Multi-Service Internet Charging Bob Briscoe BT Research 21 Jan 2000 Internet & Telephony Convergence Consortium MIT, Boston, MA

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar2 menu 4 market control of multiservice networks 4 cheap generalised packet charging systems 4 charging for quality 4 results & limitations 4 another time… inter-domain charging for multicast & mobile re-apportioning payments betw. senders & receivers bundling context demo

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar3 context 4 multi-service, multicast, connectionless 4 can be flowless –simple  open –overprovision may be cheaper 4 no PSTN billing to rely on 4 generalised technology allows many specific business models –future is …? computer-computer comms? –not just Web, audio & video 4 each idea independent context

req’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar4 new model for what business? applic’n present’n session transport network link physical network link physical end-system router network link physical applic’n present’n session transport network link physical context e-commerce

diffchar requirements

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar6 too cheap to meter? 4 Qwest, Sprint - all you can eat –fat pipes, Terabit routers 4 Microsoft, Intel - eat all you can –fat software, GigaHertz processors, mass market 4 dilemma –single multiservice network reduces overheads –need empty queues for real-time multimedia –elastic data always fills queues req’mts

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar7 Why usage charging? 8 granularity mismatch –service: packet –charges: SLA / subscription / reservation 8 assumes low utilisation factor –gap between what is paid for and what is used req’mts 8 incentive for –customer to waste resources (e.g. robots) –provider to over-book resources % extranet t utilisation

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar8 incentive to waste 8 computer-computer comms will dominate –near infinite capacity to waste resources –e.g. pre-fetching robots 8  access capacity >> core capacity 8  SLAs >> core capacity 8 SLA  guaranteed refund 4 our aim: guaranteed serendipitous service req’mts

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar9 incentive to over-book (e.g. SLA)... h~5 r~5 #(AS)= r h ~ ? 400? 2000? 8 either broken guarantees 8 or 40,000 SLAs per packet 8 SLAs: guaranteed refunds  8 => usage charging req’mts

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar10 multi-application network utility 1/delay (1/latency) end-end Web, VoD conferencing, telephony gaming, agents req’mts

diffchar engineering

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar12 active tariff distribution to customers Internet multicast marketing or network mgmt tariff load engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar13 self-billing - ‘pay and display’ £ Internet customer premises or storage service data path engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar14 self-billing - ‘traffic warden £ Internet random sample customer premises engineer’g evidence

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar15 recursive - inter-provider charging Internet access provider Internet service provider corporate £ engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar16 zero bits for charging transmission infrastructure charging infrastructure tariff for traffic class x? see channel y RSVP tariffs? see bulk usage stats engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar17 demo - tariff dissemination 4 multicast signed tariff class 4 modified class loader 4 listens for class arrival 4 stops current tariff object 4 loads new tariff object engineer’g Mike Rizzo

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar18 demo - tariff dissemination engineer’g Mike Rizzo

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar19 admission control is a delusion 4 probability of session blocking with CAC = probability of packet block without CAC 4 control session admission  improve intra-session utility  reduce inter-session utility 4 just moving the problem 4 mechanism to allow user to choose engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar20 admission control at source a) traditional admission control service full! client full! b) price announcements service raise price client c) active tariff service The price algorithm client engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar21 price & time offer various price fixing periods time price spot engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar22 provider price control 4 congestion per region per class ¶re-route ·borrow ¸provision request ¹notify region’s price controller ºcontroller considers commercial implications »changes region’s price…... or routers become congested engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar23 congestion avoidance pricing 4 if congestion unavoidable ¶router signals congestion ¶active tariff threatens receiver with price rise ·remote host feeds back to sender ¸sender backs off, unless: remote host offers to accept raised price......and sender agrees engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar24 Self-billing. Business decisions Dynamic Pricing Establish/review pricing strategy ProviderCustomer Tariffing info frequent price variation multiple tariff bands (QoS, cust types) Want low communication overhead (esp in congestion situations) powerful processing capability can measure usage & congestion engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar25 Tariff Representation –not flexible –pricing changes require explicit communication by provider Passive Active –tunable algorithm that can vary price on basis of local monitoring –lower communication overheads –but more security problems engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar26 User interfacing + Tariff bundle Client devices only need to load in memory the currently active tariffs. Other tariffs can be stored elsewhere. = Algorithm GUI Definition (XML) Client Device builds a specific GUI engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar27 Transport For small number of large customers with different requirements - e.g. back-bone provider to ISP - connection-oriented protocol Unicast Multicast For large number of small customers with similar requirements - e.g. edge ISP to dial-up customers - soft-state announcement protocol engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar28 Example tariff algorithm public class CngSensitiveLinear implements PacketCountTariff { private CngSensitiveLinearDisplay display;... public float getPrice(int pkin, int pkout, int cng) { boolean cngWarning = false; float price = pkin*inRate + pkout*outRate; if (cng > cngThreshold) { // congestion threshold exceeded if (pkin > inLimit || pkout > outLimit) { // traffic limits exceeded price += cngPenalty; cngWarning = true; } display.update(pkin, pkout, cng, cngWarning); return price; } … engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar29 + engaged tone if cost too high traditional access control by price Internet access provider Internet service provider engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar30 optimistic access control service ? customer 1 2 ? 4 single blocking test engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar31 customer state in the network police classify schedule engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar32 self-policing police 1 price classify schedule 2 3 best effort engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar33 diffserv SLA without policing 4 tariff based on SLA –multicast + unicast specifics 4 customer marks traffic in/out as per diffserv 4 customer measures traffic & reports 4 provider audits measurements 4 if incorrect marking, fine or cut off engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar34 demo: price controlled QoS Kostas Damianakis app QoS ctrl stack active tariff engineer’g non- functional

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar35 demo: accounting & payment Jérôme Tassel engineer’g

account sharing VP Act c Acs customerprovider Identity Payment PolicingRatingAccounting Measure- ment Ctrl Measure- ment Access ctrl I McMc MbMb MpMp Po network Pa c Po MC c service provision control reconcile control feedback payment host Po Act p Pa p Ra c Ra p

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar37 Accounting 4 Accounting on customer devices –Gather & Store network usage data –Apply tariffs to generate accounting records –Report to provider in aggregates –Provider control customer’s accounting 4 not enough resources –client’s alternative storage facility (PC) –network provider storage service –third party storage service Reporting in real-time Charging API engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar38 Billing 4 Can always relate usage to Customer through 4 Accounting data available locally is the bill No bill if micro-payments 4 User of a service needs not be the payee –BT Bill Direct, 0800, Advertisements –Can get very complicated relationships 4 Bill according to liability (defined in session description) View my Bill engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar39 Payment 4 Low risk if micro-payments 4 Integrate off-line payment with electronic payments 4 Integrate charge for service with charge for transport to create a single payment 4 Payments highest reporting level between customers and provider Current Work BT Bill Direct engineer’g

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar40 Currency 4 Columbia Uni –vulnerability of market managed system limited to budget of attacker –network currency? –provider controls money supply –provider gives privileged access to high profile customers 4 Government Telephone Preference Service –currency = battery power engineer’g

diffchar models

diffchar highlights - lowlights

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar43 limitations 4 full metering still to be integrated –meter rules sent with tariff? 4 reliability of end customer OS 4 user acceptance of dynamic pricing 4 user acceptance of dynamic provider code 4 hogging? summary

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar44 M 3 I consortium 4 Market-Managed Multi-service Internet 4 EC Vth Framework, Jan EU/US customer experiments partners: –BT, HP Labs, Telenor –TU Darmstadt, Athens UEB, ETH Zürich ?Berkeley INDEX, UCL summary

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar45 summary 4 market control of multiservice networks –hassle of dynamic pricing removed? 4 cheap generalised packet charging systems –changes assumptions? 4 charging for quality & multicast 4 session bundling summary

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar46 generalisations general pre-pay + credit pay as you go pay as you fancy raise price or fine spot + stability price usage-charging modular SDP bundling specific post-pay batch payment regular billing deny logical service stable price policing SLA or RESV retail bundling summary

contextreq’mtsengineer’gmodelssummary 21 Jan 2000diffchar47 further information 4 details  but, may not appear for some time - see Bob Briscoe  more info