A new draft has landed at the IETF proposing that IANA allocate 44::/16 to Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC). This mirrors the pre-Regional Internet Registry (RIR) assignment of 44.0.0.0/8 to ARDC for early IPv4 packetized radio. Choosing 44::/16 has a certain romantic symmetry, a nod to the long history of ‘ham’ radio networking — especially now that most of the original IPv4 block has been returned. ARDC continues to operate the remaining 44/8 delegations as a non-profit on behalf of amateur radio operators worldwide, and they propose to do the same with the /16, bringing packetized radio into the IPv6 era with a recognized ‘ham community’ super-prefix from which more sensibly sized blocks can be delegated.
Packetized amateur radio operates on specific frequencies coordinated globally through the ITU and dates back to the 1960s, developing in parallel with early packet networks. Systems like ALOHANET in Hawaiʻi experimented with half-duplex, time-division techniques for satellite data transmission, and ARPANET explored similar ground. In 1981, after the FCC approved digital data over amateur radio, the 44.0.0.0/8 block was delegated. Since then, it has supported automatic station identification, signal-strength and reception reporting, and data exchange between enthusiasts.
The system generally uses a link-layer protocol known as AX.25, which frames higher-layer IP packets (or other protocols) and enables automatic relay and reporting systems.
Endpoints in the ham radio network are not tucked away in a private cloud. By using publicly routable IP space, the community can be globally reachable, albeit with delay, loss, and jitter characteristics that look unusual by modern network standards. In that sense, they’re not so different from many Internet of Things (IoT) deployments or public infrastructure systems such as digital meter-reading networks. They are part of the Internet, just not a part that most people travel through consciously.
The proposal has already sparked plenty of discussion on the IETF list as well as on Reddit and forums like Hacker News. It also has to grapple with the realities of today’s globally addressable Internet and the delegation framework shared between IANA, the RIRs (acting collectively through the NRO), and ICANN as the broader oversight body for Internet governance.
The proposed updates to the ICP-2 document sets out the principles for creating any new global registry. Against that backdrop, a request to the IETF for IANA to delegate a specific block — and to a specific organization — is likely to run straight into the process boundaries that govern the creation of new global registries.
ARDC will likely point to the original IPv4 allocation from IANA, arguing that under their existing arrangements with ARIN this is simply ‘business as usual’. Even so, the community clearly has some distance to go in working through the procedural implications of doing something like this today. Their draft does address some of the more obvious counter-suggestions — such as using unroutable address space — and highlights the long-standing role of amateur radio in emergency response and crisis communications, as well as the fact that its use is tightly regulated at the national level.
It’s an important discussion for the addressing community, for the IETF, for the NRO as the RIRs’ coordination body, and for amateur radio communities worldwide. The ongoing conversations on the IETF lists are a useful start toward possible adoption, but the draft is far from assured. The prospect of it ultimately producing a /16 that is independently routable and managed outside the existing RIR system is even less certain.
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