Migration to the new Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) standard is virtually non-existent, according to a year-long study released this week by network security firm Arbor Networks. Experts and governments have been encouraging organisations to migrate to the new protocol because the current 20 year-old IPv4 is fast running out of available addresses.
IPv4 addresses could in fact run out as early as 2010, according to Scott Iekel-Johnson, principle software engineer at Arbor Networks. The firm used data from over 80 of its ISP partners and customers to determine the amount of IPv6 traffic on the internet. Arbor Networks found that the proportions of IPv6 and IPv4 traffic has stayed roughly the same over the past year. The report also found that IPv6 traffic is still a tiny percentage of overall internet traffic. There were 6Mbps of IPv6 traffic by the end of July compared to 4Tbps of IPv4 traffic.