Secure 3G user authentication in ad-hoc serving networks

The convergence of cellular and IP technologies has pushed the integration of 3G and WLAN networks to the forefront. With 3G networks\u27 failure to deliver feasible bandwidth to the customer and the emerging popularity, ease of use and high throughput of 802.11 WLANs, integrating secure access to 3G services from WLANs has become a primary focus. 3G user authentication initiated from WLANs has been defined by an enhancement to the extensible authentication protocol, EAP, used to transport user authentication requests over WLANs. The EAP-AKA protocol executes the 3G USIM user challenge and response authentication process over the IP backbone for WLAN serving networks. To improve the degree of control of 3G subscribers, spatial control has been proposed for 3G-WLAN user authentication. Successful execution of 3G security algorithms can be limited to a specified area by encrypting a user\u27s authentication challenge with spatial data defining his/her visited WLAN. With 3G networks\u27 limited capacity to determine a user\u27s location to the granularity of a small WLAN area and restricted access to users\u27 location due to privacy, 3G operators must rely on spatial data sent from visited WLANs to implement control for authentication. The risks of implementing EAP-AKA spatial control by 3G operators with no prior relationship or trust for serving WLAN networks are presented in this paper. An ad-hoc architecture is proposed for serving networks in 3G-WLAN integration and the advantages of this architecture that facilitate secure 3G user authentication are identified. Algorithms are proposed to define robust trust relationships between the parties in 3G-WLAN networks. The security of 3G user authentication is further protected by new mechanisms defined that are based on the quality of trust established between parties

A Seamless Vertical Handoff Protocol for Enhancing the Performance of Data Services in Integrated UMTS/WLAN Network

The Next Generation Wireless Network (NGWN) is speculated to be a unified network composed of several existing wireless access networks such as Wireless Local Area Network (WLAN), Global System for Mobile (GSM), Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS), Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX), and satellite network etc

From geographical innovation clusters towards virtual innovation clusters: The innovation virtual system

The opportunities of the new economic landscape have determined radical changes in the organizational structures of the firms, till the creation of new virtual clusterization forms, that is distinct systems of suppliers, distributors, service providers and clients that use the 'internetworking technologies' as a principal way for co-operating and competing. These 'virtual clusterization forms' that have been also defined as 'e-business communities' or 'b-web communities' (Tapscott, Lowy & Ticoll, 2000), are here defined as 'virtual clusters'. In a virtual cluster (VC), each enterprise adds one or more distinct aspects of product/service value to the value of the network, by exchanging digital knowledge with other members. Recent studies, focused on VCs, highlight that the VC enabling factors may be identified in ICTs ubiquity (increasingly wireless) and bandwidth robustness, that allow firms to access real-time what they need and to co-ordinate their intra and inter-firm activities, creating value both by offering innovative and personalized products, services and by cutting transaction costs. (Davin and Botkin, 1994) (Rayport and Sviokla, 1995). This paper focuses on these VCs innovation processes, in order to make some comparisons between the traditional geographical innovation clusters and the emerging virtual innovation clusters. To this end, the paper is organized in two logical patterns: Some empirical evidence for describing ad discussing the more important features of the emerging VCs. Specifically, the paper focuses on the following issues: - Some first results on VCs characteristics, regarding four distinctive features of their new world of business: i. Agents: radical increase in the number of agents that form a cluster. ii. Connections: virtually unlimited increase in the number of connections and therefore in the potential size of the cluster. iii. Space: delocalization of transactions which become space independent. iv. Time: information transmission takes place at the speed of electronic communication. - The analysis of the VC basic unit, the Internetworked Enterprise (IE), and of its learning process with customers and trough strategic alliances. A model of the VCs global virtual learning environment, here conceived as a system of innovation, defined as 'Innovation Virtual System' (IVS). IVS is here interpreted as a new way of projecting the traditional systems of innovation into a global scale.

Review of network integration techniques for mobile broadband services in next generation network

Next Generation Network (NGN) is intended at integrating the existing heterogeneous wireless access networks in order to produce a composite network that provides users with ubiquitous broadband experience. Currently, it has been established that Long Term Evolution (LTE) network, as a backbone network, provides broadband capacity with high efficiency, reduced latency and improved resource provisioning. Resource provisioning on this backbone network is not without its limitation as more mobile broadband services (MBBs) are evolving and users demand for mobility is on the increase. This paper, therefore, reviewed the different integration techniques for the heterogeneous networks that use LTE network as backbone that supports mobile broadband services.Keywords: MBB, NGN, LTE, SIP, Qo

Names, addresses and identities in ambient networks

Ambient Networks interconnect independent realms that may use different local network technologies and may belong to different administrative or legal entities. At the core of these advanced internetworking concepts is a flexible naming architecture based on dynamic indirections between names, addresses and identities. This paper gives an overview of the connectivity abstractions of Ambient Networks and then describes its naming architecture in detail, comparing and contrasting them to other related next-generation network architectures

Distributed control of reconfigurable mobile network agents for resource coordination

Includes abstract.Includes bibliographical references.Considering the tremendous growth of internet applications and network resource federation proposed towards future open access network (FOAN), the need to analyze the robustness of the classical signalling mechanisms across multiple network operators cannot be over-emphasized. It is envisaged, there will be additional challenges in meeting the bandwidth requirements and network management...The first objective of this project is to describe the networking environment based on the support for heterogeneity of network components..

Comparison of vertical handover decision-based techniques in heterogeneous networks

Industry leaders are currently setting out standards for 5G Networks projected for 2020 or even sooner. Future generation networks will be heterogeneous in nature because no single network type is capable of optimally meeting all the rapid changes in customer demands. Heterogeneous networks are typically characterized by some network architecture, base stations of varying transmission power, transmission solutions and the deployment of a mix of technologies (multiple radio access technologies). In heterogeneous networks, the processes involved when a mobile node successfully switches from one radio access technology to the other for the purpose of quality of service continuity is termed vertical handover or vertical handoff. Active calls that get dropped, or cases where there is discontinuity of service experienced by mobile users can be attributed to the phenomenon of delayed handover or an outright case of an unsuccessful handover procedure. This dissertation analyses the performance of a fuzzy-based VHO algorithm scheme in a Wi-Fi, WiMAX, UMTS and LTE integrated network using the OMNeT++ discrete event simulator. The loose coupling type network architecture is adopted and results of the simulation are analysed and compared for the two major categories of handover basis; multiple and single criteria based handover methods. The key performance indices from the simulations showed better overall throughput, better call dropped rate and shorter handover time duration for the multiple criteria based decision method compared to the single criteria based technique. This work also touches on current trends, challenges in area of seamless handover and initiatives for future Networks (Next Generation Heterogeneous Networks)

An Emergent Architecture for Scaling Decentralized Communication Systems (DCS)

With recent technological advancements now accelerating the mobile and wireless Internet solution space, a ubiquitous computing Internet is well within the research and industrial community's design reach - a decentralized system design, which is not solely driven by static physical models and sound engineering principals, but more dynamically, perhaps sub-optimally at initial deployment and socially-influenced in its evolution. To complement today's Internet system, this thesis proposes a Decentralized Communication System (DCS) architecture with the following characteristics: flat physical topologies with numerous compute oriented and communication intensive nodes in the network with many of these nodes operating in multiple functional roles; self-organizing virtual structures formed through alternative mobility scenarios and capable of serving ad hoc networking formations; emergent operations and control with limited dependency on centralized control and management administration. Today, decentralized systems are not commercially scalable or viable for broad adoption in the same way we have to come to rely on the Internet or telephony systems. The premise in this thesis is that DCS can reach high levels of resilience, usefulness, scale that the industry has come to experience with traditional centralized systems by exploiting the following properties: (i.) network density and topological diversity; (ii.) self-organization and emergent attributes; (iii.) cooperative and dynamic infrastructure; and (iv.) node role diversity. This thesis delivers key contributions towards advancing the current state of the art in decentralized systems. First, we present the vision and a conceptual framework for DCS. Second, the thesis demonstrates that such a framework and concept architecture is feasible by prototyping a DCS platform that exhibits the above properties or minimally, demonstrates that these properties are feasible through prototyped network services. Third, this work expands on an alternative approach to network clustering using hierarchical virtual clusters (HVC) to facilitate self-organizing network structures. With increasing network complexity, decentralized systems can generally lead to unreliable and irregular service quality, especially given unpredictable node mobility and traffic dynamics. The HVC framework is an architectural strategy to address organizational disorder associated with traditional decentralized systems. The proposed HVC architecture along with the associated promotional methodology organizes distributed control and management services by leveraging alternative organizational models (e.g., peer-to-peer (P2P), centralized or tiered) in hierarchical and virtual fashion. Through simulation and analytical modeling, we demonstrate HVC efficiencies in DCS structural scalability and resilience by comparing static and dynamic HVC node configurations against traditional physical configurations based on P2P, centralized or tiered structures. Next, an emergent management architecture for DCS exploiting HVC for self-organization, introduces emergence as an operational approach to scaling DCS services for state management and policy control. In this thesis, emergence scales in hierarchical fashion using virtual clustering to create multiple tiers of local and global separation for aggregation, distribution and network control. Emergence is an architectural objective, which HVC introduces into the proposed self-management design for scaling and stability purposes. Since HVC expands the clustering model hierarchically and virtually, a clusterhead (CH) node, positioned as a proxy for a specific cluster or grouped DCS nodes, can also operate in a micro-capacity as a peer member of an organized cluster in a higher tier. As the HVC promotional process continues through the hierarchy, each tier of the hierarchy exhibits emergent behavior. With HVC as the self-organizing structural framework, a multi-tiered, emergent architecture enables the decentralized management strategy to improve scaling objectives that traditionally challenge decentralized systems. The HVC organizational concept and the emergence properties align with and the view of the human brain's neocortex layering structure of sensory storage, prediction and intelligence. It is the position in this thesis, that for DCS to scale and maintain broad stability, network control and management must strive towards an emergent or natural approach. While today's models for network control and management have proven to lack scalability and responsiveness based on pure centralized models, it is unlikely that singular organizational models can withstand the operational complexities associated with DCS. In this work, we integrate emergence and learning-based methods in a cooperative computing manner towards realizing DCS self-management. However, unlike many existing work in these areas which break down with increased network complexity and dynamics, the proposed HVC framework is utilized to offset these issues through effective separation, aggregation and asynchronous processing of both distributed state and policy. Using modeling techniques, we demonstrate that such architecture is feasible and can improve the operational robustness of DCS. The modeling emphasis focuses on demonstrating the operational advantages of an HVC-based organizational strategy for emergent management services (i.e., reachability, availability or performance). By integrating the two approaches, the DCS architecture forms a scalable system to address the challenges associated with traditional decentralized systems. The hypothesis is that the emergent management system architecture will improve the operational scaling properties of DCS-based applications and services. Additionally, we demonstrate structural flexibility of HVC as an underlying service infrastructure to build and deploy DCS applications and layered services. The modeling results demonstrate that an HVC-based emergent management and control system operationally outperforms traditional structural organizational models. In summary, this thesis brings together the above contributions towards delivering a scalable, decentralized system for Internet mobile computing and communications