Investigating Public IP Address Assignment in Infrastructureless Social
Networks
Authors: Ramkissoon Amit 
Published: July 2023

An Internet Protocol (IP) address is a logical address that is used by
the router to identify a device on a network. An IP version 4 (IPv4) address
is composed of 32 bits that are split into 4 octets of 8 bits each. Each
IPv4 address is encoded using decimal notation giving the address the
appearance of being composed of 4 integers. As such IPv4 addresses range
from 0.0.0.0 to 255.255.255.255 with 232 or 4294967296 possible addresses.
An IP version 6 (IPv6) address is composed of 128 bits that are split into 8
octets of 16 bits each. Each IPv6 address is encoded using hexadecimal
notation giving the address the appearance of being composed of 32
alphanumeric characters. As such IPv6 addresses range from
0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000:0000 to FFFF:FFFF:FFFF:FFFF:FFFF:FFFF:
FFFF:FFFF with 2128 or 340282366920938463463374607431768211456 possible
addresses. Infrastructureless Networks are distributed networks where no
sense of infrastructure is present in the network. As such, no central
server or administrative device is present and each device operates as a
client and a server. When such infrastructureless networks are used for
sharing news and social interactions, it is defined as an Infrastructureless
Social Network. Hence given the finite set of public IP addresses available
to devices on Infrastructureless Social Networks and the dynamic nature of
Infrastructureless Social Networks, there is a need to conserve public IP
addresses on such networks. Therefore, this work proposes the Law of
Conservation of IP Addresses and uses Infrastructureless Social Networks as
a test base. The proposed Law of Conservation of IP Addresses states that a
public IP address cannot be created nor destroyed but rather redistributed
by a DHCP Server from one end device to another. Based upon this proposed
law, Infrastructureless Social Networks are used as the testing ground for
testing the proposed law. In Infrastructureless Social Networks, one
approach by which public IP addresses are normally assigned is based upon
some form of grouping or clustering. In the group, the group leader is used
as the administrator of the group and is normally charged with distributing
the IP addresses to members of the group. The public IP addresses are
assigned based upon those that are available on the network and hence are
not created as the Law of Conservation of IP Addresses proposed above. When
each device leaves the network, the device releases the public IP address
back to the network and it is once again available for use by a device.
Hence the public IP address is not destroyed. If the group leader leaves the
network, the members of the group appoint a new group leader and the public
IP address is updated accordingly. Even though there is no central device,
each end device acts as a DHCP server and distributes addresses as they join
and leave the network. Hence the Infrastructureless Social Networks have
proven to be an excellent testbed for the Law of Conservation of IP
Addresses. As such the conclusion is that the Law of Conservation of IP
addresses aptly describes how public IP addresses are assigned and have
proven its applicability to the world of Infrastructureless Social Networks.