WebProNews

The European Commission said today that it is setting a goal to get 25 percent of EU industry, public authorities and households to use IPv6 by 2010.

"In the short term, businesses and public authorities might be tempted to try to squeeze their needs into the strait jacket of the old system, but this would mean Europe is badly placed to take advantage of the latest internet technology, and could face a crisis when the old system runs out of addresses," said Viviane Reding, EU Commissioner for Information Society and Media.

"IPv6 provides more addresses in cyberspace than there are grains of sand on the world's beaches, " said Reding.

IPv4 provides 4.3 billion addresses, with about 700 million or 16 percent available for new connections. The new Internet protocol, IPv6, will make an almost unlimited amount of IP-addresses available along with supporting new applications.

The Commissions wants the most important Web sites in Europe to take the lead on the initiative and hopes to receive commitments from at least 100 top European Web site operators, including broadcasters or online news services, before the end of 2008.