July 2016 - db-wg - mailman.ripe.net

<auto-dbm@ripe.net> is slow this afternoon.
by RIPE Database Administration 17 May '18

17 May '18

Dear Colleagues, Because of a very high level of use this afternoon, the response time of <auto-dbm(a)ripe.net> is longer than normal. I have made contact with those who are responsible and I expect the situation to improve as the machine works through the queue. Please be patient. Obviously we at the RIPE NCC Database Group are continuously working to make the performance of the database as good as possible. However, we cannot make improvements in zero time. We thank you for your co-operation up to now and we ask for your continued co-operation so that everyone receives the best possible service. If you have anymore questions, please contact <ripe-dbm(a)ripe.net>. Regards, Ambrose Magee ____________________________ RIPE Database Administration.

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WG Chairs Selection
by Piotr Strzyzewski 16 Nov '16

16 Nov '16

Dear DB-WG Members As agreed during DB-WG session at RIPE69 Meeting in London on 06.11.2014, the WG Chair Selection procedure is executed at yearly intervals. This means that it is about time to run it for the very first time. This is the call for interested parties. Interested parties have 2 weeks to make their interest known on this mailing list. All members of the community are encourage to make a discussion and express their approval or otherwise of the presented candidates. After two weeks the chairs will declare consensus. Since there is a limit of 3 co-chairs, if at the end of the discussion phase there will be more than 3 proposed co-chairs then a call will be made for any of the candidates to withdraw. If there still will be more than 3 candidates then names will be put into a hat and the first three names drawn from the hat will take on the role of chairs for the next 12 months. All three of present co-chairs expressed their interest in being co-chairs for another term. All the best, Job, Nigel & Piotr -- gucio -> Piotr Strzyżewski E-mail: Piotr.Strzyzewski(a)polsl.pl

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Locking unmaintained PERSON and ROLE objects in the RIPE Database
by Trudy Prins 02 Sep '16

02 Sep '16

Dear colleagues, The RIPE NCC Executive Board (EB) endorsed a proposal on how to deal with a vulnerability for RIPE Database users. Following their advice, the RIPE NCC proactively locked 848,986 unmaintained PERSON objects and 1,206 unmaintained ROLE objects on 6 April 2016. Since reaching the last /8, IPv4 address space has become more susceptible to hijacking. Unmaintained PERSON and ROLE objects are highly at risk of being found and hijacked. In addition, unmaintained PERSON and ROLE objects are an issue with regards to data protection obligations. The potential impact of abuse led us to consult with the EB on this intermediary solution before engaging with the community on the next steps. Exposing this issue without taking adequate measures would have left the RIPE NCC liable to third party damages. The proposed solution we outline below is a starting point, to be discussed by the community. Background: =========== Since 2010 it has been mandatory to protect PERSON and ROLE objects in the RIPE Database using a maintainer on "mnt-by:". A large number of PERSON and ROLE objects dating from before 2010 are still not protected in this way. Objects can be created that reference these unmaintained objects, but doing so will generate a warning. In recent years, given the scarcity of IPv4 address space, there is a higher risk of people searching for unmaintained PERSON or ROLE objects in order to pose as a resource holder to sell IPv4 space. In the case of legacy space, this could take place outside the view of the RIPE NCC if the address space is not registered with the RIPE NCC. Proposal: ========= 1) All unmaintained ROLE and PERSON objects are now locked. As the RIPE NCC will not be able to correctly check all claims on unmaintained database objects, unlocking is not available. Offering to unlock these objects could leave the RIPE NCC liable to third party damages if due diligence is not followed. 2) Furthermore, the RIPE NCC modifies the existing warning about referencing unmaintained persons/roles to a similar warning about referencing locked persons/roles. 3a) The locked objects can remain as they are. In time, all locked PERSON or ROLE objects no longer referenced by other objects could be automatically deleted: the current thinking is a 180-day deletion timeout for these locked, unreferenced objects. 3b) If there is an operational need, new PERSON or ROLE objects should be created by the object owners. This solution puts control back into the hands of the object owners. The user can follow the existing process for creating and referencing new objects. If there is a use case for supporting bulk migrations where a reference to a locked PERSON or ROLE object should be replaced, the RIPE NCC can create a wizard in the RIPE Database webupdates section of www.ripe.net <http://www.ripe.net/>. We look forward to your feedback. Kind regards, Trudy Prins Manager Software Engineering RIPE NCC

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NWI-3 - AFRINIC IRR Homing
by Job Snijders 16 Aug '16

16 Aug '16

Dear Working Group, (You can review https://www.ripe.net/ripe/mail/archives/db-wg/2016-April/005190.html to ensure you have an overview of the next steps.) NWI-3 - Afrinic IRR Homing -------- In recent years Afrinic set up an IRR instance that enforces authorisation for ROUTE(6) objects at rr.afrinic.net And while the general problem of out-of-region ROUTE(6) and AUT-NUM objects in the RIPE Database IRR, and the problem where the prefix and the ASN belong to different regions is not trivial to resolve, there seems to be a general consensus that simple cases where ROUTE(6) objects have both an ASN and prefix in Afrinic (~34k objects), should appear in the Afrinic IRR where authorisation can be done and not in the RIPE DB. Complicated cases where the prefix is in Afrinic, but the ASN is another region -or- where the ASN in Afrinic, but the prefix is out of region are out of scope for this NWI. -------- Some of you might wonder why this topic is back on the table. The chairs felt that it would be most appropiate to follow our new NWI formal process to help progress this work. Working group participants, if you agree/disagree with the above problem statement please voice your opinion. If you have suggestions to refine the text that is welcome too. Kind regards, Job

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NWI-5 - Out of region ROUTE(6) / AUT-NUM objects
by Job Snijders 28 Jul '16

28 Jul '16

Dear Working Group, This is a slighly longer problem statement, please bear with us. There has been a LOT of discussion about the problems related to out-of-region ROUTE(6) and AUT-NUM objects in the RIPE Database. We would like to provide a starting point of the problem definition here, and ask the community to discuss it further. NWI-5 - Out of region ROUTE(6) / AUT-NUM objects ---------- The RIPE Database Internet Routing Registry (IRR) requires authorisation to create ROUTE(6) objects, by the appropriate maintainer for the covering inet(6)num object - or an existing covering ROUTE(6) object for the prefix in the "route(6):" attribute, as well as the appropriate maintainer for aut-num object matching the "origin:". For resources within the RIPE region this authorisation is covered by either: * Objects that RIPE NCC creates upon assigning or allocating resources to LIRs or end-users with a sponsoring LIR * Objects held by legacy resource holders (authorisation may be delegated to others by holders of these objects) However for out-of-region space the authorisation is different. Because out-of-region resources are not maintained in the RIPE Database there are no proper maintainers in the RIPE Database to authorise the creation of such objects. Because there is a need for having ROUTE(6) objects for these routes, and there were no authoritative alternative IRRs available, the RIPE community decided to support the creation of these objects in the RIPE Database IRR through the use of placeholder objects for out-of-region IP resources and ASNs. In case of IP resources the INET(6)NUM objects delegate authorisation to create route objects through "mnt-routes:" to a special use maintainer with a well-known password: RIPE-NCC-RPSL-MNT. In case of out-of-region ASNs the RIPE NCC maintains placeholder AS-BLOCK objects. Since "mnt-routes:" does not exist on AS-BLOCK objects the RIPE-NCC-RPSL-MNT is added to "mnt-lower:" here instead. Any user of the database can therefore create a AUT-NUM object for an out-of-region ASN, and use it to authorise ROUTE(6) objects. There are a number of problems resulting from this approach: * Authorisation for out-of-region objects is anecdotal * Globally duplicate AUT-NUM objects are required for out-of-region ASNs, confusing contact information, policy etc * This facilitates hijacking for out-of-region resources and RIPE NCC is neither mandated nor staffed to deal with these issues. * Detailed placeholders need to be maintained, which causes overhead especially w.r.t. inter-RIR transfers --------- We invite the working group to better define this problem definition so that a structured discussion about (partial) solutions can follow. Kind regards, Job

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Re: [db-wg] NWI-3 - AFRINIC IRR Homing
by Daniel Shaw 20 Jul '16

20 Jul '16

> > NWI-3 - Afrinic IRR Homing > -------- > > In recent years Afrinic set up an IRR instance that enforces > authorisation for ROUTE(6) objects at rr.afrinic.net > > And while the general problem of out-of-region ROUTE(6) and AUT-NUM > objects in the RIPE Database IRR, and the problem where the prefix > and the ASN belong to different regions is not trivial to resolve, > there seems to be a general consensus that simple cases where > ROUTE(6) objects have both an ASN and prefix in Afrinic (~34k > objects), should appear in the Afrinic IRR where authorisation can > be done and not in the RIPE DB. > Hello NCC DB WG, Just a note to mention that AFRINIC supports this as a valid problem statement and is looking forward to working with you on the solution phase. Cheers, Daniel

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NWI-2 - displaying history for DB objects where available
by Job Snijders 12 Jul '16

12 Jul '16

Dear Working Group, This is the second Numbered Work Item. (You can review https://www.ripe.net/ripe/mail/archives/db-wg/2016-April/005190.html to ensure you have an overview of the next steps.) --------- NWI-2: The RIPE NCC was tasked with the following action point: AP69.2 [RIPE NCC] Come up with some straw man proposals for displaying history for objects where available. The RIPE Database already provides a mechanism for object history. In our understanding the problem statement that motivated the action point is that some people are interested in seeing the history of *deleted* objects. It is our understanding that this interest is mainly focussed on primary (resource) objects. However, it is not entirely clear to the RIPE NCC why this is useful. We also have some concerns, mainly non-technical, and therefore we believe that the problem statement and motivation needs to be better defined in the working group. --------- The next step is to help refine the problem statement. I would appreciate it if working group participants with an interest in the history of objects speak up and elaborate on the issue. Kind regards, Job

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Progress on Numbered Work Items - July 2016
by Job Snijders 09 Jul '16

09 Jul '16

Dear working group, As discussed during the Database Working Group session at RIPE 72, we have now published the new process, as well as an overview of the ongoing Numbered Work Items (NWIs) here: https://www.ripe.net/manage-ips-and-asns/db/numbered-work-items We currently have the following five NWIs, all in state "Problem Definition": NWI-1 Staying on top of abuse contact changes (2 responses) NWI-2 Displaying history for database objects where available (some discussion involving 3 people) NWI-3 AFRINIC IRR homing (5 responses) NWI-4 Role of status: field in multivalued status context (2 responses) NWI-5 Out of region ROUTE(6) / AUT-NUM objects (zero responses) <!--- ?!?! NWI-6 Applicable data model not clear from contextless objects (2 responses) Kind regards, Job

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