multihoming

Datagram Congestion Control Protocol (DCCP) communications, as defined in RFC 4340, are inherently restricted to a single path per connection, despite the availability of multiple network paths between peers. The ability to utilize multiple paths simultaneously for a DCCP session can enhance network resource utilization, improve throughput, and increase resilience to network failures, ultimately enhancing the user experience.

Use cases for Multipath DCCP (MP-DCCP) include mobile devices (e.g., handsets and vehicles) and residential home gateways that maintain simultaneous connections to distinct network types such as cellular and Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs) or cellular and fixed access networks. Compared to existing multipath transport protocols, such as Multipath TCP (MPTCP), MP-DCCP is particularly suited for latency-sensitive applications with varying requirements for reliability and in-order delivery.

This document specifies a set of protocol extensions to DCCP that enable multipath operations. These extensions maintain the same service model as DCCP while introducing mechanisms to establish and utilize multiple concurrent DCCP flows across different network paths.

The Multi-Chassis Link Aggregation (MC-LAG) group technology enables establishing a logical link-aggregation connection with a redundant group of independent nodes. The objective of MC-LAG is to enhance both network availability and bandwidth utilization through various modes of traffic load balancing. RFC 7432 defines an EVPN-based MC-LAG with Single-Active and All-Active multihoming redundancy modes. This document builds on the existing redundancy mechanisms supported by EVPN and introduces a new active/standby redundancy mode, called 'Port-Active'.

An Ethernet Virtual Private Network (EVPN) is commonly used with Network Virtualization Overlay (NVO) tunnels as well as with MPLS and Segment Routing (SR) tunnels. The multihoming procedures in EVPN may vary based on the type of tunnel used within the EVPN Broadcast Domain. Specifically, there are two multihoming split-horizon procedures designed to prevent looped frames on multihomed Customer Edge (CE) devices: the Ethernet Segment Identifier (ESI) Label-based procedure and the local-bias procedure. The ESI Label-based split-horizon procedure is applied to MPLS-based tunnels such as MPLS over UDP (MPLSoUDP), while the local-bias procedure is used for other tunnels such as Virtual eXtensible Local Area Network (VXLAN) tunnels.

Current specifications do not allow operators to choose which split-horizon procedure to use for tunnel encapsulations that support both methods. Examples of tunnels that may support both procedures include MPLSoUDP, MPLS over GRE (MPLSoGRE), Generic Network Virtualization Encapsulation (Geneve), and Segment Routing over IPv6 (SRv6) tunnels. This document updates the EVPN multihoming procedures described in RFCs 7432 and 8365, enabling operators to select the split-horizon procedure that meets their specific requirements.

This document discusses multihoming considerations for DDoS Open Threat Signaling (DOTS). The goal is to provide some guidance for DOTS clients and client-domain DOTS gateways when multihomed.

Source-specific routing, also known as Source Address Dependent Routing (SADR), is an extension to traditional next-hop routing where packets are forwarded according to both their destination address and their source address. This document describes an extension for source-specific routing to the Babel routing protocol.

This document specifies mechanisms to configure DDoS Open Threat Signaling (DOTS) clients with their DOTS servers. The discovery procedure also covers the DOTS signal channel Call Home. It can be useful to know the appropriate DOTS server for a given location in order to engage mitigation actions. This is true even in cases where the DOTS client cannot localize the attack: cases where it only knows that some resources are under attack and that help is needed.

TCP/IP communication is currently restricted to a single path per connection, yet multiple paths often exist between peers. The simultaneous use of these multiple paths for a TCP/IP session would improve resource usage within the network and thus improve user experience through higher throughput and improved resilience to network failure.

Multipath TCP provides the ability to simultaneously use multiple paths between peers. This document presents a set of extensions to traditional TCP to support multipath operation. The protocol offers the same type of service to applications as TCP (i.e., a reliable bytestream), and it provides the components necessary to establish and use multiple TCP flows across potentially disjoint paths.

This document specifies v1 of Multipath TCP, obsoleting v0 as specified in RFC 6824, through clarifications and modifications primarily driven by deployment experience.

Connecting an enterprise site to multiple ISPs over IPv6 using provider-assigned addresses is difficult without the use of some form of Network Address Translation (NAT). Much has been written on this topic over the last 10 to 15 years, but it still remains a problem without a clearly defined or widely implemented solution. Any multihoming solution without NAT requires hosts at the site to have addresses from each ISP and to select the egress ISP by selecting a source address for outgoing packets. It also requires routers at the site to take into account those source addresses when forwarding packets out towards the ISPs.

This document examines currently available mechanisms for providing a solution to this problem for a broad range of enterprise topologies. It covers the behavior of routers to forward traffic by taking into account source address, and it covers the behavior of hosts to select appropriate default source addresses. It also covers any possible role that routers might play in providing information to hosts to help them select appropriate source addresses. In the process of exploring potential solutions, this document also makes explicit requirements for how the solution would be expected to behave from the perspective of an enterprise site network administrator.

This document discusses the most common scenarios of connecting an enterprise network to multiple ISPs using an address space assigned by an ISP and how the approach proposed in "Enterprise Multihoming using Provider-Assigned Addresses without Network Prefix Translation: Requirements and Solution" could be applied in those scenarios. The problem of enterprise multihoming without address translation of any form has not been solved yet as it requires both the network to select the correct egress ISP based on the packet source address and hosts to select the correct source address based on the desired egress ISP for that traffic. The aforementioned document proposes a solution to this problem by introducing a new routing functionality (Source Address Dependent Routing) to solve the uplink selection issue. It also proposes using Router Advertisements to influence the host source address selection. It focuses on solving the general problem and covering various complex use cases, and this document adopts its proposed approach to provide a solution for a limited number of common use cases. In particular, the focus of this document is on scenarios in which an enterprise network has two Internet uplinks used either in primary/backup mode or simultaneously and hosts in that network might not yet properly support multihoming as described in RFC 8028.

This document provides guidelines on how to make Interactive Connectivity Establishment (ICE) conclude faster in multihomed and IPv4/IPv6 dual-stack scenarios where broken paths exist. The provided guidelines are backward compatible with the original ICE specification (see RFC 5245).

This specification defines extensions to the Proxy Mobile IPv6 (PMIPv6) protocol that allow a mobile access gateway (MAG) to register more than one proxy care-of address (pCoA) with the local mobility anchor (LMA) and to simultaneously establish multiple IP tunnels with the LMA. This capability allows the MAG to utilize all the available access networks to route the mobile node's IP traffic. This document defines the following two new mobility header options: the MAG Multipath Binding option and the MAG Identifier option.

The Stream Control Transmission Protocol (SCTP) supports multihoming. However, when the failover operation specified in RFC 4960 is followed, there can be significant delay and performance degradation in the data transfer path failover. This document specifies a quick failover algorithm and introduces the SCTP Potentially Failed (SCTP-PF) destination state in SCTP Path Management.

This document also specifies a dormant state operation of SCTP that is required to be followed by an SCTP-PF implementation, but it may equally well be applied by a standard SCTP implementation, as described in RFC 4960.

Additionally, this document introduces an alternative switchback operation mode called "Primary Path Switchover" that will be beneficial in certain situations. This mode of operation applies to both a standard SCTP implementation and an SCTP-PF implementation.

The procedures defined in the document require only minimal modifications to the specification in RFC 4960. The procedures are sender-side only and do not impact the SCTP receiver.

This document is a product of the work of the Multiple Interfaces Architecture Design team. It outlines a solution framework for some of the issues experienced by nodes that can be attached to multiple networks simultaneously. The framework defines the concept of a Provisioning Domain (PvD), which is a consistent set of network configuration information. PvD-aware nodes learn PvD-specific information from the networks they are attached to and/or other sources. PvDs are used to enable separation and configuration consistency in the presence of multiple concurrent connections.

Network Address and Port Translation (NAPT) works well for conserving global addresses and addressing multihoming requirements because an IPv4 NAPT router implements three functions: source address selection, next-hop resolution, and (optionally) DNS resolution. For IPv6 hosts, one approach could be the use of IPv6-to-IPv6 Network Prefix Translation (NPTv6). However, NAT and NPTv6 should be avoided, if at all possible, to permit transparent end-to-end connectivity. In this document, we analyze the use cases of multihoming. We also describe functional requirements and possible solutions for multihoming without the use of NAT in IPv6 for hosts and small IPv6 networks that would otherwise be unable to meet minimum IPv6-allocation criteria. We conclude that DHCPv6-based solutions are suitable to solve the multihoming issues described in this document, but NPTv6 may be required as an intermediate solution.

A multi-interfaced node is connected to multiple networks, some of which might be utilizing private DNS namespaces. A node commonly receives recursive DNS server configuration information from all connected networks. Some of the recursive DNS servers might have information about namespaces other servers do not have. When a multi-interfaced node needs to utilize DNS, the node has to choose which of the recursive DNS servers to use. This document describes DHCPv4 and DHCPv6 options that can be used to configure nodes with information required to perform informed recursive DNS server selection decisions. [STANDARDS-TRACK]

This document describes issues encountered by a node attached to multiple provisioning domains. This node receives configuration information from each of its provisioning domains, where some configuration objects are global to the node and others are local to the interface. Issues such as selecting the wrong interface to send traffic happen when conflicting node-scoped configuration objects are received and inappropriately used. Moreover, other issues are the result of simultaneous attachment to multiple networks, such as domain selection or addressing and naming space overlaps, regardless of the provisioning mechanism. While multiple provisioning domains are typically seen on nodes with multiple interfaces, this document also discusses situations involving single-interface nodes. This document is not an Internet Standards Track specification; it is published for informational purposes.

An increasing number of hosts are operating in multiple-interface environments. This document summarizes current practices in this area and describes in detail how some common operating systems cope with challenges that ensue from this context. This document is not an Internet Standards Track specification; it is published for informational purposes.

The General Internet Signaling Transport (GIST) protocol currently uses TCP or Transport Layer Security (TLS) over TCP for Connection mode operation. This document describes the usage of GIST over the Stream Control Transmission Protocol (SCTP) and Datagram Transport Layer Security (DTLS). This document defines an Experimental Protocol for the Internet community.

There has been much recent discussion on the topic of whether the IETF should develop standards for IPv6 Network Address Translators (NATs). This document articulates the architectural issues raised by IPv6 NATs, the pros and cons of having IPv6 NATs, and provides the IAB's thoughts on the current open issues and the solution space. This document is not an Internet Standards Track specification; it is published for informational purposes.

Enterprise users require mobility and secure connectivity when they roam and connect to the services offered in the enterprise. Secure connectivity is required when the user connects to the enterprise from an untrusted network. Mobility is beneficial when the user moves, either inside or outside the enterprise network, and acquires a new IP address. This document describes a solution using Mobile IPv4 (MIPv4) and mobility extensions to IKEv2 (MOBIKE) to provide secure connectivity and mobility. This document specifies an Internet Best Current Practices for the Internet Community, and requests discussion and suggestions for improvements.

This document is an analysis of multihoming in the context of network mobility (NEMO) in IPv6. As there are many situations in which mobile networks may be multihomed, a taxonomy is proposed to classify the possible configurations. The possible deployment scenarios of multihomed mobile networks are described together with the associated issues when network mobility is supported by RFC 3963 (NEMO Basic Support). Recommendations are offered on how to address these issues. This memo provides information for the Internet community.

The IKEv2 Mobility and Multihoming (MOBIKE) protocol is an extension of the Internet Key Exchange Protocol version 2 (IKEv2). These extensions should enable an efficient management of IKE and IPsec Security Associations when a host possesses multiple IP addresses and/or where IP addresses of an IPsec host change over time (for example, due to mobility).

This document discusses the involved network entities and the relationship between IKEv2 signaling and information provided by other protocols. Design decisions for the MOBIKE protocol, background information, and discussions within the working group are recorded. This memo provides information for the Internet community.

This document describes the MOBIKE protocol, a mobility and multihoming extension to Internet Key Exchange (IKEv2). MOBIKE allows the IP addresses associated with IKEv2 and tunnel mode IPsec Security Associations to change. A mobile Virtual Private Network (VPN) client could use MOBIKE to keep the connection with the VPN gateway active while moving from one address to another. Similarly, a multihomed host could use MOBIKE to move the traffic to a different interface if, for instance, the one currently being used stops working. [STANDARDS-TRACK]

This document lists security threats related to IPv6 multihoming. Multihoming can introduce new opportunities to redirect packets to different, unintended IP addresses.

The intent is to look at how IPv6 multihoming solutions might make the Internet less secure; we examine threats that are inherent to all IPv6 multihoming solutions rather than study any specific proposed solution. The threats in this document build upon the threats discovered and discussed as part of the Mobile IPv6 work. This memo provides information for the Internet community.

This document specifies a set of questions that authors should be prepared to answer as part of a solution to multihoming with IPv6. The questions do not assume that multihoming is the only problem of interest, nor do they demand a more general solution. This memo provides information for the Internet community.

This memo provides an analysis of the architectural aspects of multi-homing support for the IPv6 protocol suite. The purpose of this analysis is to provide a taxonomy for classification of various proposed approaches to multi-homing. It is also an objective of this exercise to identify common aspects of this domain of study, and also to provide a framework that can allow exploration of some of the further implications of various architectural extensions that are intended to support multi-homing. This memo provides information for the Internet community.

Multihoming is an essential component of service for many Internet sites. This document describes some implementation strategies for multihoming with IPv4 and enumerates features for comparison with other multihoming proposals (particularly those related to IPv6). This memo provides information for the Internet community.

BCP 38, RFC 2827, is designed to limit the impact of distributed denial of service attacks, by denying traffic with spoofed addresses access to the network, and to help ensure that traffic is traceable to its correct source network. As a side effect of protecting the Internet against such attacks, the network implementing the solution also protects itself from this and other attacks, such as spoofed management access to networking equipment. There are cases when this may create problems, e.g., with multihoming. This document describes the current ingress filtering operational mechanisms, examines generic issues related to ingress filtering, and delves into the effects on multihoming in particular. This memo updates RFC 2827. This document specifies an Internet Best Current Practices for the Internet Community, and requests discussion and suggestions for improvements.

This document outlines a set of goals for proposed new IPv6 site- multihoming architectures. It is recognised that this set of goals is ambitious and that some goals may conflict with others. The solution or solutions adopted may only be able to satisfy some of the goals presented here. This memo provides information for the Internet community.

This document describes the applicability of the Stream Control Transmission Protocol (SCTP). It also contrasts SCTP with the two dominant transport protocols, User Datagram Protocol (UDP) & Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), and gives some guidelines for when best to use SCTP and when not best to use SCTP. This memo provides information for the Internet community.

The document describes a mechanism for basic IPv6 multihoming support, and its operational requirements. This memo provides information for the Internet community.