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Wasted netspace (recovering)

  • From: listuser
  • Date: Sun May 18 19:46:51 2003

Howdy.  This afternoon I was working with a used switch I recently
purchased when I noticed it still had the previous owner's IP in it.  I
noted that it wasn't a reserved address that I recognized so I looked it
up.  As it turned out the IP belonged to Occidental Petroleum Corp
(oxy.com) and was part of a /16 (155.224.0.0/16).  The fact that it they
had a /16 was a bit surprising.  Seeing how it was allocated back in 1992,
I guess I really shouldn't be that surprised.  I figured they must have
enough remote offices to reasonably use a large portion of that /16.  
While loading their website I noted that www.oxy.com fell into another
netblock (208.35.252.113/24).  I was curious enough (read: bored) that I
eventually queried Arin's WHOIS for Occidental Petroleum and was quite
surprised at what I saw.

http://ws.arin.net/cgi-bin/whois.pl?queryinput=occidental%20petroleum

OCCIDENTAL PETROLEUM (OCCIDE-1)
Occidental Petroleum Corp. (OPC)
Occidental Petroleum Corporation (OPC-2)
Occidental Petroleum IP (OPI-1)
Occidental Petroleum Corporation (AS26517) OXYHOUAS-01    26517
OCCIDENTAL PETROLEUM FON-106789196846411 (NET-63-166-189-0-1)
63.166.189.0 - 63.166.189.255
OCCIDENTAL PETROLEUM FON-106789094446405 (NET-63-166-185-0-1)
63.166.185.0 - 63.166.185.255
OCCIDENTAL PETROLEUM FON-106789068846359 (NET-63-166-184-0-1)
63.166.184.0 - 63.166.184.255
OCCIDENTAL PETROLEUM FON-106790118446425 (NET-63-166-225-0-1)
63.166.225.0 - 63.166.225.255
OCCIDENTAL PETROLEUM FON-110111612871621 (NET-65-161-178-224-1) 
65.161.178.224 - 65.161.178.255
OCCIDENTAL PETROLEUM FON-349201920042097 (NET-208-35-252-0-1)
208.35.252.0 - 208.35.252.255
Occidental Petroleum Corp. OXY1-NET (NET-155-224-0-0-1)
155.224.0.0 - 155.224.255.255
Occidental Petroleum Corporation OXY-2 (NET-170-189-0-0-1)
170.189.0.0 - 170.189.255.255
Occidental Petroleum Corporation OXY-3 (NET-199-248-164-0-1)
199.248.164.0 - 199.248.168.255
Occidental Petroleum IP FON-106769945643237 (NET-63-163-205-0-1) 
63.163.205.0 - 63.163.205.255
Occidental Petroleum IP FON-106780672044417 (NET-63-165-112-0-1) 
63.165.112.0 - 63.165.112.255

They have not one /16 but two /16s, eight /24s, one /22, and one /27.  
Does this seem a little excessive to anyone else?  I can think of a dozen 
state-run universities off of the top of my head that could never dream of 
justifying a /16, let alone more.

I hate to pummel a dead horse but would it be worthwhile to ask these
corporations to relinguish netblocks that they don't use or can't justify
keeping?  "Because I'm paying you" isn't a good enough reason IMHO.  
Would it be worthwhile to have organizations with direct allocations
submit a netblock usage summary every 4-5 years to justify keeping their
existing blocks?  I know it might be hard for ARIN to justify taking back
someone's netblocks.  It just irks me to no ends to see a considerable 
amount of wasted netspace such as this.

Pardon me for asking because I imagine this has been discussed many times
before.

Justin Shore