7.

Mobility Management Contents

Mobile Communications
Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Claudia Linnhoff-Popien, Peter Ruppel

6 Mobility Management
Handover Management Location Management GSM Location Management GPRS Location Management UMTS Location Management

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management v7.0 1/51

7. Mobility Management Overview Handover Management

Maintaining the traffic connection with a moving user when crossing cell boundaries Occurs when the quality or the strength of the radio signal falls below certain parameters (signal quality reason) Occurs when the traffic capacity of a cell has reached its maximum or is approaching (traffic reason) GSM standard identifies about 40 reasons for a handover Handover is initialized by the mobile or by the base station Other term: handoff (primarily used in the U.S.)

Location Management
Mechanisms to localize users in case of incoming calls, short messages, or data Requires to partition an operators coverage area into location areas in order to efficiently perform location management Two basic operations: Location update and Paging Location Update (LU) Operation initialized by the terminal to inform the network about the users location Paging Broadcast message initialized by the network to locate the current cell of a user
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Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

7.1 Handover Management Overview of the Handover Process Measurement Measurement

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Measurement criteria: signal strength (between mobile and current base station as well as between mobile and neighboring base stations), distance, quality (e.g., in terms of error rates), traffic volume,.... Measurement reports exchanged between mobile and base station

Decision Decision
Decision parameters: thresholds and hysteresis margin Network-controlled, mobile-assisted, mobile-controlled handover

Execution
Handover signaling Radio resource allocation Re-establishing connections in core and access networks Hard and soft handover Inter-cell and intra-cell handover Inter-frequency and intra-frequency handover Inter-system and intra-system handover
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Execution

7.1 Handover Management Overview of the Handover Process

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Primarily, RSS (relative signal strength) measurements from the serving point of attachment and neighboring points of attachment are used

Alternatively, or in conjunction, path loss, carrier-to-interference ratio, bit error rates, block error rates, symbol error rates, utilization have been employed as metrics in certain types of networks
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7.1 Handover Management Decision: Relative Signal Strength

Base station A Received signal strength Received signal strength Base station B

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

L1 Mobile terminal is handed off from BS A to BS B when the signal strength at B first exceeds that at A If the signal strength at B first exceeds that at A, the mobile unit is handed back to A In this figure, handover occurs at point L1

Distance between base stations Because signal strength fluctuates due to multipath propagation effects, this method can lead to a ping-pong effect in which the unit is repeatedly passed back and forth between two base stations

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7.1 Handover Management Decision: Relative Signal Strength with Threshold

Base station A Received signal strength Received signal strength Base station B

Th1
Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Th2 Th3 Distance between base stations

L1 Handover only occurs if the signal at the current BS is less than a predefined threshold, and the signal from a neighboring base station is stronger Handover is avoided as long as the signal from the serving base station is strong enough

L2

L3

For a high threshold (e.g., Th1), this scheme performs the same as the relative signal strength scheme If the threshold is set quite low (e.g., Th3), the mobile may move far into the new cell Threshold should not be used alone because its effectiveness depends on prior knowledge of the crossover signal strength between the current and the candidate base stations

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7.1 Handover Management Decision: Relative Signal Strength with Hysteresis

Base station A Received signal strength Received signal strength Base station B

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

H H L4 Handover occurs only if the new base station is sufficiently stronger (by a margin H) than the current one While the mobile is assigned to base station A, the scheme will generate a handover when the relative signal strength reaches or exceeds H Distance between base stations

Once the mobile is assigned to B, it remains so until the relative signal strength falls below H, at which point it is handed back to A Prevents the ping-pong effect Disadvantage: the first handover may still be unnecessary if base station A still has sufficient signal strength
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7.1 Handover Management Decision: Relative Signal Strength with Threshold and Hysteresis
Base station A Received signal strength Received signal strength Base station B

Th1
Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Th2 Th3 H

L4 Handover occurs only if the current signal level drops below a threshold, and the target base station is stronger than the current one by a hysteresis margin H

L3

Distance between base stations

Handover occurs at L4, if the threshold is either Th1 or Th2 Handover occurs at L3 if the threshold is at Th3 Scheme avoids the ping-pong effect and execution of handover if signal from the serving base station is still strong enough
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7.1 Handover Management Hard vs. Soft Handover Hard handover

Break before make Connection is released before making the new connection Causes a short cut in the connection The terminal is linked to no more than one base station at any given time Primarily used in FDMA and TDMA, where different frequency ranges are used in adjacent cells

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

(1)

(2)

(3)

Soft handover
Make before break New connection is established before the old connection is released, avoiding a cut in the connection during handover After the successful handover, the old connection is released Used in CDMA, where adjacent cells use the same frequency range

(1)

(2)

(3)

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7.1 Handover Management Further Handover Classification Intra-frequency handover

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

The new carrier frequency is the same as the previous carrier frequency Deployment: CDMA (as neighboring cells usually use the same frequency range)

f1

f1

Inter-frequency handover
Carrier frequency of the new radio access is different from the old carrier frequency Deployment: GSM, handover between different UMTS operators

Inter-system handover
Happens between two different radio access networks (e.g., GSM and UMTS) Special kind of inter-frequency handover Deployment: areas where GSM and UMTS coexist and overlay networks

f1

f2

UMTS

GSM 900

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7.1 Handover Management Control over Handover (I) Network-controlled Handover (NCHO)

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Mobile-assisted Handover (MAHO)

Mobile terminal continuously measures signal strength from serving and neighboring base stations and sends the recorded values to the serving base station On the basis of these values, the network decides when handover should take place Unlike NCHO, the terminals situation is taken into account, as the terminal itself does the measuring Handover time between handover decision and execution is approximately 1 second Increased signaling across the air interface
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Network measures the transmission quality via base stations and decides when handover should be executed Mobile terminal makes no measurements Intense signaling between the base stations and the node that decides on handover No handover signaling at the air interface Handover process (including data transmission, channel and network switching) takes 100-200ms

7.1 Handover Management Control over Handover (II) Mobile-controlled Handover (MCHO)

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Mobile terminal is completely in control of the handover process, i.e., it measures signal strength and decides on handover Very short reaction time (on the order of 0.1 seconds)

Overview
Method Network-controlled handover (NCHO) Mobile-assisted handover (MAHO) Mobile-controlled handover (MAHO) Measurem. Network Network and mobile Mobile Decision Network Network Mobile Systems Analog systems GSM, UMTS DECT, 802.11

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7.1 Handover Management Handover in GSM GSM Handover- Overview

Inter-frequency hard handover: adjacent cells always use different frequency ranges Mobile-assisted handover: mobile station measures signal level of up to 16 neighboring base stations and reports the results of the strongest six base stations every 480 ms to the BSS Algorithm for handover decision is not standardized, but network operators can develop and deploy their own algorithms which are optimally tuned for their networks Software of mobile stations need not be changed when the handover strategy is changed Generally, handover between BSS of different operators (inter-operator handover) is not standardized However, sometimes different operators (competing in the same geographical region) enter into agreements to use one anothers system (e.g., O2 and T-Mobile in Germany)

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

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7.1 Handover Management Handover Types in GSM

1
4

2
4

3
4

4
4

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

BTS

BTS

BTS

BTS

BSC

BSC

BSC

MSC

MSC

(1) Intra-cell handover

Executed, if fading makes transmission at a certain frequency impossible

(2) Inter-cell, intra BSC

Terminal moves from one cell to another, but stays within control of the same BSC Typical handover scenario

(3) (4) Inter-BSC, intra-MSC Inter-MSC handover

Handover between cells controlled by different BSCs, but within the coverage area of one MSC Handover between two cells that belong to different MSCs

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7.1 Handover Management Principal Signaling Sequence for an Inter-BSC/Intra-MSC Handover

MS BTSold BSCold MSC BSCnew BTSnew

Measurement report

Measurement result

HO decision HO required

3
Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

HO request Resource allocation Channel activation HO request ack. Ch. activation ack.

4 5

HO command HO access HO complete

HO command

HO command

Link establishment HO complete

clear command clear command clear complete clear complete

HO complete

2 3

Mobile continually transmits measurement reports BSS decides when to perform handover and request handover from the MSC MSC causes the new BSS to prepare a channel for the handover, and frees handover to the mobile as soon as this channel is acknowledged

Mobile station accesses new BSS and receives information about the new air interface (timing advance value, transmitter power level) Once the mobile can occupy the new channel, resources of the old BSS are released Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management v7.0 15/51

7.1 Handover Management Handover in UMTS Soft (softer, soft-softer) handover*

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Summary of UMTS handover types

Intra-BS/inter-cell handover (softer handover) Inter-BS handover, including hard and soft handovers Inter-RNC handover, including hard, soft, and soft-softer handovers Inter-MSC handover Inter-Serving GPRS Support Node handover Inter-system handover

Adjacent cells as well as sectors of a cell use the same 5-MHz frequency range Cell separation by spreading codes Majority of handovers are intrafrequency soft handovers

Hard handover...
...if old and new cell use different frequency ranges (inter-frequency handover) ...if RNCs participating in the handover are not connected ...if old and new cell use different UTRAN modes (FDDTDD) ...if old and new cell belong to different systems (e.g., UMTSGSM)

*)

Softer handover
Active set comprises different cell sectors served by the same node-B

Soft-softer handover
Active set comprises cell sectors of the same cell as well as sectors from other cells
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7.1 Handover Management Code Types in UMTS

Two types of codes in UMTS: channelization codes and scrambling codes
Code Scrambling codes Channelization codes Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management Spreading code Uplink direction User separation Data and control channels from the same terminal Channelization code scrambling code Downlink direction Cell separation Users within one cell Channelization code scrambling code

2,+2,4,+6,+2,+4,+2,4,4,+6,0,+2

+2,+2,4,+6,2,4,+2,+4,+4,+6,0,2

1,+1,+1,+1 1,1,+1 1,1,+1,+1,1

Combined signal comprising several channels (of one terminal), each spread with a channelization code

Scrambled signal

Scrambling code

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7.1 Handover Management Inter-RNC Soft Handover in UMTS

Soft handover enables simultaneous connection of the terminal to several Node-Bs List of Node-Bs connected to the terminal is called the Active Set Uplink: signal spread with the scrambling code SU1 is received by different neighboring Node-Bs Downlink: Node-Bs participating in soft handover send the same user data to the terminal, but spread with different scrambling codes (here: SD1 and SD2) Serving Radio Network Controller (SRNC): initial RNC that controls the soft handover and decides which signal to forward into the core network Drift Radio Network Controller (DRNC): RNC belonging to the new cell that forwards user data to the SRNC Core network

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

SRNC

DRNC

SD1 SU1

SD2 SU1

NB

NB

f1

f1

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7.1 Handover Management Handover in IEEE 802.11 (I)

Mobile-controlled handover No handover Terminal is static or moves within an BSS BSS handover Terminal moves from one BSS to another within the same ESS ESS handover Terminal moves from one BSS to another BSS that is part of a new ESS Upper layer connections may break Handover must be supported by Mobile IP or Cellular IP for continuous connection Sequence for an IEEE 802.11 Handover (see next slide)
1 2 3 AP broadcasts a beacon signal every 100ms Terminal scans beacons and associates itself with the AP with the strongest beacon When the beacon becomes weak, it starts to scan for stronger beacons Passive scanning: the terminal simply listens to available beacons Active scanning: the terminal sends a probe request and waits for receiving probes Each AP that receives the probe responds with a probe response Terminal chooses the AP with the strongest beacon Terminal sends a reassociation request to the selected AP, containing information about the terminal and the old AP New AP answers with reassociation response containing station identifier, supported bit rates,.... Old AP is not informed by the terminal, but by the new AP about the handover procedure

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

4
5 6 7 8

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7.1 Handover Management Handover in IEEE 802.11 (II)

8 Reassociation to old AP

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

AP

AP

AP

Beacon periodically

7 6
Reassociation response

4 1
Strong signal

3
Probe request

Probe Reassociation response request

5 Choose AP with

strongest response

2 Weak signal;

start scanning for handover

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7.2 Location Management Antagonism between Paging and Location Update Mobility Management based on pure Paging: Mobility Management based on pure Location Update:

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

If a call arrives, terminal is paged in all cells of the mobile network Location update is not required As paging must be executed in all cells of the network for each arriving call/SMS/data-packet high signaling overhead high delay in call/SMS/datapacket delivery

Each time the user crosses cell boundaries a location update is triggered Paging is not required As location updates must be initialized whenever crossing cell boundaries high signaling and database update overhead high power consumption in the terminals

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7.2 Location Management Basics of Location Areas

LA3 LA2 LA1 LA4 LA5 LA6

Location Areas

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Several cells are combined to a location area (LA) Subscriber location is known if the system knows the LA in which the subscriber is located When the system must establish a communication with the mobile, the paging only occurs in the current LA where called user resides Resource consumption is limited to the respective LA: paging messages are only transmitted in the cells of this particular LA Location information are stored in databases (generally, a home database and several visitor location databases are included in the network architecture)

Design of Location Areas

Size of LAs is determined in dependence on the cell radius the mean mobile velocity the cost of LUs (in terms of the number of LU messages required to update the location of a mobile) the cost of paging (in terms of the number of paging messages required to find a mobile) Goal: minimizing location management cost (LU+paging traffic and processing)
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7.2 Location Management Location Update Strategies Periodic Location Updating

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Hybrid Location Updating

Combination of Periodic and Location Updating on LA Crossing Mobile generates its LUs each time it detects an LA crossing If no communication (related to an LU or a call) has occurred between mobile and network for a fixed period, the mobile generates a periodic LU Advantage: User location can be recovered in case of database failures

Mobile periodically transmits its identity to the network Resource consumption is userindependent and can be unnecessary if the user does not move from a LA for a long time

Location Updating on LA Crossing

BS periodically broadcasts the identity of its LA (Location Area Identifier, LAI) Mobile permanently listens to the broadcast and stores the current LAI If the received LAI differs from the stored one, a location update is triggered by the mobile Advantage: a highly mobile user generates a lot of LUs; a low mobility user only triggers a few

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7.2 Location Management Paging Strategies LA-Splitting in Paging Areas

Mobile registers only when entering the LA; it does not register when moving between PAs of one LA For an incoming call, paging messages are broadcast in the PAs according to a sequence determined by different strategies Example: Start paging in the PA where the terminal was last detected by the network

Multilayer Location Areas

Problem: LU traffic is mainly concentrated in the cells of the LA border Introduction of multilayer LAs Each mobile is assigned to a given group, and each group is assigned one or several layers of LAs LU traffic load is distributed over all the cells

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Paging area 1

Layer 3

Paging area 2 Paging area 3 Location area

Layer 2

Layer 1
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7.3 GSM Location Management Overview (I)

Different location management schemes for GSM circuit-switched and GPRS GSM circuit-switched: Hybrid location updating GPRS: introduction of new (smaller) location areas with adaptive paging/location update strategies

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Hybrid location updating

Periodic execution Executed by the terminal if a timer has expired Timer value is determined by operator: Operator
D1 D2 Eplus Itineris Swisscom

Country
Germany Germany Germany France Switzerland

Periodic LU time constant Storage time

6 hours 4 hours 12 hours 6 minutes 2 hours 2 days 2 days 7 days

Execution on location area crossing Mobile station recognizes new location area by reading the LAI broadcast If new location area is recognized, location update is triggered
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7.3 GSM Location Management Numbering Schemes in ISDN/PSTN

...
Format of telephone numbers according to ITU-T E.164 Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management Country Code (CC) 1-3 digits National Destination Code (NDC) N digits Subscriber Number (SN) 15-N digits

...

International numbering plan enables that customers from different countries can call each other in a similar way, i.e., to use the same country code to make a call to a specific country Every country belonging to one of 9 different world areas starts with the same digit (e.g. Europe (3 or 4), Central and South America (5),...) International numbering plan is specified in the ITU-T recommendation E.164

National numbering plans contains the rules of a specific country to follow when issuing telephone number Each country has autonomy about its numbering plan, but some countries use the same national numbering plan (e.g., USA and Canada) In Germany, the national numbering plan specifies the scheme for local numbers, carrier access numbers, service numbers,....
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7.3 GSM Location Management Numbering Plans in Germany

Intelligent Network (IN) services
0800 (0130) 0900 (0180, 0190)

Mobile services T-Mobile

0170, 0171, 0175 0172, 0173

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

International telephone network

00xx

Vodafone

01019

Deutsche Telekom
0177, 0178 0179

Mobilcom

Carrier access codes 01013

Eplus

01030

...

Tele2

Teldafax

O2

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7.3 GSM Location Management Drawbacks of Conventional Telephone Numbering Schemes Telephone numbers in the PSTN/ISDN...

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Distance: 350 km Dsseldorf

...initially represented a geographic area where the associated device was located ...have been organized hierarchically in Aachen 24 order to reflect the network topology ...contain routing information used to locate the destination device of a call Kall 244

Frankfurt

65 Trier
659 Gerolstein

For GSM, this approach is not applicable, because...

Distance: 3km ...users want to be called via their 6597 Esch Dahlem 2477 personal telephone number independent of the used mobile device (personal mobility) ...are only temporarily attached to a 02447 / 4711 06597 / 555 local switch (i.e, MSC) due to terminal mobility
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7.3 GSM Location Management Principals of Numbering in GSM

Numbering of subscribers
Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Numbering of devices
International Mobile Station Equipment Identity (IMEI)

Permanent numbering

International Mobile Subscriber Identitiy (IMSI) Mobile Subscriber ISDN Number (MISDN)

Temporary numbering

Mobile Station Roaming Number (MSRN) Temporary Mobile Subscriber Identity (TMSI) Location Area Identifier (LAI) Cell Id (CI)

Separation between subscriber and device numbering supports personal mobility Separation between permanent and temporary numbering supports mobility management

Mapping between a users permanent/temporary and device/subscriber numbers is stored in the HLR and VLR for each user
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7.3 GSM Location Management Permanent Subscriber Addresses International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI)

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Uniquely identifies the subscriber and Mobile Subscriber Identification Number is stored in the SIM, HLR, and AuC Mobile Country Code (MCN) (MSIN) Hierarchical addressing (example: MCN=262 for Germany, MNC=01,02,03,07 for T-Mobile, Mobile Network Code Vodafone, Eplus, O2) (MNC) Used, e.g., for billing

Mobile Subscriber ISDN Number (MSISDN)

Real telephone number of a subscriber Subscriber can have several MSISDNs, e.g., to distinguish several services (voice, data, fax,...) Thus, automatic activation of service-specific resources is already possible during setup of connection Stored centrally in the HLR and in the SIM
Country Code (CCN), max. 3 places Subscriber Number (MSIN), max. 10 places

National Destination Code (NDC), max. 3 places

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7.3 GSM Location Management Temporary Subscriber Addresses Mobile Station Roaming Number (MSRN)

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Temporary Mobile Subscriber Identity (TMSI)

Used in place of the IMSI for the definite identification and addressing of the mobile station Avoids to determine the identity of the subscriber by listening to the radio channel Assigned during the mobile stations presence in the area of one VLR (by that VLR) and can be changed during this period (ID hopping) Is stored by the mobile station on the SIM card Is stored on the network side only in the VLR, not in the HLR Is assigned in an operator specific way and consists of 4x8 Bits Subscriber can be uniquely identified; IMSI is replaced by (TMSI, LAI)
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Temporary location-dependent ISDN number Required to make routing descisions and to identify the responsible MSC Assigned by the locally responsible VLR to each mobile station in its area and passed to the HLR Generated at each registration or when the HLR requests it for call setup (on a call-by-call basis)
NDC MSIN

CCN

Addresses the responsible MSC

Addresses the subscriber

7.3 GSM Location Management Other Addresses International Mobile Station Equipment Identity (IMEI)

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Uniquely identifies mobile stations Type Approval Code (TAC), Serial Number (SNR), centrally assigned assigned by the manf. internationally Allocated by the manufacturer, registered Finally Assembly Code (FAC), Spare (SP), by the network operator and stored in the assigned by the manufacturer not used EIR Characterizes a mobile station and gives clues about the manufacturer and the date of manufacturing

Location Area Identifier (LAI)

Internationally unique identification of a location area Regularly broadcasted by the base station Heard by the mobile station in order to decide whether or not a new LA has been entered
Country Code (CC) Location Area Code (LAC)

Cell Identifier (CI)

Uniquely identification of cells within an LA Length of CI: 2x8 bits Internationally unique identification with the Global Cell Identity (LAI+CI)

Mobile Network Code (MNC)

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7.3 GSM Location Management Overview of Addresses

EIR
IMEI IMSI RANDSRES Ki Kc

AUC
Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

BTS CI, LAI IMEI IMSI, MSISDN, TMSI

MSRNIMSI TMSI MSISDN LAI

VLR

HLR
IMSI MSISDNMSRN

BSIC CI IMEI IMSI Kc Ki MSISDN

Base Transceiver Station Identity Code Cell Identifier International Mobile Station Equipment Identity International Mobile Subscriber Identity Cipher/Decipher Key Subscriber Authentication Key Mobile Subscriber ISDN Number

MSRN LAI RAND SPC SRES TMSI

Mobile Station Roaming Number Location Area Identifier Random Number Signaling Point Code Session Key Temporary Mobile Subscriber Identity

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7.3 GSM Location Management Mobile Terminated Call (MTC)

HLR
Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management Forwarding to the local MSC MSRN

HLR 3 2
MSISDN

SS7
MSC VLR
MSRN TMSI

Request and delivery of routing address Forwarding to responsible GMSC MSISDN (based on CC and 1 NDC of MSISDN)

4 5 GMSC VLR
TMSI Request and delivery of TMSI for paging

ISDN

TMSI

7 BSC 7

7
TMSI

6 MSC VLR

BTS
4

8 BTS

Paging request Paging response

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7.3 GSM Location Management Detailed Sequence of Mobile Terminated Call

MS

BSS/MSC
Send info for setup

VLR

HLR

SS7 network

Initial Address Message Page MS (TMSI, LAI) Process Access Request

Paging Request (TMSI) Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management Paging Resp.

Authentication Start of ciphering procedure

Access Request Accepted Auth. Par. Request Complete Call (IMSI) Auth. Info Setup (IMSI,Kc,RAND,SRES) Call Conf. Address Complete Message Assign comnd. Assign compl. Alert Connect Connect ack.
Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management v7.0 35/51

Answer, i.e., switch connection through

7.3 GSM Location Management Location Registration and Location Updates Location Registration
Must be executed in order to get access to a GSM network, i.e., to receive or to initiate calls Registration with home network or a foreign network (roaming; provided there is a roaming agreement between home and foreign network) Steps: Sending IMSI and LAI to the network Authentication Start of ciphering Generation of an TMSI (stored in the associated VLR) and an MSRN (stored in the central HLR) MS receives TMSI and saves it in the SIM storage

Location Update
Purpose: Tracking the mobile user in order to deliver calls or SMS Hybrid location updating Execution on LA crossing: mobile station recognizes that it is in a new LA by regularly reading the LAI broadcasted in each cell Periodic execution: Periodic execution of location updates (independent of Execution on LA crossing) Difference between location registration and location update: location update is based on TMSI (which is only unique in connection with an LAI) instead of the IMSI

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

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7.3 GSM Location Management Location Update

Get parameters from old VLR (only required if VLR changes)

HLR HLR 5 6
Update location in HLR

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

IMSI,RAND, SRES,Kc

4 3 VLR

SS7

IMSI, MSRN

MSC
Location update confirmation and assignment of new TMSI

TMSIold, LAI

7 1

TMSInew

BTS
4

BSC 1 7 7 1 BTS

7 MSC 2 VLR

GMSC VLR

ISDN

Update location

TMSIold, LAI
Location update request

TMSIold, LAI

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7.3 GSM Location Management Overview (I)

BTS
(old LA)

BTS
(new LA)

MSC

VLR

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

LAI LAI newLAI Location Update Request(newLAI) Update Loc. Area

Authentication Assignment of a new paging identifier (TMSI)

Update Loc. Area Acknowledgement Location Update Confirm

*)

Figure shows location update sequence when roaming within a VLR area and MSC area If location area change incorporates change of the MSC or/and the VLR, location update procedure requires interactions with the central HLR
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7.3 GSM Location Management Mobile Originated Call (MOC)

HLR HLR
Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management Forwarding to responsible GMSC/MSC

SS7
Indication that processing of connection request has started

MSC

VLR 5 1 MSC

4 2 3 VLR GMSC VLR

ISDN

BTS
4

BSC 5 1 5 1 BTS

Authentication, start of ciphering procedure

Setup indication

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7.3 GSM Location Management Number Portability

MSISDNs are operator-specific and initially could not be kept by the user when changing the operator (number portability) Regulatory Authority for Telecommunications and Posts imposed operators to support number portability GSM TS 23.066: introduction of an additional Number Portability Database (NPDB) NPDB: operational database (used in real time at call set-up) which provides portability information

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Detection that MSISDN is ported

NPDB 4

HLR 2 3

HLR Unknown Subscriber error Routing Number, MSISDN 6 7

VLR 11 10 9 MSC

Incoming call 1 MSISDN

GMSC

GMSC

Number range holder network (initial operator of target subscriber)

Home network

Visited network

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7.4 GPRS Location Management Gateway Tunneling Protocol

SGSN
Application Network layer (IP, X.25) Network layer (IP, X.25) GTP Radio/Logical Link Control Medium Access Physical Layer Radio/Logical Link Control Medium Access Physical Layer TCP/UDP IP ... GTP TCP/UDP IP ...

GGSN

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Because IP does not support keeping the host address while moving to other points of attachment, GPRS applies tunneling Tunneling transparently transfers packets between the mobile station and external data networks In a tunnel, IP and X.25 packets are transmitted encapsulated within the GPRS backbone network between GGSN and SGSNs

GPRS Tunneling Protocol (GTP) carries the users IP or X.25 packets between GSNs within the same GSM network and between GSNs of different GSM networks GTP is carried over TCP/IP if X.25 is carried over GPRS and UDP/IP if IP is carried over GPRS GPRS backbone is IP-based
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7.4 GPRS Location Management Example: Mobile Originated Packet Transfer

GTP Packet
Header
SGSN Address Tunnel Identifier Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

IP Packet
Header
IP source IP destination

Payload

User data

SGSN

GGSN

Internet

SGSN SGSN Due to tunneling overhead, tunnels are terminated at an SGSN and are not continued at the air interface in GPRS
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7.4 GPRS Location Management GPRS Routing Example

BTS BTS BSC

WWW response
Inter-PLMN GPRS backbone

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Roaming mobile subscriber with PLMN 2 as home network and WWW request static or dynamic home-PLMN address

BSC

SGSN

SGSN

Intra-PLMN GPRS backbone

Border Gateway

Border Gateway

Intra-PLMN GPRS backbone

PLMN 2 PLMN 1
GGSN Packet Data Network (PDN) (e.g. Internet, X.25) GGSN

Router LAN

Server

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7.4 GPRS Location Management GPRS Advanced Addressing Packet Data Protocol (PDP) Address

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Packet TMSI (P-TMSI)

Assigned during an GPRS attach procedure and after a location update Used to page the MS when packets have to be delivered Mapping between PDP address and P-TMSI by the SGSN makes the transmission of packets between GGSN and MS possible

Address of an MS in the format of the used PDP (e.g., IP address) Static

MS permanently owns a PDP address assigned by the operator of the users home GSM network MS is assigned a new PDP address whenever it attaches to the network Dynamic Home-PLMN Address: Dynamic address assigned by the users home PLMN Dynamic Visited-PLMN Address: dynamic address assigned by the operator of the visited PLMN

Dynamic

Routing Area Identifier (RAI)

In order to optimize location management, GSM location areas are subdivided into several routing areas RAI is transmitted from the MS to the network instead of the LAI

GGSN is responsible for the allocation and deactivation of PDP addresses

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7.4 GPRS Location Management Routing Areas

Like terminals must be located for incoming calls in circuit-switched GSM, in GPRS localization is necessary for the delivery of data packets in the downlink Paging of the terminal for every downlink packet (or at least for every data burst) in all cells of the users location area: High overhead, which may exceed amount of user data to be transferred High delay for packet delivery Not used Instead: Introduction of Routing areas and State model for adaptive location management

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Routing Areas A routing area comprises several cells Routing areas are significantly smaller than location areas Depending on the GPRS state model, location updates and paging are related to routing instead of location areas or to cells
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7.4 GPRS Location Management Characteristics of Circuit and Packet Switched Traffic

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Frequency of data bursts (i.e., packets) exchanged in the packet-switched mode may be much higher than that of calls in the circuit-switched mode Interarrival-time of data bursts is on average much smaller than the inter-arrival time of calls Packet switched traffic may result in an increased number of paging requests, i.e., each time a data burst is to be transferred in the downlink
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7.4 GPRS Location Management Signaling Overhead of Location Update and Paging Costs

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

Optimal LA/RA size is determined in dependence on the margin between location update and paging costs As paging costs are much higher for packet-switched traffic, routing areas have a smaller number of cells than location areas
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7.4 GPRS Location Management GPRS State Model

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

States: IDLE, READY, STANDBY Timers: READY, STANDBY State transitions are executed by timers, data packet transfer, or user activity No paging and low delay of packet delivery in the READY state, but increased locationupdate overhead Decreased location-update overhead and power consumption in the STANDBY state, but increased paging overhead if downlink transmission starts Timers are operator-specific and are broadcasted on a dedicated signaling channel to the terminals

IDLE
Terminal is not reachable in GPRS mode Location management according to GSM circuit-switched

READY
Terminal performs location updates whenever entering a new cell

STANDBY
Terminal performs location updates whenever entering a new routing area

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7.5 UMTS Location Management Access and Core Network Location Management Experiences from GPRS
Location management is exclusively controlled in the core network (e.g., by SGSNs) Procedures (paging and location/cell updates) must pass the interface between access and core network High load and large delays

New approach for UMTS PS domain

Track subscribers on the basis of routing areas in the core network Track subscribers on the basis of UTRAN Registration Areas (URAs) and cells in the access networks

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

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7.5 UMTS Location Management State Models

Location updates on crossing of routing areas Corresponds to CELL CONNECTED or URA CONNECTED state in the access network Location updates on crossing of routing areas

No location management in the PS domain Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

PMM Packet Mobility Management RRC Radio Resource Control PS Packet switched

Location updates on crossing of URAs Corresponds to PMM CONNECTED state in the core network

No location management in the access network

Location updates on crossing of cells Corresponds to PMM CONNECTED state in the core network

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7.5 UMTS Location Management Areas tracked by Network Nodes

Mobile Communications 6. Mobility Management

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