AS3316 RELARN Research & Education Network

Registered as RELARN — "Research & Education Network", Moscow — and now held

by the joint-stock company that operates MSK-IX, the Moscow Internet Exchange.

What it's used for

• Historically the routing identity of RELARN, the association that connected Russian research and academic institutions to the internet.
• Today it sits with the MSK-IX organisation, whose main business is running Russia's largest internet exchange and the associated network services.

Notable

• An exchange-point operator is an unusual holder for an academic AS handle; the RELARN name has simply been carried forward on the registration rather than renamed.
• The block is a research-era allocation (roughly 11,000 IPv4 addresses), much larger than a modern exchange operator would be issued.

Interesting

• The handle is a small artefact of how the Russian internet grew: academic networks came first, and the commercial interconnect infrastructure was built by the same people around them.