In this short article, we will see the need for private IPv4 addressing. You would understand why there is a private IPv4 address and a public IPv4 address.
If you don’t know the difference between a private IPv4 address and a public IPv4 address, click here to find out.
Basic Cisco commands for configurations part 2 – CISCO (dir-tech.com)
IPv4 addressing
Originally, the Internet was intended for communication within the military and also between universities and government agencies.
As the commercialization of the Internet began, IPv4 addresses began to run out.
In fact, the computer network is designed so that each device has at least one IPv4 address to communicate with the other devices.
And with the growth of users and devices, IPv4 shortages have begun.
To address these shortages, researchers have found three solutions, including the following technologies:
- Private Network Addresses;
- Network Address Translation (NAT) ;
- And IPv6 addressing.
We will focus on private IPv4 addresses here.
IPv4 Addressing and Subnetting – CCNA 200-301 (dir-tech.com)
Need for private IPv4 addressing
IPv4 was the first version of Internet Protocol (IP) to be widely deployed, and still forms the basis for the majority of Internet communications today.
A maximum of 4,294,967,296 or 232 IPv4 addresses can therefore be allocated simultaneously in theory. And the world population is at 7.9 billion in 2022, the majority of people have at least one device. Hence the problem of lack of IPv4 address.
To partially solve the IPv4 scarcity problem, the solution is private IPv4 addressing.
The need for a private IP address is that we can assign an IPv4 address to any device that does not need to be connected to the Internet with that address.
That is, the same private IPv4 addressing range used on one company’s local network can be used on another company’s local network.
This technology has largely solved the IPv4 shortage problem.
Private IPv4 addressing technology is coupled with NAT (Network Address Translation) technology.
En effet, pour accéder à Internet, les entreprises utilisent NAT, qui traduit les adresses IPv4 des ordinateurs d’un réseau local de chaque entreprise en une seule adresse IPv4 publique que les entreprises peuvent utiliser sur Internet.
Conclusion
In short, private IPv4 addresses are used for local communications, i.e. communications that do not require Internet service.
Moreover, the biggest advantage of the private IP address is that it is free, whereas public IP addresses are expensive.
