Hurricane Electric

Hurricane Electric
Company typePrivate
IndustryInternet service provider
Founded1994; 30 years ago (1994)
HeadquartersFremont, California, United States
Key people
Mike Leber, founder
ServicesIP transit, colocation, dedicated servers
ASN
Peering policyOpen
Websitewww.he.net

Hurricane Electric is a global Internet service provider offering Internet transit, tools, and network applications,[1] as well as data center colocation and hosting services at one location in San Jose, California[2] and two locations in Fremont, California,[3] where the company is based.

As of June 2024, according to its own data, Hurricane Electric is the largest global IP network as measured by network adjacencies in both IPv4 and IPv6.[4] It is also the largest global IPv6 network as measured by IPv6 prefixes announced, and the fifth-largest global IP network as measured by IPv4 prefixes announced, according to its own data.[5]

IPv6

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Hurricane Electric operates the largest Internet Protocol version 4 (IPv4) and Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) transit networks globally, as measured by the count of peering interconnections to other networks.[6][better source needed] The majority of these adjacencies are native IPv6 BGP sessions.

Hurricane Electric offers an IPv6 tunnel broker service,[7] providing free connectivity to the IPv6 Internet via 6in4 IPv6 transition mechanisms. Prior to 2020, the service allowed users to peer with Hurricane Electric over the tunnel using Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) to announce their routes. Users attempting to sign up to use BGP over a tunnel received a message that they were no longer available for free due to abuse. Regular tunnels remain available.[8] The company provides an online IPv6 certification program to further education and compliance in IPv6 technology.[9][10] As of June 18, 2024, the company reports 52,760 provisioned tunnels spanning 174 countries[11] via the IPv6 tunnel broker. 21,512 individuals in 164 countries have reached the highest level of the IPv6 certification.[12]

Peering

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Within its global network, Hurricane Electric is connected to more than 310 major exchange points[13][14] and exchanges IP traffic directly with more than 10,325 different networks.[15] Hurricane Electric currently has 30+ Terabits per second active public peering capacity and 200+ Terabits per second active private peering capacity.[13][16]

The European Internet Exchange Association (Euro-IX) ranks Hurricane Electric first in the world for the number of connections to Internet exchange points, with presence at more than 170 of Euro-IX member IXPs.[17][18]

Cogent dispute

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There is a long-running dispute between the provider Cogent Communications and Hurricane Electric. Cogent has been refusing to peer settlement-free with Hurricane Electric since 2009.[19][20]

IncogNET dispute

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In July 2023, Hurricane Electric added a BGP filtering rule to deny traffic to and from the controversial discussion forum Kiwi Farms.[21] The ISP company IncogNET filed a complaint to the Washington State Attorney General's Office in response to this.[22][needs update]

References

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  1. ^ Cherry, Steven (January 27, 2011). "IPv6 is Coming--Just in Time". IEEE Spectrum. Archived from the original on January 31, 2011.
  2. ^ "Colocation at Hurricane Electric". Hurricane Electric Internet Services. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  3. ^ "About Hurricane Electric". Hurricane Electric Internet Services. Retrieved May 1, 2021.
  4. ^ "BGP Peer Report: Adjacencies". Hurricane Electric BGP Toolkit. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  5. ^ "BGP Peer Report: Prefixes". Hurricane Electric BGP Toolkit. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  6. ^ Huston, Geoff. "AS's ordered by AS Adjacency".
  7. ^ Henderson, Nicole (June 6, 2011). "Hurricane Electric Launches Premium IPv6 Tunnel Broker Service". Web Host Industry Review. Archived from the original on November 17, 2012. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  8. ^ blondguy (April 23, 2020). "Hurricane Electric no longer offers free BGP tunnels". r/ipv6. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  9. ^ Deploy360 Programme. "Training: Hurricane Electric Free IPv6 Certification". Internet Society (ISOC). Archived from the original on July 3, 2012. Retrieved June 21, 2012. Hurricane Electric offers a series of free IPv6 "certification exams" aimed at helping you demonstrate your familiarity with IPv6 concepts and your ability to correctly configure IPv6 systems. Registration is free.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link)
  10. ^ Salmela, Jacob (November 3, 2013). "Earning the IPv6 Certification from Hurricane Electric on Mac OS X". Archived from the original on April 16, 2019. Retrieved November 9, 2014.
  11. ^ "Tunnels By Country". Hurricane Electric Internet Services. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  12. ^ "IPv6 Sages by Region". Hurricane Electric Internet Services. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  13. ^ a b "Hurricane Electric Peering Policy". Hurricane Electric Internet Services. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  14. ^ "Internet Exchange Report: - Exchange Participants". Hurricane Electric BGP Toolkit. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  15. ^ "AS6939 Hurricane Electric LLC". Hurricane Electric BGP Toolkit.
  16. ^ "IP Transit". Hurricane Electric Internet Services. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  17. ^ "Hurricane Electric". Euro-IX.net IXPDB. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  18. ^ "IXPDB ASNs sorted by number of IXP connections". Euro-IX.net IXPDB. Retrieved June 18, 2024.
  19. ^ McCarthy, Kieren (August 28, 2018). "Another problem with IPv6: It's sparked a punch-up between top networks". The Register.
  20. ^ Leber, Mike (October 12, 2009). "IPv6 internet broken, cogent/telia/hurricane not peering". NANOG mailing list.
  21. ^ Van der Sar, Ernesto (October 19, 2023). "Kiwi Farms' Copyright Battle Could Spell Bad News for DMCA Transparency". TorrentFreak. Retrieved June 28, 2024.
  22. ^ IncogNET (July 29, 2023). "Today we filed an official complaint against @henet (Hurricane Electric) with the @AGOWA (Attorney General of Washington State) over their censorship of legal and protected speech". Twitter. Archived from the original on July 29, 2023. Retrieved August 9, 2023.
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