Minutes | MENOG

Day 1 – Sunday, 30 March 2014

Day 2 – Sunday, 31 March 2014

Day 1 – Sunday, 30 March 2014

Welcome

Osama I. Al-Dosary, MENOG Chair

Keynote: IPv6 Promotion and Deployment in Saudi Arabia

Dr. Ibraheem Al-Furaih, CITC

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/263-CITC-Keynote.pdf

In his keynote presentation, Dr Ibraheem showed a series of statistics relating to broadband uptake in the region and the corresponding demand for IPv4 addresses. He explained that alternative approaches to bridge the gap (such as CG NAT) were not sustainable in the long-term, and said that wide-scale IPv6 adoption was the only viable alternative. He gave an overview of CITC’s efforts to encourage IPv6 adoption – through task forces, IPv6 training and conferences within the region. He thanked MENOG and RIPE for their support of the CITC’s mission.

Paul Rendek, RIPE NCC, thanked Dr Ibraheem for his work and noted that the RIPE NCC was very fond of its relationship with the CITC and thought it was doing important work in the region. He said the RIPE NCC was keen to work with him at the enterprise level and looked forward to working with him in Saudi Arabia.

Kaveh Ranjbar, RIPE NCC, said the presentation showed a great achievement in terms of IPv6 adoption in the country. He highlighted that the RIPE Atlas measurement system could be useful for the community to measure the penetration of IPv6 among other things. He said that community members could contact the RIPE NCC if they wanted to learn more about RIPE Atlas.

RIPE NCC Update

Axel Pawlik, RIPE NCC

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/264-Axel-RIPENCC-update.pdf

Axel talked about the RIPE NCC’s expansion into the Middle East, including the new office it had just opened in Dubai, as well as the new staff who would be based in the region. He noted that operations would remain in Amsterdam. He gave an IPv4 update and reminded members that they could still request a final /22 allocation. He talked about the increased risk of IPv4 hijackings that they were seeing. He mentioned other improvements the RIPE NCC was making, such as supporting more languages, more contact with the membership, and capacity building efforts. He finished by saying that it was important that members exercised their voting rights and registered for the upcoming RIPE NCC General Meeting.

Elvis Velea, v4Escrow, said it was good to see that the RIPE NCC was working on a fifth RIPEness star.

Marco Hogewoning, RIPE NCC, said that while it was still a prototype, the fifth star looked at actual usage and attendees could ask Kaveh or Christian if they had any further questions.

Submarine and Terrestrial Network Developments in the Middle East

Alan Mauldin, Teleography

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/261-MENOG-amauldin.pptx

Alan gave an overview of the situation regarding submarine and terrestrial fibre developments in the Middle East region. He said that recent construction had infused the region with considerable lit and potential capacity, and prices for transport and IP transit would cross-connect, while back-haul fees remained expensive. He also highlighted that the capacity of old cables was increasing, and cable cuts and outages remained an issue after the regional outage in 2008.

Mapping the Middle East’s Financial Industry

Jim Cowie, Renesys

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/267-cowiemenog14_1394661436.pdf

Jim gave a talk that looked at identifying the Internet footprint of the financial services industry – an industry that consumed over $150 billion in telecommunications services. He said these organisations had been agile in moving to the cloud and were increasingly becoming “first class Internet citizens” in terms of getting their own ASNs, engaging in Internet governance discussions and attending Internet meetings.

Internet Measurement Tools and their Usefulness

Gaurab Raj Upadhaya, Limelight

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/268-Gaurab-tools-talk-menog14.pdf

Gaurab gave an overview of a number of Internet measurement tools. He gave an explanation of CAIDA’s IPv4, IPv6 and ASN charts and the CAIDA ARK, along with measurement tools from the RIPE NCC and APNIC. He said that these measurements were not only useful for academics, but also for network operators as well.

Christian Teuschel, RIPE NCC, said what had been missing from Gaurab’s slides on the RIPE NCC’s tools was information about RIPEstat – which was the interface to the RIPE NCC’s many datasets.

Advanced Traffic Steering and Optimization Technologies in Cellular and Wifi Networks

Bart Salaets, F5

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/272-Advanced_Traffic_Steering_v04.pdf

Bart compared flow-based and transaction-based packet steering. He then explained the work of the IETF Service Chaining Working Group within this context.

Middle East Strategy Updates

Fadh A. Batayneh, ICANN

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/262-Middle_East_Strategy_Updates_-_MENOG_14_-_March_30.pdf

Fahd gave an update on ICANN’s strategy in the Middle East, which he said was focused on three strategic areas: the domain name industry, capacity building, and multi-stakeholder Internet governance. He also gave an update on the work to introduce Arabic IDNs.

Kaveh Ranjbar, RIPE NCC, asked if ICANN had any plans to support DNSSEC in the region, or to support ccTLD operators to ensure their main servers were IPv6 enabled.

Fahd replied that encouraging IPv6 deployment was in their plans, but this was more within the remit of the RIPE NCC, as the ccTLD community was a very small part of this larger effort. He said that ICANN had been offering operators training in DNSSEC with the understanding that they would deploy it when they completed the training. He said so far this had only been offered in Lebanon.

Paul Rendek, RIPE NCC, said he was an observer on the Middle East Stakeholder Working Group and he just wanted to clarify that the RIPE NCC was working to support IPv6 deployment and to provide what the region wanted.

Fahd said he wanted to add to Paul’s statement. He said that in the IANA Database they could see those registries that were IPv6 ready, and there were several in the region that were. He said it therefore looked like the RIPE NCC was doing a better job than ICANN in this regard.

RIPE NCC Regional Activities and Internet Governance

Paul Rendek, RIPE NCC

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/274-Paul-MENOG%28K9%29.pdf

Paul gave an update on Internet governance issues and the RIPE NCC’s regional activities. He said in the RIPE NCC Survey 2013 there had been a clear request from members in the Middle East for the RIPE NCC to have a bigger presence in the region and, importantly, to provide members with the opportunity to engage with RIPE NCC staff in Arabic. Paul announced the opening of their RIPE NCC’s regional office in Dubai and the hiring of new Arabic-speaking RIPE NCC staff. He then gave an overview of the NTIA announcement regarding the transition of the IANA functions.

Dimitry Burkov, RIPE NCC Executive Board, asked if Paul saw any risks in the Internet governance sphere after the NTIA announcement.

Paul replied that there were a couple. He said one risk was that the organisations involved in Internet administration, such as the RIPE NCC, might have to change how they operate, which could be a risk. He added that the RIPE NCC and the other RIRs were uniquely positioned to consult with their communities through their long-standing bottom-up processes and when they had finished that process, people would see how ready they were to move to any new model. He said there was also a risk that the US Government might change its mind.

Dimitri asked what they hoped to gain from the IANA transition.

Rob Blokzijl, RIPE Chair, said he would answer the Dimitri’s question. He said the current fashion of multi-stakeholder models should not be taken too seriously. He noted his concern that words such as “bottom-up” had disappeared and said this was how the RIPE NCC had operated so successfully for the past 20 years. He pointed out that the NTIA or the US Government had never leaned on the community and had expressed a deep satisfaction with the competence of its work and the inclusiveness of the bottom-up model. He said they needed to keep this in mind.

Regarding the IANA transition, Rob said they should make an inventory of what their interactions were with IANA today. He said he would not be surprised if this was a half-page document. He said it was important to know this before getting carried away.

Paul thanked Rob for his comment and noted that in a recent document that had said the RIRs were multi-stakeholder, he had removed this in favour or “open, transparent and bottom-up.” He said multi-stakeholder meant opening your operations to anyone who was interested, while many people weren’t interested in certain areas of the RIPE community – though these areas were open for them to participate in if they chose.

Axel Pawlik, RIPE NCC, said the question was what their goals were with regard to the NTIA statement and the IANA globalisation. He said the NTIA had expressed that it was thinking of letting go of its IANA oversight. He said IANA performed three roles: giving numbers to RIRs, overseeing the DNS root zone, and publishing protocol parameter registries. He said the focus of the NTIA transition would likely be on domain names, though the RIRs would be seen to outside eyes as part of the system, and so they would have to be seen joining in on the process.

Paul clarified that the RIPE NCC’s members were its first priority, ahead of any Internet governance activities.

Elvis Velea, v4Escrow, asked if they still needed to have five RIRs. He suggested they aim for compatible policies between regions and work towards a central registry. He also asked if there would be an IGF meeting in 2015.

Paul replied that the strength of the registry system came from its regional reach. He said this had evolved over time and that each region had needs that were specific to its community. He said any centralised alternative would not be as robust as what they had now. He said if anything, the RIRs were becoming even more regionalised.

Paul said the UN was looking at whether it would extend the IGF. He said these were great events, and the UN wanted to ensure that the outcomes were more useful for them, rather than just a talking shop. He said they would probably be renewing the IGF after that.

Dr Ibraheem, CITC, thanked Paul and the RIPE NCC for its regional outreach efforts. He noted his concerned that the RIPE NCC could invest too much effort at the Internet governance level, to the detriment of its work with the technical community.

Paul thanked Dr Ibraheem for voicing his concerns and reiterated that the RIPE NCC was there for the technical community first and foremost – which was where its mandate came from.

NTP and Evil (Geoff Huston, APNIC and Randy Bush, IIJ)

(Presented by) Phillip Smith, NSRC

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/271-2014-02-25-ntpddos1392941955_1393309946.pdf

Phillip explained how people were using the Network Time Protocol (NTP) to launch DDoS attacks, and highlighted the need for operators to implement BCP 38 on their networks.

Kaveh Ranjbar, RIPE NCC, said that as Chief Information Officer of the RIPE NCC, he encouraged everyone to implement BCP 38 on their networks. He said it would save them money and protect their customers.

IPv4 Transfers in the RIPE NCC Service Region

Andrew de la Haye, RIPE NCC

This presentation is not available.

Andrew gave an overview on transfers of IPv4 address space in the RIPE NCC service region. He outlined the relevant RIPE Policies and noted a number of policy proposals being debated by the RIPE community that would have an impact on transfers. He also highlighted the increase in hijackings of IPv4 address space that the RIPE NCC was seeing and said that as a result they were being more careful to establish the identity of people making requests. He asked for the community’s patience as the RIPE NCC found the right balance between due diligence and not being overly bureaucratic.

Rob Blokzijl, RIPE Chair, asked if Andrew could share any information about which regions the IPv4 hijackers seemed to be operating from – or if there was no correlation with this. He said if Andrew didn’t want to announce this publicly he would understand.

Andrew said it was a bit early to announce this. He added that if there was a need to inform the community they would.

Elvis Velea, v4Escrow, said that he felt the RIPE NCC had become overly bureaucratic in some respects. He said that in cases where there was a merger, for example, things shouldn’t be so difficult.

Andrew said they were aware of this and it was due to the nuances associated with internal processes within the RIPE NCC – whether something was classified as a merger, an acquisition, or a transfer for example. He said they had recently completed an internal review that would make this a lot more streamlined by doing away with some of these distinctions. He added that he was aware that this bureaucracy might be inconvenient for some, but the RIPE NCC had to carry out its due diligence.

IPv4 Transfers as Seen by an IPv4 Broker

Elvis Velea, v4Escrow

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/276-20140330_-_IPv4_Transfers_pdf.pdf

Elvis approached IPv4 transfers from a broker’s perspective. He presented some statistics on transfers in the various RIR service regions and outlined the process by which a transfer was conducted through a broker.

Andrew de la Haye, RIPE NCC, suggested that people could use the RIPE NCC’s Resource Certification system to establish whether someone was a legitimate holder of a resource.

Day 2 – Sunday, 31 March 2014

MENOG Peering Forum

How to do Effective Peering Personals, and Peering DB

Martin Levy, CloudFlare

This presentation is available at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/279-MENOG14-PeeringDB-Martin-Levy-CloudFlare.pdf

Martin gave a demonstration of how to do “Peering Personals.” He also explained how to use the Peering DB and highlighted some common pitfalls and best practices when contacting others for peering.

The Role IXPs and Peering Play in the Evolution of the Internet

Steve Wilcox, IX Reach

This presentation is available at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/278-MENOG-presentation-2014.pptx

Steve gave an overview of how IXPs fit into the wider ecosystem and how they have changed over the years as the Internet has evolved. He noted that large IXPs were starting to look more and more like networks themselves. He also highlighted a number of trends, such as the fact that it was becoming harder to differentiate between international and local peering.

GCC Peering Status and Peering Curiosities

Bernd Spiess, UAE-IX

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/283-UAE-IX_MENOG-v2.pdf

Bernd highlighted a number of curiosities using traceroutes between different areas in the Middle East region that highlighted the need for peering. He showed that in many instances local traffic had to pass through Europe or the United States to reach its destination for example.

MENOG Peering Forum Panel

Moderator: Osama I. Al Dosary, MENOG Chair

Panellists:

Saleh Mansour, Palestine IX
Haitham El-Nakhal, NTRA and Cairo IX
Christian Kaurmann, Akamai
Marco Brandstaetter, UAE-IX

The panellists explained the strategies their organisations used towards peering. In particular, they discussed the balance between cost, increased performance and added control over their networks that was achieved through peering with other networks.

Akamai CDN and Peering

Christian Kaufmann, Akamai

This presentation is available at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/282-20140331_MENOG_BGP_and_Traffic_Engineering_with_Akamai.pdf

Christian gave an overview of Akamai’s CDN network and explained how it peered with other networks. He outlined some do’s and don’t’s and typical scenarios in traffic engineering.

RIPE Atlas and RIPEstat

Christian Teuschel, RIPE NCC

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/294-MENOG14_main_Christian.pdf

Christian gave an overview of RIPE Atlas and RIPEstat. He also explained the RIPE Atlas anchor project, which had just passed the significant milestone of having 50 anchors deployed.

An audience member asked how much RIPE Atlas anchors cost.

Christian replied that the cost of an anchor was 700 EUR. He added that RIPE Atlas probes were free, though sponsorship was always welcome.

An audience member asked if there was a way to check how many IP addresses from a prefix were assigned to a particular system.

Christian said there was M-Labs data in RIPEstat that did look at IP address usage. He said they should enter the IP range into RIPEstat and look under the various tabs, which might show what they were looking for.

Kaveh Ranjbar, RIPE NCC, said he wanted to add that these tools were unique in terms of scale and functionality and both RIPEstat and RIPE Atlas were being developed by the RIPE NCC for the whole Internet community.

Routing for an Anycast CDN

Martin Levy, CloudFlare

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/286-MENOG14-Routing-for-an-Anycast-CDN-Martin-Levy-CloudFlare.pdf

Martin explained how CloudFlare’s CDN worked at the network level to route web traffic through its global network of 24 data centres. He explained how the choice of a transit provider was very important and having a single provider made routing easier. He then explained some of the challenges associated with running an anycast CDN.

Migrading DE-CIX to Apollon: Lessons Learnt

Arnold Nipper, DE-CIX

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/277-e-an-20140331-menog14-Apollon-lessons-learnt.pdf

Arnold shared DE-CIX’s experience migrating to Apollon and highlighted lessons learned throughout the process.

ISOC IXP Toolkit and Upcoming Peering and IXP Partnership Opportunities

Jane Coffin, Internet Society

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/259-ISOC_IXPtoolkit_MENOG_14_%28Mar-Apr_2014%29.pdf

Jane presented on ISOC’s IXP toolkit and best practices guide that they had developed to encourage IXPs in emerging markets. She also explained how ISOC could support IXPs by offering training and technical assistance.

Euro-IX and IX-F Update

Arnold Nipper, EURO-IX Board

This presentation is available online at:
http://www.menog.org/presentations/menog-14/257-euroix-update-menog14-dubai.pdf

Arnold gave an update from Euro-IX, which is an association of 76 Internet exchanges. He presented some statistics relating to their members and the equipment they used in their Internet exchanges.

Closing Remarks

Serge Radovcic, RIPE NCC

Serge closed the meeting and noted that the RIPE NCC had been the host for this meeting. He said the RIPE NCC was committed to supporting the MENOG community and highlighted the need for sponsor organisations to keep the meetings free for attendees. Serge said they were keen to hear feedback from attendees and there was a form on the MENOG website they should use.

Vote of Thanks