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Online Network Traffic Characterization

Deliverable Progress on Standardization Plans – Part I

ONTIC Project

(GA number 619633)

Deliverable D5.8 Dissemination Level: PUBLIC

Authors

Alejandro Bascuñana, Miguel-Ángel Monjas (Ericsson Spain)

Alberto Mozo, Bruno Ordozgoiti (UPM)

Version

ONTIC_D5.8.2016-01-30.1.1

Version History

Version Modification date

Modified by Summary

0.01 2014-12-19 Ericsson Structure proposal 0.1 2016-01-22 Ericsson Contributions on

standardization activities 1.0 2016-01-30 SATEC QA Review 1.1 2016-01-31 UPM UPM contribution

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619633 ONTIC. Deliverable D5.8: Progress on Standardization Plans – Part I

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Quality Assurance:

Name

Quality Assurance Manager Miguel Ángel Lopez Peña (SATEC Spain)

Reviewer #1 Alberto Mozo (UPM)

Reviewer #2 Fernando Arias (EMC Spain)

619633 ONTIC. Deliverable 5.8: Progress on Standardization Plans – Part I

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Table of Contents 1. ACRONYMS AND DEFINITIONS 6

1.1 Acronyms ............................................................................................. 6

2. PURPOSE OF THE DOCUMENT 7

3. SCOPE 8

4. INTENDED AUDIENCE 9

5. SUGGESTED PREVIOUS READINGS 10

6. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 11

7. STANDARDIZATION ACTIVITIES 12

7.1 Standardization .................................................................................... 12 7.1.1 Progress on Standardization Plans .................................................................... 12 7.1.2 Standardization activities .............................................................................. 13

8. REFERENCES 18


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List of figures Figure 1: 3GPP UPCON Architecture ........................................................................ 13 Figure 2: UC #3 reference points (with IF3-2 highlighted) .............................................. 15


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List of tables Table 1: ONTIC activities, 1st Year .......................................................................... 12 Table 2: Np - IF3-2 Comparison ............................................................................. 16


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1. Acronyms and Definitions

1.1 Acronyms Acronym Defined as 3GPP 3rd Generation Partnership Project APN Access Point Name AQoE Adaptive Quality of Experience AVP Attribute-Value Pair CN Core Network CSP Communication Service Provider DoW Description of Work IETF Internet Engineering Task Force IMSI International Mobile Subscriber Identity ITU International Telecommunication Union MME Mobility Management Entity OAM Operation and Maintenance PCC Policy and Charging Control PCRF Policy and Charging Rules Function PDN Packet Data Network PGF Policy Governance Function QoS Quality of Service RAN Radio Access Network RCAF RAN Congestion Awareness Function RUCI RAN User Plane Congestion Information SCTP Stream Control Transmission Protocol TLV Tag-Length-Value UPCON User Plane Congestion


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! !2. Purpose of the Document

As described in the ONTIC DoW, deliverable D5.7 [5] must describe “activities carried out in the workgroup of standardization and European consultation meeting plans will be provided”. This deliverable will summarize the future plans and current activities for contributing ONTIC results to the various standardization bodies. In particular, active participation will be developed in the following standardization bodies: 3GPP, IETF and 3rd-ITU. For each standard body, plans and activities will be detailed.” It is also one of the outputs of Task 5.3.

This document is an update of deliverable D5.7 and therefore aims to describe the plans and activities for contributing the ONTIC results to standardization bodies, according to the opportunities detected by the partners and to the foreseen ONTIC results. As mentioned in D5.7, standardization efforts are focused on the interfaces between the ONTIC framework and other network management subsystems that could interact with it and to guarantee the interoperability of such framework with said subsystems.


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! !3. Scope

This document intends to provide information about the progress on the ONTIC standardization plans defined in deliverable D5.7.


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! !4. Intended Audience

The intended audience comprises the receivers of the document, the partners within the ONTIC consortium and any reader interested in knowing the ONTIC standardization strategies and the areas where the ONTIC findings can be applied.


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! !5. Suggested Previous Readings

It is expected that a basic background on Information and Communications Technology (ICT) is sufficient to address the contents of this document; however, some previous reading are suggested:

• ONTIC. “Deliverable D2.3. Progress on ONTIC Big Data Architecture” [1]. • ONTIC. “Deliverable D2.4. Progress on Provisioning Subsystem” [2]. • ONTIC. “Deliverable D5.1. Use Cases requirements” [3]. • ONTIC. “Deliverable D5.2. Progress on Use Cases” [4]. • ONTIC. “Deliverable D5.7. Progress on Use Cases” [5].


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6. Executive Summary

As mentioned in D5.7, standardization is not an easy aspect within the IT industry. From ONTIC, the consortium partners have chosen the standardization bodies where the ONTIC results and solutions could fit, according to their own business and academic requirements, and to available budget.

Firstly, 3GPP User Plane Congestion (a working item dealing with the detection of congestion and application of alleviation measures) was selected as a suitable area where the UC #3 framework could fit and therefore follow-up and design of compatible solution were carried out. The activities in UPCON finished in Q2 2015 and no further activities are considered. The main UC #3 protocol deliverable, IF3-2, QoE Analytics Function − Policy Governance Function (Insight Delivery), has been compared to the Np reference point in 3GPP and found to be semantically equivalent and therefore able to play similar roles.

Secondly, we have provided several inputs to our Advisory Board, Diego Lopez (Telefonica) in order to contribute to the IRTF Proposed Research Group on Network Machine Learning (NMLRG). In addition, we have identified as well potential contributions to the IETF ANIMA WG (on autonomic networking) and the IRTF NMRG (on network management), and the ETSI NFV ISG (on network functions virtualization). In an indirect manner, we plan that the results of the project are being conveyed to the 5G network architecture initiatives in which Telefonica is contributing actively.


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! !7. Standardization activities

7.1 Standardization

7.1.1 Progress on Standardization Plans

The following table describes the status of the activities that were declared in ONTIC’s first year:

Table 1: ONTIC activities, 1st Year

Activity Status

Keep on membership in the UPCON working group in 3GPP (Ericsson joined during ONTIC first year).

Done. The working group was finished in Q2 2015 and all the pending work in technical specifications completed

UPCON follow-up in order to guarantee the compatibility of the ONTIC development and solutions. It may involve attendance to the working group meetings. In particular, compatibility between the Np so-called reference point and the interface between the ONTIC Analytics Function and the Policy Governance Function.

IF3-2 is equivalent to 3GPP Np. See section7.1.2.1

Generation of contributions to the UPCON specifications whenever it can be necessary for guaranteeing compliancy with ONTIC and according to the partners’ business strategy.

Not actually needed

Reporting of 3GPP UPCON evolution. Done. See [13]

As UPM is an active member of Nessi Association and the Big Data Value Association (BDVA), (which are key drivers in the Big Data Public Private Partnership in the EU), it is expected that ONTIC will benefit from a privileged situation with respect to any standardization initiative to be held not only in the EU but also in the rest of the world.

On hold. Currently, Nessi and BDVA are not involved in any standardization activity. In particular, BDVA is focusing nearly all their efforts in the preparation of the European Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda for the European contractual Public Private Partnership (cPPP) on Big Data Value.

Establish relationships with the Big Data Public Private Forum (BIG) in order to provide feedback to each other.

Done. After contacting BIG Forum we were informed that no significant work related to standardization has been developed in this Forum.

Start preliminary contacts with already existing IRTF working groups to contribute in the design of real time analytics components for smart orchestration in

On progress. Several inputs have been provided to our Advisory Board member, Diego Lopez (Telefonica). The main immediate target is the IRTF Proposed


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! !NFV scenarios.

Research Group on Network Machine Learning (NMLRG). In addition, potential contributions to the IETF ANIMA WG (on autonomic networking) and the IRTF NMRG (on network management), and the ETSI NFV ISG (on network functions virtualization) have been identified.

7.1.2 Standardization activities

7.1.2.1 Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) - UPCON

As described in D5.7 [5], 3GPP UPCON was identified as a suitable area for ONTIC-related standardization activities. Starting in early 2013, the Stage 21 UPCON working group [6] aimed to define system enhancements for user plane congestion management (UPCON stands for User Plane Congestion management). Radio Access Network (RAN) user plane congestion occurs when the demand for resources exceeds the available capacity to deliver the user data for a period of time. The relevance of this working group to ONTIC is the implicit creation of a framework for actuation in order to alleviate congestion situations. As such, this area is deeply related to the Automated Management area (sometimes referred to as autonomic networks). The ambition of automated management is to increase the degree of automation in a telecommunication network. Autonomic networks have been a subject of research over the last 15 or so years, but lost momentum. Recently, however, there have been advances based on new computational, memory and storage capabilities that increase both the urgency to address automation as well as the possibilities to do so. ONTIC exploits such advances.

The framework introduced by UPCON can be naturally expanded with the functionalities defined as result of the AQoE use case (UC #3) introduced by ONTIC, as both aim to take advantage of the network actuation features provided by PCC, the 3GPP policy architecture. The idea is to consider not only RAN congestion reports but also situations of service QoE degradation as triggers of the policy decision and subsequent policy enforcement. Moreover, the use of analytics functions such as the ones developed in WP3 can enrich the situations in which actuation is needed (that is, when detecting degradation patterns and being able to pre-emptively report a foreseen degradation situation).

With regard to UPCON, its final architecture can be seen in the figure below ([7] and [8]):

Figure 1: 3GPP UPCON Architecture

According to the initial technical report and to subsequent specifications (the actual mandatory documents), a new logical function entity, the RAN Congestion Awareness Function (RCAF), is

1 3GPP defines three stages for its specifications: roughly speaking, Stage 1 deals with requisites; Stage 2 with architecture; and Stage 3 with protocols. Each of them translates in a specification with the following numbering: 22.xxx for Stage 1; 23.xxx for Stage 2; and 24.xxx, 28.xxx, or 29.xxx for Stage 3.

MME or SGSN

RCAF

SGW PDN GW (PCEF) RAN

RAN OAM PDN

TDF

PCRF

S1-MME or Iu

S11 or S4

S1-U or S12

S5

Np

Nq/Nq’

Gx Sd

Rx

SGi


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! !added to PCC in order to report so-called RAN User Plane Congestion Information (RUCI) to a PCRF for the purpose of congestion mitigation. For this purpose the RCAF:

• Collects information related to user plane congestion from the RAN’s OAM system or any equivalent system (the way such information is not retrieved is not specified). It also determines the congestion level of the congested location(s);

• Determines the UE’s served by a congested location and retrieves the APNs of the active PDN connections of those UEs;

• Provides RAN congestion status (including the identifiers of the UE’s served by the congested location) to the PCRF (it does so only when a sustained congestion situation is determined);

• Aggregates RAN congestion status analyzing whether the congestion associated with a location is related to the congestion status in the neighboring locations.

The introduction of UPCON and the RCAF (see [8] 2) involves the addition of the following reference points:

• Np: Between RCAF and PCRF. Over Np, RAN User Plane Congestion Information (RUCI) is sent from RCAF to PCRF. The Np reference point is based on Diameter and has been specified in [9]. The actual signaling flows are in [11].

• Nq/Nq': Via Nq, the MME provides the RCAF with the list of UE’s (IMSI’s) in a given location (eNB ID, ECGI, depending on the deployment) and for each of these IMSI(s) the APNs of the active PDN connections. The Nq' reference point between RCAF and SGSN is used, for a set of IMSI(s), to provide the RCAF with the list of APN’s of the active PDN connections of each of these IMSI’s. The Nq reference point uses the so-called Nq-AP protocol, which follows a Type, Length and Value (TLV) encoding of messages over an SCTP transport and is specified in [10].

• No explicit reference point has been introduced between the RCAF and the RAN OAM, as it left outside the specification.

This was one of the first times 3GPP explicitly proposed a control loop that considers OAM entities. Thus, it is straightforward to roughly attempt to map the UC #3 functional entities to the UPCON entities, at least with regard to the involved interfaces between entities: The Analytics Function plays a similar role to the 3GPP UPCON RCAF, at least with regard to the PCC entities, while the PGF can be seen as a PCRF add-on, in charge of mediating with the UPCON features. Therefore, the interface IF3-2 (Insight Delivery) can be seen as an equivalent to the Np reference point (see figure below). The full description of the ONTIC IF3-2 reference point can be found in [12].

2 See section 6.1.15 (Reporting of RAN user plane congestion information); 6.2.10 (RCAF); and 7.10 (Procedures over Np interface).


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Figure 2: UC #3 reference points (with IF3-2 highlighted)

When analyzing how compatible both protocols (those over Np and IF3-2) are, two aspects have to be taken into account. The first one relates to the transport protocol. Np is based on Diameter, the protocol supported by the PCRF in PCC. In contrast, IF3-2 is based on REST. The second one deals with the semantics of reference points. It should be guaranteed that Np and IF3-2 are, at least, similar.

With regard to the first aspect, a decision had to be made when designing IF3-2. Although Diameter should have been an obvious decision, REST was preferred for ONTIC. There were several reasons to do so. The first one was related to simplicity and availability of development tools. Although Diameter is a rather powerful protocol, using it requires a not trivial level of expertise. REST, on the other hand, relies on HTTP and web servers, and the competence in said matters is widely spread. REST support is built-in in almost every technology (Java, Python to name a few) and relies on web servers, while the Diameter support is rather limited. Finally, election of the technology must take into account all the involved partners and not only those used to core network technologies. Thus, the conclusion was that using popular technologies paid off in terms of effort and speed. Another reason was the fact that the ONTIC use cases are focused on ISP scenarios and therefore using CN-related protocols such as Diameter can be troublesome. For those reasons, a RESTful approach was preferred.

The other way around (suggesting the use of REST instead of Diameter) was not actually feasible. The UPCON working group was started in 2014 and therefore it was not possible to introduce requirements from ONTIC in the ongoing work. Moreover, the introduction of new requirements in the standardization activities has to take into account several stakeholders within the companies the ONTIC consortium is made of. New requirements would have required a large amount of work, mainly in lobbying and coordination with other members of the 3GPP working group and that was deemed as unfeasible given the project budget. Instead, the coherence between Np and ONTIC IF3-2 was focused on the comparison between the semantics of each protocol.

First of all, RAN User Plane Congestion Information (RUCI) is made of the following information:

1. Congestion/abatement location information (e.g. eNB ID or Cell ID or 3G Service Area ID);

2. Congestion level;

3. The validity time of the information. When this time has elapsed and no further congestion information has been received, the congestion is assumed to be over;

4. List of IMSI’s from UE’s in the congested area.

Secondly, a rough description of Np is also needed. Np is a Diameter-based protocol that supports three different procedures:


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! !• Non-aggregated RUCI report and Aggregated RUCI report procedures: These procedures

deliver RUCI reports from the RCAF to the PCRF. Aggregated RUCI report groups reports from several users. Non-aggregated reports specify a single user. IF3-2 uses the QoE Degradation Report Delivery procedure, which can be configured to send information about a single or several users (see discussion on AVP’s). The latter option is preferred.

• Np reporting restriction provisioning procedure: it enables reporting only referring to a specific set of users. Although IF3-2 does support the modification of some of the reporting features, per-user limitation is not currently defined. It is left for further releases.

Finally, when it comes to the semantics of the protocols, a comparison between the AVP’s3 used in the Np procedures and the elements of the IF3-2 reference point is also provided in order to assess coherence:

Table 2: Np - IF3-2 Comparison Np AVP IF3-2 element Comment Aggregated-RUCI-Report QoE Degradation Report

(JSON object) The QoE Degradation Report passed as a JSON object in the HTTP body is the equivalent of the RUCI report handled in Np.

Aggregated-Congestion-Info

Elements of properties users and service (see below) of the QoE Degradation Report object

The actual Np congestion info is passed within the value of some properties in the QoE Degradation Report object

Congestion-Level-Value value property in each kpi object in the service object of the QoE Degradation Report

Congestion-Location-ID location property (Array) of the QoE Degradation Report

3GPP-User-Location-Info (or eNodeB-ID)

each of the items in the location property

IMSI-List users property (Array) of the QoE Degradation Report

The conclusion of the comparison is that both protocols (those implemented over Np and IF3-2) are equivalent and to a large extent easily translated by a protocol gateway. While Np is oriented to CSP core networks, IF3-2 has a broader scope and could be deployed in ISP’s.

7.1.2.2 Big Data standardization activities

In January 2015, The International Organization for Standardization ISO created the working group WP9 (Big Data) depending on the joint technical committee ISO/IEC JTC-1 (Information technology). ISO/IEC JTC-1 WP9 will serve as the focus of ISO JTC 1’s big data standardization program and will identify standardization gaps. In addition, it will develop foundational standards – including reference architecture and vocabulary – that will guide the way for other

3 Diameter AVPs are the basic unit inside the Diameter message that carries the Data. There must be at least one AVP inside any Diameter message.


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! !big data efforts. Currently, WP9 is working in ISO/IEC 20546 (Big Data Overview and Vocabulary) and ISO/IEC 20547 (Big Data Reference Architecture) standards. ITU has approved the first ITU standard on Big Data in December 2015. The new standard, Recommendation ITU-T Y.3600 “Big data – cloud computing based requirements and capabilities” details the requirements, capabilities and use cases of cloud-based Big Data as well a high-level ‘system context’ view and its relationships with other entities. The NIST Big Data Public Working Group (NBD-PWG) is working to develop consensus on important, fundamental concepts related to Big Data. This working group released the final version of “Big Data Interoperability Framework: Volume 1, Definition” in September 2015. This volume contains a definition of Big Data and related terms necessary to lay the groundwork for discussions surrounding Big Data. Finally, neither Nessi nor the Big Data Value Association have been involved in standardization activities in this year. In particular, BDVA is focusing nearly all their efforts in the preparation of the European Strategic Research and Innovation Agenda (SRIA). SRIA defines the overall goals, main technical and non-technical priorities, and a research and innovation roadmap for the European contractual Public Private Partnership (cPPP) on Big Data Value.

7.1.2.3 IRTF standardization activities on Big Data

Standardization in what relates to Big Data, Machine Learning and Data Mining applied to networks in in its very early stages, and the project has focused on identifying potential targets for future contributions with the support of our Advisory Board member, Diego Lopez (Telefonica). The main immediate target is the IRTF Proposed Research Group on Network Machine Learning (NMLRG), that the project is promoting and supporting, and where first contributions will be sent. Apart from that, we have identified as well potential contributions to the IETF ANIMA WG (on autonomic networking) and the IRTF NMRG (on network management), and the ETSI NFV ISG (on network functions virtualization). In an indirect manner, the results of the project are being conveyed to the 5G architecture initiatives in which Telefonica is contributing actively, and in particular, through another research project on 5G cognitive network management recently started.


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8. References

[1] ONTIC. “Deliverable D2.3. Progress on ONTIC Big Data Architecture.” Internet: http://www.ict-ontic.eu/, Feb. 2016 [Feb. 1, 2016].

[2] ONTIC. “Deliverable D2.4. Progress on Provisioning Subsystem.” Internet: http://www.ict-ontic.eu/, Feb. 2016 [Feb. 1, 2016].

[3] ONTIC. “Deliverable D5.1. Use Cases requirements.” Internet: http://www.ict-ontic.eu/, Feb. 2015 [Feb. 1, 2015].

[4] ONTIC. “Deliverable D5.2. Progress on Use Cases.” Internet: http://www.ict-ontic.eu/, Feb. 2016 [Feb. 1, 2016].

[5] ONTIC. “Deliverable D5.7. Standardization Plans.” Internet: http://www.ict-ontic.eu/, Feb. 2015 [Dec. 1, 2015].

[6] “3GPP Work Item 570029 (UPCON): User Plane Congestion management [Rel-13].” Internet: http://www.3gpp.org/DynaReport/WiVsSpec--570029.htm

[7] “3GPP TR 23.705 V0.10.0 (2014-04): 3rd Generation Partnership Project; Technical Specification Group Services and System Aspects; Study on system enhancements for user plane congestion management (Release 13),” pp. 39-44. Internet: http://www.3gpp.org/ftp/Specs/archive/23_series/23.705/23705-0a0.zip, Apr. 2014.

[8] “3GPP TS 23.203 V13.6.0 (2015-12): 3rd Generation Partnership Project; Technical Specification Group Services and System Aspects; Policy and charging control architecture (Release 13).” Internet: http://www.3gpp.org/ftp/Specs/archive/23_series/23.203/23203-d60.zip, Jan. 2016.

[9] “3GPP TS 29.217 V13.2.0 (2015-12): 3rd Generation Partnership Project; Technical Specification Group Core Network and Terminals; Policy and Charging Control (PCC); Congestion reporting over Np reference point (Release 13).” Internet: http://www.3gpp.org/ftp/Specs/archive/29_series/29.217/29217-d20.zip, Dec. 2015.

[10] “3GPP TS 29.405 V13.1.0 (2015-12): 3rd Generation Partnership Project; Technical Specification Group Core Network and Terminals; Nq and Nq' Application Protocol (Nq-AP); Stage 3 (Release 13).” Internet: http://www.3gpp.org/ftp/Specs/archive/29_series/29.217/29217-d20.zip, Dec. 2015.

[11] “3GPP TS 29.213 V13.4.0 (2015-12): 3rd Generation Partnership Project; Technical Specification Group Core Network and Terminals; Policy and Charging Control signalling flows and Quality of Service (QoS) parameter mapping (Release 13)” Internet: http://www.3gpp.org/ftp/Specs/archive/29_series/29.213/29213-d40.zip, Dec. 2015.

[12] ONTIC. “Adaptive QoE Control Reference Point IF3-2: QoE Analytics Function − Policy Governance Function (Insight Delivery).” Internet: http://www.ict-ontic.eu/, Jun. 2015 [Dec. 1, 2015].

[13] ONTIC. “User Plane Congestion (UPCON).” Internet: http://www.ict-ontic.eu/, May. 2015 [Jan. 9, 2015].

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