4. Promoting IPv6

An issue that ICANN, the Commerce Department and the entire U.S. government will face in 2009 is the ongoing transition to IPv6, an upgrade to the Internet's main communications protocol.

IPv6 provides virtually unlimited address space, built-in security and simplified network management. Created by the Internet Engineering Task Force in 1998, IPv6 replaces IPv4, which supports 4.3 billion individually addressed devices on the network.

is running out, and experts agree that the 27-year-old protocol will not support all the Internet-connected devices used by the world's 6.5 billion people in the future. provides so many IP addresses -- 2 to the 128th power -- that it is expected to enable secure, mobile and embedded applications that are inconceivable today.

Federal agencies last June to upgrade all backbone networks to be capable of supporting IPv6 traffic.