July 2021 - db-wg - mailman.ripe.net

New NWI for geofeed?
by denis walker 14 Apr '22

14 Apr '22

Colleagues [Apologies for the length of this email...] The chairs would like to suggest creating a new NWI for the "geofeed:" attribute and suggest the following draft Problem statement and Solution definition. If there is agreement on this the RIPE NCC will do an impact assessment including legal review and summary of what the other RIRs are doing. There has already been quite a discussion in the WG on this issue with a lot of support. So hopefully we can reach a consensus quickly, at least on setting up the NWI and starting the impact assessment. Having read the latest draft IETF docs, there are some outstanding questions. Comments and changes are welcome... cheers denis co-chair DB-WG Problem statement Associating an approximate physical location with an IP address has proven to be a challenge to solve within the current constraints of the RIPE Database. Over the years the community has chosen to consider addresses in the RIPE Database to relate to entities in the assignment process itself, not the subsequent actual use of IP addresses after assignment. The working group is asked to consider whether the RIPE Database can be used as a springboard for parties wishing to correlate geographical information with IP addresses by allowing structured references in the RIPE Database towards information outside the RIPE Database which potentially helps answer Geo IP Location queries The IETF is currently discussing an update to RPSL to add a new attribute "geofeed: url". The url will reference a csv file containing location data. Some users have already started to make use of this feature via the "remarks: geofeed: url". It is never a good idea to try to overload structured data into the free format "remarks:" attribute. This has been done in the past, for example with abuse contact details before we introduced the "abuse-c:" attribute. There is no way to regulate what database users put into "remarks:" attributes. So even if the new "geofeed:" attribute is not agreed, the url data will still be included in the RIPE Database. Currently there are 24,408 INETNUM and 516,354 INET6NUM objects containing a "remarks: geofeed: url" attribute in the database. These have 7,731 distinct values in the INETNUMs and 1,045 distinct values in the INET6NUMs. Solution definition Implement a new "geofeed:" attribute according to the IETF's definition. Although the IETF has not yet concluded discussions on this attribute we can still implement it in the RIPE Database RPSL data definition. The RIPE Database already has many local differences to the RPSL standard. As expressed in the Problem statement, users are already using the geofeed data by overloading the "remarks:" attribute. That is a dirty hack which should be avoided. An invalid formated url will be a syntax error. The RIPE NCC will perform a one time conversion of the existing data to convert "remarks: geofeed: url" to "geofeed: url". If an update then contains a "remarks: geofeed: url" attribute, the update will be successful and the response should include an appropriate Warning message. At some point in the (near) future, this could be changed to an update failure as a syntax error. An update containing a "geofeed:" and a "remarks: geofeed:" attribute or more than one "remarks: geofeed:" will be a syntax error. The resource holder should be able to create, modify, delete the "geofeed:" attribute in allocation objects. Questions: -Should the database software do any checks on the existence/reachability of the url as part of the update with an error if the check fails? -Should the RIPE NCC do any periodic repeat checks on the continued existence/reachability of the url? -Should the RIPE NCC do any periodic checks on the content structure of the csv file referenced by the url? -Should the Solution definition define how this will be adopted into RDAP or should we simply ask the RIPE NCC to define this in their impact assessment? -The RIPE Database contains hierarchical address space objects. Should it be acceptable for "geofeed:" attributes to exist at multiple levels within a specific hierarchy? -Suppose a geofeed csv file referenced by a /16 INETNUM object contains location data for the whole /16. Then a more specific /24 INETNUM object references another geofeed csv file that contains conflicting location data for this /24. Should this be a concern for the RIPE Database? -Should geofeed data be inherited? If you query for a /24 that does not contain a "geofeed:" attribute, but a less specific /16 does contain a "geofeed:" attribute, should this data be returned? In other words could it be used in a similar way to "abuse-c:"? -Thinking ahead to how people will actually deploy this data and what short cuts they could make. It is said that when reading a geofeed csv file, consumers of the data should ignore all data within that file not directly concerning the address space queried in the RIPE Database. Could you therefore create a single csv file with location data for all your address space and reference the same file in all your RIPE Database address objects? The address space owner could rely on the data consumer to pick out the correct piece of data for the relevant address space. The manager of the csv file then only has to work with one file. If this is possible and does happen (which the IETF doc 'Finding geofeeds' seems to suggest is possible for unsigned geofeed data), would it therefore make sense to apply "geofeed:" hierarchically as with "abuse-c:"? Allow a single, default "geofeed:" attribute in the ORGANISATION object to be applied to all that organisations address space, with the option of specific localised "geofeed:" attributes in address space objects. That could be a neater solution, and easier to setup, than applying thousands of references to the same geofeed file at a more specific level in the database. -Relating to the above 3 questions, should geofeed data only be considered applicable if returned by a specific geofeed locater application which takes into account the hierarchical nature of address space in the database? Otherwise do the standard database query mechanisms have to take into account this hierarchy and locate the most specific "geofeed:" attribute from the less specific objects? -Should/could the RIPE Database return the csv file as part of the query? If so should the file be cached (for how long?) to avoid too many downloads? -Should we only allow HTTPS urls? (Which the IETF doc 'Finding geofeeds' seems to suggest) -Should the RIPE NCC go ahead and implement this now, with our own set of RIPE rules? Or should we try to coordinate this and agree a set of common rules between all the RIRs before any deployment in the RIPE Database? -For the legal review, there are 2 statements in the IETF doc 'Finding geofeeds' which may be of concern: *[RFC8805] geofeed data may reveal the approximate location of an IP address, which might in turn reveal the approximate location of an individual user. Unfortunately, [RFC8805] provides no privacy guidance on avoiding or ameliorating possible damage due to this exposure of the user. In publishing pointers to geofeed files as described in this document the operator should be aware of this exposure in geofeed data and be cautious. All the privacy considerations of [RFC8805] Section 4 apply to this document. *It is significant that geofeed data may have finer granularity than the inetnum: which refers to them. It is clear that the RIPE NCC cannot prevent this data being referenced by objects in the RIPE Database. It is already being referenced from "remarks:" attributes. Perhaps the RIPE NCC should require (as part of their service agreement) that it's members obtain written consent from their customers to publish this location data, or at least inform the customers in writing that it will be published. Also, although RFC8805 says postcode is deprecated it is still provided for in the csv files. So anyone can still enter location data to this detail. -The IETF doc 'Finding geofeeds' suggests that geofeed information 'will be' available in bulk accessed whois data. In view of the privacy concerns above, is this likely? -The IETF doc 'Finding geofeeds' says "To minimize the load on RIR whois [RFC3912] services, use of the RIR's FTP [RFC0959] services SHOULD be the preferred access." Is the RIPE NCC expected to download all the geofeed files and make them available through their FTP service? -The IETF doc 'Finding geofeeds' states that consumers of the geofeed data MUST NOT access this data in real time via the RPSL servers 'too frequently' or at 'magic times like midnight'. Some users will do whatever they want to do if they are able to do, regardless of any statements to the contrary. Should the RIPE NCC enforce such access rules by some means? References The IETF doc 'Finding geofeeds': https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-ietf-opsawg-finding-geofeeds/?includ… geofeed file format: https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc8805.html

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RIPE Database Requirements Task Force – Draft Report Published
by Bijal Sanghani 04 Oct '21

04 Oct '21

Dear colleagues, The RIPE Database Requirements Task Force has just published a draft report for your review: https://www.ripe.net/participate/ripe/tf/rdb-requirements-tf/the-ripe-datab… In this third draft, we’ve added new recommendations and edited our document based on feedback received via emails, survey and during our third BoF in May. Please review this draft and share any comments on the ripe-list before Friday, 13 August 2021. The task force will reconvene in August to discuss the feedback received and work on its final report that will be published ahead of RIPE 83. We look forward to your feedback. Best Regards, Bijal Sanghani

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"status:" attribute values in the RIPE database
by Edward Shryane 30 Aug '21

30 Aug '21

Dear colleagues, In Remco van Mook's presentation to the Address Policy WG at RIPE 82: "What Colour Is My IP(v4) space? PI Addresses and LIRs", he pointed out that resource "status:" attribute values may not always be all UPPERCASE. This is because the RIPE database is case-insensitive and case preserving in general, meaning a "status:" attribute value is the same regardless of the case. However, this may make parsing this value more difficult as the case should be ignored. Should the DB team implement a rule to always force the "status:" attribute value to uppercase, for consistency? Regards Ed Shryane RIPE NCC

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Bogon cleanup -- Current anomalies
by Ronald F. Guilmette 24 Jul '21

24 Jul '21

According to information given to me by Edward Shryane <eshryane(a)ripe.net>, the cleanup of bogon route objects which made reference to bogon IP address space should have been completed the night before last. My latest analysis suggests that a few such route objects escaped the net and are still present within the NONAUTH data base. These route objects are summarized below. I'd appreciate it if others would take a look at these and tell me if they think that these route objects should or should not be present within the data base. Note that both batches of bogon routes given below are really rather curious due to the fact that nearly all of the routes have the exact same last-modified date (2018-09-04) and a great many of them refer either to the 192.88.99.0/24 IPv4 block, which is apparently reserved by RFC 3068, or to some IPv6 block which is *not* clearly related to RFC 3068. I am frankly not sure what to make of any of these, but I do suspect that they are all invalid, because no RIR has assigned any of the relevant IP space to any resource member. NONAUTH / IPv4 routes (36): --------------------------- 41.217.128.0/19 37034 2018-09-04 41.217.144.0/20 37034 2018-09-04 41.217.144.0/21 37034 2018-09-04 41.242.84.0/22 37609 2018-09-04 170.56.0.0/16 15854 2018-09-04 170.56.0.0/16 702 2018-09-04 192.31.196.0/24 112 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 1741 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 29259 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 2847 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 12816 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 3344 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 20640 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 5408 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 1835 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 8473 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 15598 2021-02-25 192.88.99.0/24 1101 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 12871 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 680 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 25192 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 35244 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 39326 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 5413 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 25308 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 3243 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 29076 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 29632 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 8903 2020-11-18 192.88.99.0/24 21416 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 43097 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 29432 2018-09-04 192.88.99.0/24 50113 2018-09-04 192.107.242.0/24 394784 2018-09-04 204.144.127.0/24 40142 2018-09-04 205.166.145.0/24 394784 2018-09-04 NONAUTH / IPv6 routes (37): --------------------------- 2001::/32 1101 2018-09-04 2001::/32 12816 2018-09-04 2001::/32 12871 2018-09-04 2001::/32 1741 2018-09-04 2001::/32 21155 2018-09-04 2001::/32 25192 2018-09-04 2001::/32 25308 2018-09-04 2001::/32 25525 2018-09-04 2001::/32 29259 2018-09-04 2001::/32 29432 2018-09-04 2001::/32 44980 2018-09-04 2001::/32 57801 2018-09-04 2001:4:112::/48 112 2018-09-04 2002::/16 1101 2018-09-04 2002::/16 12871 2018-09-04 2002::/16 15598 2021-02-23 2002::/16 1741 2018-09-04 2002::/16 1835 2018-09-04 2002::/16 20640 2018-09-04 2002::/16 21416 2018-09-04 2002::/16 25192 2018-09-04 2002::/16 25308 2018-09-04 2002::/16 2847 2018-09-04 2002::/16 29259 2018-09-04 2002::/16 29432 2018-09-04 2002::/16 29632 2018-09-04 2002::/16 3344 2018-09-04 2002::/16 35244 2018-09-04 2002::/16 39326 2018-09-04 2002::/16 43097 2018-09-04 2002::/16 5413 2018-09-04 2002::/16 559 2018-09-04 2002::/16 680 2018-09-04 2002::/16 8473 2018-09-04 2002::/16 8903 2018-09-04 2011:4188::/48 12880 2018-09-04 2c0f:f260::/32 36924 2018-09-04

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consensus on AS23456
by denis walker 13 Jul '21

13 Jul '21

Colleagues Whilst part of the discussion continues, there does seem to be a consensus on adding AS23456 to the reserved list maintained by the RIPE NCC. This would prevent anyone creating a ROUTE(6) object with AS23456 as the origin. The chairs also recognise the consensus to not delete or modify any set objects that reference AS23456. This is in line with past views not to purge set objects when an AUT-NUM object is deleted for any reason. The chairs therefore ask the RIPE NCC to add AS23456 to the RIPE Database reserved list. Regards William & denis co-chairs DB-WG

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Re: [db-wg] Further cleanup (was: RIPE NONAUTH route(6) objects
by Ronald F. Guilmette 13 Jul '21

13 Jul '21

Job Snijders <job(a)sobornost.net> wrote: >Should the database server software impose brittle restrictions >on that field? No, not worth the headache. I never suggested any changes to the data base software. I have merely suggested that *existing* route objects that make reference to bogon ASNs should be deleted from the data base, just as is already and currently being done in the case of those route objects that make reference to bogon IP space. The overwhelming majority of these "bogon-ASN" route objects are quite obviously leftovers that just never got cleaned up... some having languished unattended in the data base for as much as 20 years or more (and even some of the people who put those there originally are no doubt dead by now). We are in agreement in our (idealistic?) hops that someday RPKI will make all of these issues moot. By for today, there is no good reason not to remove the decades long accumulation of rust. It isn't doing anybody any good, and I fear it is an active enticement to mischief makers, of which the Internet has an over-supply these days. Regards, rfg

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RIPE NONAUTH route(6) objects using unregistered space cleanup - deployment *today*
by Edward Shryane 08 Jul '21

08 Jul '21

Dear colleagues, The implementation of the cleanup of RIPE NONAUTH route(6) objects using unregistered space is now complete, we plan to deploy to production *today*. This means that the cleanup job will run for the first time tonight. * Each night, all RIPE NONAUTH route(6) objects with an unregistered prefix ("available" or "reserved" in delegated stats) are selected. * If a prefix remains unregistered for 1 week, notify the maintainers of any related route(6) objects. * The maintainer can ask to make an exception, not to delete a route(6) object. * Otherwise, after a further 2 weeks, delete the route(6) objects. See the solution definition for more details: https://www.ripe.net/ripe/mail/archives/db-wg/2021-March/006876.html Note for now, the AS origin status is *not* considered. Please discuss further whether this should be included. If you have any feedback, please let us know. Regards Ed Shryane RIPE NCC

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Whois Release 1.101
by Edward Shryane 01 Jul '21

01 Jul '21

Dear Working Group, RIPE Database release 1.101 has been deployed to the Release Candidate environment. We plan to deploy to production on Thursday 1st July. This release includes the following main changes: * Switch RIPE database to UTC timezone (all timestamps will be in UTC and all timestamps specify the 'Z' timezone) * Display an error on NRTM if client is blocked by ACL limit (#812) * Added rewrite rules to embedded Jetty (#801) * RDAP nameserver queries always return Not Implemented (#811) * Updated dependencies *Additionally* some operational changes will also be made to the production environment on 1st July: * Remove support for TLS versions 1.0 and 1.1 on HTTPS connections * The IETF has formally deprecated these TLS versions, now only versions 1.2 and 1.3 are recommended. * Remove insecure TLS cipher algorithms * TLS_DHE_RSA_WITH_CAMELLIA_128_CBC_SHA * TLS_DHE_RSA_WITH_CAMELLIA_256_CBC_SHA * TLS_DHE_RSA_WITH_SEED_CBC_SHA * TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_3DES_EDE_CBC_SHA * TLS_ECDHE_RSA_WITH_AES_128_CBC_SHA * Remove HTTP redirects for whois.ripe.net and www.db.ripe.net * HTTP requests to these hosts will no longer redirect to https://apps.db.ripe.net but will return 400 Bad Request. * Remove HTTP redirects for the legacy Whois REST API * The legacy Whois REST API was retired in 2015, a temporary redirect to https://rest.db.ripe.net will be removed. * HTTP requests to the legacy API at http://apps.db.ripe.net/whois/lookup/ripe will return 400 Bad Request. Please check your Whois client in case you are affected by these changes. The release notes are on the website: https://www.ripe.net/manage-ips-and-asns/db/release-notes/ripe-database-rel… More information on the Release Candidate environment can be found on our website: https://www.ripe.net/manage-ips-and-asns/db/release-notes/rc-release-candid… Please let us know if you find any issues with this release in the RC environment. Regards Ed Shryane RIPE NCC

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