Fortinet, Inc.

Telefonaktiebolaget Lm Ericsson (publ)

Francois Lemarchand

Rajesh I Balay

Sachin Desai

Chandramouli Sargor

Amit K Khetawat

Sunny Y Wang

Timothy John Lynch

Srikanth Chavali

Sudhakar Chunduru

Methods are provided for managing hierarchically organized subscriber profiles. According to one embodiment, a connection for a subscriber is created based on a service context of the subscriber. A connection request is received from a subscriber of a network service delivery environment. The subscriber is associated with a first-level profile identifier indicative of a service context for the subscriber. One or more other subscribers can be associated with the first-level profile identifier. Lower-level profile identifiers are determined using the first-level profile identifier. The lower-level profile identifiers indicate a set of services that is available to the subscriber during the connection. Creating a connection for the subscriber that enables forwarding of packets based on the lower-level profile identifiers.

Managing hierarchically organized subscriber profiles

Service groups are dynamically created and members are dynamically assigned. A network element receives a request for a subscriber session and transmits an authentication request to a AAA server. The network element receives an authentication reply from the AAA server that includes dynamic service group configuration information that indicates that the subscriber session should be part of a service group and defines the criteria for the network element to dynamically create and join that subscriber session to a service group if an appropriate service group does not exist or dynamically join that subscriber session to an existing service group. The network element derives a dynamic service group identifier from attributes of the subscriber session based on instructions in the dynamic service group configuration information. Based on that dynamic service group identifier and service group attribute information in the configuration information, the network element dynamically creates and joins the subscriber session to a service group if an appropriate service group does not exist or dynamically joins the subscriber session to an existing appropriate service group.

Dynamic service groups based on session attributes

Methods are provided for managing hierarchically organized subscriber profiles. According to one embodiment, a policy engine of a VR defines services available to subscribers in terms of profile identifiers. A scalable subscriber profile database is established having a memory requirement dependent upon the number of available service contexts by hierarchically organizing profile identifiers as leaf profile identifiers, which explicitly define services, and intermediate profile identifiers, which indirectly represent services. The policy engine receives a first-level profile identifier and determines whether it is among those stored in the database. If not, then it obtains service profile information associated with the first-level profile identifier. If the first-level profile identifier is an intermediate profile identifier having leaf profile identifiers, then it further obtains them and associated profile information and stores this information in the database. The first-level profile identifier and the associated service profile information are also stored in the database.

Methods are provided for managing hierarchically organized subscriber profiles. According to one embodiment of the present invention, a subscriber connection is created with a virtual router operable within a telecommunications system of a service provider. A connection request is received from a subscriber of multiple subscribers of the service provider at a subscriber manager of the virtual router. The virtual router maintains a database of hierarchically organized profile identifiers, including multiple lower-level profile identifiers, which explicitly define subscriber services, and multiple first-level profile identifiers, which define service contexts representing combinations of services available to subscribers when connected by (i) explicitly defining the subscriber services or (ii) referring to one or more of the multiple lower-level profile identifiers. If the subscriber is successfully authenticated, a connection is created by creating and configuring a virtual interface within the virtual router for the subscriber connection based on the subscriber's first-level profile identifier.

Methods are provided for managing hierarchically organized subscriber profiles. According to one embodiment, subscriber services are modified without requiring a change to the subscriber's first-level profile identifier and without requiring the subscriber to reestablish a connection with the service provider. A database of hierarchically organized profile identifiers, including multiple lower-level profile identifiers, explicitly defining subscriber services, and multiple first-level profile identifiers, defining service contexts representing combinations of services available to subscribers by (i) explicitly defining the subscriber services or (ii) referring to one or more of the lower-level profile identifiers, are maintained within a virtual router operable within a telecommunications system of the service provider. Updated service profile information, representing a change to the subscriber's service context, is received. Responsive the updated service profile information, lower-level profile identifiers currently associated with the subscriber's first-level profile identifier are replaced with lower-level profile identifiers corresponding to the updated service profile information.

Apparatus are provided for managing hierarchically organized subscriber profiles. According to one embodiment, a router includes a subscriber manager, a database and a virtual interface. The subscriber manager is operable to receive a connection request from a subscriber of a service provider. The database has stored therein hierarchically organized profile identifiers, including multiple lower-level profile identifiers, which explicitly define subscriber services, and multiple first-level profile identifiers, which define service contexts representing combinations of services available to subscribers when connected to the service provider by (i) explicitly defining the subscriber services or (ii) referring to one or more of the plurality of lower-level profile identifiers. The virtual interface defines a subscriber connection between the router and the subscriber and is created and configured responsive to the connection request based on a first-level profile identifier that is associated with the subscriber.

Apparatus are provided for managing hierarchically organized subscriber profiles. According to one embodiment, a router includes multiple virtual interfaces and a policy engine. The virtual interfaces define connections between the router and corresponding subscribers of a service provider. A first virtual interface is operable to receive packets from a first subscriber and to process the packets in accordance with a first-level profile identifier. The policy engine is coupled with the virtual interfaces and operable to de-reference subscriber profiles of the subscribers on behalf of the virtual interfaces based on a database of hierarchically organized profile identifiers. The database includes multiple lower-level profile identifiers, which explicitly define subscriber services, and multiple first-level profile identifiers, which define service contexts representing combinations of services available to subscribers when connected to the service provider by (i) explicitly defining the subscriber services or (ii) referring to one or more of the lower-level profile identifiers.

Methods and apparatus for managing subscriber profiles are described herein. In one embodiment, the method includes receiving, from a requester, a request to determine an operation to be performed on a data packet. The method also includes determining profile identifiers associated with the requester, wherein the profile identifiers include, a first-level profile identifier associated with a lower-level profile identifier that defines the operation. The method also includes determining, based on the profile identifiers, that the operation should be performed on the data packet and transmitting an indication of the operation to the requestor, wherein the requestor performs the operation on the data packet.

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Palaiseau, France

Francois Lemarchand