Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) is the latest revision of the Internet Protocol (IP), the communications protocol that provides an identification and location system for computers on networks and routes traffic across the Internet. IPv6 was developed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) to deal with the long-anticipated problem of IPv4 address exhaustion.
IPv6 is intended to replace IPv4, which still carries the vast majority of Internet traffic as of 2013. As of late November 2012, IPv6 traffic share was reported to be approaching 1%.
Every device on the Internet must be assigned an IP address in order to communicate with other devices. With the ever-increasing number of new devices being connected to the Internet, the need arose for more addresses than IPv4 is able to accommodate. IPv6 uses a 128-bit address, allowing 2128, or approximately 3.4×1038 addresses, or more than 7.9×1028 times as many as IPv4, which uses 32-bit addresses. IPv4 allows only approximately 4.3 billion addresses. The two protocols are not designed to be interoperable, complicating the transition to IPv6.
Tele2 has, in some degree, been IPv6 enabled since the beginning of 2002. In late 2007, the decision to implement IPv6 natively and alongside IPv4 in the network, was taken. Mid-2008 this was to a large extent complete and virtually all core nodes of Tele2s pan-european network are now IPv6 enabled. Some 90% (a number bound to fluctuate) of the IPv6 prefixes on the Internet can be reached via Tele2s customers or peers leaving Tele2 a very well connected network.
It is the goal and vision of Tele2 to stay at this technological forefront, implementing new technologies and facilitating for the widespread deployment of IPv6 across the Internet in any way we can..