AS224

AS224 is a low-number legacy autonomous system registered under RIPE NCC to the operator historically named UNINETT and now operated by Sikt — Kunnskapssektorens Tjenesteleverandor (the Norwegian Agency for Shared Services in Education and Research). It is Norway's National Research and Education Network (NREN): the academic backbone connecting Norwegian universities, university colleges, research institutes, libraries, archives, and related public-sector institutions. The operator originated as a project in 1976, was incorporated as the state-owned company Uninett AS in 1993, and merged on 1 January 2022 with NSD and Unit to form the public body Sikt; the RIPE autnum record still carries the legacy name "UNINETT" under organization ORG-UA17-RIPE. The ASN is actively routed and well-integrated into the global fabric: CAIDA marks it a clique member (top-tier peering core), it announces roughly 17 IPv4 prefixes and 2 IPv6 prefixes with near-100% RIS visibility, and it reaches upstream via NORDUnet (AS2603), the pan-Nordic research backbone, with onward reach to GÉANT. It peers across Norway's regional exchanges (NIX Oslo, BIX Bergen, TRDIX Trondheim, SIX Stavanger, TIX Tromsø) under an open peering policy and runs a public looking glass. The RIPE autnum top-level registration event is dated 2002-09-18 (last modified 2022-08-02), though prefix 129.241.0.0/16 was first seen in BGP as early as August 2000. No notable public abuse signal was found as of June 2026 — AS224 is absent from Spamhaus ASN-DROP, carries zero RPKI-invalid prefixes, and is covered by Sikt CERT and NORDUnet CERT. The only security-adjacent signal is DDoS-amplifier infrastructure (open resolvers / misconfigured services) within its large academic IP space, a common trait of NREN networks with diverse institutional end users rather than operator-level abuse.

Operator

UNINETT (registry name) — now operated by Sikt, Kunnskapssektorens Tjenesteleverandor / Norwegian Agency for Shared Services in Education and Research; RIPE org ORG-UA17-RIPE, Trondheim, Norway [Confirmed] — RIPE RDAP autnum/224, sikt.no/en/about-sikt, connect.geant.org/2022/01/05/welcome-sikt

Country / RIR

NO (Norway), RIPE NCC [Confirmed] — RIPE RDAP autnum/224, bgp.he.net/AS224, ipinfo.io/AS224

Allocated

2002-09-18 (RIPE RDAP autnum top-level registration event — first-party RIR fact, NOT an IEEE date); last modified 2022-08-02 [Confirmed] — RIPE RDAP autnum/224 events[]

Org status

public administrative body (forvaltningsorgan) under the Norwegian Ministry of Education and Research; formed 1 January 2022 by merger of Uninett AS (founded as a project 1976, incorporated 1993), NSD, and Unit [Confirmed] — connect.geant.org/2022/01/05/welcome-sikt, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uninett

Contacts

abuse@uninett.no; peering@uninett.no; kontakt@sikt.no (NOC); looking glass http://stats.uninett.no/lg; HQ Trondheim, Norway [Confirmed for abuse via RIPEstat/RDAP, peering/NOC/LG via PeeringDB] — RIPE RDAP autnum/224, peeringdb.com/asn/224, RIPEstat abuse-contact-finder

Security/abuse context (NEUTRAL, DATED)

no notable public abuse signal found as of 2026-06-19 — not in Spamhaus ASN-DROP (430-entry list checked, AS224 absent), not in community bad-ASN blocklists, 0 RPKI-invalid prefixes, no NANOG abuse threads, no documented breach/DDoS/LE action 2024–2026; only signal is DDoS-amplifier infrastructure (open resolvers / misconfigured services) within its large academic space — common for NRENs, not operator-level abuse

Network & routing

Network type

National Research and Education Network (NREN) — research/education backbone for Norwegian universities, colleges, research institutes, libraries, archives, and public institutions [Confirmed] — peeringdb.com/asn/224, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uninett, sikt.no/en/about-sikt

Size

actively routed — ~17 IPv4 prefixes and 2 IPv6 prefixes (2001:700::/32, 2001:67c:714::/48); RIPEstat address estimate ~1,050,880 IPv4 addresses; CAIDA customer cone 6 ASNs / 28 prefixes / 1,186,880 addresses [Confirmed] — RIPEstat routing-status, RIPEstat announced-prefixes, CAIDA AS Rank

Routing/peering

CAIDA AS rank 3659; clique member = true (top-tier core); neighbor degree 14 (5 customers, 8 peers, 1 provider); upstream NORDUnet AS2603; RIS visibility ~326/327 v4, 324/324 v6; first BGP visibility 2000-08-18 (129.241.0.0/16, predates RDAP registration event) [Confirmed] — CAIDA AS Rank, RIPEstat routing-status, bgp.tools/as/224. Open peering policy, no route servers, supports IPv4/IPv6/Multicast, IRR object AS-UNINETT

[Confirmed] — peeringdb.com/asn/224

RPKI

0 RPKI-invalid prefixes; validates RPKI ROV (route origin validation); strong IRR compliance [Confirmed] — bgp.he.net/AS224, bgp.tools/as/224

Notable usage

Norway's NREN since 1976 (incorporated 1993), academic/research backbone; participates in NORDUnet (Nordic research backbone) and GÉANT (pan-European research network); historically linked to Norid (.no TLD registry); traffic shows a pronounced weekday business-hours peak consistent with an academic constituency

[Confirmed/Likely] — en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uninett, connect.geant.org/2022/01/05/welcome-sikt, ipinfo.io/AS224

Related ASNs / upstream

NORDUnet AS2603 (sole upstream / Nordic research backbone) [Confirmed] — bgp.tools/as/224, ipinfo.io/AS224

IXPs

NIX1 Oslo (100G), NIX2 Oslo (20G), BIX Bergen (10G), TRDIX Trondheim (20G), SIX Stavanger (10G), TIX Tromsø (1G) [Confirmed] — peeringdb.com/asn/224

CSIRT coverage

Sikt CERT (internal) plus NORDUnet CERT (Nordic NREN incident response, ~2h critical-incident SLA) [Confirmed] — nordu.net/network-operations/cert/

Analyst note

Active NREN ASN. Registry name still reads "UNINETT" but the operating entity is now Sikt after the 2022 merger; allocated_date is the RIPE RDAP top-level registration event (2002-09-18), distinct from the earlier 2000 BGP first-seen.