NAT

Background and History of NAT NAT (Network Address Translation) is a core technology that translates between private and public IP addresses in network communications. It emerged in the mid-1990s to address the IPv4 address depletion problem and was first standardized through the IETF’s RFC 1631 document in 1994, later revised as RFC 2663 in 1999 to take its current form. The original internet design assumed all devices would have unique public IP addresses, but rapid internet expansion from the late 1980s led to the quick depletion of the 32-bit IPv4 address space (approximately 4.3 billion addresses). NAT was developed as a short-term solution to this problem and has become an essential technology forming the foundation of global network infrastructure. NAT is widely used in everything from home routers to large-scale corporate networks, cloud infrastructure, and mobile communication networks, and even with IPv6 transition underway, it continues to play an important role for legacy system support and security purposes. ...