Hi, On Tue, Dec 07, 2021 at 06:25:21PM +0100, denis walker wrote:
Many years ago I questioned why we ever invented a market for address space 'that no one owns' when we had a perfectly good system of allocating address space based on need and when no longer needed was returned to the RIR to be re-allocated...for free. I was told 'don't be silly, people will still sell the address space but not record the transfers in the RIPE Database'. So the quality of the registry diminishes. What is going to stop people selling these 'never to be transferred' allocations and not recording the transfer in the RIPE Database? I am sure some back door dealings can be arranged to keep the LIRs active that have the allocations registered and obfuscate the fee payments to confuse the RIPE NCC. Have companies developed some sense of morality in recent years?
If the LIR fee is still to be paid, this is commercially not very attractive - and as such, should stop the business model "open a LIR, get a /24 for <x> EUR, sell it for <5*x>" nicely. Note that we always acknowledged the need for a block of addresses to "change hands", by mergers & acquisition. Having a formal transfer policy was basically just accepting that people would hide this in a company sale otherwise. My proposal is actually to disallow transfers *including* disallowing M&A transfers on these. It MUST stay in the LIR it was requested by, and if the LIR closes, it MUST be returned. Buying a "company with the LIR" would still be possible, of course (and I do not see a way to disallow this, it's like MS trying to disallow selling used windows licenses), but "... and then transferring, and closing the LIR" would not. Gert Doering -- NetMaster -- have you enabled IPv6 on something today...? SpaceNet AG Vorstand: Sebastian v. Bomhard, Michael Emmer Joseph-Dollinger-Bogen 14 Aufsichtsratsvors.: A. Grundner-Culemann D-80807 Muenchen HRB: 136055 (AG Muenchen) Tel: +49 (0)89/32356-444 USt-IdNr.: DE813185279