English

Measuring NAT64 Usage in the Wild

Networking and Internet Architecture 2024-02-23 v1

Abstract

NAT64 is an IPv6 transition mechanism that enables IPv6-only hosts to access the IPv4 Internet. Understanding the deployment of NAT64, and its performance impact, is crucial to the success of the IPv6 transition, by encouraging IPv6-only deployments. We develop a set of tests for detecting NAT64 and apply them to the RIPE Atlas testbed, finding 224 probes, in 43 networks, that can use NAT64 to access the IPv4 Internet. Using 34 dual stack probes, that have both NAT64 and native IPv4 access, to compare performance, we find that NAT64 paths are, on average, 23.13% longer, with 17.47% higher round-trip times.

Cite

@article{arxiv.2402.14632,
  title  = {Measuring NAT64 Usage in the Wild},
  author = {Elizabeth Boswell and Stephen McQuistin and Colin Perkins and Stephen Strowes},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2402.14632},
  year   = {2024}
}

Comments

17 pages (incl. appendix), 8 figures

R2 v1 2026-06-28T14:57:15.215Z