This allows encapsulating IPv6 packets in IPv4
packets for transport over IPv4 only network.
This will allow IPv6 only end stations to
communicate over IPv4 only networks.
IPv6

IPv6-IPv4 Translation
This allows communication between IPv4 only
and IPv6 only end stations.

The job of the translator is to translate IPv6 packets

into IPv4 packets by doing address and port
translation and vice versa.
 Advantages
• More Efficient Routing
• reduces the size of routing tables and makes
routing more efficient and hierarchical.
• More Efficient Packet Processing
• simplified packet header
• no IP-level checksum
• Directed Data Flows
IPv6 supports multicast rather than broadcast.
• the IPv6 header has a new field, named Flow
Label, that can identify packets belonging to the
same flow.
 Advantages
• Simplified Network Configuration
• Address auto-configuration (address
assignment) is built in to IPv6.
• A router will send the prefix of the local link in
its router advertisements.
• A host can generate its own IP address by
appending its link-layer (MAC) address,
converted into Extended Universal Identifier
(EUI) 64-bit format, to the 64 bits of the local
link prefix.
 Advantages
• Support For New Services
• By eliminating Network Address Translation
(NAT), true end-to-end connectivity
• enabling new and valuable services.
• services such as VoIP and Quality of
Service (QoS) become more robust.
 Advantages
• Security
• IPSec,
• Provides confidentiality, authentication and data integrity
• Because of their potential to carry malware, IPv4 ICMP
packets are often blocked by corporate firewalls
• ICMPv6, the implementation of the Internet Control
Message Protocol for IPv6, may be permitted because
IPSec can be applied to the ICMPv6 packets.
BASIS OF COMPARISON IPV4 IPV6
Address Configuration Supports Manual and DHCP Supports Auto-configuration
configuration. and renumbering
End-to-end connection Unachievable Achievable
integrity
Address Space It can generate 4.29 x It can produce quite a large
109 addresses. number of addresses, i.e.,
3.4 x 1038.
Security features Security is dependent on IPSEC is inbuilt in the IPv6
application protocol
Address length 32 bits (4 bytes) 128 bits (16 bytes)
Address Representation In decimal In hexadecimal
Fragmentation performed by Sender and forwarding Only by the sender
routers
Packet flow identification Not available Available and uses flow
label field in the header
Checksum Field Available Not available

Message Transmission Broadcasting Multicasting and Anycasting

Scheme

Encryption and Not Provided Provided

Authentication