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URI Scheme for Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) Short Message Service (SMS)
draft-wilde-sms-uri-20

The information below is for an old version of the document that is already published as an RFC.
Document Type
This is an older version of an Internet-Draft that was ultimately published as RFC 5724.
Authors Antti Vaha-Sipila , Erik Wilde
Last updated 2015-10-14 (Latest revision 2009-10-23)
RFC stream Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)
Intended RFC status Proposed Standard
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IESG IESG state Became RFC 5724 (Proposed Standard)
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Responsible AD Lisa M. Dusseault
Send notices to leslie@thinkingcat.com
draft-wilde-sms-uri-20
Network Working Group                                           E. Wilde
Internet-Draft                                               UC Berkeley
Intended status: Standards Track                          A. Vaha-Sipila
Expires: April 26, 2010                                            Nokia
                                                            Oct 23, 2009

                URI Scheme for GSM Short Message Service
                         draft-wilde-sms-uri-20

Status of this Memo

   This Internet-Draft is submitted to IETF in full conformance with the
   provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.

   Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
   Task Force (IETF), its areas, and its working groups.  Note that
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   This Internet-Draft will expire on April 26, 2010.

Copyright Notice

   Copyright (c) 2009 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
   document authors.  All rights reserved.

   This document is subject to BCP 78 and the IETF Trust's Legal
   Provisions Relating to IETF Documents in effect on the date of
   publication of this document (http://trustee.ietf.org/license-info).
   Please review these documents carefully, as they describe your rights
   and restrictions with respect to this document.

Abstract

   This memo specifies the Uniform Resource Identifier (URI) scheme
   "sms" for specifying one or more recipients for an SMS message.  SMS

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   messages are two-way paging messages that can be sent from and
   received by a mobile phone or a suitably equipped networked device.

Table of Contents

   1.  Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  4
     1.1.  What is GSM? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  4
     1.2.  What is SMS? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  4
   2.  The "sms" URI Scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  7
     2.1.  Applicability  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  8
     2.2.  Formal Definition  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .  8
     2.3.  Processing an "sms" URI  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
     2.4.  Comparing "sms" URIs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
     2.5.  Examples of Use  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
     2.6.  Using "sms" URIs in HTML Forms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
   3.  URI Scheme Registration  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
     3.1.  URI Scheme Name  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
     3.2.  Status . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
     3.3.  URI Scheme Syntax  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
     3.4.  URI Scheme Semantics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
     3.5.  Encoding Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
     3.6.  Applications/Protocols that use this URI Scheme Name . . . 13
     3.7.  Interoperability Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
     3.8.  Security Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
     3.9.  Contact  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
   4.  Security Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
   5.  IANA Considerations  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
   6.  Change Log . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
     6.1.  From -19 to -20  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
     6.2.  From -18 to -19  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
     6.3.  From -17 to -18  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
     6.4.  From -16 to -17  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
     6.5.  From -15 to -16  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
     6.6.  From -14 to -15  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
     6.7.  From -13 to -14  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
     6.8.  From -12 to -13  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
     6.9.  From -11 to -12  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
     6.10. From -10 to -11  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
     6.11. From -09 to -10  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
     6.12. From -08 to -09  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
     6.13. From -07 to -08  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
     6.14. From -06 to -07  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
     6.15. From -05 to -06  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
     6.16. From -04 to -05  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
     6.17. From -03 to -04  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
     6.18. From -02 to -03  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
     6.19. From -01 to -02  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

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     6.20. From -00 to -01  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
     6.21. Change Log of draft-wilde-sms-service  . . . . . . . . . . 20
   7.  Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
   8.  References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
     8.1.  Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
     8.2.  Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
   Appendix A.  Syntax of 'telephone-subscriber'  . . . . . . . . . . 23
   Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

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1.  Introduction

   The capitalized key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL",
   "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and
   "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in RFC
   2119 [RFC2119].

1.1.  What is GSM?

   GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) is a digital mobile
   phone standard which is used extensively in many parts of the world.
   First named after its frequency band around 900 MHz, GSM-900 has
   provided the basis for several other networks utilizing GSM
   technology, in particular GSM networks operating in the frequency
   bands around 1800 MHz and 1900 MHz.  When referring to "GSM" in this
   document, we mean any of these GSM-based networks that operate a
   short message service.

1.2.  What is SMS?

   The Short Message Service (SMS) [SMS] is an integral part of the GSM
   network technology.  It has been very successful and currently is a
   major source of revenue for many GSM operators.  SMS as a service is
   so successful that other Global Switched Telephone Network (GSTN)
   technologies have adopted it as well, in particular the Integrated
   Services Digital Network (ISDN).  Because of this development, this
   memo uses the term "SMS client" to refer to user agents that are able
   to send and/or receive SMS messages.

1.2.1.  SMS content

   GSM SMS messages are alphanumeric paging messages that can be sent to
   and from SMS clients.  SMS messages have a maximum length of 160
   characters (7-bit characters from the GSM character set [SMS-CHAR]),
   or 140 octets.  Other character sets (such as UCS-2 16-bit
   characters, resulting in 70 character messages) MAY also be supported
   [SMS-CHAR], but are defined as being optional by the SMS
   specification.  Consequently, applications handling SMS messages as
   part of a chain of character processing applications MUST make sure
   that character sets are correctly mapped to and from the character
   set used for SMS messages.

   While the 160 character variety for SMS messages is by far the most
   widely used one, there are numerous other content types for SMS
   messages, such as small bitmaps ("operator logos") and simple formats
   for musical notes ("ring tones").  However, these formats are
   proprietary and are not considered in this memo.

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   SMS messages are limited in length (140 octets), and the first
   versions of the SMS specification did not specify any standardized
   methods for concatenating SMS messages.  As a consequence, several
   proprietary methods were invented, but the current SMS specification
   does specify message concatenation.  In order to deal with this
   situation, SMS clients composing messages SHOULD use the standard
   concatenation method based on the header in the TP-User Data field as
   specified in the SMS specification [SMS].  When sending a message to
   an SMS recipient whose support for concatenated messages is unknown,
   the SMS client MAY opt to use the backwards-compatible (text-based)
   concatenation method defined in the SMS specification [SMS].
   Proprietary concatenation methods SHOULD NOT be used except in closed
   systems, where the capabilities of the recipient(s) are always known.

1.2.2.  SMS infrastructure

   SMS messages can be transmitted over an SMS client's network
   interface using the signaling channels of the underlying GSTN
   infrastructure, so there is no delay for call setup.  Alternatively,
   SMS messages may be submitted through other front-ends (for example
   Web-based services), which makes it possible for SMS clients to run
   on computers which are not directly connected to a GSTN network
   supporting SMS.

   SMS messages sent with the GSTN SMS service MUST be sent as class 1
   SMS messages, if the client is able to specify the message class.

1.2.2.1.  SMS Centers

   For delivery within GSTN networks, SMS messages are stored by an
   entity called SMS Center (SMSC), and sent to the recipient when the
   subscriber connects to the network.  The number of a cooperative SMSC
   must be known to the SMS sender (i.e., the entity submitting the SMS
   message to a GSTN infrastructure) when sending the message (usually,
   the SMSC's number is configured in the SMS client and specific for
   the network operator to which the sender has subscribed).  In most
   situations, the SMSC number is part of the sending SMS client's
   configuration.  However, in some special cases (such as when the SMS
   recipient only accepts messages from a certain SMSC), it may be
   necessary to send the SMS message over a specific SMSC.  The scheme
   specified in this memo does not support the specification of SMSC
   numbers, so in case of scenarios where messages have to be sent
   through a certain SMSC, there must be some other context establishing
   this requirement, or message delivery may fail.

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1.2.3.  Uniform Resource Identifiers

   One of the core specifications for identifying resources on the
   Internet is RFC 3986 [RFC3986], specifying the syntax and semantics
   of a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI).  The most important notion of
   URIs are "schemes", which define a framework within which resources
   can be uniquely identified and addressed.  URIs enable users to
   access resources, and are used for very diverse schemes such as
   access protocols (HTTP, FTP), broadcast media (TV channels
   [RFC2838]), messaging (email [RFC2368]), and even telephone numbers
   (voice [RFC3966]).

   URIs often are mentioned together with Uniform Resource Names (URNs)
   and/or Uniform Resource Locators (URLs), and it often is unclear how
   to separate these concepts.  For the purpose of this memo, only the
   term URI will be used, referring to the most fundamental concept.
   The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has issued a note
   [uri-clarification] discussing the topic of URIs, URNs, and URLs in
   detail.

1.2.4.  SMS Messages and the Internet

   One of the important reasons for the universal access of the Web is
   the ability to access all information through a unique interface.
   This kind of integration makes it easy to provide information as well
   as to consume it.  One aspect of this integration is the support of
   user agents (in the case of the Web, commonly referred to as
   browsers) for multiple content formats (such as HTML, GIF, JPEG) and
   access schemes (such as HTTP, HTTPS, FTP).

   The "mailto" scheme has proven to be very useful and popular, because
   most user agents support it by providing an email composition
   facility when the user selects (e.g., clicks on) the URI.  Similarly,
   the "sms" scheme can be supported by user agents by providing an SMS
   message composition facility when the user selects the URI.  In cases
   where the user agent does not provide a built-in SMS message
   composition facility, the scheme could still be supported by opening
   a Web page which provides such a service.  The specific Web page to
   be used could be configured by the user, so that each user could use
   the SMS message composition service of his choice.

   The goal of this memo is to specify the "sms" URI scheme, so that
   user agents (such as Web browsers and email clients) can start to
   support it.  The "sms" URI scheme identifies SMS message endpoints as
   resources.  When "sms" URIs are dereferenced, implementations MAY
   create a message and present it to be edited before being sent, or
   they MAY invoke additional services to provide the functionality
   necessary for composing a message and sending it to the SMS message

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   endpoint.  In either case, simply activating a link with an "sms" URI
   SHOULD NOT cause a message to be sent without prior user
   confirmation.

1.2.4.1.  SMS Messages and the Web

   SMS messages can provide an alternative to "mailto" URIs [RFC2368],
   or "tel" or "fax" URIs [RFC3966].  When a "sms" URI is activated, the
   user agent MAY start a program for sending an SMS message, just as
   "mailto" may open a mail client.  Unfortunately, most browsers do not
   support the external handling of internally unsupported URI schemes
   in the same generalized way as most of them support external handling
   of content for media types which they do not support internally.
   Ideally, user agents should implement generic URI parsers and provide
   a way to associate unsupported schemes with external applications (or
   Web-based services).

   The recipient of an SMS message need not be a mobile phone.  It can
   be a server that can process SMS messages, either by gatewaying them
   to another messaging system (such as regular electronic mail), or by
   parsing them for supplementary services.

   SMS messages can be used to transport almost any kind of data (even
   though there is a very tight size limit), but the only standardized
   data formats are character-based messages in different character
   encodings.  SMS messages have a maximum length of 160 characters
   (when using 7-bit characters from the SMS character set), or 140
   octets.  However, SMS messages can be concatenated to form longer
   messages.  It is up to the user agent to decide whether to limit the
   length of the message, and how to indicate this limit in its user
   interface, if necessary.  There is one exception to this, see
   Section 2.6.

1.2.4.2.  SMS Messages and Forms

   The Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) [HTML401] provides a way to
   collect information from a user and pass it to a server for
   processing.  This functionality is known as "HTML forms".  A
   filled-in form is usually sent to the destination using the Hypertext
   Transfer Protocol (HTTP) or email.  However, SMS messages can also be
   used as the transport mechanism for these forms.  Depending on the
   network configuration, the sender's telephone number may be included
   in the SMS message, thus providing a weak form of authentication.

2.  The "sms" URI Scheme

   Syntax definitions are given using the Augmented BNF (ABNF) for

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   syntax specifications [RFC5234].

2.1.  Applicability

   This URI scheme provides information that can be used for sending SMS
   message(s) to specified recipient(s).  The functionality is
   comparable to that of the "mailto" URI, which (as per RFC 2368
   [RFC2368]) can also be used with a comma-separated list of email
   addresses.

   The notation for phone numbers is taken from [RFC3966] and its
   Erratum 203.  Appendix A provides a corrected syntax of the telephone
   number.  Refer to this document for information on why this
   particular format was chosen.

   How SMS messages are sent to the SMSC or other intermediaries is
   outside the scope of this specification.  SMS messages can be sent
   over the GSM air interface, by using a modem and a suitable protocol,
   or by accessing services over other protocols, such as a Web-based
   service for sending SMS messages.  Also, SMS message service options
   like deferred delivery and delivery notification requests are not
   within the scope of this document.  Such services MAY be requested
   from the network by the user agent if necessary.

   SMS messages sent as a result of this URI MUST be sent as class 1 SMS
   messages, if the user agent is able to specify the message class.

2.2.  Formal Definition

   The URI scheme's keywords specified in the following syntax
   description are case-insensitive.  The syntax of an "sms" URI is
   formally described as follows, where the URI base syntax is taken
   from RFC 3986 [RFC3986]:

  sms-uri        = scheme ":" sms-hier-part [ "?" sms-fields ]
  scheme         = "sms"
  sms-hier-part  = sms-recipient *( "," sms-recipient )
  sms-recipient  = telephone-subscriber ; defined in RFC 3966
  sms-fields     = sms-field *( "&" sms-field )
  sms-field      = sms-field-name "=" escaped-value
  sms-field-name = "body" / sms-field-ext ; "body" MUST only appear once
  sms-field-ext  = 1*( unreserved )
  escaped-value  = *( unreserved / pct-encoded ) ; defined in RFC 3986

   Some illustrative examples using this syntax are given in
   Section 2.5.

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   The syntax definition for <telephone-subscriber> is taken from RFC
   3966 [RFC3966] (Section 5.1).  Please consider Erratum 203 in that
   specification.  For the reader's convenience, Appendix A contains a
   fixed syntax of the telephone number URI scheme including Erratum
   203, but RFC 3966 (plus all applicable errata) is the normative
   reference.  The description of phone numbers in RFC 3966 states
   (quoted from RFC 3966, Section 5.1): "The 'telephone-subscriber' part
   of the URI indicates the number.  The phone number can be represented
   in either global (E.164) or local notation.  All phone numbers MUST
   use the global form unless they cannot be represented as such.
   Numbers from private numbering plans, emergency ('911', '112'), and
   some directory-assistance numbers (e.g., '411') and other 'service
   codes' (numbers of the form N11 in the United States) cannot be
   represented in global (E.164) form and need to be represented as a
   local number with a context.  Local numbers MUST be tagged with a
   'phone-context'."

   This specification defines a single <sms-field>: "body".  Extensions
   to this specification MAY define additional fields.  Extensions MUST
   NOT change the semantics of the specifications they are extending.
   Unknown fields encountered in "sms" URIs MUST be ignored by
   implementations.

   The "body" <sms-field> is used to define the body of the SMS message
   to be composed.  It MUST not appear more than once in an "sms" URI.
   It consists of percent-encoded UTF-8 characters.  Implementations
   MUST make sure that the "body" <sms-field> characters are converted
   to a suitable character encoding before sending, the most popular
   being the 7-bit SMS character encoding, another variant (though not
   as universally supported as 7-bit SMS) is the UCS-2 character
   encoding (both specified in [SMS-CHAR]).  Implementations MAY choose
   to discard (or convert) characters in the <sms-body> that are not
   supported by the SMS character set they are using to send the SMS
   message.  If they do discard or convert characters, they MUST notify
   the user.

   The syntax definition for <escaped-value> refers to the text of an
   SMS where all <reserved> (as per RFC 3986 [RFC3986]) characters in
   the SMS text are percent-encoded, please refer to RFC 3986 [RFC3986]
   for the definition of <unreserved> and <pct-encoded>, and the details
   about percent-encoding.

   User agents SHOULD support multiple recipients, and SHOULD make it
   clear to users what the entire list of recipients is, before
   committing the user to sending all the messages.

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2.3.  Processing an "sms" URI

   The following list describes the steps for processing an "sms" URI:

   1.  The phone number of the first <sms-recipient> is extracted.  It
       is the phone number of the final recipient and it MUST be written
       in international form with country code, unless the number only
       works from inside a certain geographical area or a network.  Note
       that some numbers may work from several networks but not from the
       whole world - these SHOULD be written in international form.
       According to RFC 3966 [RFC3966], all international numbers MUST
       begin with a "+" character.  Hyphens, dots, and parentheses
       (referred to as "visual separators" in RFC 3966) are used only to
       improve readability and MUST NOT convey any other meaning.

   2.  The "body" <sms-field> is extracted, if present.

   3.  The user agent SHOULD provide some means for message composition,
       either by implementing this itself, or by accessing a service
       providing it.  Message composition SHOULD start with the body
       extracted from the "body" <sms-field>, if present.

   4.  After message composition, a user agent SHOULD try to send the
       message first using the default delivery method employed by that
       user agent.  If that fails, the user agent MAY try another
       delivery method.

   5.  If the URI contains a comma-separated list of recipients (i.e.,
       it contains multiple <sms-recipient> parts), all of them are
       processed in this manner.  Exactly the same message SHOULD be
       sent to all of the listed recipients, which means that the
       message resulting from the message composition step for the first
       recipient is used unaltered for all other recipients as well.

2.4.  Comparing "sms" URIs

   Two "sms" URIs are equivalent according to the following rules.
   Since the definition of the <telephone-subscriber> is taken from RFC
   3966 [RFC3966], equivalence of individual values of <telephone-
   subscriber> is based on the rules defined in Section 4 of RFC 3966
   [RFC3966], repeated here for convenience:

   o  Both must be either a 'local-number' or a 'global-number', i.e.,
      start with a '+'.

   o  The 'global-number-digits' and the 'local-number-digits' must be
      equal, after removing all visual separators.

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   o  For mandatory additional parameters and the 'phone-context' and
      'extension' parameters defined in RFC 3966 [RFC3966], the 'phone-
      context' parameter value is compared as a host name if it is a
      'domainname' or digit by digit if it is 'global-number-digits'.
      The latter is compared after removing all 'visual-separator'
      characters.

   o  Parameters are compared according to 'pname', regardless of the
      order they appeared in the URI.  If one URI has a parameter name
      not found in the other, the two URIs are not equal.

   o  URI comparisons are case-insensitive.

   Since "sms" URIs can contain multiple <telephone-subscriber>s as well
   as <sms-fields>, in addition to adopting the rules defined for
   comparing <telephone-subscriber> as defined by RFC 3966 [RFC3966],
   two "sms" URIs are only equivalent if their <sms-fields> are
   identical, and if all <telephone-subscriber>s, compared pairwise as a
   set (i.e., without taking sequence into consideration), are
   equivalent.

2.5.  Examples of Use

   sms:+15105550101

   This indicates an SMS message capable recipient at the given
   telephone number.  The message is sent using the user agent's default
   SMS delivery method.

   sms:+15105550101,+15105550102

   This indicates SMS message capable recipients at the given telephone
   numbers.  The identical message should be sent to both recipients
   using the user agent's default SMS delivery method.

   sms:+15105550101?body=hello%20there

   In this case, a message (initially being set to "hello there", which
   may be modified by the user before sending) will be sent via SMS
   using the user agent's default SMS delivery method.

2.6.  Using "sms" URIs in HTML Forms

   When using a "sms" type URI as an action URI for HTML form submission
   [HTML401], the form contents MUST be packaged in the SMS message just
   as they are packaged when using a "mailto" URI [RFC2368], using the
   "application/x-www-form-urlencoded" media type (as defined by HTML
   [HTML401]), effectively packaging all form data into URI compliant

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   syntax [RFC3986].  The SMS message MUST NOT contain any HTTP header
   fields, only the form data.  The media type is implicit.  It MUST NOT
   be transferred in the SMS message.  Since the SMS message contains
   the form field values, the body <sms-field> of an "sms" type URI used
   for an HTML form will be ignored.

   The character encoding used for form submissions MUST be UTF-8
   [RFC3629].  It should be noted, however, that user agents MUST
   percent-encode form submissions before sending them (this encoding is
   specified by the URI syntax [RFC3986]).

   The user agent SHOULD inform the user about the possible security
   hazards involved when submitting the form (it is probably being sent
   as plain text over an air interface).

   If the form submission is longer than the maximum SMS message size,
   the user agent MAY either concatenate SMS messages, if it is able to
   do so, or it MAY refuse to send the message.  The user agent MUST NOT
   send out partial form submissions.

3.  URI Scheme Registration

   This memo requests the registration of the Uniform Resource
   Identifier (URI) scheme "sms" for specifying one or more recipients
   for an SMS message.  The registration request complies with RFC 4395
   [RFC4395].

3.1.  URI Scheme Name

   sms

3.2.  Status

   Permanent

3.3.  URI Scheme Syntax

   See Section 2.

3.4.  URI Scheme Semantics

   The "sms" URI scheme defines a way how a message may be composed
   which is then transmitted using the SMS message transmission method.
   This scheme can thus be compared to be "mailto" URI scheme [RFC2368].
   See Section 2.3 for the details of operation.

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3.5.  Encoding Considerations

   The optional body field of "sms" URIs may contain a message text, but
   this text uses percent-encoded UTF-8 characters and thus can always
   be represented using URI characters.  See Section 2 for the details
   of encoding.

3.6.  Applications/Protocols that use this URI Scheme Name

   The "sms" URI scheme is intended to be used in a similar way as the
   "mailto" URI scheme [RFC2368].  By using "sms" URIs, authors can
   embed information into documents which can be used as a starting
   point for initiating message composition.  Whether the client is
   sending the message itself (for example over a GSM air interface) or
   redirecting the user to a third party for message composition (such
   as a Web service for sending SMS messages) is outside of the scope of
   the URI scheme definition.

3.7.  Interoperability Considerations

   No interoperability issues have been identified.

3.8.  Security Considerations

   See Section 4.

3.9.  Contact

   Erik Wilde
   School of Information
   UC Berkeley
   Berkeley, CA 94720-4600
   U.S.A.
   tel:+1-510-6432252
   mailto:dret@berkeley.edu

4.  Security Considerations

   SMS messages are transported without any provisions for privacy or
   integrity, so SMS users should be aware of these inherent security
   problems of SMS messages.  Unlike electronic mail, where additional
   mechanisms exist to layer security features on top of the basic
   infrastructure, there currently is no such framework for SMS
   messages.

   SMS messages very often are delivered almost instantaneously (if the
   receiving SMS client is online), but there is no guarantee for when

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   SMS messages will be delivered.  In particular, SMS messages between
   different network operators sometimes take a long time to be
   delivered (hours or even days) or are not delivered at all, so
   applications SHOULD NOT make any assumptions about the reliability
   and performance of SMS message transmission.

   In most networks, sending SMS messages is not a free service.
   Therefore, SMS clients MUST make sure that any action that incurs
   costs is acknowledged by the end user, unless explicitly instructed
   otherwise by the end user.  If an SMS client has different ways of
   submitting an SMS message (such as a Web service and a phone line),
   then the end user MUST have a way to control which way is chosen.

   SMS clients often are limited devices (typically mobile phones), and
   the sending SMS client SHOULD NOT make any assumptions about the
   receiving SMS client supporting any non-standard services, such as
   proprietary message concatenation or proprietary content types.
   However, if the sending SMS client has prior knowledge about the
   receiving SMS client, then he MAY use this knowledge to compose non-
   standard SMS messages.

   There are certain special SMS messages defined in the SMS
   specification [SMS] that can be used, for example, to turn on
   indicators on the phone display, or to send data to certain
   communication ports (comparable to UDP ports) on the device.  Certain
   proprietary systems (for example, the Wireless Application Protocol
   [WAP]) define configuration messages that may be used to reconfigure
   the devices remotely.  Any SMS client SHOULD make sure that malicious
   use of such messages is not possible, for example by filtering out
   certain SMS User Data header fields.  Gateways that accept SMS
   messages (e.g., in e-mail messages or Web forms) and pass them on to
   an SMSC SHOULD implement this kind of "firewalling" approach as well.

   Because the narrow bandwidth of the SMS communications channel, there
   should also be checks in place for excessively long concatenated
   messages.  As an example, it may take two minutes to transfer thirty
   concatenated text messages.

   Unchecked input from a user MUST NOT be used to populate any other
   fields in an SMS message other than the User Data field (not
   including the User Data Header field).  All other parts, including
   the User Data Header, of the short message should only be generated
   by trusted means.

   By including "sms" URIs in unsolicited messages (a.k.a. "spam") or
   other types of advertising, the originator of the "sms" URIs may
   attempt to reveal an individual's phone number and/or to link the
   identity (i.e., e-mail address) used for messaging with the identity

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   (i.e., phone number) used for the mobile phone.  This attempt to
   collect information may be a privacy issue, and user agents may make
   users aware of that risk before composing or sending SMS messages.
   Users agents which do not provide any feedback about this privacy
   issue make users more vulnerable to this kind of attack.

   A user agent SHOULD NOT send out SMS messages without the knowledge
   of the user, because of associated risks, which include sending
   masses of SMS messages to a subscriber without his consent, and the
   costs involved in sending an SMS message.

   As suggested functionality, the user agent MAY offer a possibility
   for the user to filter out those phone numbers that are expressed in
   local format, as most premium-rate numbers are expressed in local
   format, and because determining the correct local context (and hence
   the validity of the number to this specific user) may be very
   difficult.

   When using "sms" URIs as targets of forms (as described in
   Section 2.6), the user agent SHOULD inform the user about the
   possible security hazards involved when submitting the form (it is
   probably being sent as plain text over an air interface).

5.  IANA Considerations

   Upon publication of this memo as an RFC, IANA has registered the
   "sms" URI scheme, using the template in Section 3, in accordance with
   RFC 4395 [RFC4395].

6.  Change Log

   This section will not be part of the final RFC text, it serves as a
   container to collect the history of the individual draft versions.
   To the editor: Please remove this section before publication as RFC.

6.1.  From -19 to -20

   o  Added Section 2.4 defining how to compare SMS URIs.

   o  Minor editorial changes.

6.2.  From -18 to -19

   o  Changed phone numbers in Section 2.5 to match the rules for
      reserved phone numbers in the +1 country code (as given by http://
      www.nanpa.com/nas/public/

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      form555MasterReport.do?method=display555MasterReport).

   o  Changed "sms-field-ext = *( unreserved )" to "sms-field-ext = 1*(
      unreserved )" (i.e., field name cannot be empty).

   o  Changed the registration request from "Provisional" to
      "Permanent".

   o  Renamed [8.2] from "Non-Normative References" to "Informative
      References".

   o  Minor text changes.

6.3.  From -17 to -18

   o  Added normative reference to [HTML401] for the "application/
      x-www-form-urlencoded" media type.

   o  Changed <sms-body> to become <sms-field> (with "body" as the only
      predefined field name) and <escaped-sms> to become <escaped-
      value>, to allow extensions and defined extension model to be
      mustIgnore.

6.4.  From -16 to -17

   o  Changed phone numbers in Section 2.5 to be clearly identifiable
      example phone numbers.

   o  Changed syntax of <sms-body> to use <escaped-sms> (defined
      internally) instead of <query> (which had been reused from RFC
      3986).

   o  Removed RFC 2822 from the references (unused).

   o  Moved Section 2 outside of Section 1, becoming a top-level
      section.

   o  Renamed <hier-part> to <sms-hier-part> to avoid confusion with RFC
      3986 tokens.

   o  Removed unused tokens from Appendix A.

6.5.  From -15 to -16

   o  Changed phone numbers to be defined by the <telephone-subscriber>
      part of RFC 3966 [RFC3966] rather than being defined here.

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   o  Removed the intermediate <sms-number> part and defined <sms-
      recipient> to directly use <telephone-subscriber>.

   o  Replaced reference to [RFC5234] in Section 5 with correct
      reference to [RFC4395].

6.6.  From -14 to -15

   o  RFC 4234 (ABNF) has been obsoleted by [RFC5234].

6.7.  From -13 to -14

   o  Updated abstract of Section 3 to the new abstract of the complete
      document (mentioning of gateway functionality removed).

   o  Removed the "smsc" qualifier which allowed the specification of an
      SMSC to be used for SMS message delivery.

   o  Removed the section about interfacing between a user agent
      processing an "sms" URI, and a Web-based service for SMS
      composition and sending.

   o  Replaced "gstn-phone" with "sms-number" in Section 2.3
      (inconsistency from earlier syntax revision).

   o  Replaced all quotes around ABNF symbols within text with <...> to
      clearly identify them as ABNF.

   o  Updated all references to their complete XML version.

   o  Added Section 5.

6.8.  From -12 to -13

   o  Updated [SMS] to point to the latest version of the SMS spec (3GPP
      TS 23.040 V7.0.1).

   o  Removed support for telematic interworking from the draft.  This
      feature of SMS messaging is hard to understand, poorly supported
      by clients as well as network operators, and for these reasons
      would have been likely to see poor adoption in implementations
      anyway.

   o  Added some text making it more clear that all recipients SHOULD be
      sent the exact same message.

   o  Several small editorial changes.

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6.9.  From -11 to -12

   o  Integrated draft-wilde-sms-service-11 and
      draft-wilde-sms-uri-registration-00 into this draft.  This draft
      is now self-contained.

   o  Changed the phone number notation to use the definition from RFC
      3966 [RFC3966] rather than RFC 3601 (RFC 3966 is a simpler
      notation disallowing some of the special characters allowed by RFC
      3601).

   o  Rephrased various parts of Section 4.

   o  Removed Section "Author/Change Controller".

   o  RFC 2806 (tel URI scheme) has been obsoleted by [RFC3966].

6.10.  From -10 to -11

   o  RFC 2234 (ABNF) has been obsoleted by RFC4234.

   o  Updated reference information for [SMS] and [SMS-CHAR].

   o  Minor textual changes.

6.11.  From -09 to -10

   o  Added security consideration about filtering local format phone
      numbers.

   o  Changed IPR clause from RFC 3667 to RFC 3978 (updated version of
      RFC 3667).

6.12.  From -08 to -09

   o  Fixed syntax error in hier-part and sms-recipient non-terminals,
      which allowed sms-recipients to be concatenated without comma
      separation.

6.13.  From -07 to -08

   o  URIs are now defined by RFC 3986 [RFC3986], so the text (including
      the syntax definitions) and the references have been updated.

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6.14.  From -06 to -07

   o  Changed IPR clause from RFC 2026 to RFC 3667 (updated version of
      RFC 2026).

6.15.  From -05 to -06

   o  Updated reference from draft-allocchio-gstn to RFC 3601.

6.16.  From -04 to -05

   o  Updated reference to SMS spec to the version referenced in the SMS
      service draft.

6.17.  From -03 to -04

   o  Updated reference to draft-allocchio-gstn (to revision -05).

6.18.  From -02 to -03

   o  Changed ordering of "change Log" section (descending to
      ascending).

   o  Clarified the wording at the beginning of Section 2.2 about only
      the keywords of the scheme being case-insensitive.

   o  Changed "sms-body" to be a URI query string.

   o  Added some text describing "sms" URIs as addressing resources.

6.19.  From -01 to -02

   o  Changed the sms-body field to percent-encoded UTF-8 characters.

6.20.  From -00 to -01

   o  Added the "sms-body" field and its processing rules.

   o  Added section about using "sms" URIs as query strings for SMS Web
      services.

   o  Fixed typo in ABNF (said "global-phone" instead of "gstn-phone").

   o  Added some explanatory text about form submissions using email
      telematic interworking.

   o  Added some text about character encoding in form submissions.

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6.21.  Change Log of draft-wilde-sms-service

   This section contains the change log of draft-wilde-sms-service-11
   before it was incorporated into this document at version
   draft-wilde-sms-uri-12.

6.21.1.  From -10 to -11

   o  RFC 2234 (ABNF) has been obsoleted by RFC4234.

   o  Added new security issue in Section 4.

   o  Updated reference information for [SMS] and [SMS-CHAR].

   o  Minor textual changes.

6.21.2.  From -09 to -10

   o  Changed IPR clause from RFC 3667 to RFC 3978 (updated version of
      RFC 3667).

6.21.3.  From -08 to -09

   o  No changes, re-release for alignment with draft-wilde-sms-uri.

6.21.4.  From -07 to -08

   o  No changes, re-release for alignment with draft-wilde-sms-uri.

6.21.5.  From -06 to -07

   o  Changed IPR clause from RFC 2026 to RFC 3667 (updated version of
      RFC 2026).

6.21.6.  From -05 to -06

   o  Updated reference from draft-allocchio-gstn-05 to RFC 3601.

6.21.7.  From -04 to -05

   o  No changes, re-release for alignment with draft-wilde-sms-uri.

6.21.8.  From -03 to -04

   o  Updated reference to draft-allocchio-gstn (to revision -05).

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6.21.9.  From -02 to -03

   o  Changed ordering of "change Log" section (descending to
      ascending).

   o  Fixed some spelling errors.

6.21.10.  From -01 to -02

   o  Removed address specification for X.400 SMS from ABNF
      (surprisingly not part of the SMS spec).

   o  Added some explanatory text about character set mapping for SMS
      messages.

   o  Added text requiring the use of message class 1 for sending SMS
      messages.

6.21.11.  From -00 to -01

   o  Added a number of new security considerations.

   o  Added the "PID" qualif-type1 keyword and the section about "SMS
      Telematic Interworking" (removed in -13, available as Section
      1.2.3 in -12).

7.  Acknowledgements

   This document has been prepared using the IETF document DTD described
   in RFC 2629 [RFC2629].

   Thanks to (listed alphabetically) Claudio Allocchio, Derek Atkins,
   Nevil Brownlee, John Cowan, Leslie Daigle, Lisa Dusseault, Miguel
   Garcia, Vijay Gurbani, Alfred Hoenes, Cullen Jennings, Graham Klyne,
   Larry Masinter, Alexey Melnikov, Michael Patton, and Magnus
   Westerlund for their comments.

8.  References

8.1.  Normative References

   [HTML401]  Raggett, D., Le Hors, A., and I. Jacobs, "HTML 4.01
              Specification", W3C REC-html401, December 1999,
              <http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/>.

   [RFC2119]  Bradner, S., "Key words for use in RFCs to Indicate

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              Requirement Levels", BCP 14, RFC 2119, March 1997.

   [RFC3629]  Yergeau, F., "UTF-8, a transformation format of ISO
              10646", STD 63, RFC 3629, November 2003.

   [RFC3966]  Schulzrinne, H., "The tel URI for Telephone Numbers",
              RFC 3966, December 2004.

   [RFC3986]  Berners-Lee, T., Fielding, R., and L. Masinter, "Uniform
              Resource Identifier (URI): Generic Syntax", STD 66,
              RFC 3986, January 2005.

   [RFC4395]  Hansen, T., Hardie, T., and L. Masinter, "Guidelines and
              Registration Procedures for New URI Schemes", BCP 115,
              RFC 4395, February 2006.

   [RFC5234]  Crocker, D., Ed. and P. Overell, "Augmented BNF for Syntax
              Specifications: ABNF", RFC 5234, January 2008.

   [SMS]      European Telecommunications Standards Institute, "3GPP TS
              23.040 V7.0.1 (2007-03): 3rd Generation Partnership
              Project; Technical Specification Group Core Network and
              Terminals; Technical realization of the Short Message
              Service (SMS) (Release 7)", March 2007, <http://
              www.3gpp.org/ftp/Specs/archive/23_series/23.040/
              23040-701.zip>.

   [SMS-CHAR]
              European Telecommunications Standards Institute, "TS 100
              900 (GSM 03.38 version 7.2.0 Release 1998): Digital
              Cellular Telecommunications System (Phase 2+); Alphabets
              and language-specific information", July 1999, <http://
              www.3gpp.org/ftp/Specs/archive/03_series/03.38/
              0338-720.zip>.

8.2.  Informative References

   [RFC2368]  Hoffmann, P., Masinter, L., and J. Zawinski, "The mailto
              URL scheme", RFC 2368, June 1998.

   [RFC2629]  Rose, M., "Writing I-Ds and RFCs using XML", RFC 2629,
              June 1999.

   [RFC2838]  Zigmond, D. and M. Vickers, "Uniform Resource Identifiers
              for Television Broadcasts", RFC 2838, May 2000.

   [WAP]      WAP Forum, "Wireless Application Protocol - Architecture
              Specification (WAP-210-WAPArch-20010712)", July 2001.

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   [uri-clarification]
              World Wide Web Consortium, "URIs, URLs, and URNs:
              Clarifications and Recommendations 1.0", W3C uri-
              clarification , September 2001,
              <http://www.w3.org/TR/uri-clarification/>.

Appendix A.  Syntax of 'telephone-subscriber'

   The following syntax is reproduced from Section 3 of RFC 3966
   [RFC3966].  It defines the <telephone-subscriber> part used in the
   "sms" URI scheme syntax.  Please note that it includes Erratum 203
   for RFC 3966, which changes the definition of <isdn-subaddress>.

   telephone-subscriber = global-number / local-number
   global-number        = global-number-digits *par
   local-number         = local-number-digits *par context *par
   par                  = parameter / extension / isdn-subaddress
   isdn-subaddress      = ";isub=" 1*paramchar
   extension            = ";ext=" 1*phonedigit
   context              = ";phone-context=" descriptor
   descriptor           = domainname / global-number-digits
   global-number-digits = "+" *phonedigit DIGIT *phonedigit
   local-number-digits  =
      *phonedigit-hex (HEXDIG / "*" / "#")*phonedigit-hex
   domainname           = *( domainlabel "." ) toplabel [ "." ]
   domainlabel          = alphanum
                          / alphanum *( alphanum / "-" ) alphanum
   toplabel             = ALPHA / ALPHA *( alphanum / "-" ) alphanum
   parameter            = ";" pname ["=" pvalue ]
   pname                = 1*( alphanum / "-" )
   pvalue               = 1*paramchar
   paramchar            = param-unreserved / unreserved / pct-encoded
   unreserved           = alphanum / mark
   mark                 = "-" / "_" / "." / "!" / "~" / "*" /
                          "'" / "(" / ")"
   pct-encoded          = "%" HEXDIG HEXDIG
   param-unreserved     = "[" / "]" / "/" / ":" / "&" / "+" / "$"
   phonedigit           = DIGIT / [ visual-separator ]
   phonedigit-hex       = HEXDIG / "*" / "#" / [ visual-separator ]
   visual-separator     = "-" / "." / "(" / ")"
   alphanum             = ALPHA / DIGIT

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Authors' Addresses

   Erik Wilde
   UC Berkeley
   Berkeley, CA 94720-4600
   U.S.A.

   Phone: +1-510-6432253
   Email: dret@berkeley.edu
   URI:   http://dret.net/netdret/

   Antti Vaha-Sipila
   Nokia

   Email: antti.vaha-sipila@nokia.com
   URI:   http://www.iki.fi/avs/

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