[ncc-services-wg] Destruction of trust

(excuse the top posting, but I wanted to keep the whole of Havard's email in the thread as it makes some interesting points)

Dear Havard,

I'm sorry to see that you believe there has been an erosion of trust
between yourself and the RIPE NCC. This is certain not the intent.
I would just like to make some points on the legacy address space issues you
raise below that I hope will help clarify matters.

Note that it is not mandatory to register legacy address
space. It's completely optional for legacy address space holders to:

a. Become a RIPE NCC member; or
b. Register their resources with a sponsoring LIR; or
c. Remain as they are

While the option for a legacy address space holder to become a member of
the RIPE NCC is available, the RIPE NCC actively encourages legacy
address space holders to register their address space with a sponsoring LIR.

As noted in the RIPE NCC's Activity Plan for 2012, "The goal of these
activities will be to bring ERX and legacy space registration records up
to the same standards of accuracy as address space distributed by the
RIPE NCC since 1992."

For legacy address space holders who do wish to become RIPE NCC members,
the sign-up fee and the membership fee for the coming year is waived.

The document you refer to mentioning the "carrot and stick" approach is
the Report of the RIPE NCC Charging Scheme Task Force. This task force
was made up of RIPE NCC members, RIPE NCC Executive Board members and
representatives from the RIPE NCC. The report only makes recommendations
to the RIPE NCC Executive Board regarding a proposed Charging Scheme model.

To give you some information on the work carried out by the RIPE NCC so
far, the Registration Services Department has contacted 145 existing
LIRs who hold legacy resources. The responses from those LIRs can be
broken down as follows:

- 63 LIRs added the address space under their LIR's registration
- 24 LIRs said that they were not interested because of the lack of RIPE
Policies
- 2 returned unused legacy address space
- 56 did not reply to the original email or reminder emails

A total of 8,513,280 IP addresses were added to the LIRs' registration
during this phase of the project.

The RIPE NCC recently started to contact legacy address space holders
who are not LIRs.

All of the information on the RIPE NCC's activities regarding legacy
address space are available at:
http://www.ripe.net/lir-services/resource-management/legacy-space

Best regards,

Nigel
Chairman RIPE NCC Board

On 18/07/2012 14:36, Havard Eidnes wrote:
> Hi,
>
> as you may be aware, the RIPE NCC is currently engaged in an
> activity to establish contact with legacy address space holders,
> and among other things to set up a contractual relationship
> between the RIPE NCC and the legacy resource holders.
>
> However, it is my opinion that the current RIPE NCC actions with
> legacy resource holders is destroying some of the valuable trust
> they have built in the community over the years.
>
> It has been said that "the RIPE NCC does what the members tell
> them to do".  That does however not appear to be the case for
> this action, where the RIPE NCC appears to act in a policy-free
> zone, simply on executive decision.  Despite the RIPE NCCs
> knowledge that work is ongoing to formulate a policy for this
> area, they are barging ahead, possibly in an attempt to establish
> a fait accompli.
>
> The message sent to the legacy resource holders does not mention
> the option which would probably be most preferable to at least
> most of our customers, namely registering the resources via the
> LIR at their service provider.  One could suspect the RIPE NCC
> has self-interest in driving up the number of LIRs, to increase
> the number of paying customers of the RIPE NCC.
>
> Some of the documents about the approach with legacy resource
> holders has mentioned a "stick and carrot" approach.  I'll claim
> that the stick is needlessly sharp and the carrot reeks of
> decomposition.  Explanation:
>
>   * The stick is primarily the "we cannot guarantee in-addr.arpa
>     name service".  Without it, a user will in practice be unable
>     to operate mail servers within the affected address space,
>     which would be a severe blow to those who still actively use
>     their address space.
>
>     The freezing of the registry data is an inconvenience which
>     will ensure that the accuracy of the data whittles over time,
>     an action initiated by the RIPE NCC no less...  Many legacy
>     resource holders have not updated their records in a long time
>     already (many didn't have an actual need to do so), so while
>     inconvenient, it's not as strong a stick as the threat of
>     removal of the in-addr.arpa delegation.  It should however be
>     noted that the whittling of the registration data over time
>     also is detrimental for the RIPE community at large, not only
>     for the address space holder.
>
>   * What's the carrot?  Only the removal of the stick from above?
>     What makes the carrot particularly rotten is several things:
>
>      * The open-ended and unliateral application of "all relevant
>        RIPE NCC policies and procedures".  The fear would be "we
>        will mire you or your LIR (or both) down in pointless
>        address policy work to document ancient history, and have
>        the RIPE NCC verify (or deny, as the case may be) all
>        assignments done over time" (applicable where address space
>        has been used in PA-fashion).
>        ...or for PI-style assignments, the assignment itself might
>        be challenged.
>      * The highly uncertain status of the charging scheme in the
>        longer term for the legacy resource holders, where the
>        initial proposal to modify today's model had, with no
>        discussion, abolished the "age based discount", and where
>        current discussion is rampant with "payment per IP address"
>        schemes.  The fear is that the RIPE NCC will gouge the
>        legacy resource holders either directly or indirectly,
>        "motivating" them to hand back the resource.
>      * The lack of recognition that these addresses were assigned
>        under a different policy.  Anecdotal evidence suggests that
>        at one time you would be handed a class-B instead of 4
>        class-Cs because there was fear of growth of the routing
>        table.  Does the RIPE NCC now want to challenge the
>        assignments?
>
> In sum, this makes the RIPE NCC appear more as an extorting bully
> rather than an agent who has the accuracy of the address register
> as its foremost priority, and this destroys some of the valuable
> trust they have built in the community over the years.
>
>
> Regards,
>
> - Håvard
>