Summary

  • RIPE Policy Proposal 2026-03 would add a direct audit reference and new LIR-closure language to the IPv6 policy, while deleting its existing good-faith and non-renewal passage.
  • At RIPE 93, Registration Services manager Marco Schmidt said current procedures already cover IPv6 compliance. The draft has not yet mapped the old renewal condition to those procedures.

A policy clean-up sounds harmless until the paragraph being removed is the one members can point to when an IPv6 allocation comes up for renewal. RIPE NCC’s proposal 2026-03 would cut that paragraph from the IPv6 policy and add clearer references to audits and LIR closure.

The existing section 4.1 says the registry generally renews a licence when the holder makes a good-faith effort to meet the conditions attached to its allocation. It also says RIPE NCC may refuse renewal when the space is not used as intended or the holder acts in bad faith. The proposal marks that language for deletion.

At RIPE 93, Marco Schmidt, who manages RIPE NCC Registration Services, described a long-overdue clean-up of text left in the policy’s post-allocation sections. He said the additions copy wording from the IPv4 policy, point directly to the audit procedure and list grounds for closing an LIR: unpaid amounts, prolonged inability to contact it, or repeated policy violations. The draft also says RIPE NCC takes responsibility for the address space held by a closing LIR.

Schmidt’s explanation is practical. He said IPv6 audits and policy compliance already have procedures, yet some members were surprised to be audited because the policy itself did not make the route easy to find. In the working-group thread, he said the old section’s references to licences and “bad faith” had caused confusion. He also said a later version might link directly to the closure and deregistration procedure.

Those documents matter. RIPE NCC’s Audit Activity describes checks for policy compliance and sets out consequences for certain cases of audit non-cooperation or fraudulent information. The LIR Account Agreement also refers to suspension and deregistration procedures. That is a real enforcement path. The proposal’s v1.0, however, does not say in one place whether the old “not used as intended” renewal condition is carried into that path.

The mailing-list replies show why the cross-reference matters. Denis Walker argues that removing the sentence removes an explicit enforcement clause and says IPv4 should gain equivalent language. Leo Vegoda supports the proposal’s aim but asks how “a significant period” will be defined, whether the new scope reaches LIRs outside the RIPE service region, and what readers should understand when RIPE NCC takes responsibility for an LIR’s address space. These are questions about the draft, not settled outcomes.

Proposal 2026-03 was still in its Discussion Phase on 31 October, with comments due by 17 November. The specific missing fact is a clear mapping from the deleted non-use renewal condition to a surviving procedure; that answer would show whether the edit relocates the rule or changes the policy standard.

Sources: RIPE 93 Address Policy transcript · Proposal 2026-03 · official discussion thread · RIPE NCC Audit Activity · closure procedure · LIR Account Agreement