| Danial Norjidi |
THE Authority for Info-Communications Technology Industry of Brunei Darussalam (AITI) held a seminar on Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) yesterday titled ‘Preparing for the Next Generation Internet’.
The seminar was held as part of AITI’s ongoing initiative to raise awareness on IPv6 and the role it will play in the deployment of Next Generation Technologies, and saw the attendance of IT officers from various ministries and government agencies, local ISPs, and IT Network SMEs.
The seminar began with a presentation by Pengiran Alias bin Pengiran Dato Paduka Haji Hidup, the Manager of BNNIC, Regulatory & Resource Management Group, AITI on IPv6, and the current status of Brunei Darussalam.
As it was explained yesterday, IPv6 is the latest version of Internet Protocol, which is the communications protocol which provides an identification and location system for computers on networks and routes traffic across the Internet.
IPv6 was developed to overcome the limited number of IP addresses available with IPv4. The migration from IPv4 to IPv6 is of particular concern to Brunei Darussalam, due to the impending shortage of IPv4 addresses worldwide and the potential impact it will have on the country. The presentation also highlighted some of the challenges in deploying IPv6.
Speaking further on the importance of IPv6 in an interview with the Bulletin, Pengiran Alias shared, “The basic reason is that we are running out of IPv4. If you look at it in a technical way, if everyone else globally is using IPv6 and we are still in IPv4, we might run into a scenario where we can’t communicate with them, because IPv4 and IPv6 don’t speak to each other. That’s one of the reasons.”
“The other thing is, if Brunei is looking towards going to become a ‘smart nation’, 5G and smart homes, IPv6 is one of the stepping stones to have those. We don’t plan ahead to have a smart nation but we also don’t have the foundation of having these IP addresses.”
He highlighted that the core differences between IPv4 and IPv6 are in the way that they are designed, noting that IPv4 offers 32-bit addresses while IPv6 has 128-bit addresses.
“The way it’s designed, it gives more flexibility and function to it. That’s part of the reason that it’s better,” he said.
Pengiran Alias bin Pengiran Dato Paduka Haji Hidup of AITI making a presentation. – DANIAL NORJIDI
He said that AITI are encouraging local telecommunications companies to implement IPv6, “If the telcos are on board and they all implement this by 2020, then we are already 70 per cent there, because they are the main providers. The main drive is from them.”
“Users need to be up-to-date before the infrastructure is there. Users need to learn and gain some knowledge. That is why we are engaging IT departments from the government sector, we are engaging SMEs who sell IT devices so that they prepare for themselves and for customers. We are encouraging everyone to be on par with this,” he added.
Kunalan Dava Rajoo from the National Advanced IPv6 Centre of Excellence (NAv6) in Malaysia outlined the various technical requirements for IPv6. In his presentation he shared that IPv6 has new and enhanced features, which include larger address space, improved performance, simplified structure format, embedded security, mobility function and a number of other features.
He said that IPv6 transition takes place over four phases. Phase 1 involves conducting readiness and compliance assessments, which leads to reports and recommendations. Phase 2 is planning and design, dealing with IPv6 address management, budget and cost determination, deployment phases, organisation infrastructure and testing simulation environment.
Phase 3 is implementation, involving a pilot project, a transition mechanism and configuration, as well as validation and verification. The fourth transition phase is auditing, as well as support and maintenance.
The deployment has three phases of its own – the first is on the network, the second is on services and the third on additional services.
This was followed by a presentation from Chen Yu Kun of Huawei Technologies (B) Sdn Bhd, who discussed IPv6 technology and shared Huawei’s IPv6 solutions.
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