In August Dr Philip Smith travelled to the UK from Australia to speak at LINX98, and to run a specialist workshop on BGP. We ask Philip about the early days of LINX and his work with IXPs in Asia and Africa today. Turn to pages 10 and 11 to find out more.

LINX EGM Preview p06The LINX99 member conference in November will feature a vote on key governance changes and on the 2018 budget. Chairman Murray Steele will oversee

proceedings.

EPF12 Review p05The biggest ever European Peering Forum took place in the Portugese capital, Lisbon, in September. Turn to page five to read our review and to learn of the location of next year’s event.

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LINX America p17In our LINX America pages we cover our involvement with the Capacity North America conference, upcoming US events, Q3 stats as well as a legislative update from the i2C, the Internet Infrastructure Coalition.

In the Spotlight:Dr Philip SmithThe man who installed LINX’s very first rack speaks to HotLINX

Contents

LINX Technology p07Mike Hellers gives us the latest LINX engineering news including background on LON2 testing, network automation and 100GE ports at IXManchester

Public Affairs p08-09Malcolm Hutty’s regular Public Affairs update includes details on the UK Government’s consultation on the implementation of the NIS Directive

HotLINX Extra p18On page 18 LINX Member Relations manager, Katrina Smith, asks for your feedback in the 2017 annual LINX membership survey.

HotLINX Publisher: Kurt Erik LindqvistEditor: Jeremy Orbell

Telephone: +44 1733 207705Editorial & Content: hotlinx@linx.netPrinting: Sudbury PrintPublishing: London Internet Exchange Limited. Trinity Court, Trinity Street, Peterborough, United Kingdom PE1 1DA

No part of this publication may be reproduced without the permission of the publishers.

Face Off Inside StoriesWelcome to HotLINX51. Here’s a brief summary of some of the articles featured inside this issue.

In Industry News we cover the UK Government’s consultation on five Year Tax Break for New “Full Fibre” broadband networks plus the limitations on IXPs planned by Russia over fears of US eavesdropping.

Our Industry Events section on page 15 we preview the Capacity Europe in London in October and look ahead to AfricaCom in Cape Town in November.

We have three LINX conference sponsor articles, the first from EPS Global and Finisar who discuss Shortwave Wavelength Division Multiplexing (SWDM) for 40G/100G in the data centre. ProLabs give an overview on advances in 100G technology while Ciena focus on the challenges of network traffic growth.

Finally we take our usual look at the latest LINX member and technical statistics on our back page. It was a good first quarter for new members with 27 new connections from 12 different territories.

Internet Industry TweetsBelow are just a few of the LINX and member community related updates seen on Twitter recently.

Luca Cicchelli @lucacicchelli @LINX_Network update from Mike Hellers in @ixpfranceix #AGM. 811 ASNs connected: very impressive. Congrats @JohnBSouter @klindqvist & team

Opsview @opsviewGreat to see Mo from @LINX_Network speaking in great detail about ‘IXP Route Server Prefix Validation’ - The Progress & Challenges #UKNOF38

Capacity Media @capacitymedia East African #Telecom operator, @Djibtelecom, connects IP network to the London Internet Exchange (@LINX_Network) http://bit.ly/2jZZOUR Marty Strong @martystronguk Very impressed with @LINX_Network, ordered a 100G port on both London LANs, patched and turned-up the next day!

LINX on TwitterKeep up to date with LINX on Twitter by following @LINX_Network

02 HotLINX © London Internet Exchange 2017

Do you follow?You can also get LINX news on LinkedIn and Facebook via the quick links below:www.linx.net/LNC/linkedinwww.linx.net/LNC/facebook

LINX News p06LINX significantly cut 10GE and 100GE port prices at IXManchester on 1st October. Chris Byrd of M24Seven was among those welcoming the move

HotLINX Issue 51 | Welcome 03

Welcome

A new PoP and price cuts are great news for UK regional peeringBy John Souter, LINX Chief Executive Officer

Editorial

HotLINX 5.0 upgrade available from JanuaryBy Jeremy Orbell, HotLINX EditorHotLINX has had a few different designs over the years. The layout you see before you here is the fourth such styling but from the new year LINX members will see a whole new approach to these pages.

When coming up for a title for this editorial I did consider a geeky play on words using the line ‘HotLINX 4.0 to be unsupported from January’. However, I didn’t want to give the impression that we were going to stop publishing altogether do I went for a more positive upgrade line!

It has been a pleasure putting HotLINX together and it has been a fascinating insight to see how the exchange has evolved over the years. We certainly weren’t talking about 100G Ethernet ports when I started out on HotLINX8 in 2004.

A quick look back at the cover that edition says ‘LINX Captures World Title!’ with Internet volumes of 69 Gigabits per second. As John Souter points out in his intro article we are now firmly in Terrabit territory with growth showing no sign of slowing down. Times are a changin’...just like HotLINX!

hotlinx@linx.net

It’s hard to believe that we are already in the final quarter of 2017. It’s been another good year with plenty happening at LINX and in the networking community at large.

From a regional peering standpoint we are delighted that IXManchester is heading towards 100 connected networks. We implemented price reductions of nearly 40% on 100G ports and 22.8% on 10G ports on 1st October which we hope will see us break through that three-digit barrier.

North of the border in Scotland there have been developments too. Following discussions with the Scottish Government and other interested bodies LINX will be opening a brand new IXScotland PoP in Glasgow. We have news articles on both these local exchange stories in our LINX News section on page 6.

Another news headline is that peak traffic on the LINX public exchange in September increased by almost 6.5% to a record 3.81Tb/sec. This means we are closing in on yet another milestone of 4Tb/sec.

Personally it has been a remarkable time for business travel. As this issue of HotLINX went to press I was returning from a visit from NANOG71 in San Jose, USA, one of eight countries I’ve visited in the name of LINX in just 10 months.

IXP co-operation a key element towards future growth The autumn conference period began with a trip to Portugal for the twelfth European Peering Forum which continues to go from strength to strength. The number of attendees at EPF has more than doubled over the last 10 years and there were some great discussions among attendees.

As I’m sure you are aware IXP co-operation is something I feel very strongly about. It’s very pleasing how the EPF co-hosts LINX, AMS-IX, DE-CIX and Netnod work together to create the event it is today and were pleased to have Italian exchange MIX as a guest IXP in Lisbon too.

Continuing the IXP theme we have the next Euro-IX forum coming up, this time in Bratislava.

Job WittemanTo close I would just like to give a special mention to Job Witteman, who has stepped down as Chief Executive Officer at AMS-IX after 17 years. Job and I started our CEO roles at a similar time so we have both seen how our respective exchanges have grown and developed together. We at LINX wish him the very best for the future.

Would you like to know more?Call: +44 1285 719666Email: salessupport@prolabs.comWeb: www.prolabs.com

MAKING SENSE OF 100G

INCREASE BANDWIDTH, MINIMISE AGGREGATION AND IMPROVE OVERALL EFFICIENCY.

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Industry NewsSubmissions

Have a story you’d like to tell the LINX members? Send your

ideas to the HotLINX team hotlinx@linx.net

04 HotLINX Issue 51 | Industry News

IXP NewsRussia considers limitations on IXPs over US surveillance fearsRussian newspaper Vedomosti has reported that the government in Russia is to take steps to minimise Internet traffic flows through foreign-based IXPs in order to prevent sensitive data being viewed by US intelligence agencies.

Russian government and presidential administration officials are said to be concerned that sensitive data could be decoded and studied by US agencies such as the National Security Administration (NSA), which has several electronic surveillance centres in Europe. While US intelligence agencies may claim that their objectives for surveillance involve the fight against terrorism and extremism, it could still technically obtain details of bank transfers and other official correspondence data as part of that process.

Major Russian telecom companies say that only about 20% of Internet traffic in the country was conducted through foreign IXPs, mainly due to cost cutting. However, the Russian Communications Ministry published a draft law in mid-August that, if passed, means that operators would be forced to direct Russian web traffic through Russian-based IXPs listed in a special state register. The bill would also set a 20% limit on foreign shares in companies that own Russian IXPs, as well as requiring IXPs to keep data logs for at least three years.

If passed, the bill would come into force on 1st July 2018.

Further information on this story can be viewed here:www.rt.com/politics/400627-russia-mulls-limitations-on-internet

UK Government consultation on 5 year tax break for new “Full Fibre” broadband networks In August the UK government began a new consultation on their proposed introduction of 100% business rates relief for new “full fibre” (FTTH/P) broadband networks. Estimated to be worth £60m, this will run until 31st March 2022.

First unveiled by Chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond, in last year’s Autumn Statement, the tax break was introduced on 1st April 2017 and now forms part of the new Telecommunications Infrastructure Bill 2017-19. The measure is designed to complement the £400m Digital Infrastructure Investment Fund (DIIF) which also aims to support ultrafast full fibre networks. A further £200m was earmarked in the 2017 Budget for local projects to leverage private sector investment in full fibre broadband.

The new consultation seeks views only on how the draft regulations should implement this relief and not the policy of the relief itself. This covers who should be eligible, its duration and from when it should apply. However, as expected, the consultation notes that the relief will only be available on new fibre. This means the use of existing unused fibres (known as Dark Fibre) won’t be covered, unless the fibre itself is a completely new deployment built after 1st April 2017.

The consultation will run until 11:45pm on 21st November 2017 and the document currently only applies to operators in England, though the bill does include Wales too. The consultation document can be viewed on the www.gov.uk website.

Full Fibre BroadbandUK Government names trial areas for “Full Fibre” broadbandThe government are to spend around £10m on full fibre pilot schemes around the UK. Businesses, schools and hospitals will be the first to try out the technology in the schemes which will be run in Aberdeenshire, West Sussex, Coventry and Warwickshire, Bristol, West Yorkshire and Greater Manchester. Those in the trials will have the opportunity to experience data speeds approaching one gigabit per second.

Currently only 2% of UK premises have access to full fibre connections. Possible uses of the service would include education with video in schools as well as hospitals for sharing high-definition images to aid diagnosis. It has been suggested by broadband analysts however that gigabit-capable cables would be shared with many different premises, meaning that actual data download speeds could be much lower than the theoretical maximum.

The regulator Ofcom says modern families need at least 10 megabits per second to meet their requirements which is far below the gigabit speeds that full fibre offers. It is claimed that 93% of UK premises can now access superfast broadband service speeds of around 24mbps. In July the government published information on its broadband delivery programme, which plans to further improve download speeds across the country.

The pilots will be funded from the £200m pot announced in the budget earlier this year with the remaining balance of the fund to be spent by the end of 2021.

Serge Radovcic of the RIPE NCC was again on hand to

host proceedings during the morning presentations

HotLINX Issue 51 | Industry News 05

What they’re saying“Full Fibre is the gold standard for fixed broadband connectivity. It will ensure our digital infrastructure supports the UK’s world-class digital economy” Matt Hancock MP, Minister of State for Digital“We want to create an attractive environment for private sector providers to increase their roll out of fibre connectivity. We have therefore introduced in this Parliament specific legislation to allow business rates relief on new fibre deployment from 1 April 2017. This measure will support all providers who deploy new fibre increasing competition and helping the roll out of 5G. We are keen to ensure the measures are as effective as possible, and so we are launching this consultation on the detail of the regulations.”

“We fully support new proposals for 100% business rates relief on the installation of new fibre broadband” Matthew Hare, Chief Executive Gigaclear“Such a scheme provides the incentive needed to extend full fibre rollout across the country, particularly for those providers that are already investing in bringing broadband to areas such as rural communities that are saddled with poor infrastructure and second-rate connections. Guaranteeing business rates relief for five years will also give the government time to review the wider process of rating fibre and create a fairer mechanism of valuing different provider’s assets.”

The UK Government are to consult with fibre providers and other stakeholders on plans for a tax break for new “full fibre” broadband networks. MP Matt Hancock and Gigaclear’s Matthew Hare both commented on proposals in a recent ISP Review article: www.ispreview.co.uk

EPF12 Review Lisbon, Portugal • 18-20 September

A record 337 people registered to attend the recent European Peering Forum in Lisbon. So popular was EPF12 that organisers were having to decline requests to attend more than two weeks before the event. Portugal became the eleventh different country to stage the forum which was again co-hosted by LINX, AMS-IX, DE-CIX and Netnod. The guest IXP on this occasion was MIX from Italy.

The programme featured the usual diverse range of presentation topics. Among the sessions were ‘The Death of Transit and Beyond’ by Geoff Huston (APNIC), IXP legal obligations and other external threats from Luca Cicchelli (TOP-IX Consortium) and peering opportunities and challenges in Africa by Simon Mayoye of Seacom. The second day saw Interxion’s Michael Rabinowitz discuss the future of peering while Martin Levy, (Cloudflare) and Job Snijders (NTT) hosted a panel on BGP in the 21st century. The final day saw Falk von Bornstädt (Deutsche Telekom) speak of new levels of cooperation between eyeball ISPs and OTT/CDNs while Emil Palm (ComHem) presented on BGP Flowspec.

As usual there was also ample opportunity for networking and peering discussions whether as part of the afternoon bi-lateral peering meetings or at the evening social events.

EPF13: “Where next?”Traditionally EPF organisers announce a shortlist of possible venues for the following year at the conference. On day three of EPF12 it was revealed that among the options being considered for 2018 were Vienna, Krakow, Athens plus Cyprus and Majorca. After discussion it was decided that the preferred location is the Greek capital, Athens.

Further details on EPF13 will be published in due course on the European Peering Forum website: www.peering-forum.eu

LINX cut port fees at IXManchester by up to 40%LINX announced at the LINX98 member conference on 21st August that it was to significantly reduce 10GE and 100GE port fees at its regional exchange, IXManchester. As of 1st October monthly 10GE port prices were cut by 22.8% to £270 with 100GE fees reduced by over a third to £1350 (39.3%). In addition, the first 1GE port at IXManchester is available at no charge and comes as part of LINX membership.

IXManchester operates across three city locations; Equinix Williams House, Equinix Joule House plus the M24Seven data centre in Stretford.

Chris Byrd, Technical Director at M24Seven, said:“IXManchester is very well established now and M24Seven is proud to have been host to one of the exchange’s three city sites for the past three years. The decision to reduce prices is great news for the networking community in the region and will help further enhance Manchester’s status as a leading tech city.”

Established in 2012, IXManchester is approaching 100 connected networks who pass a combined 35Gb/s of traffic at peak times. This makes IXManchester the biggest peering LAN in the UK outside of London and an attractive alternative to peering in the capital.

06 HotLINX Issue 51 | LINX News

LINX NewsRegional PeeringLINX to launch second PoP for IXScotland in NovemberLINX established the IXScotland regional exchange four years ago in the Pulsant data centre facility in Edinburgh. This decision was based on the goal of keeping Scottish Internet traffic local and IXScotland was seen as being a stepping stone towards the wider development of peering in the country. This target was given a boost last year when a report published by the Scottish Government (SG) highlighted their own vision for a world-class digital Scotland by 2020. This ultimately led to a programme which in part encouraged networks to interconnect at the IXScotland exchange.

LINX have been working alongside the Scottish Futures Trust (SFT) since early 2017, and along with the work with the SG it has revealed there is viability for an additional site for IXScotland. As a result LINX are pleased to announce that it will be opening a new PoP at the Scottish exchange within the Data Vita facility in Glasgow in early November.

LINX are currently finalising technical logistics to ensure the PoP is ready to go and start connecting new members to the IXScotland facility before the year is out. Further information on this development will be published on the LINX website and on social media in due course.

The next LINX member meeting will be held at the Congress Centre in London on the 20th and 21st of November. It will include an EGM with votes on governance issues, the 2018 budget plus Board remuneration and LINX fees.The extent of any fee reductions have yet to be finalised but will be announced shortly.

New Governance ProposalsAt LINX95 a member consultation was held on changes to LINX’s Memorandum and Articles of Association (M&A). At the subsequent vote at LINX96 in February the motion was supported by nearly two-thirds of voters but not the 75% required to be passed. Since then further reviews and consultations have taken place to address member concerns. LINX has published a full description of the revised and simplified proposals including a copy of the proposed revised M&A itself. There is also full background information, justification and a consultation timeline. www.linx.net/manda-2017-proposal

LINX99 EGM preview

The Data Vita facility in Glasgow

The proposed M&A text has been checked by legal advisors, who have confirmed that it is fit for purpose.

LINX CEO, John Souter, said, “Every effort to gain member feedback, with direct conversations, documentation and explanations to test member opinion has been made. All indications suggest that these proposals will be approved, so the next step is to hold the formal vote at the General Meeting at LINX99 in November.”

Further information on the EGM, including voting instructions, will be released to the membership shortly. The LINX99 event page can be found here: www.linx.net/LINX99

Chairman Murray Steele and John Souter during the LINX95 governance consultation

LON2 Edgecore/IPInfusion updateWe’ve seen a great deal of progress on the project to move to the new LON2 network platform. Testing of the latest software version is continuing and we are getting very close to having a production ready version. With the arrival of the majority of the Edgecore network devices, we have started to stage them in our Lab. The setup in our Lab will replicate a significant part of the actual network and is a big step forward in the project. It will facilitate further testing, allow us to validate our internal systems, tools and processes and complete dry runs of the migration process. Last, but certainly not least, it will also play an important role in our training programme, allowing our engineers to gain confidence and experience with the new platform.

Network Configuration AutomationAnother important project has also reached an important milestone. During the first week of October we have bought our network configuration automation platform into production for the LON1 (Juniper) peering LAN. All member related configurations are now driven directly our of our CRM system. User Acceptance Testing (UAT) was completed during August and September. Over the next phases, this will be extended to the remainder of the configuration elements but even during this first stage, we expect to see a number of improvements. It is a major step towards improving our internal workflows and towards opening up

RecruitmentBernard LiNetwork EngineerBernard Li has joined the LINX Technology team as a Network Engineer. After gaining a Masters Degree at Swinburne University in Melbourne, Bernard moved to Mauritius to take on a position at Orange Business Service as a VPN Owner.

At Orange Bernard managed their MPLS network for all their international sites. Customers were mainly from the Benelux region namely Akzo Nobel, KPMG and DSM. Among his tasks were troubleshooting MPLS network issues as well as implementation and configuration of new routers. After two years Bernard moved to London to work for Virtual1 in a network engineering support role. It was from here that Bernard joined LINX.

Bernard told HotLINX, “I firmly believe that you never stop learning in technology. During my three years as a network engineer I have seen a lot of progress and the best way to adjust is to understand the logic behind these developments. LINX is an ideal place to do this!”

HotLINX Issue 51 | LINX News 07

access to certain changes (i.e MAC ACL changes) directly to members through our Portal.

IXManchester 100G capabilityAs mentioned during LINX98 in August, we have received our first 100G member port order at IXManchester. In order to provide 100G capability, we have implemented an interim capacity upgrade to allow us to deliver the first couple of 100G member ports. This upgrade was completed in mid-September. Further capacity upgrades providing full 100G capability at all IXManchester sites will follow in early 2018.

New Peak Aggregated Traffic Finally, during September we saw a new highest peak traffic level across our Peering LANs. Coinciding with the live streaming of an announcement by a major mobile phone manufacturer, we reached 3.81Tbps traffic across the public Peering LANs. This does not include any traffic over PI (private interconnect) infrastructure at some of the sites, which we are sure carried significant amounts of additional traffic.

Are you considering connecting at 100G? Help us to plan capacity by letting us know

If you are considering connecting at 100G it would help us if you could share your plans in advance to enable us to deliver your port requirements as swiftly as possible.

To let us know, or to obtain further information on 100G, please email the Member Relations team: mr@linx.net

Engineering UpdateLON2 Testing, New Traffic High, Automation and 100G at IXManchester By Mike Hellers, LINX Network Engineering Manager

This graph shows the traffic peaks in the period following the August member conference.For more statistics on LINX traffic and routes please visit https://stats.linx.net/

that they can recover quickly after an event, with the capability to respond and restore systems. The Government has stated that “any operator who takes cyber security seriously should already have such measures in place.”

Organisations who fail to implement effective security measures could be fined as much as £17 million or 4 per cent of global turnover. The Government has said, however, that fines would be a last resort, and will not apply to operators that have “assessed the risks adequately, taken appropriate security measures, and engaged with competent authorities but still suffered an attack.”.

Public Affairs BlogFor the latest industry news

and comment on regulatory issues please visit the Public Affairs blog

on the LINX website.https://publicaffairs.linx.net/news

UK Government launches consultation on implementing NIS DirectiveIn August, the UK Government launched a consultation on its plans to implement the Security of Network and Information Systems Directive (“NIS Directive”). The NIS Directive was adopted by the European Parliament on 6 July 2016 and Member States have until 9 May 2018 to transpose the Directive into domestic legislation. The Government has emphasised that it supports the overall aim of the NIS Directive and that its intention is that this legislation will continue to apply in the UK even after the UK has left the EU.

The NIS Directive imposes obligations on two groups of businesses: “operators of essential services” and digital service providers. However, it does not affect network providers as they are already subject to similar obligations in the UK under Section 105 of the Communications Act 2003.

Under the Directive, operators of essential services, including those in the

energy, transport, water, healthcare and digital infrastructure sectors, will have to take “appropriate and proportionate” security measures to manage the risks to their network and information systems. Operators of essential services will also be required to notify serious incidents to the relevant authority.

Key digital service providers (search engines, cloud computing services and online marketplaces) will also have to comply with the security and incident notification requirements established under the Directive.

Organisations who fall in scope of the Directive will be required to develop a strategy and policies to understand and manage their risk; to implement security measures to prevent attacks or system failures, including measures to detect attacks, develop security monitoring, and to raise staff awareness and training; to report incidents as soon as they happen; and to have systems in place to ensure

Malcolm HuttyLINX Head of Public AffairsPublic Affairs

08 HotLINX Issue 51 | LINX Public Affairs

LINX Public AffairsIn Brief Tribunal says EU court

should rule on legality of UK surveillance powersThe UK’s top national security court, the Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT) has ruled that the European Court of Justice (ECJ) should decide whether the UK’s bulk collection of communications data is legal. The case was brought by the campaign group Privacy International after the ECJ ruled in December that the “general and indiscriminate retention” of communications data by governments was illegal.

However, the IPT ruling also stated that the bulk collection of communications data was “essential to the protection of the national security of the United Kingdom” and that applying the ECJ ruling “would effectively cripple the security and intelligence agencies’ bulk data capabilities.” As the tribunal refused to expedite the case to the ECJ, it is likely to be several years before a final ruling is delivered.

HotLINX Issue 51 | LINX Public Affairs 09

UK Government publishes Data Protection BillThe UK Government has published a Data Protection Bill which will replace the current Data Protection Act and transfer the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) into UK law. The legislation is intended to offer people more control over their data and how they use it. Key provisions of the bill include making it simpler for people to withdraw consent for their personal data to be used, letting people ask for data to be deleted, and making it a criminal offence to re-identify people from anonymised or pseudonymised data. In addition, UK firms that suffer a serious data breach could be fined up to £17m or 4% of global turnover.

Online abuse to be treated as hate crime under new guidelinesThe Crown Prosecution Service has told prosecutors in England and Wales that online hate crimes should be treated as seriously as abuse committed face-to-face. Announcing the revised guidance, Alison Saunders, the director of public prosecutions, said the CPS will seek stiffer penalties for abuse on Twitter, Facebook, and other social media platforms, and that online abuse can fuel “dangerous hostility”. In December 2014, Scotland’s Crown Office issued similar prosecution guidance saying “If it would be illegal to say it on the street, it is illegal to say it online.”

AfPIF 2017 ReviewAfPIF 2017 - The 8th African Peering and Interconnection Forum (AfPIF) was held in Abidjan, Ivory Coast (Cote D’Ivoire) from 22-24 August. The event drew 227 participants from IXPs, ISPs, governments, content delivery networks, hardware providers, data-centre operators, among others. The event is growing every year, and the progress in developing the African peering and interconnection environment are clear.. The number of IXPs in the region now stands at 38 IXPs in 29 countries.

ISOC expect that next year’s AfPIF will show continued growth through the efforts of many that come to AfPIF. ISOC would like to offer a special “thank you” to LINX and other organisations who help sponsor the event.

Tirana, AlbaniaOn 14 November, NaMeX will hold an IXP workshop along with ISOC and other sponsors, in Tirana, Albania. Euro-IX will join ISOC for the training session where we hope to strategise on ways to provide more equipment and level-up the technical expertise in Albania to strengthen their peering and interconnection environment.

Port Moresby, Papua New GuineaISOC and APNIC will hold an IXP peering and routing workshop with Papua New Guinea’s regulatory body, NICTA, in Port Moresby the week of 2 October. NICTA has been instrumental in facilitating the development of the IXP, while taking a “hands-off” regulatory approach. We expect to see several CDNs peering at the IXP in the very near future. Past expertise has also been provided by NSRC, making the development of this IXP a great team effort across organisations.

ISOC Update:New IXP, Peering & Routing Workshops in Europe and Asia

ALBANIA

10 HotLINX Issue 51 | Inside Story: Philip Smith

Your LINX history presentation at LINX98 was fascinating. How do you reflect on those days now? With the benefit of hindsight would you have done anything differently?If I had known back then that there would have been so much interest in the LINX history now, I’d have been more careful at documenting my part of what was happening in the early days. I wasn’t exactly a key part of establishing the exchange but I was there and I did drive down from Cambridge with a car boot full of stuff to put the first rack together. Hindsight is always a wonderful thing, and of course the infrastructure would have been built up and documented like we do it today. The discussion around FastEthernet vs FDDI and the eventual decision towards the latter reads as absurd today, but back in 1996 there was a real belief that FastEthernet really was not ready for prime-time. Of course, the whole early discussion about what LINX is and what it should do (eg UK domain names, political lobbying) was a clear case of feature creep, and I actually use this as an example today of how the IXP should focus on interconnecting ISPs first and foremost, at minimal cost to the members, and avoid expanding its scope beyond interconnects. The golden rule is “Keep It Simple”.

In the IXPs in Asia talk you say that IX development across that region have traditionally been more challenging than in Europe. Why do you think this was and are attitudes changing?Europe is geographically relatively small compared with other regions around the globe, and there are many operators serving a lot of the

LINX98 Talk 1: IXPs in AsiaThe first of Philip’s two talks was a tour of the IXPs across Asia. This covered the challenges and experiences he and the Network Startup Resource Center (NSRC) had witnessed in the development of IXPs in the region with the primary focus on open neutral IXPs rather than commercially operated datacentre interconnects. Several organisations are involved in assisting with the set up of IXPs in the area. Along with NSRC, APNIC (Asia Pacific Network Information Centre), Packet Clearing House (PCH) and the Internet Society (ISOC) have also been involved. www.linx.net/archive/linx98/video/linx98_m08_ixp_asia.mp4

In the SpotlightDr Philip Smith

same local areas. The incumbents in Europe were slow to adopt IP or provide IP services to end users, allowing independent network operators to establish their networks and gain a lot of experience in providing Internet access to consumers. There is a different sense of cooperation because each independent operator got a good foothold, and with such a competitive market place, the only way to keep up with the competition is to offer as much access to as much local content as possible to customers, and that is really only possible via peering.

In many Asian markets, the national incumbent telecom operator was usually first to provide Internet access to the local market. This made it more challenging for independent competition to set up, resulting in fewer and smaller competitors. Getting access to all content means a simple transit connection from the incumbent, and not much incentive to directly connect to competition. Indeed, attempting to create an IXP usually results in the reaction from the incumbent asking why it might be needed as they already provide all that an IXP can provide. They even going as far as saying they don’t charge for local traffic even though there might not be any indication in any billing. Further, there is also still a belief by network operators that they can corner the entire market and force other ISPs simply to be customers of theirs - despite there being little evidence from anywhere that this actually works.

Philip Smith’s first talk looked at the development of exchanges across Asia covering countries as diverse as Thailand and Paki-

stan, as well as Bhutan, Cambodia and Vanuatu.

This Summer LINX were delighted to announce that UK Internet pioneer, Dr Philip Smith, had agreed to speak at the LINX98 member conference in Manchester. As part of his visit to the UK Philip also ran a specialist three day BGP and peering workshop. HotLINX caught up with Philip to discuss the early days of LINX and his current work in developing IXPs in Asia and Africa.

HotLINX Issue 51 | Inside Story: Philip Smith 11

LINX98 Talk 2: LINX HistoryOn day 2 of LINX98 Philip spoke about the development of the UK Internet in the 90s including the formation of LINX in 1994. The ‘neutral interconnect’ concept was first discussed in earnest in May of that year following a proposal from the University of London Computer Centre (ULCC). A meeting to discuss creating a UK IXP was held on the 5th August featuring UKERNA (JANET), PIPEX, BTnet, Demon Internet, EUnet GB (UKnet joined EUnet alliance) with Telehouse in Docklands subsequently agreed as the location. The founding members went public with the plans for an Internet hub with a press release on 12th September.www.linx.net/archive/linx98/video/linx98_t09_early_linx.mp4

The initial technical set up for LINX was of great interest to delegates as was the process of expansion in the mid-90s

3-Day BGP and Peering Workshop a great successIn addition to the two LINX98 conference presentations Philip Smith also used his visit to the UK to run a three day LINX BGP and peering workshop. Staged at the Radisson Blu Edwardian Hotel in Manchester, the workshop covered a range of BGP configuration and operation topics as well as best current practices for peering.

Commenting on the workshop Philip told us, “The key take away I felt the participants got from the training was the background about a lot of the operational and configuration best practices they were already doing. They knew they had to do them, but really had no idea why, or the background as to why the techniques had become industry best practices. I felt that Kurtis [Lindqvist] and I, with our respective long experiences in the European Internet industry, could share some of our experiences from the 90s and early 2000s to show why the industry has converged on the best practices we use today.”

Philip continued, “The other interesting outcome was that the delegates had an opportunity to try out BGP configurations in the lab network, something they rarely get to do in their day to day work. Also, given the demand for places, it is quite clear that many other LINX members would have been interested in participating in the workshop - hopefully there will be an opportunity for another BGP Peering session in the future.”

Another question that came up during the workshop was how to monitor and manage network infrastructure using the open source tools which are available. Philip’s impression is that many operators are surviving on a shoe-string budget, and using open source software helps preserve resources for other essential expenditure. This may be a discussion point for the membership in future.

Delegates on the three day BGP and peering workshop in August pose for a team photo

Today you work with several organisations who assist with the set up Internet Exchange Points including NSRC, APNIC, PCH and ISOC. That level collaboration must be very satisfying.Yes, though collaboration within a community to get an exchange point running is just as difficult an operation now as it was 20 years ago. Commercial operators of course are competitive and want to maximise business opportunity and therefore profit, so cooperating with a competitor is very low down on their to-do lists. Whichever organisation is trying to facilitate the IX, they all face the same challenges, whether it is persuading local operators that it is in their best interests to interconnect, or working with local authorities to try and facilitate interconnections when ground up operator cooperation has failed. But hearing the news that the operators (including the local Research and Education Network) have agreed to interconnect by creating a local IXP is immensely satisfying, and donating an ethernet switch and providing the technical training (usually BGP) to make the peering reality is really the final step of a great achievement by everyone involved. Most people at the outset consider IXP creation as a big technical challenge, but in reality it is mostly about creating the trust between the participants.

What about the future? Is the IXP industry likely to consolidate with fewer, larger IXPs or will it expand with more regional exchanges? There will always be a place for an IXP. We will continue to see the major focal interconnects like LINX, and Europe is well provisioned and established with those. Major interconnects are still a novelty in Asia, with Hong Kong and Singapore being the only major regional IXPs in South East Asia, for example. There are large parts of Asia and almost all of Africa which still do not have the equivalents of LINX, AMSIX or DECIX - and I’m sure we will see this change. There is no regional interconnect in South Asia, and this has to change too, if the regulatory environment will allow international interconnects in the countries in question. However, locations which are served by multiple IXPs will see that consolidation, perhaps most likely in Europe and North America - elsewhere, there is still a lack of IXPs, and we have yet to see the local IXP vs regional IXP differential being established.

Finally, what do you expect to be the major strategic challenges LINX will face in the next five years?Technically, it’s simple: it’s carrying on scaling, keeping moving ever greater volumes of traffic. Trying to predict the next great thing is tough though - who’d have thought 10 years ago that YouTube and Facebook would grab perhaps 75% of the traffic volume on the Internet today.

12 HotLINX Issue 51 | Member Conference Sponsor: EPS Global

HotLINX Issue 51 | Member Conference Sponsor: Finisar 13

EPS Global / Finisar

Large- and medium-sized enterprise data centres have been widely deploying 10G Ethernet for several years, architecting the infrastructure around duplex OM3/OM4 multimode fibre and using 10G SR SFP+ switch port interfaces with LC connectors. To transition to 40G and 100G Ethernet, they can use 40G/100G SR4 optics, which are very cost-effective but which require the use of parallel optics infrastructure. This means replacing their duplex LC patch cords with parallel MPO patch cords, as well as installing additional trunk cables (since each full-duplex link now requires eight fibres instead of just two). This approach is capex-intensive and forces the transition to the unfamiliar MPO connector.

Alternatively, they could install single mode fibre in order to continue to use the familiar duplex fibre/LC-connector paradigm. This means using 40G/100G LR4 (or CWDM4) optics, which have a significantly higher cost than multimode SR4 optics. This is a very capex- and opex-intensive approach.

Neither of these options is particularly attractive. Enterprises would like to upgrade their data centres to 40G/100G Ethernet without changing their existing duplex multimode fibre infrastructure being used for 10G Ethernet.

Shortwave Wavelength Division Multiplexing (“SWDM”) technology addresses this market need. The approach consists of four VCSELs operating at different wavelengths in the 850nm window, which are multiplexed/demultiplexed inside the QSFP transceiver into a pair of multimode fibers (i.e., a standard duplex interface). Each one of those wavelengths operates at either 10G or 25G, enabling the transmission of 40G (4x10G) or 100G (4x25G) Ethernet over existing duplex multimode fibre, using LC connectors.

The supported reaches for SWDM on legacy OM3 and OM4 multimode fibre are as follows:

• 40G SWDM QSFP+ can support 240m and 350m, respectively

• 100G SWDM QSFP28 can support 75m and 100m, respectively

• 100G “eSWDM4” QSFP28 targets supporting 200m and 300m, respectively

Note that 40G SWDM QSFP+ and 100G SWDM QSFP28 transceivers meet the same electrical, mechanical and thermal standards as any other QSFP+ and QSFP28, enabling their use in any standard QSFP+ or QSFP28 port.

Those enterprises who are increasing the size of their new data centres are considering transitioning to single mode fibre cabling and transceivers to support longer links. This means using relatively expensive LR4/CWDM4 transceivers to only support a few hundred metres, or using a non-mainstream solution like PSM4 which requires the use of a higher fibre count and the relatively unproven single mode MPO connector.

However, a new cost-effective multimode solution is using SWDM transceivers with the new OM5 wideband multimode fibre. The supported 40G/100G Ethernet distances can be extended on OM5 multimode fibre in the following way:

• 40G SWDM QSFP+ can support 440m• 100G SWDM QSFP28 can support 150m• 100G “eSWDM4” QSFP28 targets supporting 400m

An additional benefit of upgrading to OM5 multimode fibre is to future-proof the infrastructure for future 200G/400G/800G multimode interfaces for the data centre. Many of them will take advantage of SWDM technology, and are already under consideration by the IEEE.

SWDM and OM5 are a perfect match for new data centre builds, since they offer the best combination of economics and technology. SWDM technology is not a single-vendor, proprietary solution. A group of fiber optics components and systems OEMs have formed the SWDM Alliance and MSA (www.swdm.org). Its goal is to promote the use of SWDM technology on duplex multimode fibre, as well as to ensure optical interoperability among the different vendors’ SWDM product offerings.

SWDM: The Lowest Total Cost Solution for 40G/100G in the Data CentreBy Christian Urricariet, Senior Director of Marketing for Network Solutions at FinisarFor more information please email sales@finisar.com or visit www.finisar.com

VENUE FOR LINX100 ANNOUNCEDLINX100 will take place at Park Plaza Victoria London. The address is

239 Vauxhall Bridge Road London, SW1V 1EQ. Further information on the new venue available here: www.parkplaza.com/london-hotel-gb-sw1v-1eq/gbvictor

The LINX member conference will return to the Congress Centre in London this autumn for LINX99. It will be a notable event in many ways as it is likely to be the final such meeting at the venue having been used multiple times since our first visit for LINX41 in 2003. Please make sure you pencil in the 20th and 21st of November into your diary for what will be an important constitutional session. Among the resolutions to be voted on by members will be the 2018 budget and a revised M&A.

In addition the programme is expected to feature an update of GDPR, a consultation on dark fibre access and fibre tax issues, plus a member talk from Broadband for the Rural North (B4RN) on their increased scope of activity from a geographical perspective.

The sponsors for LINX99 are confirmed as Daisy Group, Interxion and ProLabs. MRV Communications will be supporting our networking social event.

Registration for LINX99 Registration for LINX99 is now open and will close on Wednesday 15th November at12:00pm GMT. To sign up and view the agenda please visit: www.linx.net/LINX99

14 HotLINX Issue 51 | LINX Conferences

LINX98 Round Up In August LINX continued its policy of taking its summer member conferences out on the road, this time to the Manchester Central Convention Complex. LINX98 was kindly sponsored by Wave2Wave, Daisy Group, Rome-based IXP, NAMEX, and ProLabs.

A strong turnout of around 120 people were present who witnessed a broad set of agenda topics over the two day programme. A pre-event tutorial covered Software-Defined WAN (SD-WAN) while Ahmed Omran of Daisy Group discussed FlexETHERNET and 400 GigE. Philip Smith was the guest speaker who gave two fascinating talks on IXPs in Asia and on the formation of LINX in the early 90s.

There was also a strong governance element to proceedings with two public affairs slots by Malcolm Hutty, an MoU consultation plus an engaging talk on GDPR by ISC’s Andrew Cormack (pictured right).

The presentation and video archive can be viewed by members on the LINX website: www.linx.net/LINX98 (log-in required)

LINX Conferences

LINX99 PreviewMeet with LINXHere’s a list of events where you can meet with LINX representatives over the next few months.

IXManchester DNS Training & Karting Event 17 October 2017Manchester, UKwww.linx.net//IXManchester-DNS-Training-Karting-Event

RIPE75 22-26 October 2017Dubai, UAEripe75.ripe.net

Capacity Europe 24-26 October 2017Intercontinental London - The O2www.capacityconferences.com/Capacity-Europe

Ad-Tech 1-2 November 2017New York, USAny.ad-tech.com

Peering Asia 1-2 November 2017Kyoto, Japanpeeringasia.com

GCCM Africa 5-6 November 2017Cape Town, South Africawww.carriercommunity.com/africa-2017-gccm-cape-town

Africa.com 7-9 November 2017Cape Town, South Africatmt.knect365.com/africacom

Metro Ethernet Forum 13-16 Nov 2017Orlando, Florida, USAmef.net

LINX99 20-21 November 2017London, UKwww.linx.net/LINX99

Capacity Asia 12-13 December 2017Hong Kongwww.capacityconferences.com/Capacity-Asia

You can also find a list of upcoming events on the home page of the LINX website: www.linx.net

There was a great attendance for the only LINX conference outside of

London this year.

AfricaComAccelerating Africa’s Digital RevolutionIt is the 20th anniversary of AfricaCom. The event has grown enormously over recent years and now attracts well over 10,000 attendees making it one of the biggest technology conferences on the African continent.

There are 16 conference tracks at AfricaCom featuring 450 world-renowned speakers from organisations such as Google, MTN, Safaricom, Microsoft who will be presenting on topics such as IoT, big data, FinTech, digital health, sustainable power solutions, digital education and more. Each day will feature keynote presentations focussing on tech visions for Africa and the acceleration of Africa’s digital revolution.

LINX has been a regular attendee in recent years and will be back in Cape Town again this November. If you are attending and would like to arrange a meeting with us please email meetme@linx.net

HotLINX Issue 51 | LINX Industry Events 15

Industry EventsEvents Round Up

NANOG712-4 October 2017San Jose, California, USALINX engineers, member relations and business development staff, as well as LINX NoVA representatives, were in San Jose in October for NANOG71. A major part of the telecoms calendar in North America, it was an ideal opportunity to arrange a lunch for members and partners of LINX NoVA.

France-IX AGM29 September 2017Paris, FranceLINX were proud to be guests at the France-IX general meeting on 29 September. Network Engineering Manager, Mike Hellers, was on hand to present an update on LINX activities which included interesting facts and stats including network capacity, routeservers and the number of connected ASNs which now exceed 800.

Attending the meeting builds on the longstanding relationship between LINX and France-IX which will see reciprocal arrangements where the IXPs will be invited to speak each others events.

Capacity Europe is coming to London this October!24 - 26 October 2017 Capacity Europe is the largest annual meeting in Europe for the global carrier community. Over 2000 senior-level attendees are expected to attend representing 600+ companies from in excess of 85 countries.

This year the event will be held in London for the first time, after a long stint in Paris. The venue is Intercontinental London – The O2 in the east side of the capital and LINX will be part of the exhibition on stand 84.

If you are attending Capacity Europe and would like to arrange a meeting with us please email meetme@linx.net. Further information on the main conference is available here: www.capacityconferences.com/Capacity-Europe

Cape Town, South Africa7-9 November 2017

Further information on all aspects of the AfricaCom programme including the20th

Anniversary Awards available here: tmt.knect365.com/africacom

LINX AssociatesDNS BelgiumBelgium a leader in IPv6 adoption According to figures from Akamai from July 2017, Belgium is the frontrunner when it comes to the adoption of the IPv6 protocol. The country has an adoption rate of 37.3%, followed by Greece (27.9%) and the US (24.8%). If we look at the network per provider, Telenet scores 66.7% and Belgacom Skynet 41%. (The latter figures are however based on the number of IPv6 requests to Akamai).

There is a great chance that you already have an IPv6 connection with the Internet – which is a good thing, as ultimately more and more websites will become IPv6 only, and will no longer be accessible via IPv4. Users test if they have an IPv6 connection using http://testmyipv6.com.

It’s encouraging how organisations who are responsible for the reliability of the Internet in the background, are increasingly making sure that we needn’t lose any sleep worrying about IPv4 addresses being exhausted. They have implemented this important transition to IPv6 smoothly, without you even noticing it.

DNS Belgium have published an in-depth overview on IPv6 on their website:https://dnsbelgium.be/en/news/crystal-clear-what-you-need-know-about-ipv6

KentikGlobal Tier-1 GTT Enhances Visibility, Security, and Profit with KentikGTT is a global provider of internet, WAN, managed and voice services to nine of the top-10 largest telecoms providers and 5,000+ enterprises in over 100 countries. GTT needed to replace its home-grown tools and find a scalable way to extract real-time intelligence from its network. Kentik’s network traffic intelligence platform gives GTT deep insights to improve customer experience, drive down the cost of delivering customer traffic, and identify profitable new prospects.

“We were flying blind in many key areas prior to deploying Kentik,” said Bob Burris, GTT’s General Manager of the IT Network Department. “If an organization is looking for a full featured analytics solution, Kentik is the right choice.”

Learn more at http://bit.ly/GTTandKentik.

What are LINX Associate Members?Like LINX, associate members are usually ‘not-for-profit’ organisations. They are members in all respects but they have no voting rights and LINX does not charge them for membership. www.linx.net/associate-members

RIPE NCCGlobal Consultation on Identifier Technical Health Indicators (ITHI) ProjectThe Number Resource Organization (NRO), as the coordinating body for the five Regional Internet Registries (RIRs), has developed a proposal to assess the health of RIR registry data in response to an ongoing ICANN initiative. The RIPE NCC encourages LINX members to provide their feedback on the proposal. Feedback is requested specifically on the proposed approach, the definition of risks, and the measurements to report on registry data accuracy.

A mailing list has been created for community discussion and to provide input on the proposal. You can find more information here: https://www.nro.net/ithi-project

RouteViewsNew Collector at NAPAfrica, South AfricaRouteViews has now established a routing data collector at the TERACO exchange at NAPAfrica, in Johannesburg, South Africa. They are now accepting peers so if you would like to participate in the project by contributing your routes, please contact them at: help@routeviews.org.

RouteViews success depends upon the cooperative spirit and generosity of its peers, associates, and members of the network community. The organisation would like to specifically thank WORKONLINE and TERACO for their support in establishing a collector at NAPAfrica.

Additional resources related to this collector can be found here: telnet://route-views.napafrica.routeviews.org

NetnodCopenhagen IX developments Netnod is pleased to announce exciting developments at our Copenhagen IX. We have implemented a new architecture based on a 100Gbit/s optical network using state-of-the-art DCI equipment from ADVA Optical Networking and a switching layer from Arista. There has already been considerable interest in the 100G ports, with our first 2x100GE customer already connected. For more information, see: www.netnod.se/news/new-architecture-implemented-at-netnod-ix-copenhagen

With the new architecture up and running in Copenhagen, we look forward to launching a similar platform at the Netnod IX Stockholm in Q4 2017.

16 HotLINX Issue 51 | LINX Associates

Ben HedgesCEO LINX America

North American Events Round UpOn Tuesday 12th September LINX NoVA hosted a karting event for LINX members, partners and prospects, at Autobahn Indoor Speedway in Dulles. LINX see these engagement events an important part of strengthening relationships amongst the local networking community so we would encourage members to think about attending such gatherings in future.

Growth at LINX NoVA remains strong in Q3 2017Since the last issue of HotLINX in July there have been 10 new members connected to the LINX NoVA exchange with a further four in provisioning. Among the networks to connect, or add additional ports during this period, were Zenlayer, Verisign, Softlayer and Yahoo!

Traffic across the exchange remains strong and consistently surpassing 13Gb/s at peak times.

LINX participate atCapacity North America

LINX America

At Capacity North America in Denver in September, LINX America CEO, Ben Hedges, was part of the agenda session, “The Golden Age of the Data Centre”.

Moderated by Capacity Magazine Editor, Jason Mcgee-Abe, the panel also featured Nitin Rao, Cloudflare’s VP of Infrastructure, Ryan Mallory, VP Global Solutions at Equinix and Richard A Steenbergen, CTO for PacketFabric.

Perhaps because of the panelists, debate quickly moved from ‘Are we in a Golden Age for the data centre’ (No), to discussing what makes a data centre successful, including location, connectivity and services. Mr McGee-Abe asked about the increase in IXPs in the US in recent years and if having an IX made a difference to if a data centre would be successful or not. Ben spent some time comparing the mutli-site IX model with DC partners in Europe with the data-centre owned single-site IXPs in the USA. Ryan Mallory agreed with this and added Equinix were moving to a strategic position where they have ‘By Equinix’ and ‘At Equinix’ services and the ‘At Equinix’, working with third party suppliers, was where they see the most value.

SIPNOC 2017 28-30 November 2017Looking ahead Ben will be speaking at SIPNOC, the SIP Network Operators Conference, in Herndon, Virginia. Ben will explain the use cases of private vs. public peering. www.sipforum.org/event/sipnoc-2017

HotLINX Issue 51 | LINX America 17

US legislative updateThis section briefly covers the regulatory scene in the US. It is brought to us by the Internet Infrastructure Coalition (i2C), a collective who ensure that the builders of the Internet’s infrastructure have a voice in public policy.

Equifax breach updateThe Equifax breach has raised questions about whether Congress should pass a uniform data breach notification standard and rethink data protection polices so companies have fewer incentives to collect large, centralised sets of sensitive data.

Government access to dataA bipartisan group of House Judiciary Committee members has struck a deal to extend Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act through to 2023, although the specifics have not yet been released. Section 702 of FISA authorises the Intelligence Community to target the communications of non-US persons located outside the United States for foreign intelligence purposes. i2C, fully supported by LINX, opposes the straight reauthorisation of FISA Section 702 and have been engaging with legislators on the matter.

Net neutralityA hearing for 7 September on net neutrality was postponed. The FCC has not finished posting all net neutrality comments filed before August 30th and as of Sunday 3rd September the total number of comments had surpassed 22 million. The i2C has opposed the FCC’s proposed rollback of its Open Internet Order. LINX will continue to monitor relevant Internet public policy in the USA, in association with our partner, i2C.

Vinay Nagpal (DFT / Digital Realty), Michael Kennedy (LINX America) and

Mathew Coimbra (Evoswitch) took part in the LINX NoVA karting in September

HotLINX Extra

By Katrina Smith, LINX Member Relations ManagerThe 2017 annual LINX membership survey is open with respondents offered the opportunity to enter a prize draw to win a DJI Spark video-drone

We would be grateful for members’ cooperation in providing us with frank and honest answers to the selection of questions regarding LINX operations and the exchange’s position

in the marketplace. It’s important for us to understand how members feel LINX is performing in all aspects of our work, and where you think there is room for improvement. We can then consider your response to help model future plans and developments. The survey process should take no more than 10 minutes.

If you have any queries about the questions, please contact Member Relations by emailing mr@linx.net or calling +44 1733 207777

Have your say: 2017 LINX membership survey

18 HotLINX Issue 51

Would you like to know more?Call: +44 1285 719666Email: salessupport@prolabs.comWeb: www.prolabs.com

MAKING SENSE OF 100G

INCREASE BANDWIDTH, MINIMISE AGGREGATION AND IMPROVE OVERALL EFFICIENCY.

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MAKING SENSE OF 100G

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New for 2017For completing this survey, members have the chance to win a video-drone, a DJI Spark! To be included in this competition please enter your email address at the end of the survey, where asked, and one lucky winner will be drawn once the survey closes on Friday 3rd November.

Please note that we will accept just one response per member with only the first received being recognised. However, all entrants to the competition will be included.

Once collated, the anonymous results of this survey will be analysed and presented by John Souter at LINX99 members meeting on 20th November 2017.

100G connectivity is maturing at a rapid pace. Advances in transceiver technology are producing lower priced network gear. The evolution to a QSFP28 form factor offers a more energy-efficient, cost space efficient platform for 100G deployments.

You will already be doing more with less and network demands are becoming more complex. Websites and critical applications are requiring more stability and higher connectivity, and more pressure is on gaining an increase in higher-bandwidth speeds.

That’s where 100G comes in, by increasing bandwidth, minimising aggregation and significantly improving overall efficiency. The bandwidth explosion is forcing companies to continue to grow in scale, 100G offers the bandwidth speeds and

Would you like to know more?Call: +44 1285 719666Email: salessupport@prolabs.comWeb: www.prolabs.com

MAKING SENSE OF 100G

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efficiency necessary to support this growing demand.

Pluggable transceivers have become standard for network equipment and this continues with 100G. Pluggable transceivers give customers the ability to manage their expense when needed and flexibility with options such as distance or multiplexing to meet the needs of each individual circuit. Customers also have a choice in suppliers and have the option to work with a partner who offers solutions which will work seamlessly with all their network equipment, providing innovations to improve network efficiency.

Would you like to know more?Call: +44 1285 719666Email: salessupport@prolabs.comWeb: www.prolabs.com

MAKING SENSE OF 100G

INCREASE BANDWIDTH, MINIMISE AGGREGATION AND IMPROVE OVERALL EFFICIENCY.

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Escalating bandwidth demands can mean only one thing…costly and complex network upgrades. But what if you could look at the challenge from a completely different perspective? Ciena’s Kent Jordan explains how.

Traffic is growing. Fast. Escalating demands are straining over-utilised paths between data centres, along the connections between key branch offices and their headquarters, within a campus network, or across regional and long-haul backbone routes.

The drivers behind the bandwidth may differ – it could be terabyte file size data sharing between research institutions, the shift of enterprise applications, storage and computing to the cloud, transmission of complex, high-resolution medical imaging between hospitals, evolving educational tools, or other high-bandwidth applications – but, the result is the same: costly and complex upgrades. Once a scalability issue has been identified, traditional means of overbuilding capacity typically can’t solve the problem efficiently or cost-effectively.

These scalability challenges may seem insurmountable, but similar problems have been overcome in other industries by simply looking at the problem in a different way. Transportation had similar challenges with scalability. Moving bits of data from location to location is much like transporting people, and providing cost-effective ways for consumers to get from place to place via the fastest, least congested route has not been simple.To solve the problem, new private transit and ride-sharing companies decided to approach transportation from a different angle. They took the concept of private car service and modified that model to scale and be available to everyone. They built new tools, processes, and vast networks of drivers, giving all riders a new, more efficient way to get from point A to point B.

Now, rather than needing to struggle with bus routes, GPS directions, or finding a taxi off the beaten path, travellers can open an app, request a ride, and get picked up by a highly rated driver, often within minutes. It couldn’t be simpler. The entire process for securing transportation from location to location has changed forever. And, with any driver on the road potentially offering their services, it offers scalability beyond existing public transit offerings.

HotLINX Issue 51 | Member Conference Sponsor: Ciena 19

What if network operators could approach the problem of scaling network traffic from a different angle, and like the transportation industry, leverage a new way to easily scale capacity to meet growing traffic demand?

Unlike moving people, moving data is highly reliant on a massive network of existing infrastructure. However, rather than expanding and overbuilding costly, inflexible network infrastructure, what if there was a way to simply integrate a solution that optimised existing fibre facilities without impacting the existing infrastructure – an easy button for bandwidth scale. In fact, there is.

Looking at the problem of bandwidth scale in a different way, we see it isn’t so dissimilar to the exponential bandwidth growth data centre operators experience across interconnects. Data centre interconnects require efficient space, low power, massive bandwidth devices that can be set up as quickly and simply as a server, enable endless integration possibilities, and can be up and running in hours, not days.

New platforms built specifically for high-capacity interconnects offer incredible speed and massive density with never-before seen simplicity. These platforms offer high-speed transmission from 100G up to 400G per wavelength with a simple server-like operational model, giving operators a new, easy-to-use tool for increasing capacity. In addition, open APIs enable seamless integration into existing infrastructure. Enterprise, Government and R&E customers are applying these platforms designed for the data centre and leveraging them in capacity-exhausted connections all across the network, increasing bandwidth across congested links in hours while saving tens of thousands of dollars.

Sometimes the best solution simply requires a fresh perspective on the problem.

For further information please visit:www.ciena.com

Ciena

Network Traffic Challenges? It’s Time for a New Perspective

By Kent Jordan, Advisor, Product and Technology Marketing, Ciena

Stats UpdateIss

ue

51

20 HotLINX Issue 49 | Stats Update

Routes Peered at LINX (maximal)

Global routing table routes

% of global routes available via LINXROUT

ES

IXManchester peak traffic

LINX NoVA Connected ASNs

LINX NoVA peak traffic

STAT

S+ 55.1Gbs

5113.5Gbs

516089

658597

78.3%

Total Connected ASNsIXManchester 89 IXScotland 26 IXCardiff 30

New LINX MembersHere is a list of new LINX members who have connected during the third quarter of 2017. In all, there have been 27 new connections from 12 different territories.

In addition to the 11 new UK connections, a further 4 have been added in Europe who are based in Italy (2), Luxemburg and Sweden. Further afield members have connected from the USA (5), Djibouti, Ghana, India, Japan, Oman, South Africa and Tanzania.

Acme Internet AS51603

Allied Telecom Group AS22925

Aptus Solutions AS37349

Cloudhelix AS62227

Dolphin Telecom AS37613

Faelix AS41495

Faircape Group Holdings AS37363

Focus 4 U AS25590

Fuze AS13896

Djibouti Telecom AS30990

Independent Fibre Networks AS48945

Intercity Technology AS49413

ITS Technology Group AS41354

KDDI Corporation AS2516

G-Core Labs AS199524

Magine AS60205

Onecom Global Comms AS51185

Oman Telecommunications AS8529

PBX Hosting AS50823

Pilot Fiber AS46450

Quantil Networks AS54994

SED Multitel AS35574

Spectron Services AS40992

Sify Technologies AS9583

The Cloud AS56444

Updata Infrastructure (UK) AS51551

Vidscale AS47254

You can view a complete list of members on the LINX website: www.linx.net/memberlist

Our LINX stats page includes information regarding our local exchanges, plus other notable figures. The above graphic shows the headline numbers for the exchange as a whole but we felt that readers would be interested to see more detail such as available routes and also breakdowns of figures from the UK regional exchanges in England, Scotland and Wales plus LINX NoVA in the USA.

812Member ASNs75 Countries

New LINXapplications in 2017109 Member-facing 100GigE ports76

Connected member ports 1803919 Member-facing

10GigE Ports

Over 6.500 Tbs Peak Traffic inc. PI 20.583

Terabits of connected

capacity

Please note: LAN applications may contain ports on multiple LANs (LON1, LON2, IXManchester, IXScotland, IXCardiff and LINX NoVA.) These figures show applications only, not physically connected ports.