Presented herein are methods and systems that facilitate data plane signaling of a packet as a candidate for capture at various network nodes within an IPv6 network. The signaling occurs in-band, via the data plane—that is, a capture or interrogation signal is embedded within the respective packet (e.g., in the packet header) that carries a user traffic. The signaling is inserted, preferably when the packet is classified, e.g., at the ingress node of the network, to which subsequent network nodes with the IPv6 network are signaled to capture or further inspect the packet for capture.