How does a small or medium business ensure it can meet the basic needs for disaster recovery and business continuity? Whether it be Internet-facing applications, or Enterprise-facing applications and data, one of the most important issues faced by small companies is the potential loss of information and applications needed to run their operations.
Disaster recovery and business continuity. Recovery point objectives and recovery time objectives. Backing up data to offsite locations, and potentially running mirrored processing sites – it is an expensive business requirement to fulfill. Particularly for budget conscious small and medium-sized companies.
Christoph Streit, founder of Hamburg-based ScaleUp Technologies, believes cloud computing may offer a very cost-effective, powerful solution for companies needing not only to protect their company’s data, but also reduce their recovery point objectives to near zero.
“In a traditional disaster recovery model the organization must have an exact duplicate of their hardware, applications, and data in the disaster recovery location” explains Christoph. “With cloud computing models it is possible to replicate applications virtually, spinning up capacity as needed to meet the processing requirements of the organization in the event a primary processing location becomes unavailable.”
ScaleUp did in fact demonstrate their ability to replicate databases between data centers in an October 2009 test with Cari.net, where ScaleUp was able to bring up a VPN appliance and replicate data and applications between Germany and Cari.net’s data center in San Diego, California.
While there may be issues with personal data being in compliance with European Data Protection Laws, nearly every company and organization around the world participates in a global market place. This means applications and data serving the global market cannot be considered local, and the next logical step is to extend access and presentation of the company’s network presence as close to the network edge (customers) as possible.
Some companies may have physical network capacity in multiple geographies, others may look to companies such as ScaleUp to develop relationships with other cloud service providers to allow “federated” relationships.
Until a true industry standard is determined to define data structures and protocols to use between cloud infrastructure and platform providers, it is probably easiest for relationships to develop between companies using the same cloud platform as a service (PaaS) application. Such is the case with ScaleUp and Cari.net, who used a common platform provided by 3Tera’s AppLogic.
The cloud service provider industry will provide a tremendous service to small and medium businesses which normally cannot afford near zero recovery time and recovery point objectives. Whether it is real-time replication of entire data bases, subsets of data bases, or simply parsing correlated data from edge locations at regular intervals, disaster recovery modeling is changing.
A backup location can be made in some cases by logging into a cloud service provider and opening an account with a credit card – or through a very fast negotiation with the service provider. Certainly not without cost, but potentially at a much lower cost of operation than in models requiring physical data center space, hardware, and operations staff at each location.
The important lesson for small companies is that both disaster recovery and a company’s ability to recover from either a physical disaster such as a fire in their data center, or data corruption, may limit or prevent a company’s ability to continue operations. Adding cloud services to the disaster recovery model may provide a very powerful, simplified, and cost-effective model to protect your business.
CA and 3tera have announced CA’s acquisition of the innovative cloud computing Infrastructure as a Service vendor. This is a great thing for Computer Associates, and perhaps a bit sad for the cloud community in general. Why? It is hard to fit the energy and enthusiasm felt when walking into 3Tera’s Aliso Veijo office into words. A tight group of committed entrepreneurs and innovators, with a bit of cockiness due to the unique stature they held in the cloud computing community.
Not that Computer Associates is a bad company. In fact, they have always been one of the best kept secrets in business and enterprise software. Rock solid systems, professional sales and engineering – just not as well known to the broader community as other large enterprise systems vendors.
AppLogic brought the cloud community many firsts. The first to integrate IPv6 into their provisioning system. The first to really simplify the drag and drop provisioning process. Perhaps the first to really test and prove the concept of globally distributed processing and disaster recovery models. And they are really great guys.
Bert, Peter, Sean, and the rest of 3tera’s public face spent a tremendous amount of time supporting the community through participation in training events, community organizations such as the Convergence Technology Council of California, the Any2 Exchange Community – all with not only good community spirit, but also providing strong thought leadership to motivate the community into learning more about cloud computing and the future of information technology.
We will deeply miss 3tera, and hope the team will eventually regroup with a new set of ideas, and lead us into another generation of technology that will further enhance the industry’s ability to deliver a true, global, massively distributed cloud computing reality.
Computer Associates will bring value to the cloud community as well. With the power of CA’s organization behind recent acquisitions such as 3tera, Oblicore, NetQoS, Orchestria, Platinum Technology, Netreon, and others related to process, database and large data set management, the stage is set for increased competition in the cloud service industry. CA has the ability to provide a broad understanding of all aspects of enterprise and Internet-facing tools equal or better than IBM, Microsoft, or any other full-service integrator.
We will look forward to seeing the product of 3tera integration into the CA family, and hope the innovation and enthusiasm 3tera’s team brought to the cloud community is not swallowed up into a large company bureaucracy.
What is the common verbiage of Hawaii’s broadband initiatives set in senate and house bills SB895, HB984, and HB1077?
Easy, “Carried over to 2010 Regular Session.”
- SB895 – 2/10/2009 Establishes the Hawaii Communications Commission (HCC), The committee(s) recommends that the measure be deferred. Carried over to 2010 Regular Session.
- HB984 – 5/11/2009 Implements key recommendations of the Hawaii broadband task force by establishing the Hawaii broadband commissioner (HBC). Carried over to 2010 Regular Session.
- HB1077 – 5/11/2009 Establishes the Hawaii Communications Commission (HCC) in the Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs (DCCA).
The committee on EDT-CPN deferred the measure. Carried over to 2010 Regular Session.
The governor last jumped on the media bandwagon with her press conference in Feb 2009 announcing formation of the Hawaii Communications Commission. Yes, the bill listed above (SB895) which is deferred until the 2010 session. There may be budget problems, there may be difficulty understanding the scope of broadband communications in today’s society and economy. But the reality is all broadband bills are deferred, and at this point on hold.
In an article by Mark Niesse (AP) in January 2009, David Lassner, chairman of the former Hawaii Broadband Task Force (and CIO at the University of Hawaii) was quoted as saying “although we know that broadband is an essential component, essential communications infrastructure, we don’t know what it is, and we’re still trying to define it.”
It is possible the University of Hawaii has not yet implemented Google search engines in their home pages, or a study of broadband communications in the university curriculum, although my own Google search on “broadband communications university curriculum” net 47,700 entries. And the fact Mr. Lassner is a member of the Internet 2 initiative.
“Internet2 is the foremost U.S. advanced networking consortium. Led by the research and education community since 1996, Internet2 promotes the missions of its members by providing both leading-edge network capabilities and unique partnership opportunities that together facilitate the development, deployment and use of revolutionary Internet technologies.”
Let’s Get Serious
Jan 13, 2010. “The Hawaii Department of Commerce and Consumer Affairs will use a $1.9 million federal grant to map broadband availability in the state.” (West Hawaii Today). The intent is to let Hawaii’s telecom companies know what telecom and broadband infrastructure is already available in the state, and stimulate competition to develop more broadband opportunities and stimulate competition within the telecom community.
As a 30+ year veteran of the telecommunications industry, from personal experience I can say that Hawaii’s telecom infrastructure is no secret to anybody who is already in the industry. Hawaiian Telcom, Time Warner, Sprint, Verizon, Clearwire, and all the others are made up of people who have both transferred between companies several times through the course of their careers, or participate in programs such as “Call Before You Dig” and city planning (yes, every conduit, cable, duct, and culvert have a corresponding license document and city planning approval) whenever a road is opened to lay conduit or cable, as well as hanging cable on utility poles.
There are few, if any, secrets in the telecom infrastructure of Hawaii. Another $1.9 million dollar waste of taxpayer money.
WASHINGTON – The Commerce Department‘s National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) and USDA‟s Rural Utilities Service (RUS) today announced availability of $4.8 billion in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) grants and loans to expand broadband access and adoption in America. This is the second funding round for the agencies‟ broadband programs. The investment will help bridge the technological divide, boost economic growth, and create jobs.
Not all is lost. There are private companies that have taken the opportunity to apply for, and receive stimulus money. Aloha Broadband on the big island bagged $193,908 in stimulus money to further develop their broadband coverage in the northern part of the island, with plans to extend this to the Kona area. Good use of funding.
But We Have a Long Way to Go
Hawaii
Average speed: 378 Kbps
SurfSpeed rank: 49th
Satisfied users: 50 percent
Broadband penetration: 57.0 percent
Hawaii is connected to the Internet via the same fast trunks as mainland America, but something is definitely holding its residents back. With an average SurfSpeed of 378 Kbps, Hawaii was the second-slowest state in the Union. Nevertheless, residents reported exceptional satisfaction with their service: Hawaiians were the fourth-happiest group among SurfSpeed users, with fully 50 percent reporting themselves satisfied. (PC Magazine)
Maybe our expectations are not that high, maybe as a state we are satisfied with something other than the best. However if you look at the broadband.gov website, the US government lists the advantages of delivering broadband resources to Americans as providing support for:
- Education,
- Healthcare
- Telehealth and Telemedicine
- Economic Development and eCommerce
- Electronic government
- Public safety
- Homeland security
- Entertainment
- Communications for people with disabilities
- and lots of subsections within the above
That would indicate broadband is a good thing for Americans – which in my case includes Hawaii. If we are 49th in the nation (as claimed by PC Magazine), then we are suffering a serious shortfall in our capacity to meet the basics of our nation’s broadband vision.
It is the Private Sector, Not Government that Will Lead Us into True Broadband
The government is not an Internet or Broadband Service Provider. Let’s not expect the state to lead us out of this embarrassing situation of lagging the United States in broadband technology. The government can play a role in making delivery of broadband services easy for commercial companies to deliver, offering incentives in taxes, licensing, planning approvals, or rights of way for companies who have the means to construct broadband infrastructure.
Offer greater financial and tax incentives to deliver broadband to rural areas with a true shortfall in broadband access – and open that up for both cable and wireless models. LTE/4G wireless technologies with MIMO (multiple in, multiple out antennas) offer the potential of up to 1Gbps (gigabit per second) stationary subscriber access. That is enough for both HD Television AND broadband Internet access (including telephony and mobile phones).
Force your representative to address the issue, and quit debating the meaning taxonomy of broadband. Make it simple – broadband is the availability of big, fat, dumb communications pipes. Give the telecom comp0anies an incentive to deliver big, fat, dumb pipes (BFDP). Once the BFDPs are available, the applications developers will follow. Data centers will follow. Schools will produce better, and more graduates with deeply diffused network-enabled knowledge, at the same level as Korean, Dutch, or Swedish kids.
No more excuses, let’s start digging.
Previous articles on Hawaii’s Telecom, eGovernment, and Internet status:
- Is Hawaii a Candidate for International ICT Assistance?
- A Developing Country that Can Teach Hawaii an IT Strategy Lesson
Try a search engine query on “Hawaii CIO,” or “Hawaii Chief Information Officer.” You might get a couple corporate links pop up, or possibly the University of Hawaii’s CIO link, but the only state agency within the first two pages of links is for the Information and Communications Services Division of the Department of Accounting and General Services (DAGS). The first impression, once hitting the Hawaii Information and Communications Services Division (ICSD) landing page on the State of Hawaii’s website, is the microwave tower graphic.
The Information and Communication Services Division (ICSD) of the Department of Accounting and General Services is the lead agency for information technology in the Executive Branch. It is responsible for comprehensively managing the information processing and telecommunication systems in order to provide services to all agencies of the State of Hawaii. The ICSD plans, coordinates, organizes, directs, and administers services to insure the efficient and effective development of systems.
In fact, the Hawaii CIO, as appointed by the governor in 2004, acts in this capacity as a part time job, as his “day job” is comptroller of the State. In that role, the only true function managed within the ICSD is oversight of the state’s main data center.
Browsing through the ICSD site is quite interesting. Having spent a fair amount of time drilling through California’s CIO landing page, where you are greeted with a well stocked mashup of not less than 14 interactive objects giving access to topics from current news, to blog entries, to CIO department links, to instructions on following the CIO’s activities through Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube (all meetings and public activities are recorded and made available to the ‘Ether), I expected a similar menu of objects on the Hawaii page. Clearly Hawaii is a much smaller state, so expectations were set, but I did expect a fairly good semaphore of directions I could take to learn more about Hawaii’s office of the CIO.
Hot Buttons on the ICSD Landing Page
My vision of a governmental CIO was defined by Vivek Kundra, CIO of the United States. A guy who talks about the future of ICT, the strategy of applying ICT to government projects, the leadership, both in thoughts and actions, or the government as a role model for the rest of the country. Cloud computing, data center consolidation, green technology, R&D, cooperation with the private sector, aggressive use of COTS (common of-the-shelf) technology. I love the guy.
NOTE: ICT is a term unfamiliar to most Americans. It means “Information and Communications Technology,” and is a term most other countries around the world have adopted to acknowledge the critical role communications plays in any information technology discussion.
So I select the button on IT Standards. Cool. Being a cloud computing enthusiast, to put it mildly, I could not help pinging on the item for 11.17 Virtual Storage Access Method, with the expectation this might give me some insight on the cloud computing and virtualization initiatives Hawaii is taking under the guidance of either the CIO or ICSD.
VSAM is an IBM/MVS Operating System access method system. It is not a data base management system. VSAM supports batch users, on-line transactions, and data base applications. (VSAM Entry on ICSD website)
Multiple Virtual Storage, more commonly called MVS, was the most commonly used operating system on the System/370 and System/390
IBM mainframe computers. It was developed by IBM, but is unrelated to IBM’s other mainframe operating system, VM. (Wikipedia)
MVS? You mean the MVS used in the 1970s?
Ooops. Well, how about an overview of IT Standards? Written in 2003, the document is general cut and paste information that could be found in pretty much any basic IT book, with the exception that everything is manual – meaning any standard, recommendation, or update must be done through use of CD-ROM. Well, perhaps document management and approval process doesn’t need to be online.
Enough – I am not excited by the ICSD website. Let’s look at a couple other areas that might provide a bit more information on how Hawaii is doing with topics like overall IT architecture, disaster recovery, and IT strategies.
“The CIO’s role is to provide vision and leadership for developing and implementing information technology initiatives.” (Info-Tech Research Group)
In a recent report delivered by the Hawaii state auditor, “Audit of the State of Hawai’i's Information Technology: Who’s in Charge?” – a disturbing summary of the auditor’s findings declare:
- The State’s IT leaders provide weak and ineffective management.
- The State no longer has a lead agency for information technology.
The audit further finds the guidance and governance provided by the ICSD ineffective, stating:
“ICSD was originally tasked to compile an overall State technology plan from annual technology plans submitted by the various departments. However, ICSD no longer enforces or monitors compliance with this requirement. In fact, the division has actively discouraged departments from submitting these distributed information processing and information resource management plans.”
Finally, the report concludes with an ominous message for the state
“If the State’s management does not improve, the State will eventually be compelled to outsource or co-source IT functions, a complicated and expensive undertaking. Based on the issues that have been raised, future focus areas include data security and business continuity. Lack of an alternate data center and general lack of business continuity and disaster recovery plans tempt fate, since a major disruption of State IT services is not a matter of if, but when.”
If you would like some more interesting food for controversy, dig into the state’s disaster recovery situation, which was recently summarized with the statement “a breakdown of or interruption to data center services or telecommunication services will seriously diminish the ability of State (of Hawaii) agencies to deliver critical services to the public and other federal, state, and local government agencies. The primary data center serves all three branches of State government. The loss of the primary data center would impact all State employees, and without an alternative data center, health, public safety, child protective services, homeland security and other critical services would not be delivered”
How International Organizations Might Help Hawai’I's ICT and eGovernment Program
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)
A surge in the use of ICTs by government, civil society and the private sector started in the late 1990s, with the aim not only of improving government efficiency and service delivery, but also to promote increase participation of citizens in the various governance and democratic processes. The use of ICT in the overall field of democratic governance activities relates to three distinct areas where UNDP has already been doing innovative work to support the achievement of the MDGs.
- First, e-governance which encompasses the use of the ICT tool to enhance both government efficiency, transparency, accountability and service delivery, and citizen participation and engagement in the various democratic and governance processes.
- Second, the mainstreaming of ICT into the various UNDP Democratic Governance Practice service lines such as Parliaments (e-parliaments), elections (e-elections) and others.
- And third, the governance of the new ICT which addresses the institutional mechanisms related to emerging issues of privacy, security, censorship and control of the means of information and communications at the national and global levels.
That sounds awful darn close to objectives Hawaii might find useful in to developing their own long term, strategic ICT plan. Taking a look at some of the countries listed in UNDP’s “UN eGovernment Survey 2008: From eGovernment to Connected Governance,” a lot of great government program case studies are included, such as the government of Singapore:
“Similarly, as part justification for ranking Singapore as its 2007 leader in e-government and customer service, Accenture reports that in terms of back-end infrastructure, the Singaporean government has made an enterprise architecture called SGEA a strategic thrust. SGEA offers a blueprint for identifying potential business areas for interagency collaboration as well as technology, data and application standards to facilitate the sharing of information and systems across agencies.”
That sounds good. As do a couple dozen other examples of equally relevant eGovernment programs included in the study. In fact, current eGovernment development projects in Vietnam, Indonesia, Ghana, and Palestine follow a well documented plan to design, train, plan, and implement eGovernment projects. And they are working.
Perhaps Hawai’I could hire a full time CIO, participate in US and international programs supporting development of eGovernment (including the US Trade and Development Agency which sponsors eGoverment programs in many developing countries – such as Palestine, Ethiopia, and Ghana), and use that to develop a 22nd century ICT plan for Hawai’i.
The line is drawn
As taxpayers and residents of America’s 50th state, we deserve the best possible government and governance possible. Let’s take a bit of responsibility on ourselves. Study the issue, contact your representative, and demand either an explanation of the current situation – or even better, give recommendations on how we can make Hawai’i's situation better. Such as:
- Hire a professional state CIO
- Give the CIO authority
- Develop a state-wide ICT plan
- Execute
We initially touched the topic in a previous post “A Developing Country that Can Teach Hawaii a Lesson.” We’ll continue exploring the topic, and hopefully start working on positive, constructive ideas on how we can make our state more efficient, and a better place to work and live.
This is the third part in an interview series with Martin Levy, Director of IPv6 Strategy at Hurricane Electric. In this segment Martin discusses the future of Hurricane Electric, IPv6, bandwidth, and global Internet development.
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Pacific-Tier: Can you cite one defining moment that really makes Hurricane Electric stand out as a company within the Internet industry?
Martin Levy: There are a couple of different moments.
From an internal operations point of view the company was able to migrate to a new IP backbone about four years ago. That took us from the pre-IPv6 native mode, into pure IPv6. That fundamental point done well in advance of a lot of other companies.
It may well have gone unnoticed in the industry (at the time). But it is not unnoticed at this time.
We have taken that base, taken that moment and have been able to run this extremely stable, and extremely reliable IP backbone for v4 (IPv4) and v6 (IPv6) support.
So you go back to that point in time, and you (think) of having a ceremony and a toast at that point. As quiet as it was, and a very engineering moment as it was, it really redefined Hurricane Electric. That was an event really about four years ago.
The second one is a totally different measure. The second one which will be talked about at just an anonymous level for obvious reasons was when we brought in our first core v6 customer at a major wholesale level, and the details are (they were) a much larger company (than Hurricane Electric).
We were able to do that because the customer requirement was v6. The customer purchase was for v4, paying 99% of the bill, v6 maybe 1% of the bill. That’s the reality. We have no way of saying v6, from a bandwidth point of view is a massive issue at the moment.
But when that occurred, that was the moment that we knew it wasn’t at the bandwidth levels v6 was operating at, it wasn’t about the number of eyeballs that were enabled, or the number of servers, it was about the fact the enterprise and the wholesale market had realized why v6 was so important.
When that event occurred, which is now a couple of years ago, we knew that we had the right product at the right time for the marketplace. And the test of time has proven that since then.
Pacific-Tier: One final question. Anything you would like to share with us about Hurricane’s vision for the future, or where Hurricane may be going this year, next year, or after?
Martin Levy: We have a plate full!
We have expansion in Europe. We have additional bandwidth into Asia, because there is nothing slowing down in Asia whatsoever.
We have a new data center that we’ve opened in California, a new phase of a data center we’ve opened in California about two or three months ago. And it is quickly filling up.
So I would say it is growth in most measurable directions. The geography is an obvious one. We are looking as we did last year at additional cities in Europe – that’s an ongoing project. In Asia it’s more about more bandwidth into the same cities, and on the network we are just looking at more and more customers who take v6 seriously and are looking for a provider that has that solution at hand without it being a special.
Pacific-Tier: Any final points?
Martin Levy: This Internet thing – it may catch on!
Its not that we are going to see a new Internet. It’s that we are going to see with v6 an Internet that has truly matured, and we’re going to see even more accelerated growth. Whether it be within the mobile wireless world, or other worlds, we’re going to see enormous growth.
If we have this interview again in five years we are going to laugh at how little bandwidth was available in 2010. And we are just going to blow the roof off bandwidth-wise.
Pacific-Tier: Thank you for your great counsel!
Previous segments of Martin’s Interview:
This is part two in a series of interviews with Martin Levy, Director of IPv6 Strategy at Hurricane Electric
Hurricane Electric is one of those rare companies that have survived, and grown in the past two years. A private company, Hurricane Electric has become one of the largest Internet Service Providers in the world, and is a leader in IPv6 deployment. In this article Martin Levy shares a few ideas on how Hurricane Electric approaches their business and continued growth.
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Pacific-Tier: It’s been a really rough economy, and we’ve seen networks (Internet Service Provider networks) falling fairly rapidly over the last two years. How is it that Hurricane Electric continue to grow, continues to survive, and continues to expand your network presence?
Martin Levy: We’re very conservative, which is a total counter statement to being a technology advanced company. But let me explain.
Hurricane Electric is a private company. We are funded internally, we are funded by growth, and as much as the company is 15 years old we have grown steadily, we have grown conservatively over those years.
The beauty of the company is that we haven’t gone off and spent somebody else’s money and randomly done stuff with the hope it would succeed. Everything we’ve done, has been done with methodical care – quite conservatively, and done when we know that it will help with our revenue stream, and we will grow the company.
We did that with our growth into Europe, we did that with our growth into additional and larger data center space, we did that with our growth into Asia – projects that have been going on for about a year and a half, maybe longer.
All of that, based on the fact the company is private, and the company is dedicated to just doing things that have lacked in the industry, and not just doing things that are at a random level have meant that we have been able to survive the initial; “host.com era,” in the classic 2001, 2002, 2003 timeline.
But also the recession that we’ve had over the last year, year and a half, where we were set up to hunker down without any problem and didn’t really change much of our day-to-day operations.
We also are very lucky in the sense that we have a customer base, that quite frankly has always grown, and has always grown in its bandwidth needs. In the data center business there has been a requirement to add more customers, more space for every customer, more bandwidth for every customer.
In the wholesale IP word we have the same thing. Because as much as we’ve had a recession from a banking and from a Wall Street point of view, we’ve not had a recession in a bandwidth point of view. The requirements of our customers have been to grow bandwidth continuously, throughout that time, and that has been to our advantage. Here in the United States, and also in our global locations.
Pacific-Tier: How important is it for Hurricane to be a global company, rather than concentrating your efforts on growing your points of presence in North America? How important is it to become a global company today?
Martin Levy: That’s a great question!
I’ll push it back as a question, but answer it myself!
Is the Internet local or global? We find that connectivity has in nearly every situation, a global component. There is as much interest in the updates on somebody’s status on a Facebook or on a Twitter, or whatever social networking locally as well as globally.
The requirement, as we need to see it, for large amounts of connectivity, in Europe, in Asia, and the gateway cities within the United States, whether that be on the East Coast, the West Coast, or facing north or south, those bandwidth requirements have been forever increasing. And that has never been more so than the last couple of years where we’ve seen some amazing spikes (in traffic).
We as a company, because we run a global IP backbone, have always been in a great position to help service customers in those other geographies. It doesn’t mean that we ignore our backyard, the Silicon Valley, or the Los Angeles, or the New Yorks, or Washington D.C. areas – far from it.
But the reality is that as bandwidth prices for transport go down, we also see the requirement for larger and larger bandwidth to be pulled in to some of the cities around the globe, and because we have a global network we are ready to service them (networks in global locations served by Hurricane Electric).
Previous articles in this series:
- Part 1 – “Martin Levy Discusses the Global Urgency to Deploy IPv6″
I met Martin Levy for the first time in Honolulu at the Pacific Telecommunications Council ’2007 conference. After several coffees at the Kalia Tower, and an hour or so discussions on data centers, networks, and IPv6, I knew I had found a true evangelist in the Internet industry. Several more conference coffees in different locations around the world, and I became one of his IPv6 disciples.
As a senior member of the Hurricane Electric team, Martin enthusiastically spreads the IPv6 word to locations around the world including Slovenia, Hong Kong, Amsterdam, Taipei, Brussels, and the European Commission – in addition to acting as a consultant to IPv6 developers and global digital government policy groups.
An accomplished speaker and writer, Martin brings a unique talent effectively delivering IPv6 thought leadership and actual IPv6 network deployment experience to the Internet community.
This is part one of a Pacific-Tier Communications Thought Leadership series interview with Martin Levy, Director of IPv6 Strategy at Hurricane Electric. Hurricane Electric is a leading Internet backbone and colocation provider specializing in colocation, dedicated servers, direct Internet connections and web hosting.
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“Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) is the next-generation Internet Protocol version designated as the successor to IPv4, the first implementation used in the Internet that is still in dominant use today
” (Wikipedia)
“With only about 10% of IPv4 address space remaining, organizations must adopt IPv6 to support applications that require ongoing availability of contiguous IP addresses.” (ARIN)
“Organizations relying on the Internet to conduct business have only a limited time to act and adapt to changing technology. Those that delay, run the risk their online services may become unavailable to a rapidly growing number of users.” (APNIC)
Pacific-Tier: Tell me a bit of the sense of urgency on (the Internet community) moving to IPv6, and what Hurricane is doing related to the topic?
Martin Levy: Urgency is a word that has been used now for many, many years when it comes to v6. But the reality is, that we have, for every years that has passed, gotten closer to where there are real limitations on the amount of new v4 (IPv4) space that can be added into the market place and added into the existing global Internet.
2010 really marks a time when we have less than two years of available space that can be allocated to the core registries, to the RIRs (regional Internet registries). And as this year and next year go by, we are going to start seeing rules that have never been seen on the global Internet. We are going to see people with requirements to substantiate their use of v4 space in ways that they have never done till this point.
They will see a requirement for documentation, for signatures, sometimes from corporate executives, officers of the company – at least in the US. This will be a whole new world.
If that doesn’t wake people up to the fact that the world is changing, it is unclear what will.
Pacific-Tier: What is Hurricane doing itself to help push this issue along?
Martin Levy: We have always been evangelizing v6, but we’ve been doing it in a way that the users are encouraged to implement v6. In our case “users” means our wholesale providers (Internet service or network providers) that are buying our existing v4 services.
So we have made it easy at the wholesale level to bring on IPv6 connectivity anywhere on our backbone – anywhere globally on our backbone. That, as well as going out into the community and talking about v6 has been a core effort we’ve brought to the table.
It can get better. In some cases we can help a customer understand just how easy it is now, as opposed to five years ago. There really isn’t, for anybody who had bought fairly new hardware any problem enabling v6. There is a set of golden rules to follow from a security point of view. From an operations measurement and monitoring point of view.
But in reality most people can enable v6 themselves and get their feet wet, with great ease. We have spent our time talking with people and convincing them of that fact, quite successfully.
Pacific-Tier: I hear a lot of companies talking about tunneling v6 through and existing v4 network. Is Hurricane running what we would call a “native v6 network” within your backbone?
Martin Levy: Everything on our backbone is 100% native. The core network, all of the Internet peering ports, all of the customer ports, the connections into our data center customers are all what is called “dual-stacked.” In other words they all run native v6, and, if you want to use the term, native v4.
That means that every connection provided is provided as a pure v6 connection. Now, we also provide, because it is needed, “tunnel broker service.” This is a v6 tunneled over v4 service. We’ve been doing this for many years. And there are users, whether they are at home, on a broadband connection in this country or somewhere else in the world, whether they are a software developer working inside a company that needs a v6 connection for software testing… Or whether they are just a home enthusiast, or in some cases it could be a whole university in some foreign country that has no way to get a native v6 connection. They can use the tunnel broker service.
They can use the tunnel broker service with BGP for full routing if they need to, and connect up to the v6 global network though a tunnel connection. In some cases there is no other way to do it.
But the core of the network, every single POP (point of presence or locations), 26 or 28 of them around the world are all configured native v6.
Pacific-Tier: What is your feeling about how your end users, or your actual customers, are using IPv6 in their networks? Is it becoming a fairly mainstream enterprise protocol, or do you have a lot of work to do to teach or provide thought leadership in the market in that area?
Martin Levy: I won’t lie. There’s an awful lot of education that needs to be done, and there’s an awful lot of work that needs to be done – and in some cases even within wholesale or broadband networks. You can break it down into two or three different issues.
The first issue that touches any network is just their outside connectivity. Their core backbone, and links to the outside world, links into providers like ourselves (Hurricane Electric). Those have to be enabled for v6.
And because they are network entry points, that brings up the issue of network security right at the beginning of the day. The interesting thing is, network security for v6 is really identical to v4 – it’s just the syntax that changes.
The addresses are longer, and you have to use colons instead of dots in the addresses. But the theory is always the same. If I deny access to a particular service over v4, I would deny access over v6. The service could be something as simple as SNMP polling of your core router. It could be more complicated like an internal set of web servers.
Any filtering that can be done with v4 can be done with v6.
The second part that needs to be thought about is what part of your network needs to be first seen by the outside world, or in the v6 arena. And it boils down to simple service like DNS for converting names to numbers. Potentially, if you are an enterprise, inbound and outgoing email.
Obviously, your web site. If you are able to bring up your website as v6-enabled, if you are able to bring up certain web services as v6-enabled, you can take those off the list. But even that doesn’t hit the prime point, which broadband and wholesale buyers of IP transit need, and that is IPv6 connectivity to their end users.
In this area are cable MSO, DSL, or wireless network end user environment, they are going to work with all of the protocols and equipment needed to connect to their end customers, and potentially the education of the end customer.
And that is the part that still needs the most amount of work. But luckily for us at Hurricane Electric, we are a wholesale provider. So our issues are really in getting the first stage done, and potentially helping with the second stage. The third stage is left to the customer. And that (the third stage) is the hard part.
But from a wholesale point of view we get our part done, and we know that we can at least enable IPv6 to move and ensure the routing is as solid as it would be in the v4 world.
Pacific-Tier: So do you see new applications, and emerging technologies such as cloud computing, or global distributed cloud computing models that require a lot of addresses to support their VLANs and their internal process – do you see that helping enterprise adjust or have a better sense of urgency on how critical it is to start employing v6 in their networks?
Martin Levy: The story of IPv6 and cloud computing comes up on a regular basis, and it is a real, real requirement. It doesn’t seem to go away, and the two items (IPv6 and cloud computing) seem to be well-connected to each other.
But what’s more interesting as you talk to enterprises is you start hearing a story of “what are you going to do in a world that internally, the complexity of your internal network has started to push the bounds of how you would run an IPv4 network. Clashing private address space, stuff like that.
So we see even outside of cloud computing, where an enormous number of addresses are needed, that in complex enterprises or enterprise back office systems, we see benefits to the very large address spaces being given out. It may not be considered to be a killer application, but it definitely provides a solution far better than can exist in some legacy v4 environments.
Pacific-Tier: Do you have an opinion on the ability of companies such as Verizon Wireless, AT&T Wireless, T-Mobile, as they deploy their LTE and 4G networks. Will that serve as a further catalyst to force companies into the IPv6 world?
Martin Levy: I think the most pleasing part of that is that we are seeing a clear, solid understanding how and why IPv6 and IPv4 must be taken into account within the LTE or next generation wireless world. If you go back and look at very early documents on other wireless structure that have come into the marketplace, they were always very v4-centric.
This has now changed. Now it doesn’t mean that you and I are going to end up throwing away all our 3G, and in some cases 2G hardware, and be forced to go out and buy LTE or 4G hardware and magically get v6. The reality is the back office requirements for those wireless providers still have a lot of work that needs to be done.
Still, the end-user connectivity is being defined with v6 in mind. I have a lot more faith that as of today we’ll see a lot more items like that show up in the market place in a more seamless manner.
Keep in mind that we already see not every, and not so much the popular ones, but we do see certain smart phones in the marketplace that are v6-enabled and applications capable. They are v6 capable over their WiFi connections vs. their 3G connections. But at least it shows the base technology inside smart phones and smart phone products acknowledges why v6 is important.
People may not be using it very much, but that will change.
Pacific-Tier: Where does Hurricane fit in the big picture with IPv6 today? How do you rank with other networks in your category of size, scope, and scale of your IPv6 deployment vs. the rest of the network world?
Martin Levy: Over the last few years the amount of v6 traffic that we have carried has just grown enormously. It has grown by two different measures.
In actual raw bits moved around, while small compared to IPv4, we’re moving a heck of a lot more IPv6 traffic now than we were a year, or maybe two years ago.
The other measure the number of routes, the number of customers, the number of adjacencies, and the number of peering connections with other core backbones we have. We have taken those numbers and eclipsed every other provider, putting us in the number one position globally.
That is a testament to the network engineers, and the dedication the whole company has (to IPv6). And we’ve really done that because v6 is not a side project for us. V6 is not an “add on” to our existing v4 service. V6 is not something we do as a special. It means that every single connection, every customer, every peer, every interconnect on our network, is v4 and v6-enabled.
We keep each protocol on equal footing so we don’t have at any point the thinking that v6 is special. It is part of our DNA, and it is part of our base thinking for everything that we do on the network.
The Europeans mock us. The Koreans boast a claim they are the world’s most wired country. Finland is bringing broadband to reindeer. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) published in their 2009 statistics the U.S. now ranks 15th among the group’s 30 member countries for broadband subscriptions. This is down from 12th in their previous study. No way!
Is the United States actually that far behind the world in broadband deployment? Should the home of Cisco Systems, Brocade, IBM, and HP hang our heads in shame at our inability to deliver a world class communications infrastructure?
Geography and Statistics
Well, we shouldn’t hang our heads in shame, however there is ample opportunity to further develop our national broadband infrastructure.
Looking at the following table you can easily see the US has a huge landmass, with much lower than Euro-Asian average population density. Kudos to Canada and the Nordic countries, although let’s be honest – 90% of Canada’s population is within 100km of the US border, and most of that is in cities. Same for the Nordics, and Iceland is not what you would normally refer to as a large landmass.
The US is big, and other countries with a similar landmass such as Russia and China did not even qualify for the top 35 countries in the study
(From OECD Study dated June 2009)
Taking Inventory of the US Telecom Toolkit
Now let’s brush off the “feel good” paragraph and get back to the real issue. Making broadband accessible to every person in the United States who wants or needs access to network-enabled applications and resources.
We have a fairly robust toolkit of telecom resources available to deliver our bits:
- ILECs (Incumbent Local Exchange Carriers)
- CLECs (Competitive Local Exchange Carriers)
- Long Distance Carriers
- Cable Television Service Providers
- Cable (fiber optic) wholesale infrastructure providers (may also provide other services)
- Wireless Broadband providers (including mobile telephone operators)
- Utility operators (such as power companies and water companies)
In a country as large as the US, the long distance carriers and wholesale cable providers deliver infrastructure that connects New York to Los Angeles, and all others in between with high performance cable infrastructure. All other service providers deliver either a specific service to regional markets or end users. Some may contribute to “overlay” networks which provide a higher level of product or service to users throughout the market, such as Internet services, telephone services, television and “triple-play” (video, voice, Internet).
Sounds Easy? Just connect all this stuff together and the USA will be back on top of the broadband podium with a gold medal.
But…. The US is an open, competitive market. As all the US carriers (with the exception of some utilities) are privately (not government) owned, the objective is to make money for shareholders. This means cooperation with other companies is a mere short-term convenience, with no incentive for investing in any infrastructure that does not meet a business plan for satisfying the demands of investors. Altruism or working for the common good is reduced to marketing hype – and has very little basis in the reality of America’s communications infrastructure.
Maybe stimulus money or additional tax credits for companies to cooperate and meet national objectives? Unlikely, as most states are already suffering a great deal from the loss of telephone tax revenues (you’ve got to love VoIP), and to get into the stimulus business you will need to means to hire a legion of lawyers, lobbyists, and prepare for a long time horizon to see any support. That narrows it down to the ILECs, long distance carriers, and wholesalers. Same applies for money available through the Broadband Initiatives Program (BIP) and the NTIA Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP).
Thus, my favorite little town of Baudette(Minnesota) is not likely to be a really high priority for any serious infrastructure development. Yes, companies like Time Warner have delivered cable TV and cable modems to the market, however if you do not have access to the cable (which pretty much follows the state highways, and does not venture too far off the asphalt), chances are you will not be receiving multiple streams of HD video any time soon.
There are many people in Northern Minnesota who don’t spend any more time online than they have to. They would rather be in a boat with their line in the water. If broadband could help them catch fish, they would be all for it. (from Minnesota Brown)
This also begs the question – if people really want to be wired, maybe they will migrate closer to cities which offer much more robust urban 
infrastructure, and those who want to spend their life fishing can do so in peace?
Good, as long as they do not choose to reproduce, in which case the children deserve to have the same access to global information ands communications technology needed to ensure they are competitive with children in Korea and Amsterdam.
Hunter Newby, CEO of Allied Fiber reminds us that “We here in the USA are destined for a major change in our communications infrastructure. An entirely new physical layer design needs to be rolled out in the USA if we are ever to reach broadband speeds and penetration like that of the other civilized and advanced countries in the world.”
Allied Fiber was created to “address America’s need to eliminate obstacles for broadband access, wireless backhaul and lower latency through new, next generation long haul dark fiber construction with sound principles and an open access philosophy.”
Newby continues “The USA is much larger than South Korea, or Japan, yet we are always stacked against those “countries” and others that are equally as small in geography. We will never reach the speeds, services, applications, or processing power of the people if we do not match their National physical layer network designs – designs that have incorporated wireless and fiber for backhaul for many years.”
Big, Fat, Dumb Pipes
In the 1990s companies such as Level 3 Communications used marketing taglines with the theme “bandwidth is like water,” and fiber infrastructure should be considered “big, fat, dumb pipes.” If the philosophy had survived investors, Wall Street analysts, and the desire to increase cash flow by adding higher level value added services (such as voice, Internet, TV, etc), the US might have a very high performance 
physical infrastructure in place that served as a neutral conduit for regional and local carriers and service providers to deliver broadband closer to the edge – or end users.
Companies such as Allied Fiber hope to bring that idea back to reality, providing the United States and Canada a very high performance, cost-effective trans-continental backbone allowing regional and local service providers and easy way to bring their edge resources to the North American “cloud.” Wireless companies can focus on delivering transmission to end users from the tower, and Allied Fiber will connect towers, regional networks, access networks, and value-added service networks (such as Internet providers) on a national scale.
A Happy Broadband Ending
One bright spot in the discussion is broadband wireless. The US carriers are pushing deployment of LTE and 4G, further incorporating broadband support via emerging technologies such as MIMO (Multiple In – Multiple Out) antennas which bring wireless up to the Gigabit/second level on individual end-user devices. This will reduce the need for fiber optic or high speed cable infrastructure deployment into both rural and urban areas with obsolete or decrepit building/street infrastructure.
“(This) isn’t about technology, (this) is about preserving small town communities by using technology to allow them to survive in a world that is changing. It’s about allowing kids to build careers in their local community, not just find a job. (Ross Williams – Minnesota Brown)
All new communications technologies being delivered by Verizon use Internet Protocols, including wireless telephone service, and incorporating IPv6 into the basic network. A combination of their FiOS (fiber optic to the home) product and high performance LTE=>4G wireless deployments will make up a lot of ground in the US.
Add a national high performance backbone network connecting the whole North American mess via Allied Fiber, and the US has a pretty good chance at jumping into the top 5 in OECDs broadband deployment listing. And Baudette’s culture and global presence is preserved.
The headlines are no surprise to those in the Internet business. “Police in Central China have shut down a hacker training operation that openly recruited thousands of members 
online…” (AP) We’ve know China, Russia, and several of the former Soviet block countries are the source of sophisticated hacking, and those activities have at least been tolerated, if not directly supported, but the host governments.
The recent dispute between Google and China’s government brings another question into the breach – does a national government have the right to censor or control the flow of information in or out of the country? While China may be in the news, citizen journalists in Tehran have been severely punished for attempting to Tweet, email, blog, or transmit cell phone images outside of the country. Under the umbrella of national security do countries like Iran have the right to control that information, or develop teams of professional hackers to go out and look into the accounts of residents and citizens?
Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA): To amend title 18, United States Code, to make clear a telecommunications carrier’s duty to cooperate in the interception of communications for Law Enforcement purposes, and for other purposes.
DCSNet, an abbreviation for Digital Collection System Network, is the FBI‘s point-and-click surveillance system that can perform instant wiretaps on almost any communications device in the US (Wikipedia)
I think we can all agree that any state which sponsors cyber attacks on another nation, either through direct objectives, or by turning a “blind eye” to the activities of criminal groups or organizations is a bad thing, which the entire global-connected world should fight. There is no justification for state-sponsored or state-tolerated denial of service, disruption or access to personal and private data, nor online theft.
The Rights of a Sovereign Nation
As Americans, we can get very sanctimonious in our approach to human rights, national ethics, or national morals. We believe we are always right, based on our religious or cultural beliefs, and other nations and cultures should learn from us and change their errant ways to be more like Americans. This means it is probably OK for the national Security Agency, or other three-lettered government agencies to tap, monitor, or perform other forms of espionage – as long as it is done under the context of national security, or even better if you can throw the word “anti-0terrorism” in the conversation.
Thus activities such as DCSNet, or laws such as CALEA, do not bother us too much. However when China tries to look into the systems using a similar premise of national security, the world has an uproar of indignity, not understanding how those people can possibly violate the privacy of email and other systems.
So the question is – “does a nation have the right to set its own laws, cyber-policies, and regulations regarding the Internet and other information systems?”
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has strong opinions on the topic. As a long time advocate (since 1990) for protecting the civil liberties of Internet users, both through protecting the rights of users and educating law enforcement agencies, the EFF includes the following points in its stated mission:
- Develop among policy-makers a better understanding of the issues underlying free and open telecommunications, and support the creation of legal and structural approaches which will ease the assimilation of these new technologies by society.
- Raise public awareness about civil liberties issues arising from the rapid advancement in the area of new computer-based communications media.
- Support litigation in the public interest to preserve, protect, and extend First Amendment rights within the realm of computing and telecommunications technology.
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Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. (1st Amendment to the US Constitution) |
Law enforcement and national security agencies of countries around the world would object to the American equivalent of the First Amendment, citing the current world situation, or the sovereign rights of a nation allow it to write, establish, modify, interpret, or change such laws as needed to meet an existing or desired environment.
With global connections to a global community governments are struggling to understand how to control or manage information flows within the country. Twenty years ago it was easy for a government to determine exactly what materials would be used in the education of an 8 year old primary school student. Today, a student in Vietnam, Mongolia, or New Jersey basically have the same access to educational materials as any other student in the world, as well as news, intercommunications, and citizen journalism.
And we must also acknowledge the inherent use of deception by governments and other lobbyist organizations. In the world of governments, what you see is not necessarily what you get. The media is used as a mouthpiece of government policy (when it can be controlled), and without a strong governmental “noise filter” and open citizen journalist community you may not get the real story – only the story a government or organization wants you to receive. They believe it is their right as a sovereign nation’s government of deliver you the news they believe you need to know, or they want you to know.
Some Guidelines for Responsible Cyber-Government
There are priorities. While we all understand national intelligence agencies will always do what they do best – access information they believe will give their respective nation some level of political, economic, or military advantage, the priority should be to protect citizens (including the context of global citizens) from malicious attacks on their personal data and ability to do business and communicate via the Internet.
Hacker schools, such as the China-based Black Hawk Safety Net, cannot be tolerated by a reasonable global community. If a government supports the activities network-enabled criminal activities, then that government should be identified and the world given the means to protect themselves from that risk. The US Government has taken some openly advertised steps in this direction by authorizing the US Air Force to establish the USAF Cyber Command.
The new Air Force Cyber Command “will train and equip forces to conduct sustained global operations in and through cyberspace, fully integrated with air and space operations,” said Major General Charles Ickes.
Of course that capability can both defend – and attack as needed to meet military and national objectives.
Leaving users once again at the mercy of governments to both act responsibly, and in the interest of a global community. Sure, we have our work cut out for us. Like most individual users and people depending on the Internet for our livelihoods and futures, the burden is ultimately on us to protect ourselves from intrusion, theft, and denial of service.
Energy Secretary Steven Chu has evangelized the simplicity of painting rooftops white to save energy. We believe a simple thing like painting a rooftop with solar reflective materials can reduce carbon dioxide production on a scale of billions of tons.
Think Green Hawaii, a local website highlighting local green initiatives notes that even tourists are starting to look for environmentally friendly hotels for their vacations, using examples such as the Hyatt Regency Waikiki which has implemented energy-efficient LED lights in public areas to reduce the use of energy.
Other local initiatives, such as the mbbEMS (Energy Management System) uses wireless communications connecting things such as lanai (balcony) doors to air conditioning units, shutting down the fans when doors are opened, and sensors to determine if guests are actually in their room (Hmmm…., that might not be so “cool’), shutting off lights and closing drapes to reduce the cooling load within a hotel. Great ideas.
Then I look out of my high rise condo window, and see around 100 rooftops scattered
around the neighborhood below. An unscientific count of the area gives me a tally of about 65% of Waikiki/Honolulu rooftops within my line of sight have black, tarred, asphalt, or dark colored tiling.
If the energy savings buildings expect to receive using solar reflective materials start at around 15% (at the low end) and work their way up, then it appears that Honolulu may be wasting a lot of energy on cooling systems.
Hawaiian Electric Company/HECO may have the highest electrical rates in the country, coming in at something over $.25/kw hour. Today, most of the energy produced in Hawaii comes from oil. The risk in Hawaii is not only using fossil fuels for energy, but also what might be the impact if Hawaii is hit by a natural disaster that disrupts the ability of HECO to provide power, which is mostly from oil-driven power plants.
“Hawaiian Electric Company shares the very serious concerns of many regarding the potential effects of global warming, and human contributions to this phenomenon, including the burning of fossil fuels for electricity production, transportation, manufacturing, agricultural activities and deforestation.”
(Policy Adopted in January 2007 by the Hawaiian Electric Companies’ Board of Directors)
However, the good news is HECO, at least publically on their website, fully promotes use of renewable energy, and is actively participating in finding energy sources to meet a state-mandated (Hawaii Clean Energy Initiative) to provide 40% of electrical needs through renewable energy by 2030.
So Why the Asphalt Rooftops?
Maybe it is because solar reflective issues have not been a mainstream topic of conversation until the past few years. Maybe the building code is not enforced or strong enough to drive builders and landlords to either build all new buildings with solar reflective materials, or require all new roofing projects to include use of efficient materials.
Maybe people simply don’t care – “green” is a really nice buzzword to use, but to be green actually takes a bit of effort. This simple act (using solar reflective materials on rooftops) may help bring Hawaii (and HECO) to the state’s clean energy initiative goals – as well as saving a tremendous amount of money over the long run in air conditioning costs. Saving something higher than 15% in possibly 50% or more of the addressable buildings amounts to a bunch of kilowatts. Kilowatts provided today through fossil fuels.
“What is more, a white roof can cost as little as 15 percent more than its dark counterpart, depending on the materials used, while slashing electricity bills.” (NY Times, 29 July 2009)
When I ask friends and acquaintances, even in the real estate industry, why they don’t push the topic, sadly the normal responses I get include “what are you talking about? what is with painting your rooftop white? I have no idea what you mean, first I’ve ever heard of it.”
Sitting in my admittedly cool condo, high above Honolulu, I have never in my memory actually used the central air available in my unit. Tradewinds provide a very nice breeze nearly all the time, and in fact almost makes the room cold at night. My building has a white roof. If your’s doesn’t, maybe it is time to have a heart-to-heart with your landlord. If not for the environment, think about your energy bill, and how much you could potentially save with a cooler building.
