A small but growing number of O2 UK’s (Virgin Media) mobile customers have reported that the operator has assigned an Internet Protocol v6 (IPv6) address to their connections, although in most cases the IP address itself is not fully functional (certainly doesn’t work on data / mobile broadband connections).
At this point we’ve long since given up chasing the industry’s remaining IPv6 laggards, such as Virgin Media and O2, to find out when they’ll get around to actually deploying it – this is largely due to the many false starts and missed promises we’ve seen over the years. But we do still keep an eye out for any practical developments on this front.
Suffice to say that, over the past couple of months, we’ve seen a noticeable up-tick in O2 customers, both directly and via some of their MVNO partners on the same platform (e.g. giffgaff), reporting that their mobile connections and Smartphones have been assigned an IPv6 address – even if the v6 address itself doesn’t appear to function (e.g. you can’t ping them) and hasn’t yet been fully assigned to an ASN (Autonomous System Number).
So far all of the IPv6 addresses we’ve had reported appear to form part of the same 2a03:dd00::/32 (CIDR) range, which is owned by Telefonica UK Limited. But O2 itself remains vague on their plans, with a spokesperson telling ISPreview: “We are continually reviewing our IPv6 strategy and will announce any plans in due course.” Back to waiting, then.