beyond the radio: exploring the terra incognita of mobile networks with the icsi netalyzr

APRICOT 2015 Plenary | 03/2015

Narseo Vallina-Rodriguez ICSI-Berkeley

Beyond the radio: Exploring the terra incognita of mobile networks with the ICSI Netalyzr

Work done in collaboration with: Srikanth Sundaresan, Christian Kreibich, Nicholas Weaver and Vern Paxson

Narseo Vallina-Rodriguez (ICSI-Berkeley) | APRICOT 2015 Plenary | 03/2015

The uncertain mobile future

2

IoT Video streaming

AugmentedReality

+


Anticipating future traffic demands

3

• LTE deployment

• Network sharing agreements

• IPv6 support

• Peering (Cloud-mobile integration)

• LTE-Direct

• WiFi off-loading

?1Can we improve user’s network

experience by understanding how networks actually work and how

applications behave?


Measuring mobile performance: Classic E2E Model

Userparis.myisp.com

Web Serverwww.moscow.com

5

Uplink: 2.10 Mbps Downlink: 6.06 Mbps

RTT: 112 ms Loss: 0.1 %


Userparis.myisp.com

Web Serverwww.moscow.com

Hidden Proxies

Bufferbloat

Handset configuration

MTU

Carte Figurative des Pertes Successives en hommes de l’Armée Francaise dans la Campagne de Russie (1812-1813)

— Charles Minard.1869

CGNsEDNS

support

DNSSEC

Caches and CDNs

How the (mobile) Internet really is

6

IPv6

2The ICSI Netalyzr Project


• User-run tool to diagnose connectivity characteristics from the edge of the Internet

• Checks for behavioral anomalies, network properties, privacy and security issues for [everybody]

• Runs more than 120 tests

• Started in 2009 as a JAVA applet • 1.6M sessions, 170 countries

• Native Android version since November 2013 • 29K installs, 130 countries

The ICSI Netalyzr Story

8

The ICSI Netalyzr

Project sponsors:


• Large footprint (large number of operators and countries)

• High fidelity data:

• Full control of both end-points

• “You measure what you see!”

• Ability to collect contextual information

• Research outcome: ACM IMC, PAM, ACM CoNEXT, ACM MobiSys, USENIX FOCI, …

9

Advantages of measuring from the “edge” of the network

33Preliminary observations


Lat

ency

(ms)

0

50

100

150

200

HSPA+ LTERAN Latency GGSN/P-GW LatencyDefault DNS Latency OpenDNS LatencyGoogleDNS Latency Akamai CDN Latency

11

RAN latency vs IP latency

?

Narseo Vallina-Rodriguez (ICSI-Berkeley) | APRICOT 2015 Plenary | 03/2015 12

RAN latency vs IP latencyCDN / EDNS

IDENTIFIED LOCAL AKAMAI CACHE

IDENTIFIED LOCAL GOOGLE CACHE

EDNS SUPPORT

0 25 50 75 100% OF OPERATORS


• Complex and/or heterodox network deployments

• Low number of P-GW/GGSNs per operator: higher RTT

• Testimonial IPv6 support (including DNS)

13

RAN latency vs IP latencyIP deployment


3

Proxies MUST use the HTTP VIA header (RFC 2616)

Hidden HTTP proxies

HTTP PROXY

HEADER MODIFICATION

IMAGE TRANSCODING

FOLLOWS URL

PRIVACY LEAKS

0 25 50 75 100% OF OPERATORS

34Conclusions and

next steps


• Can we measure performance with a single metric?

• Fixing the IP Core can also improve user’s Internet experience, privacy and security

• Understanding mobile traffic:

• How do mobile traffic and the network behave “in the wild”?

• What is the IoT?

16

Conclusions and next steps

Try Netalyzr and tell us what you’d like to know about

your network!

17

[email protected]

[email protected] http://www.netalyzr.icsi.berkely.edu/publications


3• 8% of mobile operators leak personal information in HTTP

headers:

• IMEI/IMSI/MSISDN

• Perma-cookies: x-uidh, x-acr

• “User monetization”

• Enables user tracking by malicious parties

User’s privacy

beyond the radio: exploring the terra incognita of mobile networks with the icsi netalyzr

Internet

icsi netalyzr work

icsi netalyzr story

icsi netalyzr project

mobile internet

mobile networks

mobile performance

network properties

uncertain mobile future