The Border Gateway Protocol (BGPv4) is the foundation of the modern internet. Without it we would still be in the information dark ages and interconnectivity as we know it would not exist. One would assume, quite incorrectly I might add, that this foundational protocol is robust, secure and optimally configured to shepherd us through the daily use of this critical resource. While BGP has the capability of being all of those things, in practice it’s really not done that way. This is not a new subject and certainly not the first time I’ve written about it.  After reading the very excellent packet pushers series on how the internet works by Russ White, I found that the Routing resilience manifesto is quite fantastic and should be consumed by anyone running a network that utilizes BGP, particularly eBGP, because since 1997 I’ve seen far more networks that don’t follow these practices than ones that do. BGP is one of those mechanisms that is, unfortunately, often done as a set and forget task. And herein lies the problem. I choose to think of it as a policy framework]