An Introduction to IP Networks
BT Technology Journal
Scaling Global Internet Networks
BT Technology Journal
BT Technology Journal
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Anything connected to the Internet needs, at some point, to pick up a globally unique address to identify it among everything else on the Internet. In the case of today's Internet, these addresses are Internet protocol version 4 (IPv4) addresses and they are limited in number. Responsibility for management of this limited resource is delegated from a global level through regional organisations and ultimately to individual Internet service providers. In order to gain maximum use out of the available number of addresses against the background of explosive growth in the size of the Internet, this valuable resource has to be carefully managed to ensure that there is enough to go round. This paper discusses what IP addresses are, the global organisations used to manage IP addresses, and how BT manages its IP addresses.