Locally Accessible Cloud System for Disaster Resilience;

LACS

August, 2019

Toshikazu SAKANO

Advanced Telecommunication Research Institute,

International (ATR), Kyoto, Japan.

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LACS Introduction

Emergence of communication outage area under the

large-scale disasters

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Large-scale disasters like the earthquake, tsunami, flooding and typhoon cause serious

damages to communication network including cables, building, switch, router,

transmission equipment and others.

Besides, power outage forces to cease not only legacy communication services like

telephone and networking services, but also various services provided over the Internet.

Due to these reasons, communication outage causes serious problems in the disaster

countermeasure activities and people’s life.

Internet

Data center

Cloud services Communication outage area

Both the telephone and the Internet are broken down due to the

damage of the access network and transport network.

Breakdown of Base station

Exhaustion of battery power

Communication buildings

Cables

Base station Area A

Area B

Transport sys. Switch Switch

Switch

Communication Equipment

LACS concept

LACS is comprised of a compact server, Wi-Fi

Access Point, Battery and peripheral devices.

LACS offers basic cloud communication functions

including information broadcasting, information

sharing, and bi-directional communication among

users, although service area for them is restricted

to small, surrounding area of the LACS.

User accesses to the service using his/her network

device like smartphone over Wi-Fi functionality.

LACS enables us to handle large size contents in

the form of text, voice, moving picture, still image.

LACS collaborates with other systems on the

Internet, such as a system for disaster

countermeasure.

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LACS

People in a evacuation center /

Public servants in disaster affected area

SNS

LACS (Locally Accessible Cloud System) is a portable server system which comprises of

compact server, access point, battery and peripheral devices. LACS delivers cloud service

anytime anywhere and in any network environment even in the devastated disaster situation.

Users use

Smartphone

to access to

the services.

Access over

Wi-Fi

Broadcasting of disaster information

Acquiring of disaster information

Vi-directional communication function in

disaster affected areas

Collaboration with other systems

Service delivery in usual time

Feature of ＬＡＣＳ

• LACS is available as a local communication

tool even if you don’t have the Internet

connectivity using your ICT devices like

smartphone.

• Popular smartphones with Wi-Fi function are

available as an access tool to LACS services.

• Friendly user interface enables us to easily

access to LACS services.

• Basic services are information delivery from

public organizations, information sharing as a

social networking service, and bi-directional

communication as a messaging service.

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■Popular smartphones and tablet devices are used as interface to the service

・Conventional Wi-Fi connection

・Easy operation

・Portable

■LACS Offers a tool for communication in disaster affected area

・Operation without power feed

・Collection and delivery of disaster information

・Delivery information by local government

・Offer person-to-person bi-directional communication tool

LACS Locally Accessible Cloud System

Main computer

Intel NUC Core i7

16GB Memory 512GBSSD

OS:CentOS7(Linux)

Wi-Fi Access Point

(Wireless LAN router)

# of simultaneously

connectable devices

5GHz: 128 2.4GHz: 128

HUB

Gigabit switch

5-port

Battery

Capacity 50000mAh

20V, 12V, USB IF

Solar charger

Capacity 20000mAh

Power-feed by USB

Overview of LACS

A pilot product

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LACS TOP Page Important Notice

This page is mainly used for delivery of important

information from authorized organizations like local

government and medical centers.

Bulletin board

This page is mainly used for sharing information

among users of LACS

Messaging

Message function enables us to exchange message,

still image and video between users like our friends,

family members.

Registration

User registration is necessary for users to post

articles and exchange messages on LACS.

Functions offered by ＬＡＣＳ

Recent Proof of Concept experiments using the pilot product

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We conducted two PoC experiments using the developed pilot product that aim to confirm the

effectiveness of the LACS concept and to collect material for considering the deployment of LACS in

the real society.

１）Usage of LACS in a summer festival held in a typical Japanese residential area with the support of

Urban Renaissance Agency of Japanese Government.

２）LACS application to the rural area in Cebu, Philippines with the collaboration of CVISNET

Disaster situation Peace time situation User

Usage in disaster response headquarters

Usage in other organizations that support

the activities in disasters like hospitalsル

Drills for disaster prevention

Daily use in the government work

Offer a tool for information delivery and

sharing in disaster affected area with no

Internet.

To offload the condensed traffic at events.

Daily use in residential areas as a

conventional information sharing tool.

Use as an instant ICT installation tool in developing areas with not-rich network infrastructure.

National/Local

government,

Police, Hospitals

People in

disaster areas /

residential areas

People in

developing areas

PoC in an event of a residential area PoC in Philippines

LACS PoC for Event application

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LACS was demonstrated in a summer festival held in a Japanese residential area and its concept was

evaluated with the support of Urban Renaissance Agency of Japanese Government.

Residential area: a UR residential area with over 1500 house holds.

Event: Summer festival with “Bon Dancing.” Estimated number of participants was over 500.

PoC: demonstration of LACS, Trial usage by organizer of the event and trial usage by participants.

Results: Most users evaluated LACS definitely useful in the disaster situations.

Number of valid questionnaire responses:80

LACS Usefulness in disaster situations?

LACS Usefulness in events?

Very useful

Useful

Useful

Very useful

LACS PoC in Philippines

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LACS was also demonstrated in a rural area of Cebu, Philippines and its concept was evaluated with the

collaboration of CVISNET, Cebu, Philippines and with the support of Cordova.

Place: Cordova in Cebu, Philippines

PoC: demonstration of LACS, several simulations on disaster countermeasure, e-education and e-health.

The number of participants is over 30 including university students and citizens.

Results: Most users evaluated LACS definitely useful in the disaster situations.

Cebu city

Mactan island

Cordova

Area extension

by Fixed

Wireless

Access

Philippines

Summary

• In this presentation, a novel architecture for disaster resilience which we call LACS or Locally Accessible Cloud Service is introduced.

• We developed a pilot product based on the concept.

• We then conducted two Proof-of-Concept experiments and confirmed LACS very effective in disaster situations and also in other use cases.

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Thank you for your attention.

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Contact Information:

Toshikazu Sakano

ATR, Kyoto, Japan.

Email: t.sakano@atr.jp

Telephone: +81-772-95-2720