Dioptra is an Internet cartography research group within the Networks and Performance Analysis (NPA) team at the LIP6 computer science laboratory in Paris, France. We are located on the campus of the Faculty of Science of Sorbonne University, which jointly runs LIP6 with the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS). We are also associated with the LINCS laboratory.

IPRS is the Dioptra group’s initiative to continuously monitor IP-level routing across the internet. This is done through the regular collection of traceroute-style measurements from multiple vantage points towards a significant portion of the internet’s routable address blocks.

The IPRS Team

IPRS is built using free, open-source, liberally-licensed code that was created over the course of two completed doctoral dissertations. Kevin Vermeulen was the lead author of diamond-miner. Matthieu Gouel was the lead author of zeph and iris. Former post-doctoral fellow Maxime Mouchet was the lead author of caracal and a main contributor to the other code.

Senior research engineers Saied Kazemi and Elena Nardi have stabilized the code in production, and they maintain it and publish the data through M-Lab. Contractor Ciro Scognamiglio manages sysops. Doctoral student Hugo Rimlinger is using IPRS data to study BGP hijacks. Doctoral student Ufuk Bombar is conceiving the next generation of IPRS. Master’s intern Zeynep Arslan is addressing IPRS tech debt.

Sorbonne Université faculty members Olivier Fourmaux and Timur Friedman head the Dioptra group. CNRS and École Polytechnique research scientist Kevin Vermeulen co-advises the Dioptra group doctoral students.

Measurement Lab (M-Lab)

Founded in 2009, M-Lab is an open platform for studying internet performance and neutrality over time. M-Lab provides public, transparent data to empower researchers, policymakers, and open internet advocates to make informed decisions about internet infrastructure and policies. M-Lab is a fiscally sponsored project of Code for Science & Society (CS&S).

Support

IPRS receives funding through a cybersecurity grant from the French Ministry of Armed Forces. It receives Google Cloud credits and data hosting through its partnership with M-Lab.