UNIT III

MOBILE IP And
Wireless Access Protocol
Mobile IP Requirements
• Transparency
• mobile end-systems keep their IP address
• continuation of communication after interruption of link possible
• point of connection to the fixed network can be changed
• Compatibility
• support of the same layer 2 protocols as IP
• no changes to current end-systems and routers required
• mobile end-systems can communicate with fixed systems
• Security
• authentication of all registration messages
• Efficiency and scalability
• only little additional messages to the mobile system required (connection
typically via a low bandwidth radio link)
• world-wide support of a large number of mobile systems in the whole Internet
MOBILE IP USES
• It is not a standard of a wireless technology
– But wireless technology may extend mobility capacity of its user

• Enable computers to maintain Internet connectivity while moving from

one Internet attachment point to another
• Mobile – user's point of attachment changes dynamically

and all connections are automatically maintained despite the change

– From communication protocol perspective, it occurs in network layer

In TCP/IP, it is internet layer
– Routing of packet destined to mobile unit becomes challenging
• Nomadic - user's Internet connection is terminated each

time the user moves and a new connection is initiated when the
user dials back in
– New, temporary IP address is assigned
 OPERATION OF MOBILE IP
• Mobile node is assigned to a particular network –
home network
• IP address on home network is static – home
address
• Mobile node can move to another network – foreign
network
• Mobile node registers with network node on foreign
network – foreign agent
• Mobile node gives address to agent on home
network – home agent
 MOBILE IP TERMINOLOGY

Based on RFC 5944 for IPv4

Term Remarks
s
Mobile node A host or router that changes its point of attachment from one network or
subnetwork to another. A mobile node may change its location without changing its IP
address. It may continue to communicate with other Internet nodes at any location
using its (constant) IP address, assuming link layer connectivity to a point of
attachment is available

Home address An IP address that is assigned for an extended period of time to a mobile node. It
remains unchanged regardless of where the node is attached to the internet
Home agent A router on a mobile node’s home network, which tunnels datagram for delivery to
the mobile node when it is away from home and maintains current location
information for the mobile node

Home network A network, possibly virtual, having a network prefix matching that of a mobile node’s
home address. Note that standard IP routing mechanism will deliver datagrams
destined to a mobile node’s home address to the mobile node’s home network
 MOBILE IP TERMINOLOGY
Term Remarks
s
A router on a mobile node’s visited network which provides routing services to the
Foreign Agent mobile node while registered. The foreign agent detunnels and deliver datagrams to
the mobile node that were tunneled by the mobile node’s home agent. For datagram
sent by a mobile node, the foreign agent may serve as a default router for registered
mobile nodes
Foreign network Any network other than the mobile node’s home network

Care of address The termination point of a tunnel toward a mobile node, for datagrams forwarded to
the mobile node while it is away from home.
Correspondent node A peer with which a mobile node is communicating. A correspondent node may
either mobile or stationary
Link A facility or medium over which nodes can communicate at the link layer. A link
underlies the network layer
Node A host or a router

Tunnel The path followed by a datagram while it is encapsulated. While it is encapsulated, a

datagram is routed to knowledgeable decapsulating agent, which decapsulates the
datagram and then correctly deliver to its ultimate destination
FIGURE 15.4 MOBILE IP
SCENARIO
 Example network
HA
MN

router

home network mobile end-system

Internet
(physical home network
for the MN)
FA foreign
network
router
(current physical network
for the MN)
CN

end-system router
Data transfer to the mobile
HA
2
MN

home network 3 receiver

Internet

FA foreign
network

1. Sender sends to the IP address of MN,

HA intercepts packet (proxy ARP)
1 2. HA tunnels packet to COA, here FA,
CN
by encapsulation
3. FA forwards the packet
sender to the MN
Data transfer from the mobile
HA
1 MN

home network sender

Internet

FA foreign
network

1. Sender sends to the IP address

of the receiver as usual,
CN
FA works as default router

receiver
 CAPABILITIES OF MOBILE IP
• Discovery – mobile node uses discovery
procedure to identify prospective home and
foreign agents
• Registration – mobile node uses an authenticated
registration procedure to inform home agent of its
care-of address
• Tunneling – used to forward IP datagrams from a
home address to a care-of address
FIGURE 15.5 PROTOCOL SUPPORT FOR MOBILE IP
 DISCOVERY
• Mobile node is responsible for ongoing discovery
process
– Must determine if it is attached to its home network or
a foreign network
• Transition from home network to foreign network can
occur at any time without notification to the network
layer
• Mobile node listens for agent advertisement messages
– Compares network portion of the router's IP address with
the network portion of home address
 AGENT SOLICITATION
• Foreign agents are expected to issue
agent advertisement messages
periodically
• If a mobile node needs agent
information immediately, it can issue
ICMP router solicitation message
– Any agent receiving this message will then issue
an agent advertisement
 MOVE DETECTION
• Mobile node may move from one network to another
due to some handoff mechanism without IP level
being aware
– Agent discovery process is intended to enable the agent
to detect such a move
• Algorithms to detect move:
– Use of lifetime field – mobile node uses lifetime field as
a timer for agent advertisements
– Use of network prefix – mobile node checks if any
newly received agent advertisement messages are
on the same network as the node's current care-of
address
 CO-LOCATED ADDRESSES
• If mobile node moves to a network that has no
foreign agents, or all foreign agents are busy, it can
act as its own foreign agent
• Mobile agent uses co-located care-of address
– IP address obtained by mobile node associated with
mobile node's current network interface
• Means to acquire co-located address:
– Temporary IP address through an Internet service,
such as DHCP
– May be owned by the mobile node as a long-term address
for use while visiting a given foreign network
 REGISTRATION PROCESS
• Mobile node sends registration request to foreign
agent requesting forwarding service
• Foreign agent relays request to home agent
• Home agent accepts or denies request and sends
registration reply to foreign agent
• Foreign agent relays reply to mobile node
REGISTRATION OPERATION
MESSAGES
• Registration request message
– Fields = type, S, B, D, M, V, G, lifetime, home
address, home agent, care-of-address,
identification, extensions
• Registration reply message
– Fields = type, code, lifetime, home address, home
agent, identification, extensions
FIGURE 15.6 MOBILE IP REGISTRATION MESSAGES
REGISTRATION REQUEST
FIELDS
• Type
– 1, indicate request
• S : Simultaneous bindings
– The mobile node is requesting that the home agent retain its prior mobility
bindings.
• B
– Broadcast datagram. Indicates that the mobile node would like to
receive copies of broadcast datagrams
• D
– Decapsulation by mobile node
• M
– Indicates that the home agent should use minimal encapsulation
• G
– The home agent should use GRE
• r, x :
– Reserved
REGISTRATION REQUEST
FIELDS
• T
– Reverse tunneling requested
• Home Address
– The home IP address of the mobile node
• Home Agent
– The IP address of the mobile’s home agent
• Care of Address
– The IP address of at this end of tunnel
• Identification
– A 64 bit number generated by the mobile node, used for
matching registration request to registration replies
• Extension
– So far , it is for authentication extension
 REGISTRATION REPLY
FIELDS
• Type
– 3, indicates that this is the reply
• Code
– Indicates result of the registration request
• Lifetime
– The number of seconds before the registration is considered
expired
• Home Address
– The home IP address of the mobile node
• Home Agent
– The IP address of the mobile node’s home agent
• Identification
– A 64 bit number generated by the mobile node, used for
matching registration request to registration replies
• Extension
REGISTRATION PROCEDURE
SECURITY
• Mobile IP designed to resist attacks
– Node pretending to be a foreign agent sends registration
request to a home agent to divert mobile node traffic to
itself
– Agent replays old registration messages to cut mobile
node from network
• For message authentication, registration request and
reply contain authentication extension
– Fields = type, length, security parameter index (SPI),
authenticator
TYPES OF AUTHENTICATION
EXTENSIONS
• Mobile-home – provides for authentication of
registration messages between mobile node and home
agent; must be present
• Mobile-foreign – may be present when a security
association exists between mobile node and foreign
agent
• Foreign-home – may be present when a security
association exists between foreign agent and home
agent
 TUNNELING
• Home agent intercepts IP datagrams sent
to mobile node's home address
– Home agent informs other nodes on home network
that datagrams to mobile node should be delivered
to home agent
• Datagrams forwarded to care-of address
via tunneling
– Datagram encapsulated in outer IP datagram
MOBILE IP ENCAPSULATION
OPTIONS
• IP-within-IP – entire IP datagram
becomes payload in new IP datagram
– Original, inner IP header unchanged except TTL
decremented by 1
– Outer header is a full IP header
• Minimal encapsulation – new header is
inserted between original IP header and
original IP payload
– Original IP header modified to form new outer IP
header
• Generic routing encapsulation (GRE) –
developed prior to development of Mobile IP
Wireless Application
Protocol (WAP)
 Introduction
• WAP is designed to work with all wireless network
technologies (GSM, CDMA, TDMA)
• WAP Specification
• A programming model based on the WWW
Programming Model
• A markup language, the Wireless Markup Language,
adhering to XML
• A specification of a small browser suitable for a
mobile, wireless terminal
• A lightweight communications protocol stack
• A framework for wireless telephony applications
(WTAs)
WAP: Main Features
• Browser
• “Micro browser”, similar to existing web browsers
• Markup language
• Similar to HTML, adapted to mobile devices
• Script language
• Similar to Javascript, adapted to mobile devices
• Gateway
• Transition from wireless to wired world
• Server
• “Wap/Origin server”, similar to existing web servers
• Protocol layers
• Transport layer, security layer, session layer etc.
• Telephony application interface
• Access to telephony functions
WAP Architecture / WAP Programming Model

Client Web Server

WAP Gateway
WML
WML Encoder CGI

WML Decks
with WML-
WML- Scripts
WSP/WTP HTTP

Script
Script WMLScript etc.
WTAI
Compiler
Protocol Adapters Content
Etc.
WAP Protocol Stack / WAP
Architectural Overview
WAP Protocol Stack
• WAE (Wireless Application Environment):
• Architecture: application model, browser, gateway, server
• WML: XML-Syntax, based on card stacks, variables, ...
• WTA: telephone services, such as call control, phone book etc.
• WSP (Wireless Session Protocol):
• Provides HTTP 1.1 functionality
• Supports session management, security, etc.
• WTP (Wireless Transaction Protocol):
• Provides reliable message transfer mechanisms
• Based on ideas from TCP/RPC
• WTLS (Wireless Transport Layer Security):
• Provides data integrity, privacy, authentication functions
• Based on ideas from TLS/SSL
• WDP (Wireless Datagram Protocol):
• Provides transport layer functions
• Based on ideas from UDP
 WAP Related Protocols
• Wireless Markup Language (WML)
– Designed to describe content and format for
presenting data on devices with limited
bandwidth, limited screen size, and limited user
input capability
– Mainly text-based information that attempts to
capture the essence of the Web page and that is
organized for easy access for users of mobile
devices
 WAP Related Protocols (contd)
– WML Script
– A scripting language with similarities to JavaScript
– Designed for defining script-type programs in a
user device with limited processing power and
memory
– Wireless Application Environment
– Specifies an application framework for wireless
devices such as mobile telephones, pagers, and
PDAs
WAE Client Components
WAE Components
• Architecture
• Application model, Microbrowser, Gateway, Server
• User Agents
• WML/WTA/Others
• content formats: vCard, vCalendar, Wireless Bitmap, WML, ...
• WML
• XML-Syntax, based on card stacks, variables, ...
• WMLScript
• procedural, loops, conditions, ... (similar to JavaScript)
• WTA
• telephone services, such as call control, text messages, phone
book, ... (accessible from WML/WMLScript)
• Proxy (Method/Push)
 WAP Related Protocols (cont)
• Wireless Session Protocol (WSP)
– WSP is a transaction-oriented protocol based on
the concept of a request and a reply
– WSP also defines a server Push operation, in
which the server sends unrequested content to a
client device (e.g. broadcast messages)
• Wireless Transaction Protocol (WTP)
– WTP provides a reliable transport service but
dispenses with much of the overhead of TCP
 WAP Related Protocols (cont)
• Wireless Transport Layer Security (WTLS)
– WTLS provides security services between the
mobile device (client) and the WAP gateway
– WTLS is based on the industry-standard
Transport Layer Security (TLS) Protocol, which is
a refinement of the secure sockets layer (SSL)
• Wireless Datagram Protocol (WDP)
– WDP is used to adapt a higher-layer WAP
protocol to the communication mechanism used
between the mobile node and the WAP gateway
WDP: Wireless Datagram
Protocol
• Goals
• create a worldwide interoperable transport system by adapting WDP to
the different underlying technologies
• transmission services, such as SMS in GSM might change, new services can
replace the old ones

• WDP
• Transport layer protocol within the WAP architecture
• uses the Service Primitive
• T-UnitData.req .ind
• uses transport mechanisms of different bearer technologies
• offers a common interface for higher layer protocols
• allows for transparent communication despite different technologies
• addressing uses port numbers
• WDP over IP is UDP/IP
WTLS : Wireless Transport Layer Security
• Goals
• Provide mechanisms for secure transfer of content, for applications
needing privacy, identification, message integrity and non-repudiation
• Provide support for protection against denial-of-service attacks

• WTLS
• is based on the TLS/SSL (Transport Layer Security) protocol
• optimized for low-bandwidth communication channels
• provides
• privacy (encryption)
• data integrity (MACs)
• authentication (public-key and symmetric)
• Employs special adapted mechanisms for wireless usage
• Long lived secure sessions
• Optimised handshake procedures
• Provides simple data reliability for operation over datagram bearers
 WTP: Wireless Transaction Protocol
• Goals
• different transaction services that enable applications to select reliability, efficiency
levels
• low memory requirements, suited to simple devices (< 10kbyte )
• efficiency for wireless transmission
• WTP
• supports peer-to-peer, client/server and multicast applications
• efficient for wireless transmission
• support for different communication scenarios
• class 0: unreliable message transfer
• unconfirmed Invoke message with no Result message
• a datagram that can be sent within the context of an existing Session
• class 1: reliable message transfer without result message
• confirmed Invoke message with no Result message
• used for data push, where no response from the destination is expected
• class 2: reliable message transfer with exactly one reliable result message
• confirmed Invoke message with one confirmed Result message
• a single request produces a single reply
 WTP Services and Protocols
• WTP (Transaction)
• provides reliable data transfer based on request/reply paradigm
• no explicit connection setup or tear down
• optimized setup (data carried in first packet of protocol exchange)
• seeks to reduce 3-way handshake on initial request
• supports
• header compression
• segmentation /re-assembly
• retransmission of lost packets
• selective-retransmission
• port number addressing (UDP ports numbers)
• flow control
• message oriented (not stream)
• supports an Abort function for outstanding requests
• supports concatenation of PDUs
• supports User acknowledgement or Stack acknowledgement option
• acks may be forced from the WTP user (upper layer)
• default is stack ack
WSP wireless session protocol
• Header Encoding
• compact binary encoding of headers, content type identifiers and other
well-known textual or structured values
• reduces the data actually sent over the network
• Capabilities (are defined for):
• message size, client and server
• protocol options: Confirmed Push Facility, Push Facility, Session Suspend
Facility, Acknowledgement headers
• maximum outstanding requests
• extended methods
• header code pages
• Suspend and Resume
• server knows when client can accept a push
• multi-bearer devices
• dynamic addressing
• allows the release of underlying bearer resources
 WSP/B session establishment
client server
S-SAP S-SAP
S-Connect.req
(SA, CA, CH, RC) Conne S-Connect.ind
ct PDU
(SA, CA, CH, RC)
S-Connect.res
(SH, NC)
S-Connect.cnf
eply P DU
(SH, NC) ConnR

CH: Client Header

WTP Class 2
RC: Requested Capabilities
transaction
SH: Server Header
NC: Negotiated Capabilities
 WSP/B session suspend/resume
client server
S-SAP S-SAP

S-Suspend.req Suspe S-Suspend.ind

nd PD
U (R)
S-Suspend.ind
(R) WTP Class 0
transaction
R: Reason for disconnection
S-Resume.req
(SA, CA)
~ ~
Re s u m S-Resume.ind
e P DU
(SA, CA)
S-Resume.res
P DU
S-Resume.cnf Reply

WTP Class 2
transaction
WSP/B session termination

client server
S-SAP S-SAP
S-Disconnect.req
(R) Discon S-Disconnect.ind
n ect PD (R)
S-Disconnect.ind U
(R) WTP Class 0
transaction