AS145

AS145 is a legacy ARIN-registered Autonomous System whose ARIN ASName is "VBNS," a reference to the Very high-speed Backbone Network Service — a U.S. National Science Foundation-funded research backbone launched in April 1995 and operated by MCI Telecommunications. The vBNS interconnected supercomputing centers and research universities, and is historically notable for pioneering production deployment of ATM, IP multicast, quality of service, and IPv6, including one of the first production OC-48c (2.5 Gbit/s) IP links in February 1999. By 1998 it connected more than 100 institutions across the United States. As universities migrated to Internet2 and the NSF cooperative agreement expired in the early 2000s, the network shifted toward U.S. government use, and after the 2006 MCI–Verizon merger the vBNS+ service became a Verizon Business offering. The current legal holder is Verizon Business Network Services LLC (ARIN registry org "Verizon Business / MCICS"), an active subsidiary of Verizon Communications. The key triage point is that AS145 is operationally dormant: it has not appeared in the global BGP routing table since December 1, 2021, announces zero IPv4 and zero IPv6 prefixes, and its only ever-observed peer was AS325 (U.S. Department of Defense) — consistent with a closed government/research network rather than a commercial transit AS. No notable public abuse signal was found as of June 2026; it is a clean, dormant legacy ASN under a major carrier.

Operator

Verizon Business Network Services LLC; ARIN registry org "Verizon Business (MCICS)" (formerly MCI Communications Corporation) [Confirmed] — ARIN RDAP (rdap.arin.net/registry/autnum/145), bgp.tools/as/145

Country / RIR

US, ARIN [Confirmed] — bgp.he.net/AS145, bgp.tools/as/145

Allocated

ARIN ASN RegDate 1996-04-16 (registry record date, NOT the original BGP appearance; the vBNS network itself launched April 1995); ASN record last updated 2024-07-02 [Confirmed for shown registry date] — bgp.tools/as/145, ipgeolocation.io/browse/asn/AS145

Org status

active ARIN registration; legal entity Verizon Business Network Services LLC (active Verizon subsidiary); AS itself dormant in BGP since 2021-12 [Confirmed] — ARIN RDAP, ipgeolocation.io/browse/asn/AS145

Contacts

tech SWIPP9-ARIN (swipper@verizon.com, +1-800-900-0241); admin/tech VIS1-ARIN (IPMGMT@verizon.com, +1-800-243-6994); abuse ABUSE5603-ARIN (abuse@verizon.com); DNS VZ-DNSADMIN (dnsadmin@verizon.com) [Confirmed] — ARIN RDAP

Security/abuse context (NEUTRAL, DATED)

no notable public abuse signal as of 2026-06-13; not on Spamhaus ASN-DROP (list ts 2026-04-13), CleanTalk 0.00% spam; AbuseIPDB returned 403 (Unknown); the well-known 2019 Verizon BGP leak involved AS701, not AS145 [Confirmed where sourced; AbuseIPDB Unknown] — spamhaus.org/drop/asndrop.json, cleantalk.org/blacklists/AS145

Network & routing

Network type

legacy research/government backbone; third-party DBs classify "BUSINESS"; currently dormant (not a visible transit AS) [Confirmed] — bgp.he.net/AS145, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_high-speed_Backbone_Network_Service

Routing/peering status

NOT in the global routing table since 2021-12-01; 0 IPv4 + 0 IPv6 prefixes announced; bgp.tools confirms "not currently in the global routing table" [Confirmed] — bgp.he.net/AS145, bgp.tools/as/145

Size

effectively 0 active routed addresses; sole historically originated prefix 55.191.112.0/21 (~2,048 IPv4) is flagged a bogon and not currently announced [Confirmed for routing facts] — bgp.he.net/AS145

RPKI

no ROAs exist for AS145; the historic bogon prefix has no ROA coverage [Confirmed] — bgp.he.net/AS145

Peering policy

no PeeringDB entry for AS145 (404); Verizon's published settlement-free peering policy applies to AS701 (main US network), not AS145 [Likely] — verizon.com/business/terms/peering, bgp.he.net/AS145

Notable usage

historic NSF-era high-speed research backbone (vBNS); connected 100+ institutions by 1998; pioneered production ATM, IP multicast, QoS, IPv6, and an early OC-48c IP link (Feb 1999); later government-focused, now dormant

[Confirmed] — en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Very_high-speed_Backbone_Network_Service, bgp.he.net/AS145

Related ASNs

AS701 (Verizon main US network, separate peering policy), AS325 (U.S. DoD, sole historic peer) [Confirmed] — bgp.he.net/AS145, verizon.com/business/terms/peering

ASN name / handle

ASName "VBNS" (Very high-speed Backbone Network Service) [Confirmed] — ARIN RDAP, bgp.he.net/AS145

Peers/upstreams

only ever-observed peer is AS325 (U.S. Department of Defense); no current upstream transit, no customer cone, no AS rank published [Confirmed; AS rank Unknown] — bgp.he.net/AS145, bgp.tools/as/145

Analyst note

A historic vBNS curiosity now dormant under Verizon Business; registry resolves to Verizon, not MCI/NSF. Clean legacy ASN with no active routing footprint.