Tanzania will soon move from its current Internet Protocol Version 4 (IPv4) to version 6 to prevent the country from having a digital blackout.
John Nkoma, director general of the Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA), said the shift from IPv4 will be a gradual and smooth process that will not affect providers.
The Daily News reports the current system is “overwhelmed” meaning a blackout was possible.
“Switching from one internet protocol to another will be slightly different from the recent analogue to digital television migration; the move from IPv4 to IPv6 will not require new hardware or added software on the side of users,” said Nkoma.
Mobile phone service providers in Tanzania have apparently been having problems rolling out the new faster and advanced 4G on IPv4 and the upgrade may therefore have to wait for the IPv6 protocol.
IPv4 provides around 4.3 billion addresses, a subset of which have been distributed by the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (INANA) to the Regional Internet Registries in blocks of an estimated 16.8 million addresses each.
