Subject: Protocol Action: Mobility Support in IPv6 to Proposed Standard

From: The IESG <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 17 Jul 2003 05:17:02 -0400

The IESG has approved the Internet-Draft 'Mobility Support in IPv6'
<draft-ietf-mobileip-ipv6-24.txt> as a Proposed Standard. This
document is the product of the IP Routing for Wireless/Mobile Hosts
Working Group. The IESG contact persons are Thomas Narten and Erik
Nordmark.

Technical Summary
 
This document specifies the Mobile IP protocol for IPv6. Mobile IP
allows a node to move around the internet, yet keep the same address
while continuing to communicate transparently with other nodes as it
moves. Each mobile node is identified by its home address, regardless
of its current point of attachment to the Internet. While situated
away from its home, a mobile node is also associated with a care-of
address, which provides information about the mobile node's current
location. IPv6 packets addressed to a mobile node's home address are
transparently routed to its care-of address.

Mobile IP for IPv6 includes a route optimization mechanism that allows
communicating nodes to forward packets directly to each other without
having to relay all traffic via a Home Agent at the mobile node's home
address. Route optimization can be invoked between arbitrary nodes
without the need for some pre-existing shared security
relationship. Route optimization uses a return-routablity procedure to
verify the safety of performing route optimization.
       
Working Group Summary
 
This document has been under very long development within the WG. It
was brought to the IESG over a year ago, but was sent back to the WG
in order to make changes to the security properties of route
optimization. That led to the development of the return-routability
mechanism.

There is strong support for moving this document forward, and there
continues to be frustration at the length of time this document has
been under development.
 
Protocol Quality
 
This document has been reviewed for the IESG by Thomas Narten.