DatagramSocket.setDatagramSocketImplFactory can be trivially deprecated once a solution is found for JDK-8237352. The DatagramSocketImplFactory type could also be deprecated at the same time, or simply left alone. Input from Alan: The deprecation text for DatagramSocket.setDatagramSocketImplFactory should probably say that it provided a way in early JDK release to replace the system wide implementation. It has been mostly obsolete since Java 1.4. A DatagramSocket can created to use a custom implementation by extending DatagramSocket and using the protected constructor that takes the impl as a parameter.