Providing aircraft in flight roaming for passenger electronic devices to home mobile network operator

Abstract

An aircraft cabin communication system includes a wireless access point (WAP) and a connectivity server. The WAP transmits a beacon indicating Hotspot capability and identifying an open SSID, establishes a connection with a first passenger electronic device (PED) carried onboard an aircraft responsive to communications received from the first PED using the open SSID, and provides a list of mobile network operators (MNOs) to the first PED. The connectivity server receive a request to setup a PDU session through the Internet for the first PED. The request identifies a mobile network operator (MNO) associated with the first PED. The connectivity server initiates authentication using extensible authentication protocol (EAP) communications with the first PED and an authorization, authentication, and accounting (AAA) server associated with a partner MNO connected with the MNO identified by the first PED. Responsive to the AAA server granting access to the first PED, the connectivity server triggers the WAP to redirect communications with the first WAP to a hidden SSID, sets up the PDU session for the first PED using the hidden SSID, and performs network resource usage measurements for traffic in the PDU session for the first PED.