Apple criticized for backing off on support of IPv6

At the North American IPv6 Summit held in Denver last week, Apple came under fire for not providing support for the next-generation of the Internet Protocol in the latest version of Apple's AirPort Utility.

The criticism came from several speakers at the conference, but most notably from John Brzozowski, a Comcast distinguished engineer considered to be one of the chief architects of IPv6. In speaking about AirPort Utility 6.0, Brzozowski was quoted on NetworkWorld as saying that "Apple has taken the ability to seamlessly support IPv6 away from the AirPort Utility. It's a little concerning. We hoped to see more IPv6 support, not less, among [customer premises equipment] vendors."

Previous versions of the AirPort Utility allowed AirPort owners to configure and maintain settings for IPv6, while the newest version only provides support for IPv4. In order to provide support for IPv6, Comcast is recommending that AirPort Utility version 5.6 be installed alongside the newer version.

IPv6 is expected to be deployed widely starting in 2012, primarily due to the need for a larger number of available IP addresses. Companies such as Comcast need to support IPv6 end to end, and home gateways need to provide IPv6 support as well. All Apple hardware supports IPv6 addressing, but the changes to AirPort Utility present a major barrier to adoption of the new protocol for users of Apple's networking products.

Thanks to TUAW reader David for the tip