Secom customers have a few options concerning their IP address needs, and this article will help to explain the differences and the practices Secom uses with our IP address resources.
As you may have heard, the IP address scheme that's largely in use on the Internet (IP Version 4, IPV4) today has been completely depleted. As such, the need to conserve and actively transition to a new version of IP addresses (IPV6) is needed. Secom's effort to conserve our IPv4 address space is out of consideration to existing and future customers that may have specific needs for their Secom Internet services that go beyond the typical customer use case.
DHCP - the free and simple solution
Most residential and small/medium business customers can be fully served with a single, free IP address that Secom will provide via DHCP. This will allow the customer router to automatically be assigned an address from a Secom server. Secom can assign an IP address to your router, and as the Internet at large starts shifting to be more IPv6-centric, we can automatically help our customers in that transition.
Static IP addresses (IPV4)
Some Secom Internet customers may need a static IP address for their technical needs. Typically this is only the case when the customer is hosting a device or service that needs to be publicly reachable from anywhere else on the internet. Examples of such are customers that host their own email servers, web servers, or some types of remote monitoring services. Secom charges a price of $7 per IP per month for customers that need to have dedicated/static IP addresses.
To request a static IP address please contact our sales team to get started. They will need you to fill out an IP Justification Form, and you can find the instructional guide here.
Secom allows 8 IPv4 Static IP's per Forte or Secom Wireless internet service. If you need more than that you'll need to upgrade to a Dedicated Internet Access package.
Carrier Grade NAT (CG-NAT)
Secom has begun implementing a process known as carrier grade NAT which allows us to expand our IPv4 conservation efforts even further. We can assign (via DHCP) customers non-globally-unique IPv4 addresses via DHCP which still allows them to connect to many of the common Internet applications (Netflix, Facebook, YouTube, email, and other general cloud based web apps). We've already begun rolling out CG-NAT to different markets and will continue to do so over the coming months. This may affect certain applications that may have been previously working to have problems, most notably some Internet connected gaming consoles like Xbox, PS4, etc that rely on the application having a unique, publicly reachable IP address in order to function. If that's the case, then the purchase of a Static IPv4 address may be the only fix to the problem. We continue to further explore options, most notably putting engineering time towards IPv6. View our infographic to further explain the difference between CG-Nat solution and Static IPv4 address solution
IPv6 - the better solution
Secom has been actively working on having an IPv6 solution for years now. The problem is that the content providers (Netflix, Microsoft, Google), the service providers (Secom, Comcast, AT&T) and the equipment vendors (Netgear, Cisco, etc) are all in various stages of being ready for IPv6. You can have a router and a service provider that are IPv6 enabled, but if the website you're trying to get to is not...then it wont work. Secom's primary goal, right now, is to allow traffic that is destined to IPv6 enabled content to get there via IPv6, all the while working with customer and equipment vendors do testing and enabling of IPv6 between Secom and our customers. This will take a while, but we're committed to stay on top and steadily make progress alongside the content and equipment providers of our industry.
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