Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) D. Kutscher
Request for Comments: 7778 F. Mir
Category: Informational R. Winter
ISSN: 2070-1721 NEC
S. Krishnan
Ericsson
Y. Zhang
Hewlett Packard Labs
CJ. Bernardos
UC3M
March 2016
Mobile Communication Congestion Exposure Scenario
Abstract
This memo describes a mobile communications use case for congestion
exposure (ConEx) with a particular focus on those mobile
communication networks that are architecturally similar to the 3GPP
Evolved Packet System (EPS). This memo provides a brief overview of
the architecture of these networks (both access and core networks)
and current QoS mechanisms and then discusses how congestion exposure
concepts could be applied. Based on this discussion, this memo
suggests a set of requirements for ConEx mechanisms that particularly
apply to these mobile networks.
Status of This Memo
This document is not an Internet Standards Track specification; it is
published for informational purposes.
This document is a product of the Internet Engineering Task Force
(IETF). It represents the consensus of the IETF community. It has
received public review and has been approved for publication by the
Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG). Not all documents
approved by the IESG are a candidate for any level of Internet
Standard; see Section 2 of RFC 5741.
Information about the current status of this document, any errata,
and how to provide feedback on it may be obtained at
http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7778.
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 1]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
1.1. Acronyms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
2. ConEx Use Cases in Mobile Communication Networks . . . . . . 4
2.1. ConEx as a Basis for Traffic Management . . . . . . . . . 5
2.2. ConEx to Incentivize Scavenger Transports . . . . . . . . 7
2.3. Accounting for Congestion Volume . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
2.4. Partial vs. Full Deployment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
2.5. Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
3. ConEx in the EPS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
3.1. Possible Deployment Scenarios . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
3.2. Implementing ConEx Functions in the EPS . . . . . . . . . 14
3.2.1. ConEx Protocol Mechanisms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
3.2.2. ConEx Functions in the Mobile Network . . . . . . . . 15
4. Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
5. Security Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
6. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Appendix A. Overview of 3GPP's EPS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 2]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
1. Introduction
Mobile data traffic continues to grow rapidly. The challenge
wireless operators face is to support more subscribers with an
increasing bandwidth demand. To meet these bandwidth requirements,
there is a need for new technologies that assist the operators in
efficiently utilizing the available network resources. Two specific
areas where such new technologies could be deemed useful are resource
allocation and flow management.
Analysis of data traffic in cellular networks has shown that most
flows are short lived and low volume, but a comparatively small
number of high-volume flows constitute a large fraction of the
overall traffic volume [lte-sigcomm2013]. That means that
potentially a small fraction of users is responsible for the majority
of traffic in cellular networks. In view of such highly skewed user
behavior and limited and expensive resources (e.g., the wireless
spectrum), resource allocation and usage accountability are two
important issues for operators to solve in order to achieve both a
better network resource utilization and fair resource sharing.
ConEx, as described in [RFC6789], is a technology that can be used to
achieve these goals.
The ConEx mechanism is designed to be a general technology that could
be applied as a key element of congestion management solutions for a
variety of use cases. In particular, use cases that are of interest
for initial deployment are those in which the end hosts and the
network that contains the destination end hosts are ConEx-enabled but
other networks need not be.
A specific example of such a use case can be a mobile communication
network such as a 3GPP EPS networks where UEs (User Equipment) (i.e.,
mobile end hosts), servers and caches, the access network, and
possibly an operator's core network can be ConEx-enabled; that is,
hosts support the ConEx mechanisms, and the network provides
policing/auditing functions at its edges.
This document provides a brief overview of the architecture of such
networks (access and core networks) and current QoS mechanisms. It
further discusses how such networks can benefit from congestion
exposure concepts and how they should be applied. Using this use
case as a basis, a set of requirements for ConEx mechanisms are
described.
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RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
1.1. Acronyms
In this section, we expand some acronyms that are used throughout the
text. Most are explained and put in a system context in Appendix A
and the 3GPP, ECN, and ConEx specifications referenced there.
eNB
Evolved NodeB: LTE base station
HSS
Home Subscriber Server
S-GW
Serving Gateway: mobility anchor and tunnel endpoint
P-GW
Packet Data Network (PDN) Gateway: tunnel endpoint for user-plane
and control-plane protocols -- typically the GW to the Internet or
an operator's service network
UE
User Equipment: mobile terminals
GTP
GPRS Tunneling Protocol [TS29060]
GTP-U
GTP User Data Tunneling [TS29060]
GTP-C
GTP Control [TS29060]
2. ConEx Use Cases in Mobile Communication Networks
In general, quality of service and good network resource utilization
are important requirements for mobile communication network
operators. Radio access and backhaul capacity are considered scarce
resources, and bandwidth (and radio resource) demand is difficult to
predict precisely due to user mobility, radio propagation effects,
etc. Hence, today's architectures and protocols go to significant
lengths in order to provide network-controlled quality of service.
These efforts often lead to complexity and cost. ConEx could be a
simpler and more capable approach to efficient resource sharing in
these networks.
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 4]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
In the following sections, we discuss ways that congestion exposure
could be beneficial for supporting resource management in such mobile
communication networks. [RFC6789] describes fundamental congestion
exposure concepts and a set of use cases for applying congestion
exposure mechanisms to realize different traffic management functions
such as flow policy-based traffic management or traffic offloading.
Readers that are not familiar with the 3GPP EPS should refer to
Appendix A first.
2.1. ConEx as a Basis for Traffic Management
Traffic management is a very important function in mobile
communication networks. Since wireless resources are considered
scarce and since user mobility and shared bandwidth in the wireless
access create certain dynamics with respect to available bandwidth,
commercially operated mobile networks provide mechanisms for tight
resource management (admission control for bearer establishment).
However, sometimes these mechanisms are not easily applicable to IP-
and HTTP-dominated traffic mixes; for example, most Internet traffic
in today's mobile network is transmitted over the (best-effort)
default bearer.
Given the above, and in the light of the significant increase of
overall data volume in 3G networks, Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) is
often considered a desirable function to have in the Evolved Packet
Core (EPC) -- despite its cost and complexity. However, with the
increase of encrypted data traffic, traffic management using DPI
alone will become even more challenging.
Congestion exposure can be employed to address resource management
requirements in different ways:
1. It can enable or enhance flow policy-based traffic management.
At present, DPI-based resource management is often used to
prioritize certain application classes with respect to others in
overload situations, so that more users can be served effectively
on the network. In overload situations, operators use DPI to
identify dispensable flows and make them yield to other flows (of
different application classes) through policing. Such traffic
management is thus based on operator decisions, using partly
static configuration and some estimation about the future per-
flow bandwidth demand. With congestion exposure, it would be
possible to assess the contribution to congestion of individual
flows. This information can then be used as input to a policer
that can optimize network utilization more accurately and
dynamically. By using ConEx congestion contribution as a metric,
such policers would not need to be aware of specific link loads
(e.g., in wireless base stations) or flow application types.
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 5]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
2. It can reduce the need for complex DPI by allowing for a bulk
packet traffic management system that does not have to consider
either the application classes flows belong to or the individual
sessions. Instead, traffic management would be based on the
current cost (contribution to congestion) incurred by different
flows and enable operators to apply policing/accounting depending
on their preference. Such traffic management would be simpler
and more robust (no real-time flow application type
identification required, no static configuration of application
classes); it would also perform better as decisions can be made
based on real-time actual cost contribution. With ConEx,
accurate downstream path information would be visible to ingress
network operators, which can respond to incipient congestion in
time. This can be equivalent to offering different levels of
QoS, e.g., premium service with zero congestion response. For
that, ConEx could be used in two different ways:
A. as additional information to assist network functions to
impose different QoS for different application sessions; and
B. as a tool to let applications decide on their response to
congestion notification while incentivizing them to react (in
general) appropriately, e.g., by enforcing overall limits for
congestion contribution or by accounting and charging for
such congestion contribution. Note that this level of
responsiveness would be on a different level than, say,
application-layer responsiveness in protocols such as Dynamic
Adaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH) [dash]; however, it could
interwork with such protocols, for example, by triggering
earlier responses.
3. It can further be used to more effectively trigger the offload of
selected traffic to a non-3GPP network. Nowadays, it is common
that users are equipped with dual-mode mobile phones (e.g.,
integrating third/fourth generation cellular and Wi-Fi radio
devices) capable of attaching to available networks either
sequentially or simultaneously. With this scenario in mind, 3GPP
is currently looking at mechanisms to seamlessly and selectively
switch over a single IP flow (e.g., user application) to a
different radio access while keeping all other ongoing
connections untouched. The decision on when and which IP flows
move is typically based on statically configured rules, whereas
the use of ConEx mechanisms could also factor real-time
congestion information into the decision.
In summary, it can be said that traffic management in the 3GPP EPS
and other mobile communication architectures is very important.
Currently, more static approaches based on admission control and
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 6]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
static QoS are in use, but recently, there has been a perceived need
for more dynamic mechanisms based on DPI. Introducing ConEx could
make these mechanisms more efficient or even remove the need for some
of the DPI functions deployed today.
2.2. ConEx to Incentivize Scavenger Transports
3G and LTE networks are turning into universal access networks that
are shared between mobile (smart) phone users, mobile users with
laptop PCs, home users with LTE access, and others. Capacity sharing
among different users and application flows becomes increasingly
important in these mobile communication networks.
Most of this traffic is likely to be classified as best-effort
traffic without differentiating, for example, periodic OS updates and
application store downloads from web-based (i.e., browser-based)
communication or other real-time communication. For many of the bulk
data transfers, completion times are not important within certain
bounds; therefore, if scavenger transports (or transports that are
less than best effort) such as Low Extra Delay Background Transport
(LEDBAT) [RFC6817] were used, it would improve the overall utility of
the network. The use of these transports by the end user, however,
needs to be incentivized. ConEx could be used to build an incentive
scheme, e.g., by giving a larger bandwidth allowance to users that
contribute less to congestion or lowering the next monthly
subscription fee. In principle, this would be possible to implement
with current specifications.
2.3. Accounting for Congestion Volume
3G and LTE networks provide extensive support for accounting and
charging already, for example, see the Policy Charging Control (PCC)
architecture [TS23203]. In fact, most operators today account
transmitted data volume on a very fine granular basis and either
correlate monthly charging to the exact number of packets/bytes
transmitted or employ some form of flat rate (or flexible flat rate),
often with a so-called fair-use policy. With such policies, users
are typically limited to an administratively configured maximum
bandwidth limit after they have used up their contractual data volume
budget for the charging period.
Changing this data from volume-based accounting to congestion-based
accounting would be possible in principle, especially since there
already is an elaborate per-user accounting system available. Also,
an operator-provided mobile communication network can be seen as a
network domain that would allow for such congestion volume
accounting. This would not require any support from the global
Internet, especially since the typical scarce resources such as the
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RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
wireless access and the mobile backhaul are all within this domain.
Traffic normally leaves/enters the operator's network via well-
defined egress/ingress points that would be ideal candidates for
policing functions. Moreover, in most commercially operated
networks, accounting is performed for both received and sent data,
which would facilitate congestion volume accounting as well.
With respect to the current Path Computation Client (PCC) framework,
accounting for congestion volume could be added as another feature to
the "Usage Monitoring Control" capability that is currently based on
data volume. This would not require a new interface (reference
points) at all.
2.4. Partial vs. Full Deployment
In general, ConEx lends itself to partial deployment as the mechanism
does not require all routers and hosts to support congestion
exposure. Moreover, assuming a policing infrastructure has been put
in place, it is not required to modify all hosts. Since ConEx is
about senders exposing congestion contribution to the network,
senders need to be made ConEx-aware (assuming a congestion
notification mechanism such as Explicit Congestion Notification (ECN)
is in place).
When moving towards full deployment in a specific operator's network,
different ways for introducing ConEx support on UEs are feasible.
Since mobile communication networks are multi-vendor networks,
standardizing ConEx support on UEs (e.g., in 3GPP specifications)
appears useful. Still, not all UEs would have to support ConEx, and
operators would be free to choose their policing approach in such
deployment scenarios. Leveraging existing PCC architectures, 3GPP
network operators could, for example, decide policing/accounting
approaches per UE -- i.e., apply fixed volume caps for non-ConEx UEs
and more flexible schemes for ConEx-enabled UEs.
Moreover, it should be noted that network support for ConEx is a
feature that some operators may choose to deploy if they wish, but it
is not required that all operators (or all other networks) do so.
Depending on the extent of ConEx support, specific aspects such as
roaming have to be taken into account, i.e., what happens when a user
is roaming in a ConEx-enabled network but their UE is not ConEx-
enabled and vice versa. Although these may not be fundamental
problems, they need to be considered. For supporting mobility in
general, it can be required to shift users' policing state during a
handover. There is existing work on distributed rate limiting (see
[raghavan2007]) and on specific optimizations (see [nec.euronf-2011])
for congestion exposure and policing in mobility scenarios.
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 8]
RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
Another aspect to consider is the addition of Selected IP Traffic
Offload (SIPTO) and Local IP Access (LIPA) [TR23829]), i.e., the idea
that some traffic such as high-volume Internet traffic is actually
not passed through the EPC but is offloaded at a "break-out point"
closer to (or in) the access network. On the other hand, ConEx can
also enable more dynamic decisions on what traffic to actually
offload by considering congestion exposure in bulk traffic
aggregates, thus making traffic offload more effective.
2.5. Summary
In summary, the 3GPP EPS is a system architecture that can benefit
from congestion exposure in multiple ways. Dynamic traffic and
congestion management is an acknowledged and important requirement
for the EPS; this is also illustrated by the current DPI-related work
for EPS.
Moreover, networks such as an EPS mobile communication network would
be quite amenable for deploying ConEx as a mechanism, since they
represent clearly defined and well-separated operational domains in
which local ConEx deployment would be possible. Aside from roaming
(which needs to be considered for a specific solution), such a
deployment is fully under the control of a single operator, which can
enable operator-local enhancement without the need for major changes
to the architecture.
In 3GPP EPS, interfaces between all elements of the architecture are
subject to standardization, including UE interfaces and eNB
interfaces, so that a more general approach, involving more than a
single operator's network, can be feasible as well.
3. ConEx in the EPS
In this section, we discuss a few options for how such a mechanism
(and possibly additional policing functions) could eventually be
deployed in the 3GPP EPS. Note that this description of options is
not intended to be a complete set of possible approaches; it merely
discusses the most promising options.
3.1. Possible Deployment Scenarios
There are different possible ways for how ConEx functions on hosts
and network elements can be used. For example, ConEx could be used
for a limited part of the network only (e.g., for the access
network), congestion exposure and sender adaptation could involve the
mobile nodes or not, or, finally, the ConEx feedback loop could
extend beyond a single operator's domain or not.
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 9]
RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
We present four different deployment scenarios for congestion
exposure in the figures below:
1. In Figure 1, ConEx is supported by servers for sending data (web
servers in the Internet and caches in an operator's network) but
not by UEs (neither for receiving nor sending). An operator who
chooses to run a policing function on the network ingress, e.g.,
on the P-GW, can still benefit from congestion exposure without
requiring any change on UEs.
2. ConEx is universally employed between operators (as depicted in
Figure 2) with an end-to-end ConEx feedback loop. Here,
operators could still employ local policies, congestion
accounting schemes, etc., and they could use information about
congestion contribution for determining interconnection
agreements. This deployment scenario would imply the willingness
of operators to expose congestion to each other.
3. For Isolated ConEx domains as depicted in Figure 3, ConEx is
solely applied locally in the operator network, and there is no
end-to-end congestion exposure. This could be the case when
ConEx is only implemented in a few networks or when operators
decide to not expose ECN and account for congestion for inter-
domain traffic. Independent of the actual scenario, it is likely
that there will be border gateways (as in today's deployments)
that are associated with policing and accounting functions.
4. [conex-lite] describes an approach called "ConEx Lite" for mobile
networks that is intended for initial deployment of congestion
exposure concepts in LTE, specifically in the backhaul and core
network segments. As depicted in Figure 4, ConEx Lite allows a
tunnel receiver to monitor the volume of bytes that has been
lost, dropped, or ECN-CE (Congestion Experienced) marked between
the tunnel sender and receiver. For that purpose, a new field
called the Byte Sequence Marker (BSN) is introduced to the tunnel
header to identify the byte in the flow of data from the tunnel
sender to the tunnel receiver. A policer at the tunnel sender is
expected to react according to the tunnel congestion volume (see
[conex-lite] for details).
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 10]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
+------------+
| Web server |
| w/ ConEx |
+------------+
|
|
|
-----------------------
| | |
| Internet | |
| | |
-----------------------
|
--------------------------------------------|--------
| | |
| +-----------+ |
| | Web cache | |
| | w/ ConEx | |
| +-----------+ |
| | |
| +----+ +-------+ +-------+ +-------+ |
| | UE |=====| eNB |=====| S-GW |=====| P-GW | |
| +----+ +-------+ +-------+ +-------+ |
| |
| Operator A |
-----------------------------------------------------
Figure 1: ConEx Support on Servers and Caches
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 11]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
-----------------------------------------------------
| +----+ +-------+ +-------+ +-------+ |
| | UE |=====| eNB |=====| S-GW |=====| P-GW | |
| +----+ +-------+ +-------+ +-------+ |
| | |
| Operator A | |
--------------------------------------------|--------
|
-----------------------
| |
| Internet |
| |
-----------------------
|
--------------------------------------------|--------
| +----+ +-------+ +-------+ +-------+ |
| | UE |=====| eNB |=====| S-GW |=====| P-GW | |
| +----+ +-------+ +-------+ +-------+ |
| |
| Operator B |
-----------------------------------------------------
Figure 2: ConEx Deployment across Operator Domains
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 12]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
-----------------------------------------------------
| |--- ConEx path ---| |
| v v |
| +----+ +-------+ +-------+ +-------+ |
| | UE |=====| eNB |=====| S-GW |=====| P-GW | |
| +----+ +-------+ +-------+ +-------+ |
| | |
| Operator A | |
--------------------------------------------|--------
|
-----------------------
| |
| Internet |
| |
-----------------------
|
--------------------------------------------|--------
| +----+ +-------+ +-------+ +-------+ |
| | UE |=====| eNB |=====| S-GW |=====| P-GW | |
| +----+ +-------+ +-------+ +-------+ |
| |
| Operator B |
-----------------------------------------------------
Figure 3: ConEx Deployment in a Single Operator Domain
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 13]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
Backhaul Network Core Network
+---------------+ +--------------+
| | | |
| BSN or ECN-CE | | |
| marked | | |
| packets | | |
| <--- | | |
+----+ +-------+ +----------+ +-------+ +--------+
| | | | GTP-U | | GTP-U | | | |
| UE |=====| eNB |=======| S-GW |=======| P-GW |==|Internet|
| | | | Tunnel| | Tunnel| | | |
+----+ +-------+ +----------+ +-------+ +--------+
| ---> | | |
| User/control | | User/control |
| packets with | | packet with |
| DL congestion | | DL congestion|
| vol counters | | vol counters |
| | | |
+---------------+ +--------------+
Figure 4: ConEx Lite Deployment
Note: DL stands for "downlink".
3.2. Implementing ConEx Functions in the EPS
We expect a ConEx solution to consist of different functions that
should be considered when implementing congestion exposure in the
3GPP EPS. [RFC7713] describes the following congestion exposure
components:
o Modified senders that send congestion exposure information in
response to congestion feedback.
o Receivers that generate congestion feedback (leveraging existing
behavior or requiring new functions).
o Audit functions that audit ConEx signals against actual
congestion, e.g., by monitoring flows or aggregate of flows.
o Policy devices that monitor congestion exposure information and
act on the flows according to the operator's policy.
Two aspects are important to consider: 1) how the ConEx protocol
mechanisms would be implemented and what modifications to existing
networks would be required, and 2) where ConEx functional entities
would be placed best (to allow for a non-invasive addition). We
discuss these two aspects in the following sections.
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 14]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
3.2.1. ConEx Protocol Mechanisms
The most important step in introducing ConEx (initially) is adding
the congestion exposure functionality to senders. For an initial
deployment, no further modification to senders and receivers would be
required. Specifically, there is no fundamental dependency on ECN,
i.e., ConEx can be introduced without requiring ECN to be
implemented.
Congestion exposure information for IPv6 [CONEX-DESTOPT] is contained
in a destination option header field, which requires minimal changes
at senders and nodes that want to assess path congestion. The
destination option header field does not affect non-ConEx nodes in a
network.
In 3GPP networks, IP tunneling is used intensively, i.e., using
either IP-in-GTP-U or Proxy Mobile IPv6 (PMIPv6) (i.e., IP-in-IP)
tunnels. In general, the ConEx destination option of encapsulated
packets should be made available for network nodes on the tunnel
path, i.e., a tunnel ingress should copy the ConEx destination option
field to the outer header.
For effective and efficient capacity sharing, we envisage the
deployment of ECN in conjunction with ConEx so that ECN-enabled
receivers and senders get more accurate and more timely information
about the congestion contribution of their flows. ECN is already
partially introduced into 3GPP networks: Section 11.6 in [TS36300]
specifies the usage of ECN for congestion notification on the radio
link (between eNB and UE), and [TS26114] specifies how this can be
leveraged for voice codec adaptation. A complete, end-to-end support
of ECN would require specification of tunneling behaviour, which
should be based on [RFC6040] (for IP-in-IP tunnels). Specifically, a
specification for tunneling ECN in GTP-U will be needed.
3.2.2. ConEx Functions in the Mobile Network
In this section, we discuss some possible placement strategies for
ConEx functional entities (addressing both policing and auditing
functions) in the EPS and for possible optimizations for both the
uplink and the downlink.
In general, ConEx information (exposed congestion) is declared by a
sender and remains unchanged on the path; hence, reading ConEx
information (e.g., by policing functions) is placement-agnostic.
Auditing ConEx normally requires assessing declared congestion
contribution and current actual congestion. If the latter is, for
example, done using ECN, such a function would best be placed at the
end of the path.
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RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
In order to provide a comprehensive ConEx-based capacity management
framework for the EPS, it would be advantageous to consider user
contribution to congestion for both the radio access and the core
network. For a non-invasive introduction of ConEx, it can be
beneficial to combine ConEx functions with existing logical EPS
entities. For example, potential places for ConEx policing and
auditing functions would then be eNBs, S-GWs, or the P-GWs. Operator
deployments may, of course, still provide additional intermediary
ConEx-enabled IP network elements.
For a more specific discussion, it will be beneficial to distinguish
downlink and uplink traffic directions (also see [nec.globecom2010]
for a more detailed discussion). In today's networks and usage
models, downlink traffic is dominating (also reflected by the
asymmetric capacity provided by the LTE radio interface). That does
not, however, imply that uplink congestion is not an issue, since the
asymmetric maximum bandwidth configuration can create a smaller
bottleneck for uplink traffic. There are, of course, backhaul links,
gateways, etc., that could be overloaded as well.
For managing downlink traffic (e.g., in scenarios such as the one
depicted in Figure 1), operators can have different requirements for
policing traffic. Although policing is, in principle, location-
agnostic, it is important to consider requirements related to the EPS
architecture (Figure 5) such as tunneling between P-GWs and eNBs.
Policing can require access to subscriber information (e.g.,
congestion contribution quota) or user-specific accounting, which
suggests that the ConEx function could be co-located with the P-GW
that already has an interface towards the Policy and Charging Rule
Function (PCRF).
Still, policing can serve different purposes. For example, if the
objective is to police bulk traffic induced by peer networks,
additional monitoring functions can be placed directly at
corresponding ingress points to monitor traffic and possibly drive
out-of-band functions such as triggering border contract penalties.
The auditing function, which should be placed at the end of the path
(at least after/at the last bottleneck), would likely be placed best
on the eNB (wireless base station).
For the uplink direction, there are naturally different options for
designing monitoring and policy enforcement functions. A likely
approach can be to monitor congestion exposure on central gateway
nodes (such as P-GWs) that provide the required interfaces to the
PCRF but to perform policing actions in the access network (i.e., in
eNBs). For example, the traffic is policed at the ingress before it
reaches concentration points in the core network.
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Such a setup would enable all the ConEx use cases described in
Section 2 without requiring significant changes to the EPS
architecture. It would also enable operators to re-use existing
infrastructure, specifically wireless base stations, PCRF, and Home
Subscriber Server (HSS) systems.
For ConEx functions on elements such as the S-GWs and P-GWs, it is
important to consider mobility and tunneling protocol requirements.
LTE provides two alternative approaches: PMIPv6 [TS23402] and the
GPRS Tunneling Protocol (GTP). For the propagation of congestion
information (responses), tunneling considerations are therefore very
important.
In general, policing will be done based on per-user (per-subscriber)
information such as congestion quota, current quota usage, etc., and
network operator policies, e.g., specifying how to react to
persistent congestion contribution. In the EPS, per-user information
is normally part of the user profile (stored in the HSS) that would
be accessed by PCC entities such as the PCRF for dynamic updates,
enforcement, etc.
4. Summary
We have shown how congestion exposure can be useful for efficient
resource management in mobile communication networks. The premise
for this discussion was the observation that data communication,
specifically best-effort bulk data transmission, is becoming a
commodity service, whereas resources are obviously still limited.
This calls for efficient, scalable, and yet effective capacity
sharing in such networks.
ConEx can be a mechanism that enables such capacity sharing while
allowing operators to apply these mechanisms in different ways, e.g.,
for implementing different use cases as described in Section 2. It
is important to note that ConEx is fundamentally a mechanism that can
be applied in different ways to realize the policies of different
operators.
ConEx may also be used to complement 3GPP-based mechanisms for
congestion management that are currently under development, such as
in the User Plane Congestion Management (UPCON) work item described
in [TR23705].
We have described a few possibilities for adding ConEx as a mechanism
to 3GPP LTE-based networks and have shown how this could be done
incrementally (starting with partial deployment). It is quite
feasible that such partial deployments be done on a per-operator-
domain basis without requiring changes to standard 3GPP interfaces.
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 17]
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For network-wide deployment, e.g., with congestion exposure between
operators, more considerations might be needed.
We have also identified a few implications/requirements that should
be taken into consideration when enabling congestion exposure in such
networks:
Performance: In mobile communication networks with more expensive
resources and more stringent QoS requirements, the feasibility of
applying ConEx as well as its performance and deployment scenarios
need to be examined closer. For instance, a mobile communication
network may encounter longer delay and higher loss rates, which
can impose specific requirements on the timeliness and accuracy of
congestion exposure information.
Mobility: One of the unique characteristics of cellular networks
when compared to wired networks is the presence of user mobility.
As the user location changes, the same device can be connected to
the network via different base stations (eNBs) or even go through
switching gateways. Thus, the ConEx scheme must to be able to
carry the latest congestion information per user/flow across
multiple network nodes in real time.
Multi-access: In cellular networks, multiple access technologies can
co-exist. In such cases, a user can use multiple access
technologies for multiple applications or even a single
application simultaneously. If the congestion policies are set
based on each user, then ConEx should have the capability to
enable information exchange across multiple access domains.
Tunneling: Both 3G and LTE networks make extensive usage of
tunneling. The ConEx mechanism should be designed in a way to
support usage with different tunneling protocols such as PMIPv6
and GTP. For ECN-based congestion notification, [RFC6040]
specifies how the ECN field of the IP header should be constructed
on entry and exit from IP-in-IP tunnels.
Roaming: Independent of the specific architecture, mobile
communication networks typically differentiate between non-roaming
and roaming scenarios. Roaming scenarios are typically more
demanding regarding implementing operator policies, charging, etc.
It can be expected that this would also hold for deploying ConEx.
A more detailed analysis of this problem will be provided in a
future revision of this document.
It is important to note that ConEx is intended to be used as a
supplement and not a replacement to the existing QoS mechanisms in
mobile networks. For example, ConEx deployed in 3GPP mobile networks
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 18]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
can provide useful input to the existing 3GPP PCC mechanisms by
supplying more dynamic network information to supplement the fairly
static information used by the PCC. This would enable the mobile
network to make better policy control decisions than is possible with
only static information.
5. Security Considerations
For any ConEx deployment, it is important to apply appropriate
mechanisms to preclude applications and senders from misstating their
congestion contribution. [RFC7713] discusses this problem in detail
and introduces the ConEx auditing concept. ConEx auditing can be
performed in different ways -- for example, flows can be constantly
audited or only audited on demand when network operators decide to do
so. Also, coarse-grained auditing may operate on flow aggregates for
efficiency reasons, whereas fine-grained auditing would inspect
individual flows. In mobile networks, there may be deployment
strategies that favor efficiency over very exact auditing. It is
important to understand the trade-offs and to apply ConEx auditing
appropriately.
The ConEx protocol specifications [CONEX-DESTOPT] and [TCP-MOD]
discuss additional security considerations that would also apply to
mobile network deployments.
6. Informative References
[CONEX-DESTOPT]
Krishnan, S., Kuehlewind, M., Briscoe, B., and C. Ralli,
"IPv6 Destination Option for Congestion Exposure (ConEx)",
Work in Progress, draft-ietf-conex-destopt-12, January
2016.
[conex-lite]
Baillargeon, S. and I. Johansson, "ConEx Lite for Mobile
Networks", In Proceedings of the 2014 ACM SIGCOMM Capacity
Sharing Workshop, DOI 10.1145/2630088.2630091, August
2014.
[dash] ISO/IEC, "Information Technology -- Dynamic Adaptive
Streaming over HTTP (DASH) -- Part 1: Media presentation
description and segment formats", ISO/IEC 23009-1:2014,
May 2014.
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 19]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
[lte-sigcomm2013]
Huang, J., Qian, F., Guo, Y., Zhou, Y., Xu, Q., Mao, Z.,
Sen, S., and O. Spatscheck, "An In-depth Study of LTE:
Effect of Network Protocol and Application Behavior on
Performance", In Proceedings of the 2013 ACM SIGCOMM
Conference, DOI 10.1145/2486001.2486006, August 2013.
[nec.euronf-2011]
Mir, F., Kutscher, D., and M. Brunner, "Congestion
Exposure in Mobility Scenarios", In Proceedings of the 7th
Euro-NF Conference on Next Generation Internet (NGI),
DOI 10.1109/NGI.2011.5985948, June 2011.
[nec.globecom2010]
Kutscher, D., Lundqvist, H., and F. Mir, "Congestion
Exposure in Mobile Wireless Communications", In
Proceedings of 2010 IEEE Global Telecommunications
Conference (GLOBECOM), DOI 10.1109/GLOCOM.2010.5684362,
December 2010.
[raghavan2007]
Raghavan, B., Vishwanath, K., Ramabhadran, S., Yocum, K.,
and A. Snoeren, "Cloud Control with Distributed Rate
Limiting", ACM SIGCOMM Computer Communication Review,
DOI 10.1145/1282427.1282419, October 2007.
[RFC6040] Briscoe, B., "Tunnelling of Explicit Congestion
Notification", RFC 6040, DOI 10.17487/RFC6040, November
2010, <http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6040>.
[RFC6789] Briscoe, B., Ed., Woundy, R., Ed., and A. Cooper, Ed.,
"Congestion Exposure (ConEx) Concepts and Use Cases",
RFC 6789, DOI 10.17487/RFC6789, December 2012,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6789>.
[RFC6817] Shalunov, S., Hazel, G., Iyengar, J., and M. Kuehlewind,
"Low Extra Delay Background Transport (LEDBAT)", RFC 6817,
DOI 10.17487/RFC6817, December 2012,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc6817>.
[RFC7713] Mathis, M. and B. Briscoe, "Congestion Exposure (ConEx)
Concepts, Abstract Mechanism, and Requirements", RFC 7713,
DOI 10.17487/RFC7713, December 2015,
<http://www.rfc-editor.org/info/rfc7713>.
[TCP-MOD] Kuehlewind, M. and R. Scheffenegger, "TCP modifications
for Congestion Exposure", Work in Progress, draft-ietf-
conex-tcp-modifications-10, October 2015.
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 20]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
[TR23705] 3GPP, "System Enhancements for User Plane Congestion
Management", 3GPP TR 23.705 13.0.0, December 2015.
[TR23829] 3GPP, "Local IP Access and Selected IP Traffic Offload
(LIPA-SIPTO)", 3GPP TR 23.829 10.0.1, October 2011.
[TS23203] 3GPP, "Policy and charging control architecture", 3GPP
TS 23.203 13.6.0, December 2015.
[TS23401] 3GPP, "General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) enhancements
for Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access Network
(E-UTRAN) access", 3GPP TS 23.401 13.5.0, December 2015.
[TS23402] 3GPP, "Architecture enhancements for non-3GPP accesses",
3GPP TS 23.402 13.4.0, December 2015.
[TS26114] 3GPP, "IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS); Multimedia
telephony; Media handling and interaction", 3GPP TS 26.114
13.2.0, December 2015.
[TS29060] 3GPP, "General Packet Radio Service (GPRS); GPRS
Tunnelling Protocol (GTP) across the Gn and Gp interface",
3GPP TS 29.060 13.3.0, December 2015.
[TS29274] 3GPP, "3GPP Evolved Packet System (EPS); Evolved General
Packet Radio Service (GPRS) Tunnelling Protocol for
Control plane (GTPv2-C); Stage 3", 3GPP TS 29.274 13.4.0,
December 2015.
[TS36300] 3GPP, "Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access (E-UTRA)
and Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio Access Network
(E-UTRAN); Overall description; Stage 2", 3GPP TS 36.300
13.2.0, January 2016.
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 21]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
Appendix A. Overview of 3GPP's EPS
This section provides an overview of the 3GPP "Evolved Packet System"
(EPS [TS36300] [TS23401]) as a specific example of a mobile
communication architecture. Of course, other architectures exist,
but the EPS is used as one example to demonstrate the applicability
of congestion exposure concepts and mechanisms.
The EPS architecture and some of its standardized interfaces are
depicted in Figure 5. The EPS provides IP connectivity to UE (i.e.,
mobile nodes) and access to operator services, such as global
Internet access and voice communications. The EPS comprises the
radio access network called Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio
Access Network (E-UTRAN) and the core network called the Evolved
Packet Core (EPC). QoS is supported through an EPS bearer concept,
providing bindings to resource reservation within the network.
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+-------+
+-------+ | PCRF |
| HSS | /+-------+\
+-------+ Gx/ \Rx
| / \
| / \
| +-------+ SGi +-------+
| | P-GW |=========| AF |
| +-------+ +-------+
HPLMN | |
------------------------------|--------------|----------------------
VPLMN | |
+-------+ |
| MME | |
/+-------+\ |S8
S1-MME / \ |
/ \S11 |
/ \ |
+-----------+ \ |
+----+ LTE-Uu | | \ |
| UE |========| | S1-U +-------+
+----+ | E-UTRAN |==============| S-GW |
| (eNBs) | +-------+
| |
+-----------+
Figure 5: EPS Architecture Overview (Roaming Case)
Note:
HPLMN - Home Public Land Mobile Network
VPLMN - Visited Public Land Mobile Network
AF - Application Function
SGi - Service Gateway Interface
LTE-Uu - LTE Radio Interface
The Evolved NodeB (eNB), the LTE base station, is part of the access
network that provides radio resource management, header compression,
security, and connectivity to the core network through the S1
interface. In an LTE network, the control-plane signaling traffic
and the data traffic are handled separately. The eNBs transmit the
control traffic and data traffic separately via two logically
separate interfaces.
The Home Subscriber Server (HSS) is a database that contains user
subscriptions and QoS profiles. The Mobility Management Entity (MME)
is responsible for mobility management, user authentication, bearer
establishment and modification, and maintenance of the UE context.
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 23]RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
The Serving Gateway (S-GW) is the mobility anchor and manages the
user-plane data tunnels during the inter-eNB handovers. It tunnels
all user data packets and buffers downlink IP packets destined for
UEs that happen to be in idle mode.
The PDN Gateway (P-GW) is responsible for IP address allocation to
the UE and is a tunnel endpoint for user-plane and control-plane
protocols. It is also responsible for charging, packet filtering,
and policy-based control of flows. It interconnects the mobile
network to external IP networks, e.g., the Internet.
In this architecture, data packets are not sent directly on an IP
network between the eNB and the gateways. Instead, every packet is
tunneled over a tunneling protocol -- the GPRS Tunneling Protocol
(GTP) [TS29060] over UDP/IP. A GTP path is identified in each node
with the IP address and a UDP port number on the eNB/gateways. The
GTP protocol carries both the data traffic (GTP-U tunnels) and the
control traffic (GTP-C tunnels [TS29274]). Alternatively, PMIPv6 is
used on the S5 interface between S-GW and P-GW.
The above is very different from an end-to-end path on the Internet
where the packet forwarding is performed at the IP level.
Importantly, we observe that these tunneling protocols give the
operator a large degree of flexibility to control the congestion
mechanism incorporated with the GTP/PMIPv6 protocols.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Bob Briscoe and Ingemar Johansson for their
support in shaping the overall idea and in improving the document by
providing constructive comments. We would also like to thank Andreas
Maeder and Dirk Staehle for reviewing the document and for providing
helpful comments.
Authors' Addresses
Dirk Kutscher
NEC
Kurfuersten-Anlage 36
Heidelberg
Germany
Email: kutscher@neclab.eu
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RFC 7778 ConEx Mobile Scenario March 2016
Faisal Ghias Mir
NEC
Kurfuersten-Anlage 36
Heidelberg
Germany
Email: faisal.mir@gmail.com
Rolf Winter
NEC
Kurfuersten-Anlage 36
Heidelberg
Germany
Email: rolf.winter@neclab.eu
Suresh Krishnan
Ericsson
8400 Blvd Decarie
Town of Mount Royal, Quebec
Canada
Email: suresh.krishnan@ericsson.com
Ying Zhang
Hewlett Packard Labs
3000 Hannover Street
Palo Alto, CA 94304
United States
Email: ying.zhang13@hp.com
Carlos J. Bernardos
Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
Av. Universidad, 30
Leganes, Madrid 28911
Spain
Phone: +34 91624 6236
Email: cjbc@it.uc3m.es
URI: http://www.it.uc3m.es/cjbc/
Kutscher, et al. Informational [Page 25]
