You are a well-known expert in the design and security of corporate network infr
ID: 3665801 • Letter: Y
Question
You are a well-known expert in the design and security of corporate network infrastructures. As such, Z Corporation, Inc. (ZCorp) has contacted you and is requesting a proposal for a network infrastructure integration design. ZCorp is a global financial institution that intends to add Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) to its existing network. The headquarters of ZCorp is in Denver, CO and it also has main offices in Sydney, Australia, Vienna, Austria, Tokyo, Japan, and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Local routers are providing network services such as Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP), network address translation (NAT), and Domain Name System (DNS). It is using Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (EIGRP) as its interior gateway protocol and Exterior Gateway Protocol (EGP) as its exterior gateway protocol. Its wide area network (WAN) involves multiple T3 connections and the use of Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM). It is unclear to the ZCorp information technology (IT) staff whether they should replace Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) with IPv6 or use both versions of IP (dual-stack operation).
Your mission is to prepare a proposal document that makes a recommendation for either replacing IPv4 with IPv6 or using both version of IP. This recommendation must be supported and explained in detail.
Your proposal should specify a phased approach for your recommendation. You should include the following considerations in your document:
The benefits of implementing IPv6, especially in the area of security
Potential issues and concerns
Whether or not to continue the use of network services
Necessary changes to existing hardware
Other resource factors
Implementation plan
Your proposal should be a Word document of 3-5 body pages that includes a title page and an abstract. Citations and references list must be in APA style. Refer to the APA style guide found in the Library for further information.
Explanation / Answer
MIGRATION OF IP4 TO IP6
Mary AV
Chief design and security Analyst
Z Corporation, Inc
Abstract
Migrating from IPv4 to IPv6 in an instant is impossible because of the huge size of the Internet and of the great number of IPv4 users. Moreover, many organizations are becoming more and more dependent on the Internet for their daily work, and they therefore cannot tolerate downtime for the replacement of the IP protocol. As a result, there will not be one special day on which IPv4 will be turned off and IPv6 turned on because the two protocols can coexist without any problems. The migration from IPv4 to IPv6 must be implemented node by node by using autoconfiguration procedures to eliminate the need to configure IPv6 hosts manually. This way, users can immediately benefit from the many advantages of IPv6 while maintaining the possibility of communicating with IPv4 users or peripherals. Consequently, there is no reason to delay updating to IPv6!
MIGRATION OF IP4 TO IP6
We have already seen that some IPv6 characteristics are explicitly designed to simplify the migration. For example, IPv6 addresses can be automatically derived from IPv4 addresses, IPv6 tunnels can be built on IPv4 networks, and at least in the initial phase, all IPv6 nodes will follow the dual stack approach; that is, they will support both IPv4 and IPv6 at the same time. This good level of compatibility between IPv4 and IPv6 may cause some users to think that the migration to IPv6 is useless. In the future, the choice of not migrating to IPv6 will limit the possibility of evolving because it will prevent users from accessing new implementations that, starting from 2000, will concern IPv6 only. IPv6 has been accurately designed, discussed thoroughly, and tested in the field by the IETF and by many other research institutions. A project called 6-Bone (described in Section 12.3) was created so that users could acquire experience and test the IPv6 protocol stacks. The years from 1997 to 2000 will be characterized by the adoption of IPv6 by ISPs and users. During 1997, users could still have problems related to the newness of products, but starting from 1998, IPv6 will be part of mass-produced protocols distributed on routers, on workstations, and on PCs. At that point, organizations will begin to migrate, less or more gradually, to IPv6.
The key goals of the migration are as follow:
IPv6 and IPv4 hosts must interoperate.
The use of IPv6 hosts and routers must be distributed over the Internet in a simple and progressive way, with a little interdependence.
Network administrators and end users must think that the migration is easy to understand and implement. A set of mechanisms called SIT (Simple Internet Transition) has been implemented; it includes protocols and management rules to simplify the migration. The main characteristics of SIT are the following:
Possibility of a progressive and nontraumatic transition: IPv4 hosts and routers can be updated to IPv6, one at a time, without requiring other hosts or routers to be updated simultaneously.
Minimum requirements for updating: The only requirement for updating hosts to IPv6 is the availability of a DNS server to manage IPv6 addresses. No requirements are needed for routers.
Addressing simplicity: When a router or a host is updated to IPv6, it can also continue to use IPv4 addresses.
Low initial cost: No preparatory work is necessary to begin the migration to IPv6. Mechanisms used by SIT include the following:
A structure of IPv6 addresses that allows the derivation of IPv6 addresses from IPv4 addresses.
The availability of the dual stack on hosts and on routers during the transition—that is, the presence of both IPv4 and IPv6 stacks at the same time.
A technique to encapsulate IPv6 packets inside IPv4 packets (tunneling) to allow IPv6 packets to traverse clouds not yet updated to IPv6.
An optional technique that consists of translating IPv6 headers into IPv4 headers and vice versa to allow, in an advanced phase of the migration, IPv4-only nodes to communicate with IPv6-only nodes.
The SIT approach guarantees that IPv6 hosts can interoperate with IPv4 hosts initially on the entire Internet. When the migration is completed,this interoperability will be locally guaranteed for a long time.This capability allows for the protection of investments made on IPv4; simple devices that cannot be updated to IPv6—for example, network printers and terminal servers—will continue to operate with IPv4 until they are no longer used. The possibility of a gradual migration allows manufacturers to integrate IPv6 in routers, operating systems, and network software when they think that implementations are stable and users to begin the migration at a time they consider the most appropriate.
References
Gilligan, E. Nordmar, RFC 1933: Transition Mechanisms for IPv6 Hosts and Routers, April 1996.
Hinden, J. Postel, RFC 1897: IPv6 Testing Address Allocation, January 1996.
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