I just bought an Android tablet after living exclusively in the Apple iOS world for the past couple years. The cost of the cheaper Android tablet was great, and my geek side surely will enjoy the customization options in the days ahead. However, what I do not look forward to are potential security issues.
All of the reports in recent years have exposed the fact that the Android environment is more susceptible to being compromised than IoS, however, recently even that is becoming a matter of degree as cracks in the Apple armor have been exposed. The one as somebody who is in the tech industry and tries to be vigilant that should make us Android users be somewhat concerned is the Stagefright vulnerability which hopefully will not make it into the wild.
To be frank, Stagefright is pretty scary. Anyone with an Android mobile device who is vulnerable to the exploit should be thinking about it, and that’s roughly close to 1 billion devices at last count. What makes Stagefright so frightening is that it isn’t just a malware exploit that cause significant grief. In what might be considered a perverse flip side of ease-of-use, Stagefright is unfortunately about ease-of-infection. It loads itself onto an Android device with nothing more than an MMS message. A message with a carefully crafted media attachment can infect the Android device without any user intervention.
As noted in a recent Alcatel-Lucent blog post, Android Vulnerability Stagefright Highlights Need for Increased Focus on Security, by Kevin McNamee, Director, Motive Security Labs, Alcatel-Lucent, vulnerabilities like this are a ringing endorsement for network-based malware detection systems such as Alcatel-Lucent’s Motive Security Guardian. Putting aside the highlighting of Alcatel-Lucent’s unique offering in this space, McNamee does make a compelling argument as to why despite device-based anti-malware, the only way to effectively stop Stagefright and similar types of malware attacks is at the network level.
As McNamee explains, most malware communicates over the network, between the device and the hackers’ command and control servers. It is this communications that only a network provider can detect and respond to quickly. He also notes, the issues with Android make it that much more important for service providers—caught amid Google, the device manufacturers and the end consumer in terms of distribution of updates that will protect the devices—to leverage their positions as positive men in the middle.
They can identify malware flows across the network and alert users if a device has become infected. This is good for keeping users safe rapidly and also goof for the operator as traffic from malware-infected mobile devices can quickly become a network burden on several levels bringing service down to intolerable levels or even a halt.
The interesting thing about the attention that has been paid the Stagefright vulnerability is that it not only shined a light on a nasty security vulnerability that we all must be aware of, but also does illustrate an opportunity for the mobile service provider to become part of a holistic security solution for the mobile subscriber. After all, such network-based malware detection can be not just a revenue opportunity for operators, but one that subscribers are likely to willingly pay a premium for.
While most customers don’t think about mobile device security now, it would be easy enough to change that with a marketing campaign and a few particularly horrendous malware outbreaks such as Stagefright. Especially if the industry has an actionable response like a network-based security service subscribers could purchase.
My new Android tablet is nice so far—but it does have its downsides. Security is one of them, but it appears that with a little vigilance on my part, and that of my service provider if they are willing, that I can rest a bit easier with my decision to switch from iOS.
]]>Alcatel-Lucent recently compiled the result of actual data collected by its Motive® Wireless Network Guardian. The data, from over 30 million subscribers, is aggregated from live 3G customer networks across most regions of the world, and represents total daily data usage of over 1 petabyte.
Figure 1 shows that Android and iPhone devices make up more than 86% of the total connected devices in the global composite network that was analyzed – a testament to how pervasive smartphones have become. This is consistent with the findings from other industry reports. This may be a harbinger of things to come with respect to consumers’ voracious appetite for more and more features, capabilities and personalized experiences.
To accurately measure the overall impact on the network, it is important to consider just how much data is being used and overall signaling activity. Data usage drives the service provider’s bandwidth-related capital expenditures and the consumer’s data usage fees. Signaling activity measures the amount of network-to-device bi-directional exchanges needed to manage a radio connection to a mobile device. Signaling uses spectral, hardware, and processing resources in the service provider’s network and is a significant cause of battery depletion on a mobile device.
Figure 2 shows the percentage share of both data usage and signaling activity for each device category in the network.
Androids consume almost 50% of the total network data usage and, combined with the iPhone category, account for more than 80% of the total network data usage. When looking at signaling activity, Androids and iPhones also dominate with Androids representing an incredible 59.7% percentage share of signaling activity. Combined with the iPhone category, they account for almost 90% of the total signaling activity. It is also clear that Androids have a larger impact on the network than iPhones do as its share of signaling and data usage are 59.7% and 47.9%, respectively, when compared to 28% and 34%, respectively for iPhones. This difference represents a 31.7% higher share of signaling and a 13.9% higher share of data usage for the Android category over the iPhone category. This is due in large part to the fact that worldwide Androids are more popular than iPhones, but also because, individually and on average, Androids signal more than iPhones.
Despite only a 2% subscriber share, the Dongle/Datacard category shows a 9.4% share of data usage. This may be explained by understanding that these devices are typically attached to a PC or laptop which has a larger screen and is not as prone to mobility as are smartphones. As such, these devices may be consuming a proportionally larger amount of data usage than other categories by streaming video, downloading various videos, playing online video games, downloading/uploading high-res pictures, etc.
The Mobile Wi-Fi category shows a similar trend. With only 0.5% of the subscriber share, this category still manages to consume 4.1% share of data usage. This represents the largest data usage-to-subscriber share ratio across all device categories due to each Mobile Wi-Fi device having many mobile Wi-Fi devices aggregated behind it, collectively generating a large amount of data for a relatively small percentage of subscriber share.
The Machine to Machine (M2M) category represents non-personal devices that fall under commercial use for monitoring and control purposes. M2M devices signal much more actively when compared to their data usage. In this global composite network, M2M consumes 0.2% share of data usage while generating 1.4% share of signaling activity. Although tiny in terms of overall popularity, the M2M category represents the largest ratio between signaling and data usage, which means these devices are signaling a lot more than they are sending data. Some M2M applications, such as a home smartmeter, frequently establish mobile connections generating multiple signaling messages to establish network connectivity, yet have small amounts of data to send each time.
The growth rate of mobile data is staggering and continues to increase at an incredible rate as mobile devices have evolved from being tools for personal communication into being high performing, multi-media platforms. Live-streaming high-definition (HD) video, surfing the web, engaging in social media, on-line gaming and secure banking are just a few of the types of applications used daily on an ever-growing number of connected devices worldwide.
Given that the total number of active wireless connected devices is expected to grow from 13 billion in 2013 to more than 40.9 billion in 2020, it’s critical that mobile service providers, as well as mobile device manufacturers, understand the impact on the mobile network. Which devices consume the most signaling resources? Which use the most data? Answers to questions such as these are essential if service providers are to plan and grow their network efficiently, and for device manufacturers to enhance their designs.
This blog touched on the overall network impact that mobile devices have in the network. In upcoming blogs, I’ll take a closer look at the role device behavior plays in the network. Questions such as how much average daily data usage and signaling activity is associated to each device independent of popularity? What is the most signaling efficient device in the market? How does LTE change the network impact and behavior of devices in the network? Are there regional variations to these findings? What are the top signaling applications behind Androids and iPhones?
Join us for a live webinar on June 17 where our experts will discuss the research results in detail.
Author
Patrick McCabe holds a senior marketing management role in Alcatel-Lucent and is currently responsible for promoting products and solutions for Network Intelligence and Analytics. Patrick has held a number of support, sales, and marketing roles during his 20 years in the telecommunications industry. He was educated at St Francis Xavier University and Technical University of Nova Scotia (DalTech), and holds Bachelor and Masters degrees in Engineering.
Indeed, it is being viewed strategically as a way for service providers to distinguish their services on the basis of Quality of Experience (QoE) from 3G and OTT voice apps. It is also seen as providing competitive advantage because of its ability to enable end users to seamlessly move from a voice call to a video call, or shift from one device to another in the midst of the conversation. It is why interest in accelerating VoLTE deployments is so high.
However, network transformations are not easy. VoLTE deployment and operations is an interesting case in point. It brings unique challenges for service providers related to policy control, charging and Diameter signaling control. Steffen Paulus, Director of Product Marketing, Alcatel-Lucent has some interesting insights worth sharing on the need for integrated policy, charging and Diameter signaling in a virtualized solution, as the path forward for VoLTE success. This is particularly relevant in light of Alcatel-Lucent’s recent launch of its End-to-End Voice over LTE (E2E VoLTE) solution that is an integral part of the Rapport multimedia real-time communications platform which has been architected specifically to me service provider and enterprise needs.
Paulus has a few tips and suggestions on how to get VoLTE rollouts optimized in those three critical and interrelated areas of policy, charging and signaling.
The first one concerns the value of network analytics and personalized offers as the means for service providers to achieve nice adoption rates when launching VoLTE. Network intelligence can be leveraged with the application of sophisticated analytics to understand which markets and customers will benefit most. This translates into the ability to offer self-service capabilities to customers and enables service providers to proactively target specific customer segments based on rich contextual information and be more responsive to changing market conditions.
In fact, the ability for the sharing of analytics across lines-of-business, assuming part of the network transformation includes the upgrading to a more flexible and adaptable underlying rating and charging capabilities, is critical for enabling rapid competitive responses. The reason is obvious but important, creative marketing can only work when new packages and business models are ready for prime time.
Second, when it comes to creating compelling VoLTE experiences is the getting the policy and signaling plumbing VoLTE-ready for ensuring the QoE. On this score Alcatel-Lucent with deep expertise in VoLTE implementations worldwide, knows that VoLTE can expose significant shortcomings of legacy Policy and Charging Rules Function (PCRF) solutions. Plus, there be limitations in scalability and performance, this can include features such as full geo-redundancy, session binding and correlation.
The scalability issue is not just one for handling the data traffic expected from VoLTE adoption. A surge in VoLTE subscribers is also going to significantly increase in diameter–based IMS-related control plane traffic. As Paulus explained, with this surge will comes a need to properly manage that signaling traffic, offer load-balancing and enable interworking capabilities. He explained, “This area is often referred to as diameter signaling control (DSC), and in combination with the IMS and policy & charging solution is a critical piece of the puzzle. “
Last and not least are the challenges for VoLTE regarding cloud readiness along with the value of using network functions virtualization (NFV) as foundational for next generation service creation and delivery. Part of this is based on the value of moving to software defined networking (SDN) and NFV capabilities in general as the most cost effective and agile way to run a network going forward. As if not more important is the ability for service providers to me fast-to-market, fast-in-the-market and incredibly fast to accommodate changes in market conditions be they competitor or user driven.
As Alcatel-Lucent points out, and recent studies have confirmed, most operators have not upgraded their policy engines and moved to NFV to enable a scalable and high-speed data layer that can be used to quickly create and manage differentiated data plans based on real-time information about subscriber preferences, needs and lifestyles. This is critical in a world where demands will increase for the unpredictability associated with the ebb and flow networking and signaling flows caused by the introduction/need for more flexible data plans and such things as providing real-time subscriber notifications about data usage.
Where all of this leads in terms of VoLTE success is that each one of the tools for success needs to be well-orchestrated and integrated to achieve, scalability and agility to assure both service quality and speedy responsiveness. All of this places a premium on having an integrated solution that incorporates all of the tools necessary for the operational efficiency and effectiveness that achieving optimal VoLTE demands.
]]>Cable multiservice operators (MSOs) have embraced the need for broadband data, and with good reason. Broadband data demand is expected to grow by 560 percent over the next five years, according to a recent Bell Labs study, largely driven by demand for pay TV and video and cloud traffic generated from the proliferation of data centers.
Cable MSOs are doing well by their entertainment services bundled with residential broadband offers, but this revenue is under siege by the likes over over-the-top (OTT) video services such as Netflix and Apple. Hence, cable MSOs are constantly in search of new revenue opportunities.
One strong candidate for new revenue is commercial services for small and medium-sized business (SMBs). This area generated 10 percent of MSO revenue in 2014, according to Gilbert Marciano, CMO Strategic Marketing - Customer & Market Insight Senior Manager at Alcatel-Lucent, in a recent TechZine posting appropriately titled, Differentiate your SMB services with big data. In fact, it is noted that in the U.S. Comcast and Time Warner Cable together generated roughly $5.5 billion from the segment in 2013.
Specifically cited is the reality that cable MSOs are in a good place to offer cloud analytics services, since the infrastructure requirements to properly leverage big data is not cheap. Cable MSOs already have this critical infrastructure and thus have the ability to offer SMB analytics as a cloud service.
To offer such analytics services, however, cable MSOs must address the architectural challenge of connecting hundreds of geographically dispersed SMBs. As Marciano notes, this can be done with a distributed datacenter architecture that is connected by a multi-country IP network in the cloud.
“An ideal solution is to deploy software-defined networking (SDN), which brings this elasticity and automation,” Marciano explains. “Network elements are implemented as software (virtual machines) on a distributed cloud infrastructure whilst SDN brings scaling, responsiveness, and automation to the required interconnectivity.”
This removes the boundaries throughout and across the data centers, dynamically provisioning for a high number of separate VLANs, low bandwidth, high latency, and lack of resilience.
“It is suited to situations with highly volatile usage patterns and where resources requirements increase/decrease depending on loads,” says, Marciano. “This solution creates opportunity for cable operators.”
Indeed it does, and with cable MSOs already making significant headway in the business broadband sector, particularly with SMBs, analytics is a natural addition to their solutions portfolios.
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Service providers are seeing an increasing number of applications moving outside of their control. At the same time, they are facing stiff competition within their geographical markets. Developing new revenue streams has become a top priority. As a result, many service providers have invested in business intelligence systems to help them figure out these new offerings and how to win and keep customers.
Interestingly, despite this need and a sense of urgency most service providers are ignoring their greatest asset: Their network. The network provides more visibility into subscriber usage and trends than Google, Yahoo and Facebook combined, according to a recent Alcatel-Lucent Motive posting on the value of big networks analytics (BNA). They believe it is time for this visibility to be unlocked and put to work.
Alcatel-Lucent offers a way to leverage network data for new service creation through its Motive Big Network Analytics offering.
The Alcatel-Lucent Motive BNA for service creation provides a suite of analytics-enabled solutions focused on deriving immediate value from the network data while positioning service providers within a big data infrastructure. The objective is to unlock greater network data intelligence for operations, engineering, planning, customer care, customer experience and marketing organizations.
The Motive BNA solution offers more than 7000 off-the-shelf network analytics reports as part of its analytics package. It consists of the:
In terms of functionality provided, the WNG taps into a network-based data source in a non-intrusive, real-time and vendor agnostic manner and currently supports multiple mobile technologies (2G, 3G, and LTE). The SG leverages analytics to examine communication patterns and detect malware operating on subscriber mobile devices.
All of this combines m.IQ6 network data, circuit-switched (CS) voice and SMS data sources, as well as IT/OSS/BSS data such as subscriber data plans, profile, and billing information, and offers it up in a big data-enabled analytics architecture. The big network analytics solution architecture then uses analytics output as the foundation for wider solutions by exposing this intelligence to external systems.
The result enables service providers to see what fuels traffic growth, and determine whether the largest contributor to growth is new subscribers, existing subscribers using more data. It helps show the relationship between new and popular applications rolled out a service provider, additional roamer traffic, and recent device promotion, helping to clearly understand the consumer and what is working.
Business intelligence solutions play their role, but service providers shouldn’t forget their best asset for obtaining valuable business intelligence is their network. After all it is the source of data that can be brought to bear on customer retention and growth.
]]>So what has changed in twelve months? Here are some highlights, for me, of some great presentations and scintillating conversations that took place over the course of three days in the shadow of Westminster.
For starters, I heard quite a few references to Customer Effort Score (CES); nearly as many as I did of net promoter score (NPS), at the 2014 edition of this event. First published by the Harvard Business Review (HBR) in 2010, “Stop Trying to Delight Your Customers” was a ground-breaking article that claimed you can best win customer loyalty by solving a customer's problem. Plain and simple.
This leads perfectly into the second topic that I heard discussed quite often: self-service or self-care. Various CSPs -- including Comcast, AT&T and O2 (Telefonica UK) -- showed examples of applications that can be used to order new services, change billing information and troubleshoot issues remotely. This aligns perfectly to the notion of the Customer Effort Score because the original HBR article introduced a number of key ideas, including one very important one: making it easy.
CSPs highlighted the benefits of self-care to their organizations, ranging from removing pressure from call centres and saving money, to motivating satisfied customers to make additional purchases.
Proactive action and/or communications was also cited by a number of CSPs as growing in importance. Whether it’s notifying customers on the status of infrastructure projects, network upgrades or outages, being more transparent was an approach that seems to be gathering momentum.
One CSP talked about the importance of correlating customer calls with known network problems, then providing updates on how repairs were coming along. They created a web page where people could register an issue -- even if it wasn’t worth calling about – that resulted in a heat map for all customers to see. In the case of a recent infrastructure upgrade, customer could see exactly what was being done, when/where it was being done and how long it would take.
Another CSP talked about the importance of monitoring network quality and fixing issues proactively, before most customers even notice that there is a problem. According to this speaker, 43% of their customer complaints are related to the quality of the service being delivered, with 17% of complaints being caused by the help desk, 10% by payment issues and the remaining 30% from five undisclosed areas combined.
By closely monitoring their networks, collecting analytics and sharing it with various departments (e.g., marketing, network planning, etc.), they can resolve issues that might affect thousands of people and/or reach out to customers proactively, when issues are known but cannot be fixed immediately.
The bottom line: consumers don’t care about how complex it is to deliver communications services in the 21st century. Instead, they want their service provider to proactively solve issues before they cause disruptions, provide them with the information and tools needed to be self-sufficient and, if they do call the Help Desk as a last resort, they expect the person at the other end of the line to be able to solve their issue quickly, efficiently and right the first time. Now, if only it was easy as it sounds.
Luckily, Motive CX solutions are designed to help our CSP customers provide better services to their customers; the modern consumer. We can make sure that you get that information to the right people at the right time. And the end result is great customer service.
]]>No matter where one looks these days, be it in enterprises or service providers, there can be no disputing that enhancing the customer experience has become a top, if not along with security the top, C-level concern.
Indeed, from burnishing the brand to enhancing customer loyalty, having permission to upsell and getting early visibility on new opportunities the customer experience (CX is now the short appellation) has become a cross line-of-business preoccupation and priority. This has meant business units’ increased attention on listening to, analyzing and reacting upon needs arising from the “voice of the customer” (or certainly knowing more about their service usage behavior), and IT department focus on providing the tools necessary to support these requirements.
It has also meant that businesses of all sizes and vertical markets are changing their views on what it takes to have a better understanding of the customers. This means using new metrics for success. It also has highlighted the realization that you need to look at life cycle management of customers, i.e., as the headline says it is no longer about the destination in the form of a sale but is about assuring optimization of what has been popularized as “The Customer Journey.”
Ultimately, what it has also meant is that organizations need not only the tools, skills and strategies to optimize the customer journey but also need to be able do so quickly. The reasons are obvious but worth repeating. Competitors are becoming more nimble and customers armed with better real-time information themselves have become more fickle. Time is of the essence.
Illustrative of an area where there is, or certainly should be, a sense of urgency regarding having all of the capabilities to optimize the customer journey is in the global mobile services business. This is a sector rife with competition and susceptible to high churn rates. The good news is that the information that resides in the network and various lines-of-business (LOBs), when properly mined, analyzed and acted upon can give service providers more satisfied customers and a competitive edge.
The question is, where are the places to go to get the information and tools needed? The answer can be seen in a recent Alcatel-Lucent webinar, “LTE, It’s Not About the Destination, but the Journey,” which is embedded in its entirety below.
Spoiler Alert!
I’d like to encourage you to view the entire webinar by sharing just a few insights provided by presenters David J. Swift Marketing Director Wireless, and Josee Loudiadis, Director Network Intelligence, Alcatel-Lucent.
The first is the chart that is the backdrop of the webinar (yes you are seeing double) which is a still frame tickler as to why Alcatel-Lucent believes the deployment of an LTE overlay network is the preferred way to go as the vehicle for being fast-to-market. Swift provides a granular explanation but the benefits slide sums it up well.
Source: Alcatel-Lucent webinar, LTE, It’s Not About the Destination, but the Journey
The savings are demonstrable and it should come as no surprise that several of the world’s leading mobile service providers have opted for an LTE overlay as their choice for not just deploying but leveraging the Alcatel-Lucent LTE Express to enable fast deployment.
For her section of the presentation Loudiadis highlights the Alcatel-Lucent belief that the network has the information to keep customers happy. She describes what this information is, and how it can be generated and analyzed for use in looking at:
In fact, a compelling case is made, and again with an emphasis on the need for service providers having some sense of competitive urgency, for implementing an analytics-driven customer care solution such as Alcatel-Lucent’s Motive Customer Experience Solutions.
While a bit of an eye chart, you hopefully get the picture.
Source: Alcatel-Lucent webinar, LTE, It’s Not About the Destination, but the Journey
Yes, the realities of the mobile market, especially as global service providers are in a mad dash to deploy LTE quickly and not fall behind competitors is to get it out there fast. However, being fast-to-market is only part of the equation. You need to also be cost-efficient, and more importantly fast in the market/agile as well. To be the later requires real-time actionable insights. That is where the information and insights from the network become critical.
Success going forward really will be about creating and leveraging better and better knowledge about the entire customer journey. Indeed, it is with such knowledge that services providers can go from being not just reactive but proactive in terms of not just pleasing customers but beating competitors to the punch.
]]>The increasingly competitive broadband market has service providers facing new challenges as they deliver services to today’s Internet-connected home. One challenge is delivering technical support for the rapidly increasing number of Internet-connected devices in the home. Consumers are now connecting gaming consoles, smart phones, tablets and other devices to their residential gateway, and their broadband Internet service. In light of this increasingly complex and dynamic technological landscape, it is no surprise that service providers have turned to analytics to better understand their customers’ needs.
Gaining a 360° view of one’s customers via analytics is quickly becoming one of the only ways to provide a service that is differentiated from competitors. Customer Experience Management tools are being used to comprehensively manage a customer’s cross-channel exposure, interaction, and transactions with a company, with the ultimate goal of optimizing these interactions from the customer’s perspective and, as a result, fostering customer loyalty.
On September 25, I will have the privilege of speaking at the SCTE Cable-Tec Expo in Denver regarding the use of analytics to optimize the customer experience in the connected home. The Cable-Tec Expo is the cable telecommunications engineering show of the year. It provides the opportunity to discover and learn first-hand about the latest in cable telecommunications technology. I will be attending on behalf of the Alcatel-Lucent Motive team, with the objective of delivering information about our cutting edge products in the realm of customer experience analytics.
The array of devices being used in today’s connected home is generating a great deal of valuable information for service providers. This key data and analytics can be used by operators for managing the connected home in relation to:
The ultimate goal of mining and transforming this data is to create meaningful, actionable insights that can be used to quickly identify anomalies and resolve issues. As operators begin to apply analytics to the customer experience they will be able to create and maintain a culture of customer experience (CX) excellence that is aligned with CX business goals and metrics. Not only that, but they will gain the ability to manage the subscriber experience proactively and predictively in order to continuously improve customer care processes and technologies.
Essentially, the Motive CX analytics framework for optimizing the customer experience in the connected home can be broken down into four categories:
The conclusion is that the use of analytics can have a meaningful influence on subscriber retention and revenue if properly deployed. In my presentation, I will delve further into the above four categories to show you how to best harness device, network, and services data in the connected home to extract valuable, actionable insights with speed and precision. With the churn rate at 89% for subscribers who have had a poor customer experience, more focus than ever needs to be paid to using analytics as a means of improving customer satisfaction and retention.
Hope to see you there!
Alan
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