IPv6 Firewall on CPEs - Default on or off

[Mark Townsley]

As a data point:  The largest residential IPv6 deployment in the world. which uses 6rd as well, has not had a firewall in the CPE by default since day one (late 2007). They have around 3 million subscribers with IPv6 today. So far, no notable attacks that at least I am aware of have been attributed to an IPv6-related vulnerability. 

- Mark

On Nov 26, 2012, at 10:02 AM, Anfinsen, Ragnar wrote:

> Hi all.
> 
> We are preparing to roll IPv6 out to customers with the latest and greatest CPEs we supply, which is great. We have chosen to use 6rd, due to lack of support in our access platform.
> 
> However, our marketing guys have now started to question whether the IPv6 firewall function should be on or off by default. I know there are as many opinions as people on this list, but I am looking for arguments from both camps.
> 
> I have my personal and clear opinion about the matter, which is off. To be able to uphold the true end to end connectivity it must obviously be off. I think the application firewall on the new OS's that support IPv6 are more than good enough, and a firewall in the CPE is redundant.
> 
> However, the arguments against is that the customer is used to having a security layer on IPv4 in the CPE (NAT), and it would be bad to allow IPv6 unprotected into the customers LAN.
> 
> I would really appreciate any comments and thoughts.
> 
> 
> Best Regards
> Ragnar Anfinsen
> 
> Senior Architect CPE
> IPv6 Architect
> Netinfrastructure
> Technology and Innovation
> Altibox AS