Although the headline may be slightly dramatic, the United Kingdom is falling behind other countries in the transition from IPv4 to IPv6, a shift that could limit its ability to deliver new and innovative online services.
A study commissioned by the UK regulator Ofcom concludes that “the UK is lagging behind other areas of the world in relation to the transition to IPv6 and continuing reliance on the existing IPv4 system of addresses.”
An easy way to understand IP addresses is to think of them as a postal system: every connected device needs an address to communicate over the internet. When IPv4 was designed in the 1970s, it provided just over 4 billion addresses. Those addresses are now largely exhausted.
The study finds that many organisations in the UK appear to be avoiding the costs associated with deploying IPv6. At the time the research was carried out, none of the country’s largest internet service providers were providing native IPv6 to their customers.
IPv6 expands the available address space dramatically—providing 340,282,366,920,938,463,463,374,607,431,768,211,456 unique addresses—an effectively inexhaustible pool designed to accommodate continued growth in internet-connected devices.
One of the fastest-growing trends in technology is the Internet of Things (IoT), where everyday objects are connected to the internet and can be monitored or controlled remotely. The proliferation of IoT devices increases the demand for IP addresses and highlights the need for a modern addressing system.
To remain competitive internationally and to support expanding digital services, the UK needs to accelerate its IPv6 deployment.
The full 80-page report, prepared by ICom for Ofcom, notes that IPv4 and IPv6 are likely to coexist for the foreseeable future. While there are mechanisms to allow communication between devices using different IP versions, these transition techniques can introduce complexity and potential security risks.
Carrier-Grade Network Address Translation (CGN) is one technique ISPs have used to stretch remaining IPv4 resources, but the research suggests CGN is not a sustainable long-term replacement for IPv6.
Increasing IPv6 adoption would reduce reliance on temporary IPv4 workarounds, simplify network architecture for future services, and lower the likelihood of address-related constraints as the volume of connected devices continues to grow.
How Britain addresses this transition will affect the country’s ability to support emerging technologies and deliver resilient, scalable internet services in the years ahead.