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Amazon owns more than $2B worth of IPv4 addresses

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Re: Amazon owns more than $2B worth of IPv4 addresses

#71

Post by TechBro8615 »

aritmo wrote: post #70
TechBro8615 wrote: post #49

I used to own 10k IP addresses that I sold as proxy servers to internet marketers. I made about $20k a month and it paid my bills through college. I had no idea what I was doing and eventually shut down the company, but damn, I wish I at least kept control of those things. If you want to see some sketchy shit, look deeply into what the VPN companies are doing.

What are they doing?

I think there was a lawsuit against one of them recently. But the gist of it is they’re opening a bunch of LLCs and registering their IPs with ARIN.

When you “geolocate” an IP, you’re really just looking up the registered info for that IP’s ASN in the ARIN/RIPE database.

Re: Amazon owns more than $2B worth of IPv4 addresses

#72

Post by TechBro8615 »

mepkn wrote: post #69
TechBro8615 wrote: post #49

I used to own 10k IP addresses that I sold as proxy servers to internet marketers. I made about $20k a month and it paid my bills through college. I had no idea what I was doing and eventually shut down the company, but damn, I wish I at least kept control of those things. If you want to see some sketchy shit, look deeply into what the VPN companies are doing.

I wish I had the same idea.

You could probably still do it and do fairly well. Go on BlackHatWorld as a starting point. I did this circa 2011-2013, but really all I did was arbitrage between webhostingtalk and BHW/Wickedfire. I ran a bunch of squidproxy instances and let the server providers convince me that I couldn’t have more than 256 IPs per server, so I way overpaid.

Re: Amazon owns more than $2B worth of IPv4 addresses

#73

Post by mike_d »

hpoe wrote: post #14

From what I understand the problem with IPv6 isn't technical problems it is with legacy. According to what I know in Africa and Asia they have mostly already been running on IPv6 the problem is just basically a bunch of lazy network admins in NA and the EU that don't want to learn the new tech and organizations that don't want to switch.

> a bunch of lazy network admins in NA and the EU that don't want to learn the new tech

Google is seeing 43% IPv6 traffic in the US, 50% in Germany, 35% in Japan, and 17% in Gabon (the most of any African country).

The data seems to support the exact opposite of your assessment.

Re: Amazon owns more than $2B worth of IPv4 addresses

#74

Post by toast0 »

slickrick216 wrote: post #47
dstick wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I think it would. Because despite the obvious business advantage they have, any would-be competitor would need IPs at a similar scale. That will either cost a ton more than Amazon has, or they simply won’t be available. I own 2048 IPv4’s myself and their value is ever increasing. Like digital real estate, without the fluctuation of crypto. But I would prefer it if IPv6 would take over IPv4, and fast, because it…

Just out of curiosity how does one go about purchasing and maintaining ownership of IPv4’s. Do you need to do it through your own company or is it possible as an individual. I’ve heard you have to demonstrate you can use them but that was in relation to IPv6’s.

Depending on which Regional Internet Registry you belong to (based on country of residence/incorporation), the process is roughly:

A) justify an AS and pay the fee B) find someone to buy IPv4 addresses and pay them (probably a deposit) C) justify IPv4 address space to the RIR and pay the fee to transfer from your seller D) pay annual dues

If your RIR actually has space available, you might be able to skip step B. And you can get IPv6 addresses without finding a seller, because all the RIRs have IPv6 space.

RIR processes are generally human driven, so you might get more questions if you're filing as an individual.

Re: Amazon owns more than $2B worth of IPv4 addresses

#75

Post by hobofan »

TechBro8615 wrote: post #71
aritmo wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are they doing?

I think there was a lawsuit against one of them recently. But the gist of it is they’re opening a bunch of LLCs and registering their IPs with ARIN. When you “geolocate” an IP, you’re really just looking up the registered info for that IP’s ASN in the ARIN/RIPE database.

So the "sketchy shit" they are doing is fulfilling their marketing promise of obfuscating the geographic location for their users?

Re: Amazon owns more than $2B worth of IPv4 addresses

#76

Post by cranekam »

bonzini wrote: post #45
toast0 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It wouldn't take too much to make a breakdown of IP announcements. Ownership is a bit harder to track down, I think. Looking at something like https://bgp.he.net/AS32934#_prefixes will tell you what IPs Facebook announces. Rinse and repeat for whoever else. Maybe a bit tricky if you need to track down subsidiary ASes. Disclosure: I worked for WhatsApp including while it was part of Facebook, and was involved in getti…

Stupid question: why does WhatsApp need to be its own AS?

I'm not sure what AS11917 is for now but the lion's share of WhatsApp now runs over/in Facebook's network/datacenters. WhatsApp chat connections are terminated on the FB edge like most other FB traffic and it shares FB's common CDN for media. AS11917 might be some legacy stuff or, as was mentioned, special policy stuff. But assuming things are as they were a year or two ago most of your WA traffic is via AS32934.

Source: also worked at FB/WA.

Re: Amazon owns more than $2B worth of IPv4 addresses

#77

Post by WhyDoesDangSuck »

TechBro8615 wrote: post #71
aritmo wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are they doing?

I think there was a lawsuit against one of them recently. But the gist of it is they’re opening a bunch of LLCs and registering their IPs with ARIN. When you “geolocate” an IP, you’re really just looking up the registered info for that IP’s ASN in the ARIN/RIPE database.

What's the issue with this if it accomplishes the goal of proxying your connection? I assume the LLCs are designed as a legal shield but would probably have their veils pierced.

Re: Amazon owns more than $2B worth of IPv4 addresses

#78

Post by usr1106 »

nucleardog wrote: post #50
shepherdjerred wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AWS does charge for a dedicated (static) IPv4 address, but only when your EC2 instance is down. https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/elastic-... https://aws.amazon.com/premiumsupport/knowledge-center/elast...

For anyone not as familiar with AWS, basically: * They'll provide a free dynamic IPv4 address attached to any interface/VM for the life of that VM. * They'll provide static IPv4 addresses. These are generally free, but you'll be charged if they're not attached to a VM (i.e., sitting unused). Only one IP per instance is free. Charge is a half cent an hour, so works out to about $3.65/mo to camp on an IP address.

Nothing is free when you get it from a profitable business.

EC2 prices are pretty high compared to other offerings if you run the machine permanently. The "free" IPv4 address is certainly a part of the price. (There are other parts like good maintenance, which you don't necessarily get from cheaper competitors)

Scaleway charges you 1 € / month for such address whether you use it or not. That's a 25% premium on the cheapest machine when in use. Much cheaper than AWS whether in use or not.

Not sure how many customers could perfectly live without the IPv4, but AWS seems to be in the market position to (covertly) charge them, too.

Re: Amazon owns more than $2B worth of IPv4 addresses

#79

Post by TechBro8615 »

WhyDoesDangSuck wrote: post #77
TechBro8615 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there was a lawsuit against one of them recently. But the gist of it is they’re opening a bunch of LLCs and registering their IPs with ARIN. When you “geolocate” an IP, you’re really just looking up the registered info for that IP’s ASN in the ARIN/RIPE database.

What's the issue with this if it accomplishes the goal of proxying your connection? I assume the LLCs are designed as a legal shield but would probably have their veils pierced.

I mean, I don’t have any moral problems with it. But any time you’ve got one entity opening a bunch of LLCs, I think it qualifies as sketchy.

Re: Amazon owns more than $2B worth of IPv4 addresses

#80

Post by jstanley »

obilgic wrote: post #43
jstanley wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, and if you try to buy them all, it will cost a lot more than $2B.

Yes and no. > "try to buy them all" buy all of AWS's? Then: no, it would cost less. buy from open market? Then: yes, It would cost more

It works the same both ways.

If you go into a market and try to buy lots of something, it drives the price up because you're increasing demand and removing supply.

If you go into a market and try to sell lots of something, it drives the price down because you're increasing supply and removing demand.

AWS don't obviously have an incentive to sell IP addresses for substantially below market value, so I don't see why buying them from AWS versus someone else would make much difference.

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