Organizations struggling to adopt IPv6 could get a hand from a new service offered by Verizon

The global body in charge of allocating Internet addresses expects to hand out the final blocks of IPv4 (Internet Protocol version 4) addresses to regional registrars early next year, it said Monday. Those allocations would mark a depletion at the global level of IPv4 addresses -- something that has been anticipated for years -- and put further pressure on network operators to switch to the newer IPv6 address system, which has massively more addresses available.

Leading Web content providers -- including Google, Yahoo, Netflix, and Microsoft -- are conducting early-stage conversations about creating a shared list of customers who can access their Web sites via IPv6, the long-anticipated upgrade to the Internet's main communications protocol.

The most popular Web sites are under increasing pressure to add support for IPv6, a long-anticipated upgrade to IPv4, the Internet's main communications protocol.

Corporations and government agencies must IPv6-enable their public-facing Web sites in the next 24 months or risk upsetting a growing number of visitors with lower-grade connectivity.

Google plans to upgrade its YouTube video streaming Web site to provide support for IPv6, a long-anticipated upgrade to the Internet's main communications protocol.

Hurricane Electric, a Fremont, Calif., ISP, will announce on Monday that its IPv6 network has doubled in size in less than a year -- a sign of how rapidly IPv6 traffic is increasing across the Internet.

U.S. ISPs are requesting more IPv6 addresses and fewer IPv4 addresses than ever before -- a sign that carriers are investing in the future amidst one of the deepest recessions in modern history.

Been meaning to catch up on IPv6, the next generation Internet Protocol? We've backtracked and collected a handful of stories that will get you up to speed well before IPv4 addresses run out.

The University of New Hampshire InterOperability Laboratory in July conducted the first trial of the U.S. federal government's new IPv6 test suite on equipment from 10 leading network vendors, including Cisco, Juniper, Microsoft, Hewlett-Packard and Sun.