1.3 Internet Protocol Addressing Solutions
Private IPv4 Addresses
- Used for network communication on the internal network
- Referred to as an RFC1918 IP address
- Internal or private IP addresses are not reachable by external devices over the internet
- These IP address ranges can be used on multiple networks, and not reachable through the internet
- Network Address Translation (NAT) server is used to facilitate communication externally
- NAT server can be a router or firewall which translates the the private IP to a public IP to ensure external communication.
- NAT server will have a limited number of public IP addresses assigned to it, which minimizes the use of these public IP addresses
- Port Address Translation (PAT) is utilized to reduce the use of public IP addresses.
- Multiple devices can connect to the internet using only one public IP address for communication. PAT is used by routers to facilitate communication.