1. Low-Cost Internet Access Using KioskNet Earl Oliver PhD Student Tetherless Computing Research Group University of Waterloo (Canada) With: S. Guo, H. Falaki, S. Ur Rahman, A. Seth, M. Zaharia, U. Ismail, and Prof. S. Keshav

2. Key points Robust, reliable, and low-cost network connectivity for rural regions Supports incremental deployment by franchisees (secure) Secure communication between users and the Internet Supports future network availability (ex. WiMAX, cellular, etc.) Available today, free for download

3. Access to timely, context-specific information can greatly benefit citizens of developing countries Farmers –Best agricultural practices –Crop inputs and treatments –Market prices Health workers –Diagnosis –Treatment Citizens –Government services –Communication (email) Why low cost networking?

4. Example aAqua project (IIT Bombay, Maharastra, India) –Bulletin board system allows farmers to consult with agricultural experts market opportunities fertilizers pricing Sample questions: –How much money can you make from a Jersey cow worth Rs. 20,000 in a year? –I want information of producing and implementation of Jatropha plant for Bio-Diesel. –We have at our disposal 10-12tonnes of aloe vera plants/leaves for sale. Parties interested in purchasing please catch us at 0- 9864031770

5. Low cost communication and access to information… Allows better decision making Improves worker productivity Integrates economies into the world market Prevents `leakage’ of development funds Promotes an informed citizenry and a participatory democracy

6. How to provide low-cost access to information?

7. Information access today Mostly one-way –Radio –TV –Newpapers –Magazines These solutions are inadequate

8. Two way information flow Possible using newer technologies –Cell phones –Internet But can be expensive –Rural poor are unlikely to get good connectivity any time soon –Revenue per sq. km << cost per sq. km Can we provide reliable connectivity for only a few dollars / person / year?

9. How to reduce costs? Sharing the cost of the technology Sharing the cost of knowing how to use the technology Information kiosk

10. Kiosk connectivity Dial-up –Slow (28 kbps) and flaky Satellite (Very Small Aperture Terminals) –Expensive and slow –Spare parts are hard to get Long range WiFi / WiMax –Experimental –Expensive up-front cost (for 18m tower) Cellular broadband (3G) –Low penetration because of high upfront costs

11. Mechanical backhaul

12. Kiosk

13. The Kiosk controller Headless, keyboardless, low-cost, low- power single board computer. Powered by solar power + battery –(near full uptime) Supports wide range of network interfaces –Choice of interface is policy driven at the session layer

14. Kiosk controller cont’d Two access modes: –Terminal: recycled PCs netboot from a read-only image stored on the kiosk controller. –Direct: access the controller (or bus or gateway) like a WiFi hotspot.

15. Ferry

16. Gateway

17. Ferries and gateways No processing of data – only store and forward –Without power restrictions –Recommended to have faster CPU, higher memory than kiosk controller Gateway has an always-on connection to the Internet (proxy)

18. Proxy Centralized server on the Internet Disconnection-aware Hides disconnected users from legacy servers Plug-in applications –Ex. SMPT plug-in to handle email service DNS location register Public key database (whitepages directory)

19. Advantages of mechanical backhaul Low cost of connectivity per kiosk (< $250 capital expenditure) –Cost of the ferry and gateway single board computer gets shared across kiosks –$3/person/year to break even at 10% penetration no trench, no tower ! See paper for calculations and cost breakdown. Increased penetration –Even in interior areas where there are no telephone lines High bandwidth data transfer in both directions Rapidly and incrementally deployable

20. Disadvantages Data transfer is delayed –Depends on frequency of visits of vehicles –Can be several days But many useful applications are delay tolerant –Trade delay for cost Suitable for smaller non-governmental organizations to set up kiosks

21. Low cost connectivity What are the challenges? –Supporting multiple network interfaces –Security –Routing –User management –Maintenance and redundancy (debugging system failure)

22. Supporting multiple NICs Need to support new networks Mechanical backhaul not ideal for all applications –Ex. High priority data Opportunistic Connection Management Protocol (OCMP) –Applies application specific policies to schedule data across multiple NICs –Currently mechanical backhaul, SMS, and TCP/IP supported.

24. Security Resilient to a diverse set of internal and external attacks PKI rooted at University of Waterloo –sub-CAs operated by KioskNet franchisers and franchisees –X.509 public keys flooded to kiosks to provide secure communication between users Encrypted user file system –Keyed by user password, NFS mounted at logon Kiosk netboots from read-only image stored on the kiosk controller

25. Routing Many DTN routing options –Robustness vs. efficiency –Guaranteeing reliability is hard Flood within a ‘region’ –Hierarchical namespace:...kiosknet.org Upstream: gateways coordinate to send one copy of data to proxy Downstream: data sent to one region’s gateway –DNS query based on user EID to determine gateway

26. User management Distribute user creation to kiosks –Walk in, get an account Extended system admin application: webmin to create/delete users and public keys Keys are signed by the local franchisee and sent to the proxy with the user’s EID –...kiosknet.org EIDs and certificates flooded back to all kiosks

27. Maintenance and redundancy Applying software updates/bug fixes can be expensive Robust mechanism for pushing updates (debian packages) Remote shell for remotely executing bash scripts Software failures can occur in the field –Need a mechanism to collect debugging information rsync/ssh flooding of logs –Activated by inserting a special USB key or via remote shell

28. Sample applications Email –Classic application for delay tolerant networks –user@...kiosknet.org Database synchronization –Replicate a centralized database to kiosks –Ex. aAqua (IIT Bombay) YouTube –Download videos to kiosk based on a search query Flickr –Take a picture, upload it to Flickr

29. Current status Live deployment in Anandpuram, India Second deployment mid December (IIT Delhi) Preparing second major release for early 2008 that includes security, SMS, and DNS user lookups

30. Future work Support for mobile users –Routing, security, user management –Recycled cell/smart phones Robustness –Exploit the cellular network as a control channel Applications, applications, applications –“if you build it they will come” might not apply

31. Conclusions Developed a secure, robust system to provide low-cost Internet to rural regions KioskNet can adapt to the availability to new networks KioskNet is free and rapidly deployable

32. For more information Earl Oliver, eaoliver@uwaterloo.ca Prof. Keshav, keshav@uwaterloo.ca Web: http://blizzard.cs.uwaterloo.ca/tetherless/ Join our mailing list