ICANN announced today that for the first time, an IPv6 nameserver address has been added to the Internet's root DNS zone. This next generation version of the Internet Protocol provides trillions more addresses than the IPv4 system that is in use by most networks today.

By taking this significant step forward in the transition to IPv6, ICANN is supporting the innovations through which the Internet evolves to meet the growing needs of a global economy.

On 20 July 2004 at 18:33 UTC the IPv6 AAAA records for the Japan (.jp) and Korea (.kr) country code Top Level Domain (ccTLD) nameservers became visible in the root zone file with serial number 2004072000. It is expected that the IPv6 records for France (.fr) will be added shortly. Other requests are pending and will be added in accordance with documented procedure, which was developed through ICANN's unique multi-stakeholder consensus-based approach. .

Recognizing the importance of IPv6 to the Internet community, ICANN has coordinated with its Root Server System Advisory Committee, Top Level Domain managers, Security and Stability Advisory Committee, and other interested parties in careful analysis of this issue. After a period of thorough examination, the decision was made to move forward with deployment of the IPv6 address records in the manner prescribed by the community.

ICANN is the global public-benefit non-profit organisation responsible for coordinating the Internet's naming and numbering systems. For more information please visit: .