Blockchain-based Roaming and Offload Service Platform for Local 5G Operators
- Post by: Nisita Weerasinghe, Tharaka Hewa, Maheshi Dissanayake, Mika Ylianttila and Madhusanka Liyanage
- February 1, 2023
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Local 5G Operator (L5GO) concept is one of the
most prominent versatile applications of the 5G in the near
future. The popularity of L5GOs will trigger a greater number
of roaming and offloading events between mobile operators.
However, existing static and operator-assisted roaming and
offloading procedures are inefficient for the L5GO ecosystem due to
poor service quality, data privacy issues, data transferring delays,
excessive costs for intermediary parties and the existence of roaming
fraud. To address these challenges, we propose a blockchain /
Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) based service platform for
L5GOs to facilitate efficient roaming and offload services. As
the key contribution, blockchain-based smart contract scheme
is proposed to establish dynamic and automated agreements
between operators. By using smart contracts, we introduce
several novel features such as universal wallet for subscribers,
service quality based L5GO rating system, user-initiated roaming
process and the roaming fraud prevention system to improve the
operational quality of a L5GO. A prototype of the proposed
platform is emulated with the Ethereum blockchain platform
and Rinkeby Testnet to evaluate the performance and justify
the feasibility of the proposal. Upon an extensive evaluation
on the prototype, it was observed that the proposed platform
offered benefits such as cost effective, more secure and reliable
experience.
