The last remaining IPv4 addresses

02/02/2015

Since the announcement was made in June last year and more restrictive Internet resource assignment policies came into effect in Latin America and the Caribbean, LACNIC has assigned 38% of the space reserved for Phase 2 of IPv4 exhaustion.

In the past six months, 808 704 IPv4 addresses were assigned to Latin American and Caribbean Internet organizations (see chart) that are LACNIC members. Only 1 288 448 addresses remain before Phase 2 comes to an end and the region enters the third and final IPv4 exhaustion phase.

During this period, Brazil was the country that received the highest number of available IPv4 block assignments (641), followed by Argentina (60), Chile (22), Mexico (21), and Colombia (14).

July was the month during which the highest number of IPv4 addresses was assigned (more than 153 000; see chart).

At the current rate, it is expected that the space reserved for Phase 2 will be depleted in February 2016, said Sergio Rojas, responsible for LACNIC’s registration service. At that point, the reserve for new members (/11) will be activated, thus triggering Phase 3 of the IPv4 exhaustion plan designed by LACNIC and the National Registries. According to the policies in force, during this final phase only new members will be able to request IPv4 addresses, which will be assigned in blocks of between 1024 (/22) and 256 (/24) addresses. Each new member will only be able to receive one assignment from this space.