Re: How will we manage IPv6 spam?

On Fri, 18 Aug 2012, John Levine wrote:

>>> I would not expect to accept any IPv6 mail until users come forward to show me that
>> they wish to correspond with MTAs that have no IPv4 connection ability. While this may
>> happen in the fullness of time, I don't expect it soon. Now and for the foreseeable
>> future such a system would have very little connectivity, far less than a blacklisted
>> spam source.
>
> I agree that it will be a while before there is any worthwhile mail
> that can't be delivered over IPv4.  But Comcast and Gmail already do
> mail over IPv6, and other big providers are likely to add it this
> year.  If you have any v6 mail connectivity at all, you will start
> to get real mail over it.

Yes, but I only have an incentive to have IPv6 mail connectivity
if I would otherwise lose email. And I have heard of no sender
that doesn't fall back to IPv4.

> So it would be nice, what with the ASRG's charter to do, you know,
> research, if we started thinking now about how to manage spam over
> V6 rather than sticking our fingers in our ears.
>

It is one thing to say that support for IPv6 is the morally correct
action, and another to point out a benefit to the receiver of
accepting IPv6 mail, when all of the same mail is available over
IPv4. Will it be possible for the IETF to convince major legitimate
senders to drop support for IPv4 mail? Would anyone here drop support
of IPv4 email for their employer or customer as a matter of
principle?

daniel feenberg