ICANN fumes as AFRINIC offers no explanation for annulled election

https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/11/afrinic_election_annulled_why/

by rntn • 1 year ago

148 60 1 year ago

JdeBP• 1 year ago

Thanks to https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44517053 and https://techdirt.com/2025/07/09/litigious-company-demands-re... I now know what The Register was being so surprisingly careful about.

alienthrowaway• 1 year ago

I was surprised the Register didn't provide the additional context of AFRINIC's revocation of Cloud Innovations IP4 blocks that were being sold anywhere but Africa[1][2][3].

1. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43753738

2. Now-deleted report on involved parties by South African news org https://archive.is/bcSDY

3. https://lowendtalk.com/discussion/172579/cloud-innovations-i...

marrickvillain2• 1 year ago

FYI The Reg has covered the back story - https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/03/nrs_afrinic_review/ - but suffice to say anything written about Cloud Innovation quickly attracts the attention of its lawyers. But evidence is being collected and the full story will one day be told.

mkj2• 1 year ago

Who are cloud innovation's IP address range customers?

harvey9• 1 year ago

Other articles suggest data centers outside of Africa

mkj2• 1 year ago

Is that legal?

ethan_smith• 1 year ago

Cloud Innovation primarily leases their AFRINIC-allocated IPv4 addresses to entities outside Africa, including datacenters and hosting companies in Asia and Europe, which is precisely what sparked the original legal disputes with AFRINIC over resource utilization policies.

oncallthrow2• 1 year ago

Dubious/bulletproof hosting companies

this15testing• 1 year ago

it's all this guy: https://heng.lu/

who is very outspoken against IPv6 adoption because he wants to capitalize on his v4 holdings. THE END.

I don't know if I've heard a sentence from him that isn't a threat of legal action for something

Y_Y• 1 year ago

But he earned those addresses by the sweat of his brow! He's entitled to whatever the market will bear and more, because numbers aren't free!

Loughla• 1 year ago

I don't know who that guy is, but if he's against IPv6, why does he say;

promotes accountable leadership, fair market practices, and adoption of the next generation of IPv6 addresses.

viraptor• 1 year ago

Why is NK called Democratic People's Republic if it's not? The marketing copy can say whatever it needs to.

evanjrowley• 1 year ago

I learned about him yesterday via this article. It also frames into context articles I've seen in the past about AFRINIC's IPv4 space being lost to foreigners. https://medium.com/@emmanuelvitus/afrinic-hope-hijack-and-th...

A couple months ago he gave a talk Why Buying IP Addresses is a Scam in Washington DC. It's a lot of complaining about who owns IP addresses: https://youtu.be/dAqXo5DB42E?si=7RpoUFXM3KXziN-Y

It appears the entire channel and Number Resource Society is just a front for his own opinions: https://m.youtube.com/@numberresourcesociety

Spooky23• 1 year ago

That site is unintentionally hilarious. Who knew that selling IP addresses was really an agent for the vague notion of social change lol.

pityJuke2• 1 year ago

As someone entirely unfamiliar with everything here: can ICANN actually do anything to resolve this situation, and I imagine, ideally retrieve the IPs from this unsavoury individual?

__turbobrew__3• 1 year ago

It’s in the article

ICANN’s letter references a policy [PDF] that allows it to appoint an emergency replacement for a dysfunctional RIR, and states that ICANN reserves all rights to start the process that would make that possible.

pityJuke2• 1 year ago

I'm interested why Cloud Innovation say that this is also their preferred ending [0]. A double-bluff?

[0] https://cloudinnovation.org/cloudinnovation-call-AFRINIC-win...

oncallthrow2• 1 year ago

AFRINIC is an utterly incompetent organisation and should be disbanded. Its resources should be managed by one of the other RIRs.

betaby• 1 year ago

Well, that was the case before 2004.

huslage• 1 year ago

I’ve posted about this saga on LinkedIn a bunch of times and received a cease and desist every time. These people are rent seeking fools who are holding African addresses hostage for profit.

__turbobrew__3• 1 year ago

More context: https://medium.com/@emmanuelvitus/afrinic-hope-hijack-and-th...

xacky• 1 year ago

The only long term solution is to ban ipv4 sales and tell anyone who wants new ip addresses to get ipv6.

IPv4 is a security risk now with all sorts of malicious traffic routed through cgnat proxies.

ICANN fumes as AFRINIC offers no explanation for annulled election

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