Recently, three departments, including the People's Bank of China ("PBC"), have jointly issued the Implementing Opinions on Executing the Action Plan for Promoting the Large-scale Deployment of Internet Protocol Version 6 (IPv6) in the Financial Sector (the "Opinions").
According to the Opinions, main objectives will be achieved in three steps. By the end of 2019, portals of financial service agencies are expected to support IPv6-based network connection and access; by the end of 2020, internet application systems developed by financial service agencies for public services will support the IPv6-based network connection and access, and have the equivalent capacity to guarantee business sustainability to that prior to the IPv6 transformation; and as of 2021, on the basis of effective IPv6 transformation of internet application systems for public services in the financial sector, further efforts will be made to consistently promote the large-scale IPv6 deployment and gradually create a next-generation internet featuring high speed, wide popularity, full coverage and smart functions. Also, the Opinions require that, in the course of expanding the large-scale IPv6 deployment in the financial sector, attention shall be paid to ensuring the safe and stable operation of systems in the first place, then combining the transformation of application systems and the upgrading of software and hardware infrastructure, and eventually promoting the deployment both in a deep-going manner and extensively.