|
Written by Edison D. Ong
Manila Bulletin online, Monday, June 30, 2008
Backs transition from IPv4 to IPv6
KUALA LUMPUR — The year 2035 may be about three decades away for common folks like us, but
not for visionaries like "Father of the Internet" Dr. Vinton Cerf.
Also Google vice president and chief Internet evangelist, Cerf addressed thousands of
attendees to the recently-held 16th World Congress on Information Technology (WCIT) 2008
regarding the current and future Internet trends, their impact on societies and economies
and how his organization is helping lead in the Web 2.0 era and beyond.
Held at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre, the five-day event drew more than 3,000
delegates from 90 countries worldwide. The WCIT is a premier global ICT forum that brings
together global leaders in business, government and academia to impact economic and social
development through the exchange of policies and ideas on technology. Often billed as the
Olympics of ICT, WCIT 2008 was themed, "Enable, Empower and Enrich" to reflect its potential
to enable businesses, empower societies, and enrich economies.
In a special preview of the Internet in 2035 he made for the international press, which
included this writer and another Philippine journalist, he expressed concern over the
impending exhaustion of Internet addresses in the current Internet Protocol version 4
(IPv4), which has room for 4,294,967,296 possible Internet addresses at 32-bit addressing.
IPv4 is a 20 years old technology that has added complexity using Network Address Translators.
At Google, Cerf is responsible for identifying new enabling technologies and applications on
the Internet and other platforms for the company. He is the co-designer, with Robert Kahn,
of TCP/IP protocols and the basic architecture of the Internet.
"Now at 2008, we are running out of unique Internet addresses," said Cerf, who together with
John Postel, a significant contributor to Internet standards; and Dr. Junichiro Hagino of
the IPv6 Samurai, are some of the key people in the Internet development.
The now in the making IPv6, the next-generation Internet Protocol designed by the Internet
Engineering Task Force (IETF), have advance features to ensure the continuous growth and
success of the Internet. It could scale up to trillions of addresses due to the larger
128-bit address.
Advanced IPv6 features will include efficient and hierarchical addressing and routing, plug
and play features, built-in security, efficient multicasting and optimized mobility support.
In a resolution released at the WCIT 2008, the World Information Technology and Services
Alliance, called upon all stakeholders to work together "to promote the transition from the
current Internet addressing system (IPv4) to an addressing system capable of supporting
continued Internet expansion and new applications for the foreseeable future (IPv6)."
Cerf said by 2035 when the Internet will be 52 years old, the world average of Internet
penetration will be approximately 70 percent. There will be about 60 billion devices that
connect to the cloud of computing for an average of 10 devices per person. "There will be a
lot of devices on each one of us," he underscored.
He added as businesses automate and interact with each other and with government, we will
come to the point of cloud computing, of virtualization and computational mobility.
"If you need to get information, come to the cloud and ask for the information, and it will
bring it to you," he stated. "There will be a lot of collaboration in virtual environments.
The world will be populated with virtual objects."
He sees mobile devices – and navigation systems – becoming people’s "remote controllers for
everything they do."
He added, "your mobile (device) on your hip becomes your information window."
|
