In this article, you will learn about the syntax of IPv6 site-local addresses and link-local addresses, which are so-called local-use, unicast addresses.
In the last post of this IPv6 tutorial, you learned about the different address types and the new public IP addresses, the global unicast addresses. Today I will introduce the so-called local-use, unicast addresses, which are those IPv6 addresses that are not routed across the public Internet. There are two types of local-use, unicast addresses: site-local addresses and link-local addresses.
Site-local addresses
Site-local addresses are equivalent to private IP addresses in IPv4. The address space reserved for these addresses, which are only routed within an organization and not on the public Internet, is 10.0.0.0/8, 172.16.0.0/12, and 192.168.0.0/16. In IPv6, the first 10 bits of a site-local address are set to 1111111011, which is why these addresses always begin with FEC0. The following 54 bits are the subnet ID, which you can use in your organization for hierarchical routing, and the last 64 bits are the interface ID, which is the part that has to be unique on a link (local network on which hosts communicate without intervening routers). Thus, the prefix of a site-local address is FEC0::/10.
Note: Site-local addresses have been deprecated, but existing implementations can still continue use them. Thus, they will probably stay around for a while. The proper way to work with private addresses in IPv6 is the use of unique local addresses which I will discuss in my next post.
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