MODULE 5

Micromobility and its approaches

Soln: If a large number of mobile devices change networks quite frequently, a high load on the home agents
as well as on the networks is generated by registration and binding update messages.

IP micro-mobility protocols offers fast and almost seamless handover control in limited geographical areas.

The basic underlying idea is the same for all micro-mobility protocols: Keep the frequent updates generated
by local changes of the points of attachment away from the home network and only inform the home agent
about major changes, i.e., changes of a region.

The following presents three of the most prominent approaches:

1. Cellular IP

 Cellular IP does not scale to a global level, but it provides fast smooth handoffs on a local scale.
 It can accommodate large number of users by separating idle hosts and active hosts.

Cellular IP architecture

- Cellular IP Gateway (CIPGW)

- Cellular IP node or the base station (BS)
- Cellular IP mobile host (MH)
 A Cellular IP network consists of several interconnected BSs.
 CIP Gateway router connects a cellular IP network and the regular Internet.
 Mobility between gateway is managed by Mobile IP while mobility within the access network is
managed by the Cellular IP
 IP address of the GW servers is the care-of-address for all the mobile hosts that are currently
attached to the network.

Routing in CIP

- Uplink packets (packets from the mobile host) are routed from the MH to the GW on a hop-by-hop basis.

- The path taken by these packets is cached in base station. This cache is called routing cache.

- To route the downlink packets to a MH, the path that is already stored in the route cache is used.

- Even if the MH is not regularly transmitting the data packets, it will maintain its routing cache. For that
MH transmit route-update packets at regular intervals to keep it’s routing cache valid. (These packets are
empty data addressed to gateway)
Paging in CIP

- In CIP, an ideal MH is one that has not received data packets for a system specific time.

- For Ideal MH, their downlink soft state routes are removed from the routing cache.

- These hosts transmit paging-update packets at regular intervals. (These packets are empty data addressed
to gateway. It is distinguished from the route update packet by its IP type parameter)

- Base stations may maintain paging cache.

- Paging occurs when a packet is addressed to an idle MH and the BS finds no valid routing cache mapping
for the destination.

- Paging is used to avoid broadcast search procedure

Handover in CIP

- CIP implements mobile controlled handover (MCHO)- handoff is initiated by MH

- MH listens to BSs beacon packets and initiates handover based on signal strength.

- MH tunes its radio to the new BS, it sends a route update packet to this new BS.

- This creates entry in a routing cache.

- During handover process, downlink packets may be lost. The mapping associated with the old base station
are not cleared at handover, they are cleared after the expiry of a timer.

- Before timeout, both old and new downlink routes remain valid and packets are delivered through both
the BSs.

2. HAWAII (Handoff – Aware Wireless Access Internet Infrastructure)

- HAWAII tries to keep micro-mobility support as transparent as possible for both HA and MN

- Step 1 – Once entering a HAWAII domain, a MN obtains co-located COA.

- Step 2 – Then it registers with HA

- Step 3 – When MN is moving to another cell inside the foreign domain, MN sends a registration request to
the new base station

- Step 4 – The base station interprets the registration request and sends out a handoff update message.
This will reconfigure all the routers on the path from the old and new base station to crossover router. Once
routing is reconfigured, the base station sends the registration reply to the MN.
3. HMIPv6 (Hierarchical Mobile IPv6)

- Provides micro-mobility support by installing a Mobility Anchor Point (MAP).

- MAP is an entity which is responsible for a certain domain and acts as a local HA within this domain for
visiting MNs.

- MAP receives all packets on behalf of the MN, encapsulates and forwards them directly to the MN’s
current address LCOA (link COA)

- For the duration MN is in the MAP domain, the regional COA (RCOA) does not change.

- Access routers (AR) define the MAP domain’s boundaries. It is used to advertise the MAP information to
the attached MNs

- MAP assists with local handovers and maps RCOA to LCOA.

- Using the binding update, the MN registers their RCOA with HA. When MN moves locally it must only
register its new LCOA with its MAP.

- Advantages:

- 1) Security: MNs can have (limited) location privacy because LCOAs can be hidden.

- 2) Efficiency: Direct routing between CNs sharing the same link is possible.

- Disadvantages:

- 1) Transparency: Additional infrastructure component (MAP)

- 2) Security: Routing tables are changed based on the messages sent by mobile nodes. This requires
strong authentication and protection against denial-of-service attacks. Additional security functions
might be required in MAP.

Mobility Management

1. IP Mobility
- A set of mechanisms that allow an IP mobile node to move freely between different IP networks while
maintaining IP connectivity in a transparent way.
- In IPV4, the IP address of a device identifies the network to which it is attached.
- But when a mobile node moves to a new network, we need to reconfigure the mobile node with a new IP
address representing its new location. (This is not possible under IPV4 - the device and loses connection
and routing)
- IP mobility mechanisms maintains connectivity without interrupting ongoing communications.

2. Mobile IP
- A communication protocol that is designed to allow mobile device users to move from one network to
another while maintaining a permanent IP address.
- An enhancement of internet protocol (IP)
- Every host will have a Home Address (Permanent IP) with in a home network
- Home Agent (HA) in the home network provides different services for mobile node (MN)
- If the MN has moved to other network (Foreign network), traffic will be IP tunneled by the HA to a Care-
of-Address. COA defines the current location of MN
- Foreign network has Foreign agent (FA) that provides several services to the MN during its visit.

3. Optimization
Triangular Routing
IPV4 follows a triangular traffic pattern – IP packet from a CN to an MN will be routed to HA first and then
tunneled to the foreign agent of MN.

 Even if the CN is very near to MN, then also the IP packet has to travel long way to reach the MN.
This non optimized mobile IP is called triangular routing
 Triangular routing is made of three segments: CN to HA, HA to COA/MN and MN back to CN.

Route Optimization to avoid triangular routing:

The optimized mobile IP protocol needs four additional messages.

● Binding request: Any node that wants to know the current location of an MN can send a binding request
to the HA. If the HA is allowed to reveal the location it sends back a binding update.
● Binding update: HA reveals CN, the current location of an MN. The message contains the fixed IP address
of the MN and the COA. The binding update can request an acknowledgement.

● Binding acknowledgement: If requested, a node returns this acknowledgement after receiving a binding
update message.

● Binding warning: If a node decapsulates a packet for an MN, but it is not the current FA for this MN, this
node sends a binding warning. The warning contains MN’s home address and a target node address (CN). If
recipient is HA, HA will send a binding update to CN that obviously has a wrong COA for the MN. If CN is the
recipient, CN requests the HA for a new binding.

4. IPV6

Advantages:

 Larger address space – 128 bit long

 Better header format – options field is separated from base header and inserted when needed. This
simplifies and speed up routing process
 New Options – to allow additional features
 Allowance for extension – extension of protocol if required
 Support for resource allocation – ‘Flow label’ has been added to enable the source to request
special handling of packet. Support real time audio – video traffic
 Support for more security – encryption and authentication – for confidentiality and integrity of
packet.
IPV6 Header:

Macromobility

The movement of devices between two network domains is referred to as macro-mobility. For example, the
movement of MN from domain 1 to domain 2 in Figure is an example of macro-mobility.
-it is inter domain mobility, also known as global scale mobility.

- Aims to provide uninterrupted services when the user is changing the domain.

- The user moves between two independently managed networks. So, it requires full low layer handover,
authentication process, network layer configuration, registration.

1. MIPv6 (Mobile IPv6)

- It is protocol developed as a subnet of IPv6 to support mobility.

- An update of Mobile IP standards designed to authenticate mobile devices using IPv6 addresses.

- In traditional IP routing, when a mobile device is disconnected from a network and reconnected through a
different network, we have to configure the device with a new IP address. Otherwisethere is no means of
delivering packets.

- Mobile IPv6 allows a mobile node to transparently maintain connections while moving from one subnet to
another.
- Each device is identified by its home address although it may be connecting to through another network.

- When connecting through a foreign network, a mobile device sends its location information to a home
agent, which intercepts the packets and tunnels then to the current location.

2. FMIPv6 (Fast Hand Over for Mobile IPv6)

 During handover, there is a period during which the Mobile Node is unable to send and receive
packets. This period is called ‘Hand over Latency’
 This handover latency is often unacceptable to real-time traffic such as VoIP.
 FMIPv6 aims at reducing the long handover latency in mobile IPv6 by fast movement detection and
fast binding update.
 FMIPv6 also obtains new COA before proceeding for handover and starts using this address later on
 FMIPv6 describes two possible ways to initiate the handover. The difference between these two
handover schemes is the time to establish the tunnel between Previous Access Router and New
Access Router.

i) Predictive fast handover – The tunnel is established before the layer 2 handover. Has a shorter handover
delay compared to reactive handover.

ii) Reactive fast handover – the tunnel is established directly after layer 2 handover.

 It uses anticipation based on the layer 2 trigger information of the mobile node (MN) to obtain a
new COA at the new link while still connected to the previous link, thus reducing handover delay.
 Also, it reduces packet loss by buffering before the real link layer handover takes place.