INEX MoU

Revision: October 2016

The INEX Memorandum and Articles of Association are available as a separate download.

General

The Internet Neutral Exchange (INEX) is a member owned organisation which facilitates providers of Internet services to easily interconnect within Ireland, and hence improve connectivity and service for their customers nationally and internationally.

INEX operates switches at which members can connect to shared-access Ethernet networks (LANs) provisioned in high-specification, custom-built data centres.

Membership of INEX is for recognised legal entities whose business includes Internet transmission of content or services.

Structure of INEX

The operation of INEX is governed by the Memorandum and Articles of Association of the Internet Neutral Exchange Association Ltd. The governing law for INEX and this Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) is that of Ireland.

This MoU describes the requirements for new Members to join INEX, and the ongoing requirements for Members.

The final authority over INEX is the Committee, which comprises eight persons who are elected in accordance with the Articles of Association by the authorised representatives of the full member organisations. The Committee shall operate and abide by the Rules and Constitution of INEX. The Committee shall have final authority to interpret this MoU.

Cost Recovery

There are costs associated with the operation of INEX. These costs will be recovered from the Members on an equitable, shared basis. INEX is a company limited by guarantee, with no shareholders, operating on a not-for-profit basis.

New Members will pay the appropriate set-up and annual fees, as determined from time to time by the Committee and published in the INEX schedule of membership fees. New Members joining during the year will pay fees prorated to the beginning of the month in which they join.

Existing Members will pay the agreed annual fees for that year within 30 days of the due date. The fees will be reviewed at least once a year by the Committee so as to cover the projected costs of the upcoming year.

Port connectivity will be charged at the appropriate connection rate as published in the INEX schedule of membership fees. If a Member requires additional services from INEX these may be charged for separately, by agreement.

Requirements

All Members are required at all times to adhere to both the Organisational Requirements and Technical Requirements of INEX, as set out below. Prior to their membership application being approved, new Members must demonstrate, to the satisfaction of the Committee, that they will be able to meet these requirements. Members who cease to meet any of these requirements subsequent to joining may lose their membership, subject to the Memorandum and Articles of Association of INEX. The Committee may amend the Requirements below from time to time and will publish these changes on the INEX web site. Members agree to comply with any amendments within 30 days. Members must not use the name “INEX” or “Internet Neutral Exchange Association” in any publicity, advertising or company literature without prior consent of the Chief Executive of INEX or the Committee, acting on behalf of the Members.

Organisational Requirements

1. Members business shall include the Internet transmission of content or services
2. Members must have their own permanent connection to the Internet, separate from any INEX connection.
3. The primary means of communication between Members will be email.
4. Each Member will provide their contact details for operation matters, and contact details of the person or persons to whom requests for peering should be sent. These contact details will be published on the Members’ area of the INEX web site. Any peering request by another member must be responded to within 5 working days of the request.
5. An appropriate level of insurance relating to equipment located at INEX and staff indemnification is to be maintained by all Members of INEX with respect to INEX, to companies providing services to INEX, and to third parties. Members will not hold INEX liable for any loss whatsoever resulting from the activities of another Member.
6. Members must pay all fees due within 30 days of the due date. Members may have their membership suspended or ceased for non-payment, subject to the discretion of the Committee, and a re-connection fee may apply.
7. Members must not carry out any illegal activities through INEX.
8. In the event of any claims made or actions taken by a Member against INEX (but excluding claims or actions where death occurs or personal injury arises) the maximum amount payable for whatever reason shall be limited to a maximum of the fees paid by the Member to INEX for the INEX financial year in which the incident occurred. Members shall not hold INEX liable for any loss whatsoever resulting from the illegal use or use not conforming to the terms of this MoU by another Member. Where a Member makes a claim or takes an action against INEX for death or personal injury the liability of INEX in respect thereof shall be limited to a sum (inclusive of legal costs, expenses and special damages) not greater than the maximum amount to which INEX’s insurers shall pay in respect thereof pursuant to the provisions of INEX’s Policy or Policies of Insurance.

Technical Requirements

1. General
   1. Members must ensure that their usage of INEX is not detrimental to the usage of INEX by other Members. Members must also ensure that their usage is in compliance with applicable Internet standards as published by the IETF and as documented in the current version of STD 1.
   2. Members should not routinely use INEX for carrying traffic between their own routers.
   3. Traffic may only be forwarded from one INEX Member to another if permission has been given by the recipient, either by advertising a route across an INEX LAN or else explicitly in writing.
2. Connectivity
   1. INEX provides connectivity to its infrastructure using switched shared Ethernet LANs. The following requirements apply:
      1. All traffic frames destined to a particular INEX physical interface and to INEX peering LANs must have the same source MAC address.
      2. Physical interfaces of the same speed on the same physical INEX switch may be aggregated together using IEEE 802.3ad link aggregation control protocol, by prior agreement with INEX.
      3. For the purposes of gaining access to multiple INEX peering LANs over the same physical port or link-aggregated group of ports, IEEE 802.1q packet framing may be used by prior agreement with INEX. If 802.1q framing is used on a port or port group, then all packets on that port or port group must be configured to use 802.1q framing.
      4. All traffic frames directed to INEX peering LANs must be configured to use IEEE 802.3 Ethernet encapsulation, with one of the following ethertypes:
         • 0x0806 – ARP
         • 0x0800 – IPv4
         • 0x86dd – IPv6
      5. With the exception of ARP and IPv6 Neighbour Discovery, traffic frames directed towards INEX peering LANs must not be addressed to a broadcast MAC destination.
      6. Proxy ARP must be disabled on all interfaces connected to INEX peering LANs.
      7. With the exception of ARP and IPv6 Neighbour Discovery, link-local traffic must not be forwarded to INEX peering LANs. Link-local traffic includes, but is not limited to:
         • IEEE 802 Spanning Tree
         • Vendor-proprietary discovery protocols (e.g. CDP, EDP)
         • BOOTP/DHCP
         • IPv6 Router Advertisement and Router Solicitation
         • IPv4 ICMP redirects and IPv6 redirects
         • All interior routing protocol announcements (e.g. RIP, OSPF, IGRP, EIGRP, ISIS)
         • IRDP
      8. Members must not configure IPv4 or IPv6 addresses on interfaces connected to INEX peering LANs other than those assigned to them by INEX.
      9. Members must not use IPv4 or IPv6 addresses on interfaces connected to INEX peering LANs for any purpose other than BGP peering on TCP port 179, IGMP, PIM and ICMP control traffic necessary for proper network operation, monitoring and diagnostics. In particular, these network addresses must not be used for network address translation or any other form of layer 3 traffic proxying.
      10. IP packets received from an INEX peering LAN with a destination IP address of any INEX peering LAN’s directed broadcast address must be ignored.
      11. Broadcast traffic forwarded to a particular INEX peering LAN must not exceed 50 packets per second.
   2. INEX reserves the right to disconnect any port which violates any of the requirements listed in section 2.1.
3. Policy Routing
   1. Each Member must have their own Autonomous System number, and register the routing policy for their AS in the RIPE routing registry or another public routing registry.
   2. Unicast peering between Members’ routers across INEX will be via BGP (version 4 or subsequent).
   3. Each Member must register in advance, in the RIPE routing registry or another public routing registry, all routes to be announced through any peerings at INEX.
   4. Members shall not generate unnecessary route flap, or advertise unnecessarily specific routes in peering sessions with other Members across INEX.
   5. Members may not advertise routes with a next-hop other than that of their own routers without the prior written permission of the advertised party, the advertisee, and INEX.
   6. Each Member must peer with the INEX route collector. If a Member advertises any routes to another Member, it must also advertise these routes to the INEX route collector.
   7. For each LAN that a Member connects to, the Member must maintain a peering relationship with at least 2 other Members connected to that LAN.
   8. IPv4 and IPv6 address prefixes assigned to INEX must not be advertised to other networks without the explicit permission of INEX.
4. Physical
   1. Any equipment installed by a Member at INEX must be clearly labelled as belonging to the Member. Members must notify INEX of equipment details and insurance values prior to installing or changing any equipment.
   2. Members must not interfere with equipment owned by others installed at INEX or in the room or cage containing INEX without the explicit permission of the owner.
   3. Members have a duty of confidentiality to INEX and other INEX Members. In particular, Members must not install packet sniffers to monitor traffic passing through INEX.
   4. Members may not directly connect customers to their router housed in any INEX rack.
   5. Members may not connect equipment to or otherwise provide connectivity to INEX switch infrastructure on behalf of non-Members.