2-9 
Bit  Description 
T 
z  When set to 0, it indicates that this address is an IPv6 multicast address 
permanently-assigned by IANA 
z  When set to 1, it indicates that this address is a transient, or dynamically 
assigned IPv6 multicast address 
 
z  Scope: 4 bits, indicating the scope of the IPv6 internetwork for which the multicast traffic is 
intended. Possible values of this field are given in 
Table 1-5.  
Table 1-5 Values of the Scope field 
Value  Meaning  
0, 3, F  Reserved 
1 Interface-local scope 
2 Link-local scope 
4 Admin-local scope 
5 Site-local scope  
6, 7, 9 through D  Unassigned 
8 Organization-local scope 
E Global scope 
 
z  Group ID: 112 bits, IPv6 multicast group identifier that uniquely identifies an IPv6 multicast group 
in the scope defined by the Scope field.   
Ethernet multicast MAC addresses 
When a unicast IP packet is transmitted over Ethernet, the destination MAC address is the MAC 
address of the receiver. When a multicast packet is transmitted over Ethernet, however, the destination 
address is a multicast MAC address because the packet is directed to a group formed by a number of 
receivers, rather than to one specific receiver.   
1)  IPv4 multicast MAC addresses 
As defined by IANA, the high-order 24 bits of an IPv4 multicast MAC address are 0x01005E, bit 25 is 0, 
and the low-order 23 bits are the low-order 23 bits of a multicast IPv4 address. The IPv4-to-MAC 
mapping relation is shown in 
Figure 1-6.  
Figure 1-6 IPv4-to-MAC address mapping 
XXXX X
XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX1110 XXXX
0XXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX0000 0001 0000 0000 0101 1110
32-bit IPv4 address
48-bit MAC address
5 bits lost
25-bit MAC address prefix
…
23 bits
mapped
…