Latif Ladid on IPv6’s role in the global Metanet vision

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IPv6, blockchain technology, peer-to-peer Internet of Things and advanced cybersecurity are critical for the global Metanet vision, said Latif Ladid.

The President of the IPv6 Forum spoke to CoinGeek Backstage on the sidelines of the IEEE COINS Conference in London about the inevitable transition from the current internet protocol, IPv4, to IPv6.

Ladid told CoinGeek reporter Becky Liggero that the Metanet, a new version of the Internet that fuses emerging technologies and micropayments, needs IPv6. This protocol restores the Internet’s peer-to-peer nature by allowing everyone to have their unique IP addresses.

Besides IPv6, the Metanet needs “peer-to-peer IoT,” where we have “billions of devices talking to each other.” This vision is well underway; today, experts estimate that there are nearly 19 billion interconnected IoT devices and that this number will double by 2030.

These devices generate massive data that we can analyze to make better decisions. However, we must guarantee that this data is authentic and verified, “and this is where blockchain, especially BSV, can play a major role for a global initiative,” Ladid noted.

All these technologies need state-of-the-art cybersecurity, which is the fourth pillar of the Metanet, added Ladid.

“So, having a combination of these four things is basically what the Metanet is going to be,” he said.

If IPv6 is this critical to the future of the Internet, then why have we not seen accelerated adoption globally? Well, according to Ladid, the uptake is much higher than many think.

Today, over 2.5 billion people are already on IPv6, but most are oblivious to the migration as it’s just background plumbing that the end user never needs to know about.

In the United States, the government has set a target for 2028 to move all digital government services to IPv6 only. This will spark a surge in adoption as most private enterprises need to keep up with the government. In China, the adoption is led by the China Next Generation Internet, a project established by the public and private sectors in 2006 to push for IPv6 adoption.

IPv6 and blockchain work in tandem: IPv6 needs an enterprise blockchain to verify and authenticate the massive data it generates and spur micropayments, while blockchain needs IPv6 to become truly peer-to-peer as it was originally envisioned.

“If we get something like 10% of these 2.5 billion IPv6 users, you already have 250 million people using blockchain. It’s just a question of educating people and promoting the right technologies.”

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