the article describing how to disable ipv6 notes this at the bottom: "if you disable IPv6, you will not be able to use Windows Meeting Space or any application that relies on the Windows Peer-to-Peer Networking platform or the Teredo transition technology. " I am trying to determine if it is safe for me to disable ipv6 on my server 2008 sp2 machines. 1. what is the peer-to-peer networking platform? and what uses it? 2. what is Teredo and what uses it? any input would be greatly appreciated.

Teredo is a ipv6 tunneling protocol which allows ipv6 over ipv4 networks. here is a great description http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teredo_tunnelingas to the peer-to-peer networkign platform this will help as it is a broad topic http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/network/bb545868.aspx Dislaimer 1:As usual I could be way off so no playing like I'm Frankenstein. Disclaimer 2: my Speeling and proofing skills are teh fail

Liam is correct with his definitions.As to "is it safe?", yes, but we don't recommend it. Why do you want to turn it off? It doesn't do anything unless you have software that needs to use it. As the world shifts towards IPv6, you're set and ready to go if you leave it enabled.Dave Bishop Senior Technical Writer Windows Server Networking User Assistance

wreaks havok with exchange 2007 as well lol Dislaimer 1:As usual I could be way off so no playing like I'm Frankenstein. Disclaimer 2: my Speeling and proofing skills are teh fail

hi, thanks for the replies... as to why I would disable it: well, I'm not using it and during the process of troubleshooting an issue I'm having I noticed the following: 1. ipv6 addresses showing in ipconfig output even though I unchecked the ipv6 protocol in the NIC properties (I later learned that doing that is not enough) 2. its a server, running server services and so I noticed that some of these services were listening on the ipv6 addresses (which I did not assign, and there is no ipv6 running on my network) Some of the services like dhcp and dns I just directed to only listen on my ipv4 address but I don't know about all of them 3. I see my server's ipv6 addresses in DNS, from dynamic updates. All the servers I'm dealing with in my case are AD domain controllers and DNS servers. So it looked to me like a potential problem where clients could be directed to an ipv6 address.... plus considering I use builtin host based firewall and only configure rules for ipv4 connections if a client is directed to ipv6 address then it will fail. Also, general security best practice of reducing attack surface by not having things enabled that are not used but could open potential security vulnerabilities. 4. if I check/select the ipv6 protocol again on my nics do I leave them dhcp or do I need to assign a static address? Its a server after all, there should only be statically assigned addresses right? I don't have any ipv6 addresses, only ipv4, so what would I use? Thats what I was thinking, anyway... and I may be wrong, so any comments on my comments are certianly welcome.

well i mean it will be safe to turn off as long as the server isn't running something dependant on it such as exchange 07 or access anywhere and you can always turn it back on and configure it when the time comes. Also keep in mind that IPv6 traffic runs ipsec as part of the standard so it gives you some nice security. Dislaimer 1:As usual I could be way off so no playing like I'm Frankenstein. Disclaimer 2: my Speeling and proofing skills are teh fail

thanks again for the info... so moving forward if I am to re-enable IPv6 but don't have any IPv6 infrastructure/address in place how should I configure the server? It doesn't seem like a good idea to leave the NICs set to receive address from DHCP and I don't have any IPv6 addresses to statically assign?

These things might help youhttp://www.simpledns.com/private-ipv6.aspxhttp://www.enterprisenetworkingplanet.com/netsp/article.php/3633211http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/network/bb530961.aspx Dislaimer 1:As usual I could be way off so no playing like I'm Frankenstein. Disclaimer 2: my Speeling and proofing skills are teh fail