GSM Association & the RIPE NCC

The European Regional Internet Registry - Clarify IP Addressing for GPRS infrastructure

London, UK, 19 July 2000: The GSM Association and the RIPE NCC (Réseaux IP Européens Network Co-ordination Centre) - the European Regional Internet Registry have jointly agreed to the process to enable GPRS (General Packet Radio Services) roaming services to be supported by operators globally.

The GSM Association entered into discussions with the RIPE NCC earlier this year initiated by a proposal for infrastructure addresses to support GPRS roaming. The proposal was initially greeted with uncertainty within the RIPE community due to concerns over the amount of addresses requested - although as a result of subsequent meetings and clarification of existing address policies the GSM Association's proposal was modified and issues of concern have been addressed and resolved.

A key result of the discussion is that a task force - the GPRS Infrastructure IP Addressing Working Party - was formed with expertise from the IP/ISP community, the GSM/GPRS community and the RIPE NCC and already a constructive meeting of task force members has taken place.

At this meeting the GSM Association's members clarified their needs, ISPs raised their concerns and the RIPE NCC clarified its existing IP address allocation policies and procedures. The results of the task force meeting were presented to the overall RIPE community during its recent meeting and the principal results were as follows:

Public IPv4 address space can be used in parts of the GPRS network infrastructure
Existing IP address allocation policies and procedures apply
Requests from mobile network operators can be sent directly to the RIPE NCC or their data network backbone providers

These processes will be communicated to the global addressing community by the RIPE NCC for review by the other Regional Internet Registries and their respective constituencies. The GSM Association's IREG (International Roaming Experts Group) has initiated discussions with the RIPE NCC to clarify the existing process for obtaining these IP addresses. The RIPE NCC has already received IP address requests from GPRS operators as a result.

Address requirements for mobile devices are still not finalised and work continues on determining the needs of GPRS terminals and third generation mobile systems.

The results of the GPRS Task Force meeting can be found at: http://www.ripe.net/ripe/wg/lir/gprs/

For more information, please contact:

Notes to Editors

About the GSM Association:
The GSM Association is the world's leading wireless industry representative body, consisting of more than 450 second and third Generation network operators, satellite operators, key manufacturers & suppliers to the GSM industry, regulators and administrative bodies. Membership of the Association spans 150 countries and areas of the world.

The GSM Association is responsible for the development, deployment and evolution of the GSM system for digital wireless communications and for the promotion of the GSM platform. The Association's members provide digital GSM wireless services to more than 331 million* customers (end-June 2000) across five continents of the world. The GSM system accounts for approximately 55 percent of the world's wireless market, and 66 percent of the total digital wireless market.

About RIPE NCC (RIPE Network Co-ordination Centre):
The RIPE Network Co-ordination Centre (RIPE NCC) is one of 3 Regional Internet Registries (RIR) providing IP address allocation and registration services which support the operation of the Internet globally.
The RIPE NCC performs activities for the benefit of its membership; primarily activities that its members need to organise as a group, even though they may compete in other areas. The membership is primarily comprised of Internet Service Providers (ISP) and its service region incorporates Europe, The Middle East, Central Asia and African countries located north of the equator.

The services provided ensure the fair distribution of global Internet resources in the RIPE NCC service region required for the stable and reliable operation of the Internet. This includes the allocation of Internet (IP) address space, interdomain routing identifiers (currently BGP autonomous system numbers), and the management of reverse domain name space (currently in-addr.arpa and ipv6.int). The RIPE NCC also provides services for the benefit of the Internet community at large including the development and maintenance of the RIPE Database, administrative support for the RIPE community, and the development and co-ordination of new projects.

The RIPE NCC currently supports over 2000 Local Internet Registries (LIRs) who collectively form the RIPE NCC membership. Membership is open to anyone using the RIPE NCC services.
Visit: http://www.ripe.net/info/ncc/

About RIPE (Réseaux IP Européens):
RIPE (Réseaux IP Européens) is a collaborative organisation open to organisations and individuals, operating wide area IP networks in Europe and beyond. The objective of RIPE is to ensure the administrative and technical co-ordination necessary to enable operation of a pan-European IP network. RIPE does not operate a network of its own.

Currently, more than 1000 organisations participate in the work. The result of the RIPE co-ordination effort is that an individual end-user is presented with a uniform IP service on his or her desktop irrespective of the particular network his or her workstation is attached to. In November 1999, nearly 10,000,000 hosts were reachable via networks co-ordinated by RIPE.

RIPE has no formal membership and its activities are performed on a voluntary basis, except the activities performed by the RIPE NCC. Most of the work happens inside several Working Groups. Each of these working groups has a mailing list where relevant topics and questions can be discussed. RIPE Working Groups meet 3 times a year during RIPE meetings.
Visit: http://www.ripe.net/ripe/about.html