Network Working Group P. Eardley
Internet-Draft BT
Intended status: Informational A. Morton
Expires: December 15, 2014 AT&T Labs
M. Bagnulo
UC3M
T. Burbridge
BT
P. Aitken
A. Akhter
Cisco Systems
June 13, 2014
A framework for large-scale measurement platforms (LMAP)
draft-ietf-lmap-framework-06
Abstract
Measuring broadband service on a large scale requires a description
of the logical architecture and standardisation of the key protocols
that coordinate interactions between the components. The document
presents an overall framework for large-scale measurements. It also
defines terminology for LMAP (large-scale measurement platforms).
Status of This Memo
This Internet-Draft is submitted in full conformance with the
provisions of BCP 78 and BCP 79.
Internet-Drafts are working documents of the Internet Engineering
Task Force (IETF). Note that other groups may also distribute
working documents as Internet-Drafts. The list of current Internet-
Drafts is at http://datatracker.ietf.org/drafts/current/.
Internet-Drafts are draft documents valid for a maximum of six months
and may be updated, replaced, or obsoleted by other documents at any
time. It is inappropriate to use Internet-Drafts as reference
material or to cite them other than as "work in progress."
This Internet-Draft will expire on December 15, 2014.
Copyright Notice
Copyright (c) 2014 IETF Trust and the persons identified as the
document authors. All rights reserved.
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
2. Outline of an LMAP-based measurement system . . . . . . . . . 5
3. Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
4. Constraints . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
4.1. Measurement system is under the direction of a single
organisation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
4.2. Each MA may only have a single Controller at any point in
time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
5. LMAP Protocol Model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
5.1. Bootstrapping process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
5.2. Control Protocol . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
5.2.1. Configuration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
5.2.2. Instruction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
5.2.3. Capabilities and Failure information . . . . . . . . 18
5.3. Operation of Measurement Tasks . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
5.3.1. Starting and Stopping Measurement Tasks . . . . . . . 20
5.3.2. Overlapping Measurement Tasks . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
5.4. Report Protocol . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22
5.4.1. Reporting of Subscriber's service parameters . . . . 23
5.5. Operation of LMAP over the underlying packet transfer
mechanism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
5.6. Items beyond the scope of the initial LMAP work . . . . . 24
5.6.1. End-user-controlled measurement system . . . . . . . 25
6. Deployment considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
6.1. Controller and the measurement system . . . . . . . . . . 26
6.2. Measurement Agent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
6.2.1. Measurement Agent on a networked device . . . . . . . 27
6.2.2. Measurement Agent embedded in site gateway . . . . . 27
6.2.3. Measurement Agent embedded behind site NAT /Firewall 28
6.2.4. Multi-homed Measurement Agent . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
6.2.5. Measurement Agent embedded in ISP Network . . . . . . 29
6.3. Measurement Peer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
7. Security considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29
8. Privacy Considerations for LMAP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
8.1. Categories of Entities with Information of Interest . . . 32
8.2. Examples of Sensitive Information . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
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8.3. Different privacy issues raised by different sorts of
Measurement Methods . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
8.4. Privacy analysis of the Communications Models . . . . . . 34
8.4.1. MA Bootstrapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
8.4.2. Controller <-> Measurement Agent . . . . . . . . . . 35
8.4.3. Collector <-> Measurement Agent . . . . . . . . . . . 36
8.4.4. Measurement Peer <-> Measurement Agent . . . . . . . 36
8.4.5. Measurement Agent . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
8.4.6. Storage and Reporting of Measurement Results . . . . 38
8.5. Threats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
8.5.1. Surveillance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
8.5.2. Stored Data Compromise . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
8.5.3. Correlation and Identification . . . . . . . . . . . 40
8.5.4. Secondary Use and Disclosure . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
8.6. Mitigations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
8.6.1. Data Minimisation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
8.6.2. Anonymity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
8.6.3. Pseudonymity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
8.6.4. Other Mitigations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
9. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
10. Appendix: Deployment examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
11. Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
12. History . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
12.1. From -00 to -01 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
12.2. From -01 to -02 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
12.3. From -02 to -03 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
12.4. From -03 to -04 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
12.5. From -04 to -05 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
12.6. From -05 to -06 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
13. Informative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
1. Introduction
There is a desire to be able to coordinate the execution of broadband
measurements and the collection of measurement results across a large
scale set of diverse devices. These devices could be software based
agents on PCs, embedded agents in consumer devices (e.g. blu-ray
players), service provider controlled devices such as set-top players
and home gateways, or simply dedicated probes. It is expected that
such a system could easily comprise 100,000 devices. Measurement
devices may also be embedded on a device that is part of an ISP's
network, such as a DSLAM, router, Carrier Grade NAT or ISP Gateway.
Such a scale presents unique problems in coordination, execution and
measurement result collection. Several use cases have been proposed
for large-scale measurements including:
o Operators: to help plan their network and identify faults
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o Regulators: to benchmark several network operators and support
public policy development
Further details of the use cases can be found in
[I-D.ietf-lmap-use-cases]. The LMAP framework should be useful for
these, as well as other use cases, such as to help end users run
diagnostic checks like a network speed test.
The LMAP Framework has three basic elements: Measurement Agents,
Controllers and Collectors.
Measurement Agents (MAs) initiate the actual measurements, which are
called Measurement Tasks in the LMAP terminology. In principle,
there are no restrictions on the type of device in which the MA
function resides.
The Controller instructs one or more MAs and communicates the set of
Measurement Tasks an MA should perform and when. For example it may
instruct a MA at a home gateway: "Measure the 'UDP latency' with
www.example.org; repeat every hour at xx.05". The Controller also
manages a MA by instructing it how to report the Measurement Results,
for example: "Report results once a day in a batch at 4am". We refer
to these as the Measurement Schedule and Report Schedule.
The Collector accepts Reports from the MAs with the Results from
their Measurement Tasks. Therefore the MA is a device that gets
Instructions from the Controller, initiates the Measurement Tasks,
and reports to the Collector. The communications between these three
LMAP functions are structured according to a Control Protocol and a
Report Protocol.
The desirable features for a large-scale measurement systems we are
designing for are:
o Standardised - in terms of the Measurement Tasks that they
perform, the components, the data models and protocols for
transferring information between the components. Amongst other
things, standardisation enables meaningful comparisons of
measurements made of the same metric at different times and
places, and provides the operator of a measurement system with a
criteria for evaluation of the different solutions that can be
used for various purposes including buying decisions (such as
buying the various components from different vendors). Today's
systems are proprietary in some or all of these aspects.
o Large-scale - [I-D.ietf-lmap-use-cases] envisages Measurement
Agents in every home gateway and edge device such as set-top-boxes
and tablet computers, and located throughout the Internet as well
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[I-D.ietf-ippm-lmap-path]. It is expected that a measurement
system could easily encompass a few hundred thousand or even
millions of Measurement Agents. Existing systems have up to a few
thousand MAs (without judging how much further they could scale).
o Diversity - a measurement system should handle different types of
Measurement Agents - for example Measurement Agents may come from
different vendors, be in wired and wireless networks, be able to
execute different sorts of Measurement Task and be on devices with
IPv4 or IPv6 addresses.
2. Outline of an LMAP-based measurement system
Figure 1 shows the main components of a measurement system, and the
interactions of those components. Some of the components are outside
the scope of initial LMAP work. In this section we provide an
overview of the whole measurement system and we introduce the main
terms needed for the LMAP framework. The new terms are capitalised.
In the next section we provide a terminology section with a
compilation of all the LMAP terms and their definition. Section 4
onwards considers the LMAP components in more detail.
Other LMAP specifications will define an information model, the
associated data models, and select/extend one or more protocols for
the secure communication: firstly, a Control Protocol, from a
Controller to instruct Measurement Agents what performance metrics to
measure, when to measure them, how/when to report the measurement
results to a Collector; secondly, a Report Protocol, for a
Measurement Agent to report the results to the Collector.
The MA performs Measurement Tasks. The MAs are pieces of code that
can be executed in specialised hardware (hardware probe) or on a
general-purpose device (like a PC or mobile phone). The MA may
generate Measurement Traffic and measure some metric associated with
its transfer, or the MA may observe existing traffic, or there may be
some kind of hybrid of these two possibilities. A device with a
Measurement Agent may have multiple interfaces (WiFi, Ethernet, DSL,
fibre; and non-physical interfaces such as PPPoE or IPsec) and the
Measurement Tasks may specify any one of these.
The Controller manages a MA through use of the Control Protocol,
which transfer the Instruction to the MA. This describes the
Measurement Tasks the MA should perform and when. For example the
Controller may instruct a MA at a home gateway: "Count the number of
TCP SYN packets observed in a 1 minute interval; repeat every hour at
xx.05 + Unif[0,180] seconds". The Measurement Schedule determines
when the Measurement Tasks are executed. The Controller also manages
a MA by instructing it how to report the Measurement Results, for
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example: "Report results once a day in a batch at 4am + Unif[0,180]
seconds; if the end user is active then delay the report 5 minutes".
The Report Schedule determines when the Reports are uploaded to the
Collector. The Measurement Schedule and Report Schedule can define
one-off (non-recurring) actions ("Do measurement now", "Report as
soon as possible"), as well as recurring ones.
The Collector accepts a Report from a MA with the Measurement Results
from its Measurement Tasks. It then provides the Results to a
repository (see below).
A Measurement Method defines how to measure a Metric of interest. It
is very useful to standardise Measurement Methods, so that it is
meaningful to compare measurements of the same Metric made at
different times and places. It is also useful to define a registry
for commonly-used Metrics [I-D.manyfolks-ippm-metric-registry] so
that a Metric with its associated Measurement Method can be referred
to simply by its identifier in the registry. The Measurement Methods
and registry will hopefully be referenced by other standards
organisations.
Broadly speaking there are two types of Measurement Method. It may
involve a single MA simply observing existing traffic - for example,
the Measurement Agent could count bytes or calculate the average loss
for a particular flow. On the other hand, a Measurement Method may
involve multiple network entities, which perform different roles.
For example, a "ping" Measurement Method, to measure the round trip
delay , would consist of an MA sending an ICMP ECHO request to a
responder in the Internet. In LMAP terms, the responder is termed a
Measurement Peer (MP), meaning that it helps the MA but is not
managed by the Controller. Other Measurement Methods involve a
second MA, with the Controller instructing the MAs in a coordinated
manner. Traffic generated specifically as part of the Measurement
Method is termed Measurement Traffic; in the ping example, it is the
ICMP ECHO Requests and Replies. The protocols used for the
Measurement Traffic are out of the scope of initial LMAP work, and
fall within the scope of other IETF WGs such as IPPM. The
Appendix has some other examples of possible arrangements of
Measurement Agents and Peers.
A Measurement Task is the action performed by a particular MA at a
particular time, as the specific instance of its role in a
Measurement Method. LMAP is mainly concerned with Measurement Tasks,
for instance in terms of its Information Model and Protocols.
For Measurement Results to be truly comparable, as might be required
by a regulator, not only do the same Measurement Methods need to be
used to assess Metrics, but also the set of Measurement Tasks should
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follow a similar Measurement Schedule and be of similar number. The
details of such a characterisation plan are beyond the scope of work
in IETF although certainly facilitated by IETF's work.
Messages are transferred over a secure Channel. A Control Channel is
between the Controller and a MA; the Control Protocol delivers
Instruction Messages to the MA and Capabilities, Failure and Logging
Information in the reverse direction. A Report Channel is between a
MA and Collector, and the Report Protocol delivers Reports to the
Collector.
Finally we introduce several components that are outside the scope of
initial LMAP work and will be provided through existing protocols or
applications. They affect how the measurement system uses the
Measurement Results and how it decides what set of Measurement Tasks
to perform.
The MA needs to be bootstrapped with initial details about its
Controller, including authentication credentials. The LMAP work
considers the bootstrap process, since it affects the Information
Model. However, LMAP does not define a bootstrap protocol, since it
is likely to be technology specific and could be defined by the
Broadband Forum, CableLabs or IEEE depending on the device. Possible
protocols are SNMP, NETCONF or (for Home Gateways) CPE WAN Management
Protocol (CWMP) from the Auto Configuration Server (ACS) (as
specified in TR-069 [TR-069]).
A Subscriber parameter database contains information about the line,
such as the customer's broadband contract (perhaps 2, 40 or 80Mb/s),
the line technology (DSL or fibre), the time zone where the MA is
located, and the type of home gateway and MA. These parameters are
already gathered and stored by existing operations systems. They may
affect the choice of what Measurement Tasks to run and how to
interpret the Measurement Results. For example, a download test
suitable for a line with an 80Mb/s contract may overwhelm a 2Mb/s
line.
A results repository records all Measurement Results in an equivalent
form, for example an SQL database, so that they can easily be
accessed by the data analysis tools.
The data analysis tools receive the results from the Collector or via
the Results repository. They might visualise the data or identify
which component or link is likely to be the cause of a fault or
degradation. This information could help the Controller decide what
follow-up Measurement Task to perform in order to diagnose a fault.
The data analysis tools also need to understand the Subscriber's
service information, for example the broadband contract.
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^
|
+-------------+ IPPM
+---------------+ Measurement | Measurement | Scope
| Measurement |<------------>| Peer | |
| Agent | Traffic +-------------+ v
+------->| | ^
| +---------------+ |
| ^ | |
| Instruction | | Report |
| | +-----------------+ |
| | | |
| | v LMAP
| +------------+ +------------+ Scope
| | Controller | | Collector | |
| +------------+ +------------+ v
| ^ ^ | ^
| | | | |
| | +----------+ | |
| | | v |
+------------+ +----------+ +--------+ +----------+ |
|Bootstrapper| |Subscriber|--->| data |<---|repository| Out
+------------+ |parameter | |analysis| +----------+ of
|database | | tools | Scope
+----------+ +--------+ |
|
v
Figure 1: Schematic of main elements of an LMAP-based
measurement system
(showing the elements in and out of the scope of initial LMAP work)
3. Terminology
This section defines terminology for LMAP. Please note that defined
terms are capitalized.
Bootstrap: A process that integrates a Measurement Agent into a
measurement system.
Capabilities: Information about the performance measurement
capabilities of the MA, in particular the Measurement Method roles
and measurement protocol roles that it can perform, and the device
hosting the MA, for example its interface type and speed, but not
dynamic information.
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Channel: A bi-directional logical connection that is defined by a
specific Controller and MA, or Collector and MA, plus associated
security.
Collector: A function that receives a Report from a Measurement
Agent.
Controller: A function that provides a Measurement Agent with its
Instruction.
Control Channel: a Channel between a Controller and a MA over which
Instruction Messages and Capabilities, Failure and Logging
Information are sent.
Control Protocol: The protocol delivering Instruction(s) from a
Controller to a Measurement Agent. It also delivers Capabilities,
Failure and Logging Information from the Measurement Agent to the
Controller.
Cycle-ID: A tag that is sent by the Controller in an Instruction and
echoed by the MA in its Report. The same Cycle-ID is used by several
MAs that use the same Measurement Method for a Metric with the same
Input Parameters. Hence the Cycle-ID allows the Collector to easily
identify Measurement Results that should be comparable.
Data Model: The implementation of an Information Model in a
particular data modelling language [RFC3444].
Environmental Constraint: A parameter that is measured as part of the
Measurement Task, its value determining whether the rest of the
Measurement Task proceeds.
Failure Information: Information about the MA's failure to action or
execute an Instruction, whether concerning Measurement Tasks or
Reporting.
Group-ID: An identifier of a group of MAs.
Information Model: The protocol-neutral definition of the semantics
of the Instructions, the Report, the status of the different elements
of the measurement system as well of the events in the system
[RFC3444].
Input Parameter: A parameter whose value is left open by the Metric
and its Measurement Method and is set to a specific value in a
Measurement Task. Altering the value of an Input Parameter does not
change the fundamental nature of the Measurement Task.
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Instruction: The description of Measurement Tasks for a MA to perform
and the details of the Report for it to send. It is the collective
description of the Measurement Task configurations, the configuration
of the Measurement Schedules, the configuration of the Report
Channel(s), the configuration of Report Schedule(s), and the details
of any suppression.
Instruction Message: The message that carries an Instruction from a
Controller to a Measurement Agent.
Logging Information: Information about the operation of the
Measurement Agent and which may be useful for debugging.
Measurement Agent (MA): The function that receives Instruction
Messages from a Controller and operates the Instruction by executing
Measurement Tasks (using protocols outside the initial LMAP work
scope and perhaps in concert with one or more other Measurement
Agents or Measurement Peers) and (if part of the Instruction) by
reporting Measurement Results to a Collector or Collectors.
Measurement Agent Identifier (MA-ID): a UUID [RFC4122] that
identifies a particular MA and is configured as part of the
Bootstrapping process.
Measurement Method: The process for assessing the value of a Metric;
the process of measuring some performance or reliability parameter
associated with the transfer of traffic; where this process involves
multiple MAs or MPs, each may perform different roles.
Measurement Peer (MP): The function that assists a Measurement Agent
with Measurement Tasks and does not have an interface to the
Controller or Collector.
Measurement Result: The output of a single Measurement Task (the
value obtained for the parameter of interest or Metric).
Measurement Schedule: The schedule for performing Measurement Tasks.
Measurement Task: The action performed by a particular Measurement
Agent that consists of the single assessment of a Metric through
operation of a Measurement Method role at a particular time, with all
of the role's Input Parameters set to specific values.
Measurement Traffic: the packet(s) generated by some types of
Measurement Method that involve measuring some parameter associated
with the transfer of the packet(s).
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Metric: The quantity related to the performance and reliability of
the network that we'd like to know the value of, and that is
carefully specified.
Report: The set of Measurement Results and other associated
information (as defined by the Instruction). The Report is sent by a
Measurement Agent to a Collector.
Report Channel: a communications channel between a MA and a
Collector, which is defined by a specific MA, Collector, Report
Schedule and associated security, and over which Reports are sent.
Report Protocol: The protocol delivering Report(s) from a Measurement
Agent to a Collector.
Report Schedule: the schedule for sending Reports to a Collector.
Subscriber: An entity (associated with one or more users) that is
engaged in a subscription with a service provider.
Suppression: the temporary cessation of Measurement Tasks.
4. Constraints
The LMAP framework makes some important assumptions, which constrain
the scope of the initial LMAP work.
4.1. Measurement system is under the direction of a single organisation
In the LMAP framework, the measurement system is under the direction
of a single organisation that is responsible for any impact that its
measurements have on a user's quality of experience and privacy.
Clear responsibility is critical given that a misbehaving large-scale
measurement system could potentially harm user experience, user
privacy and network security.
However, the components of an LMAP measurement system can be deployed
in administrative domains that are not owned by the measuring
organisation. Thus, the system of functions deployed by a single
organisation constitutes a single LMAP domain which may span
ownership or other administrative boundaries.
4.2. Each MA may only have a single Controller at any point in time
A MA is instructed by one Controller and is in one measurement
system. The constraint avoids different Controllers giving a MA
conflicting instructions and so means that the MA does not have to
manage contention between multiple Measurement (or Report) Schedules.
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This simplifies the design of MAs (critical for a large-scale
infrastructure) and allows a Measurement Schedule to be tested on
specific types of MA before deployment to ensure that the end user
experience is not impacted (due to CPU, memory or broadband-product
constraints).
An operator may have several Controllers, perhaps with a Controller
for different types of MA (home gateways, tablets) or location
(Ipswich, Edinburgh).
5. LMAP Protocol Model
A protocol model [RFC4101] presents an architectural model for how
the protocol operates and needs to answer three basic questions:
1. What problem is the protocol trying to achieve?
2. What messages are being transmitted and what do they mean?
3. What are the important, but unobvious, features of the protocol?
An LMAP system goes through the following phases:
o a bootstrapping process before the MA can take part in the other
three phases
o a Control Protocol, which delivers Instruction Messages from a
Controller to a MA, detailing what Measurement Tasks the MA should
perform and when, and how it should report the Measurement
Results. It also delivers Capabilities, Failure and logging
Information from a MA to its Controller. Finally, it allows the
Controller to update the MA's configuration.
o the actual Measurement Tasks, which measure some performance or
reliability parameter(s) associated with the transfer of packets.
The LMAP work does not define Metrics and Measurement Methods,
these are define elsewhere (e.g. IPPM).
o a Report Protocol, which delivers Reports from a MA to a
Collector. The Report contains the Measurement Results.
The diagrams show the various LMAP messages and uses the following
convention:
o (optional): indicated by round brackets
o [potentially repeated]: indicated by square brackets
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The protocol model is closely related to the Information Model
[I-D.ietf-lmap-information-model], which is the abstract definition
of the information carried by the protocol model. The purpose of
both is to provide a protocol and device independent view, which can
be implemented via specific protocols. LMAP defines a specific
Control Protocol and Report Protocol, but others could be defined by
other standards bodies or be proprietary. However it is important
that they all implement the same Information Model and protocol
model, in order to ease the definition, operation and
interoperability of large-scale measurement systems.
5.1. Bootstrapping process
The primary purpose of bootstrapping is to enable a MA to be
integrated into a measurement system. The MA retrieves information
about itself (like its identity in the measurement system) and about
the Controller, the Controller learns information about the MA, and
they learn about security information to communicate (such as
certificates and credentials).
Whilst this memo considers the bootstrapping process, it is beyond
the scope of initial LMAP work to define a bootstrap mechanism, as it
depends on the type of device and access.
As a result of the bootstrapping process the MA learns information
with the following aims ([I-D.ietf-lmap-information-model] defines
the consequent list of information elements):
o its identifier, either its MA-ID or a device identifier such as
its MAC
o (optionally) a Group-ID. A Group-ID would be shared by several
MAs and could be useful for privacy reasons. For instance,
reporting the Group-ID and not the MA-ID could hinder tracking of
a mobile device
o the Control Channel, which is defined by:
* the address which identifies the Control Channel, such as the
Controller's FQDN (Fully Qualified Domain Name) [RFC1035])
* security information (for example to enable the MA to decrypt
the Instruction Message and encrypt messages sent to the
Controller)
The details of the bootstrapping process are device /access specific.
For example, the information could be in the firmware, manually
configured or transferred via a protocol like TR-069 [TR-069]. There
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may be a multi-stage process where the MA contacts the device at a
'hard-coded' address, which replies with the bootstrapping
information.
The MA must learn its MA-ID before getting an Instruction, either
during Bootstrapping or via configuration (Section 5.2.1).
5.2. Control Protocol
The primary purpose of the Control Protocol is to allow the
Controller to configure a Measurement Agent with an Instruction about
what Measurement Tasks to do, when to do them, and how to report the
Measurement Results (Section 5.2.2). The Measurement Agent then acts
on the Instruction autonomously. The Control Protocol also enables
the MA to inform the Controller about its Capabilities and any
Failure and logging Information (Section 5.2.2). Finally, the
Control Protocol allows the Controller to update the MA's
configuration.
5.2.1. Configuration
Configuration allows the Controller to update the MA about some or
all of the information that it obtained during the bootstrapping
process: the MA-ID, the (optional) Group-ID and the Control Channel.
The measurement system might use Configuration for several reasons.
For example, the bootstrapping process could 'hard code' the MA with
details of an initial Controller, and then the initial Controller
could configure the MA with details about the Controller that sends
Instruction Messages. (Note that a MA only has one Control Channel,
and so is associated with only one Controller, at any moment.)
Note that an implementation may choose to combine Configuration
information and an Instruction Message into a single message.
+-----------------+ +-------------+
| | | Measurement |
| Controller |======================================| Agent |
+-----------------+ +-------------+
Configuration information: ->
(MA-ID),
(Group-ID),
(Control Channel)
<- Response(details)
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5.2.2. Instruction
The Instruction is the description of the Measurement Tasks for a
Measurement Agent to do and the details of the Measurement Reports
for it to send. In order to update the Instruction the Controller
uses the Control Protocol to send an Instruction Message over the
Control Channel.
+-----------------+ +-------------+
| | | Measurement |
| Controller |======================================| Agent |
+-----------------+ +-------------+
Instruction: ->
[(Measurement Task configuration(
[Input Parameter],
(interface),
(Cycle-ID))),
(Report Channel),
(Measurement Schedule),
(Report Schedule),
(Suppression information)]
<- Response(details)
The Instruction defines information with the following aims
([I-D.ietf-lmap-information-model] defines the consequent list of
information elements):
o the Measurement Task configurations, each of which needs:
* the Metric, specified as a URI to a registry entry; it includes
the specification of a Measurement Method. The registry could
be defined by the IETF [I-D.manyfolks-ippm-metric-registry],
locally by the operator of the measurement system or perhaps by
another standards organisation.
* the Measurement Method role. For some Measurement Methods,
different parties play different roles; for example (figure A3
in the Appendix) an iperf sender and receiver. Each Metric and
its associated Measurement Method will describe all measurement
roles involved in the process. Thus, the Measurement Method
role is an Input Parameter.
* a boolean flag (supppress or do-not-suppress) indicating how
such a Measurement Task is impacted by a Suppression message
(see Section 5.2.2.1). Thus, the flag is an Input Parameter.
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* any Input Parameters that need to be set for the Metric and the
Measurement Method, such as the address of a Measurement Peer
(or other Measurement Agent) that may be involved in a
Measurement Task, and for the measurement protocol used, such
as protocol role(s).
* if the device with the MA has multiple interfaces, then the
interface to use (if not defined, then the default interface is
used)
o configuration of the Measurement Schedules, each of which needs:
* the timing of when the Measurement Tasks are to be performed.
Possible types of timing are periodic, calendar-based periodic,
one-off immediate and one-off at a future time
o configuration of the Report Channels, each of which needs:
* the address of the Collector, for instance its URL
* security for this Report Channel, for example the X.509
certificate
o configuration of the Report Schedules, each of which needs:
* the timing of when reporting is to be performed. For instance,
every hour or immediately.
o Suppression information, if any (see Section 5.2.1.1)
A single Instruction Message may contain some or all of the above
parts. The finest level of granularity possible in an Instruction
Message is determined by the implementation and operation of the
Control Protocol. For example, a single Instruction Message may add
or update an individual Measurement Schedule - or it may only update
the complete set of Measurement Schedules; a single Instruction
Message may update both Measurement Schedules and Measurement Task
configurations - or only one at a time; and so on.
The MA informs the Controller that it has successfully understood the
Instruction Message, or that it cannot action the Instruction - for
example, if it doesn't include a parameter that is mandatory for the
requested Metric and Measurement Method, or it is missing details of
the target Collector.
The Instruction Message instructs the MA; the Control Protocol does
not allow the MA to negotiate, as this would add complexity to the
MA, Controller and Control Protocol for little benefit.
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5.2.2.1. Suppression
The Instruction may include Suppression information. The purpose of
Suppression is to enable the Controller to instruct the MA not to
perform Measurement Tasks. It is used if the measurement system
wants to eliminate inessential traffic, because there is some
unexpected network issue for example.
The Suppression information may include any of the following optional
fields:
o a set of Measurement Tasks to suppress; the others are not
suppressed. For example, this could be useful if a particular
Measurement Task is overloading a Measurement Peer.
o a set of Measurement Schedules to suppress; the others are not
suppressed. For example, suppose the measurement system has
defined two Schedules, one with the most critical Measurement
Tasks and the other with less critical ones that create a lot of
Active Measurement Traffic, then it may only want to suppress the
second.
o if the Suppression information includes neither a set of
Measurement Tasks nor a set of Measurement Schedules, then the MA
does not begin new Measurement Tasks that have the boolean flag
set to "suppress"; however, the MA does begin new Measurement
Tasks that have the flag set to "do-not-suppress".
o a start time, at which suppression begins. If absent, then
Suppression begins immediately.
o an end time, at which suppression ends. If absent, then
Suppression continues until the MA receives an un-Suppress
message.
o a demand that the MA ends its on-going Active Measurement Task(s)
immediately (and deletes the associated partial Measurement
Result(s)). If absent, the MA completes on-going Measurement
Tasks.
So the default action (if none of the optional fields is set) is that
the MA does not begin any new Measurement Task with the "suppress"
flag.
An un-Suppress message instructs the MA no longer to suppress,
meaning that the MA once again begins new Measurement Tasks,
according to its Measurement Schedule.
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Note that Suppression is not intended to permanently stop a
Measurement Task (instead, the Controller should send a new
Measurement Schedule), nor to permanently disable a MA (instead, some
kind of management action is suggested).
+-----------------+ +-------------+
| | | Measurement |
| Controller |===================================| Agent |
+-----------------+ +-------------+
Suppress:
[(Measurement Task), ->
(Measurement Schedule),
start time,
end time,
on-going suppressed?]
Un-suppress ->
5.2.3. Capabilities and Failure information
The Control Protocol also enables the MA to inform the Controller
about various information, such as its Capabilities and any Failures.
It is also possible to use a device-specific mechanism which is
beyond the scope of the initial LMAP work.
Capabilities are information about the MA that the Controller needs
to know in order to correctly instruct the MA, such as:
o the Measurement Method (roles) that the MA supports
o the measurement protocol types and roles that the MA supports
o the interfaces that the MA has
o the version of the MA
o the version of the hardware, firmware or software of the device
with the MA
o but not dynamic information like the currently unused CPU, memory
or battery life of the device with the MA.
Failure information concerns why the MA has been unable to execute a
Measurement Task or deliver a Report, for example:
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o the Measurement Task failed to run properly because the MA
(unexpectedly) has no spare CPU cycles
o the MA failed record the Measurement Results because it
(unexpectedly) is out of spare memory
o a Report failed to deliver Measurement Results because the
Collector (unexpectedly) is not responding
o but not if a Measurement Task correctly doesn't start. For
example, the first step of some Measurement Methods is for the MA
to check there is no cross-traffic.
Logging information concerns how the MA is operating and may help
debugging, for example:
o the last time the MA ran a Measurement Task
o the last time the MA sent a Measurement Report
o the last time the MA received an Instruction Message
o whether the MA is currently Suppressing Measurement Tasks
Capabilities, failure and logging information are sent by the MA,
either in response to a request from the Controller (for example, if
the Controller forgets what the MA can do or otherwise wants to
resynchronize what it knows about the MA), or on its own initiative
(for example when the MA first communicates with a Controller or if
it becomes capable of a new Measurement Method). Another example of
the latter case is if the device with the MA re-boots, then the MA
should notify its Controller in case its Instruction needs to be
updated; to avoid a "mass calling event" after a widespread power
restoration affecting many MAs, it is sensible for an MA to pause for
a random delay, perhaps in the range of one minute or so.
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+-----------------+ +-------------+
| | | Measurement |
| Controller |===================================| Agent |
+-----------------+ +-------------+
(Instruction:
[(Request Capabilities),
(Request Failure Information),
(Request Logging Information)]) ->
<- (Capabilities),
(Failure Information),
(Logging Information)
5.3. Operation of Measurement Tasks
This LMAP framework is neutral to what the actual Measurement Task
is. It does not define Metrics and Measurement Methods, these are
defined elsewhere (e.g. IPPM).
The MA carries out the Measurement Tasks as instructed, unless it
gets an updated Instruction. The MA acts autonomously, in terms of
operation of the Measurement Tasks and reporting of the Results; it
doesn't do a 'safety check' with the Controller to ask whether it
should still continue with the requested Measurement Tasks.
5.3.1. Starting and Stopping Measurement Tasks
This LMAP framework does not define a generic start and stop process,
since the correct approach depends on the particular Measurement
Task; the details are defined as part of each Measurement Method.
This section provides some general hints. The MA does not inform the
Controller about Measurement Tasks starting and stopping.
Before sending Measurement Traffic the MA may run a pre-check. (The
pre-check could be defined as a separate, preceding Task or as the
first part of a larger Task.) Action could include:
o the MA checking that there is no cross-traffic. In other words, a
check that the end-user isn't already sending traffic;
o the MA checking with the Measurement Peer (or other Measurement
Agent involved in the Measurement Task) that it can handle a new
Measurement Task (in case, for example, the Measurement Peer is
already handling many Measurement Tasks with other MAs);
o sending traffic that probes the path to check it isn't overloaded;
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o checking that the device with the MA has enough resources to
execute the Measurement Task reliably. Note that the designer of
the measurement system should ensure that the device's
capabilities are normally sufficient to comfortably operate the
Measurement Tasks.
It is possible that similar checks continue during the Measurement
Task, especially one that is long-running and/or creates a lot of
Measurement Traffic, and might lead to it being abandoned whilst in-
progress. A Measurement Task could also be abandoned in response to
a "suppress" message (see Section 5.2.1). Action could include:
o For 'upload' tests, the MA not sending traffic
o For 'download' tests, the MA closing the TCP connection or sending
a TWAMP Stop control message [RFC5357].
The Controller may want a MA to run the same Measurement Task
indefinitely (for example, "run the 'upload speed' Measurement Task
once an hour until further notice"). To avoid the MA generating
traffic forever after a Controller has permanently failed (or
communications with the Controller have failed), the MA can be
configured with a time limit; if the MA doesn't hear from the
Controller for this length of time, then it stops operating
Measurement Tasks.
5.3.2. Overlapping Measurement Tasks
It is possible that a MA starts a new Measurement Task before another
Measurement Task has completed. This may be intentional (the way
that the measurement system has designed the Measurement Schedules),
but it could also be unintentional - for instance, if a Measurement
Task has a 'wait for X' step which pauses for an unexpectedly long
time. The operator of the measurement system can handle (or not)
overlapping Measurement Tasks in any way they choose - it is a policy
or implementation issue and not the concern of LMAP. Some possible
approaches are: to configure the MA not to begin the second
Measurement Task; to start the second Measurement Task as usual; for
the action to be an Input Parameter of the Measurement Task; and so
on.
It may be important to include in the Measurement Report the fact
that the Measurement Task overlapped with another.
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5.4. Report Protocol
The primary purpose of the Report Protocol is to allow a Measurement
Agent to report its Measurement Results to a Collector, along with
the context in which they were obtained.
+-----------------+ +-------------+
| | | Measurement |
| Collector |===================================| Agent |
+-----------------+ +-------------+
<- Report:
[MA-ID &/or Group-ID],
[Measurement Result],
[details of Measurement Task]
ACK ->
The Report contains:
o the MA-ID or a Group-ID (to anonymise results)
o the actual Measurement Results, including the time they were
measured
o the details of the Measurement Task (to avoid the Collector having
to ask the Controller for this information later)
o perhaps the Subscriber's service parameters (see Section 5.4.1).
The MA sends Reports as defined by the Instruction. It is possible
that the Instruction tells the MA to report the same Results to more
than one Collector, or to report a different subset of Results to
different Collectors. It is also possible that a Measurement Task
may create two (or more) Measurement Results, which could be reported
differently (for example, one Result could be reported periodically,
whilst the second Result could be an alarm that is created as soon as
the measured value of the Metric crosses a threshold and that is
reported immediately).
Optionally, a Report is not sent when there are no Measurement
Results.
In the initial LMAP Information Model and Report Protocol, for
simplicity we assume that all Measurement Results are reported as-is,
but allow extensibility so that a measurement system (or perhaps a
second phase of LMAP) could allow a MA to:
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o label, or perhaps not include, Measurement Results impacted by,
for instance, cross-traffic or the Measurement Peer (or other
Measurement Agent) being busy
o label Measurement Results obtained by a Measurement Task that
overlapped with another
o not report the Measurement Results if the MA believes that they
are invalid
o detail when Suppression started and ended
5.4.1. Reporting of Subscriber's service parameters
The Subscriber's service parameters are information about his/her
broadband contract, line rate and so on. Such information is likely
to be needed to help analyse the Measurement Results, for example to
help decide whether the measured download speed is reasonable.
The information could be transferred directly from the Subscriber
parameter database to the data analysis tools. It may also be
possible to transfer the information via the MA. How (and if) the MA
knows such information is likely to depend on the device type. The
MA could either include the information in a Measurement Report or
separately.
5.5. Operation of LMAP over the underlying packet transfer mechanism
The above sections have described LMAP's protocol model. Other
specifications will define the actual Control and Report Protocols,
possibly operating over an existing protocol, to be selected, for
example REST-style HTTP(S). It is also possible that a different
choice is made for the Control and Report Protocols, for example
NETCONF-YANG and IPFIX respectively.
From an LMAP perspective, the Controller needs to know that the MA
has received the Instruction Message, or at least that it needs to be
re-sent as it may have failed to be delivered. Similarly the MA
needs to know about the delivery of Capabilities and Failure
information to the Controller and Reports to the Collector. How this
is done depends on the design of the Control and Report Protocols and
the underlying packet transfer mechanism.
For the Control Protocol, the underlying packet transfer mechanism
could be:
o a 'push' protocol (that is, from the Controller to the MA)
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o a multicast protocol (from the Controller to a group of MAs)
o a 'pull' protocol. The MA periodically checks with Controller if
the Instruction has changed and pulls a new Instruction if
necessary. A pull protocol seems attractive for a MA behind a NAT
(as is typical for a MA on an end-user's device), so that it can
initiate the communications. A pull mechanism is likely to
require the MA to be configured with how frequently it should
check in with the Controller, and perhaps what it should do if the
Controller is unreachable after a certain number of attempts.
o a hybrid protocol. In addition to a pull protocol, the Controller
can also push an alert to the MA that it should immediately pull a
new Instruction.
For the Report Protocol, the underlying packet transfer mechanism
could be:
o a 'push' protocol (that is, from the MA to the Collector)
o perhaps supplemented by the ability for the Collector to 'pull'
Measurement Results from a MA.
5.6. Items beyond the scope of the initial LMAP work
There are several potential interactions between LMAP elements that
are beyond the scope of the initial LMAP work:
1. It does not define a coordination process between MAs. Whilst a
measurement system may define coordinated Measurement Schedules
across its various MAs, there is no direct coordination between
MAs.
2. It does not define interactions between the Collector and
Controller. It is quite likely that there will be such
interactions, optionally intermediated by the data analysis
tools. For example, if there is an "interesting" Measurement
Result then the measurement system may want to trigger extra
Measurement Tasks that explore the potential cause in more
detail; or if the Collector unexpectedly does not hear from a MA,
then the measurement system may want to trigger the Controller to
send a fresh Instruction Message to the MA.
3. It does not define coordination between different measurement
systems. For example, it does not define the interaction of a MA
in one measurement system with a Controller or Collector in a
different measurement system. Whilst it is likely that the
Control and Report Protocols could be re-used or adapted for this
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scenario, any form of coordination between different
organisations involves difficult commercial and technical issues
and so, given the novelty of large-scale measurement efforts, any
form of inter-organisation coordination is outside the scope of
the initial LMAP work. Note that a single MA is instructed by a
single Controller and is only in one measurement system.
* An interesting scenario is where a home contains two
independent MAs, for example one controlled by a regulator and
one controlled by an ISP. Then the Measurement Traffic of one
MA is treated by the other MA just like any other end-user
traffic.
4. It does not consider how to prevent a malicious party "gaming the
system". For example, where a regulator is running a measurement
system in order to benchmark operators, a malicious operator
could try to identify the broadband lines that the regulator was
measuring and prioritise that traffic. It is assumed this is a
policy issue and would be dealt with through a code of conduct
for instance.
5. It does not define how to analyse Measurement Results, including
how to interpret missing Results.
6. It does not specifically define a end-user-controlled measurement
system, see sub-section 5.6.1.
5.6.1. End-user-controlled measurement system
This framework concentrates on the cases where an ISP or a regulator
runs the measurement system. However, we expect that LMAP
functionality will also be used in the context of an end-user-
controlled measurement system. There are at least two ways this
could happen (they have various pros and cons):
1. an end-user could somehow request the ISP- (or regulator-) run
measurement system to test his/her line. The ISP (or regulator)
Controller would then send an Instruction to the MA in the usual
LMAP way. Note that a user can't directly initiate a Measurement
Task on an ISP- (or regulator-) controlled MA.
2. an end-user could deploy their own measurement system, with their
own MA, Controller and Collector. For example, the user could
implement all three functions onto the same end-user-owned end
device, perhaps by downloading the functions from the ISP or
regulator. Then the LMAP Control and Report Protocols do not
need to be used, but using LMAP's Information Model would still
be beneficial. The Measurement Peer (or other MA involved in the
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Measurement Task) could be in the home gateway or outside the
home network; in the latter case the Measurement Peer is highly
likely to be run by a different organisation, which raises extra
privacy considerations.
In both cases there will be some way for the end-user to initiate the
Measurement Task(s). The mechanism is outside the scope of the
initial LMAP work, but could include the user clicking a button on a
GUI or sending a text message. Presumably the user will also be able
to see the Measurement Results, perhaps summarised on a webpage. It
is suggested that these interfaces conform to the LMAP guidance on
privacy in Section 8.
6. Deployment considerations
The Appendix has some examples of possible deployment arrangements of
Measurement Agents and Peers.
6.1. Controller and the measurement system
The Controller should understand both the MA's LMAP Capabilities (for
instance what Metrics and Measurement Methods it can perform) and
about the MA's other capabilities like processing power and memory.
This allows the Controller to make sure that the Measurement Schedule
of Measurement Tasks and the Reporting Schedule are sensible for each
MA that it Instructs.
An Instruction is likely to include several Measurement Tasks.
Typically these run at different times, but it is also possible for
them to run at the same time. Some Tasks may be compatible, in that
they do not affect each other's Results, whilst with others great
care would need to be taken.
The Controller should ensure that the Measurement Tasks do not have
an adverse effect on the end user. Tasks, especially those that
generate a substantial amount of traffic, will often include a pre-
check that the user isn't already sending traffic (Section 5.3).
Another consideration is whether Measurement Traffic will impact a
Subscriber's bill or traffic cap.
The different elements of the Instruction can be updated
independently. For example, the Measurement Tasks could be
configured with different Input Parameters whilst keeping the same
Measurement Schedule. In general this should not create any issues,
since Metrics and their associated Measurement Methods should be
defined so their fundamental nature does not change for a new value
of Input Parameter. There could be a problem if, for example, a
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Measurement Task involving a 1kB file upload could be changed into a
1GB file upload.
A measurement system may have multiple Controllers (but note the
overriding principle that a single MA is instructed by a single
Controller at any point in time (Section 4.2)). For example, there
could be different Controllers for different types of MA (home
gateways, tablets) or locations (Ipswich, Edinburgh), for load
balancing or to cope with failure of one Controller.
The measurement system also needs to consider carefully how to
interpret missing Results; for example, if the missing Results are
ignored and the lack of a Report is caused by its broadband being
broken, then the estimate of overall performance, averaged across all
MAs, would be too optimistic.
6.2. Measurement Agent
The Measurement Agent could take a number of forms: a dedicated
probe, software on a PC, embedded into an appliance, or even embedded
into a gateway. A single site (home, branch office etc.) that is
participating in a measurement could make use of one or multiple
Measurement Agents or Measurement Peers in a single measurement.
The Measurement Agent could be deployed in a variety of locations.
Not all deployment locations are available to every kind of
Measurement Agent. There are also a variety of limitations and
trade-offs depending on the final placement. The next sections
outline some of the locations a Measurement Agent may be deployed.
This is not an exhaustive list and combinations may also apply.
6.2.1. Measurement Agent on a networked device
A MA may be embedded on a device that is directly connected to the
network, such as a MA on a smartphone. Other examples include a MA
downloaded and installed on a subscriber's laptop computer or tablet
when the network service is provided on wired or other wireless radio
technologies, such as Wi-Fi.
6.2.2. Measurement Agent embedded in site gateway
A Measurement Agent embedded with the site gateway, for example a
home router or the edge router of a branch office in a managed
service environment, is one of better places the Measurement Agent
could be deployed. All site-to-ISP traffic would traverse through
the gateway. So, Measurement Methods that measure user traffic could
easily be performed. Similarly, due to this user traffic visibility,
a Measurement Method that generates Measurement Traffic could ensure
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it does not compete with user traffic. Generally NAT and firewall
services are built into the gateway, allowing the Measurement Agent
the option to offer its Controller-facing management interface
outside of the NAT/firewall. This placement of the management
interface allows the Controller to unilaterally contact the
Measurement Agent for instructions. However, a Measurement Agent on
a site gateway (whether end-user service-provider owned) will
generally not be directly available for over the top providers, the
regulator, end users or enterprises.
6.2.3. Measurement Agent embedded behind site NAT /Firewall
The Measurement Agent could also be embedded behind a NAT, a
firewall, or both. In this case the Controller may not be able to
unilaterally contact the Measurement Agent unless either static port
forwarding or firewall pin holing is configured. Configuring port
forwarding could use protocols such as PCP [RFC6887], TR-069
[TR-069]or UPnP [UPnP]. To prop open the firewall, the Measurement
Agent could send keepalives towards the Controller (and perhaps use
these also as a network reachability test).
6.2.4. Multi-homed Measurement Agent
If the device with the Measurement Agent is single homed then there
is no confusion about what interface to measure. Similarly, if the
MA is at the gateway and the gateway only has a single WAN-side and a
single LAN-side interface, there is little confusion - for
Measurement Methods that generate Measurement Traffic, the location
of the other MA or Measurement Peer determines whether the WAN or LAN
is measured.
However, the device with the Measurement Agent may be multi-homed.
For example, a home or campus may be connected to multiple broadband
ISPs, such as a wired and wireless broadband provider, perhaps for
redundancy or load- sharing. It may also be helpful to think of dual
stack IPv4 and IPv6 broadband devices as multi-homed. More
generally, Section 3.2 of [I-D.ietf-homenet-arch] describes dual-
stack and multi-homing topologies that might be encountered in a home
network, [RFC6419] provides the current practices of multi-interfaces
hosts, and the Multiple Interfaces (mif) working group covers cases
where hosts are either directly attached to multiple networks
(physical or virtual) or indirectly (multiple default routers, etc.).
In these cases, there needs to be clarity on which network
connectivity option is being measured.
One possibility is to have a Measurement Agent per interface. Then
the Controller's choice of MA determines which interface is measured.
However, if a MA can measure any of the interfaces, then the
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Controller defines in the Instruction which interface the MA should
use for a Measurement Task; if the choice of interface is not defined
then the MA uses the default one. Explicit definition is preferred
if the measurement system wants to measure the performance of a
particular network, whereas using the default is better if the
measurement system wants to include the impact of the MA's interface
selection algorithm. In any case, the Measurement Result should
include the network that was measured.
6.2.5. Measurement Agent embedded in ISP Network
A MA may be embedded on a device that is part of an ISP's network,
such as a router or switch. Usually the network devices with an
embedded MA will be strategically located, such as a Carrier Grade
NAT or ISP Gateway. [I-D.ietf-ippm-lmap-path] gives many examples
where a MA might be located within a network to provide an
intermediate measurement point on the end-to-end path. Other
examples include a network device whose primary role is to host MA
functions and the necessary measurement protocol.
6.3. Measurement Peer
A Measurement Peer participates in some Measurement Methods. It may
have specific functionality to enable it to participate in a
particular Measurement Method. On the other hand, other Measurement
Methods may require no special functionality, for example if the
Measurement Agent sends a ping to example.com then the server at
example.com plays the role of a Measurement Peer.
A device may participate in some Measurement Methods as a Measurement
Agent and in others as a Measurement Peer.
Measurement Schedules should account for limited resources in a
Measurement Peer when instructing a MA to execute measurements with a
Measurement Peer. In some measurement protocols, such as [RFC4656]
and [RFC5357], the Measurement Peer can reject a measurement session
or refuse a control connection prior to setting-up a measurement
session and so protect itself from resource exhaustion. This is a
valuable capability because the MP may be used by more than one
organisation.
7. Security considerations
The security of the LMAP framework should protect the interests of
the measurement operator(s), the network user(s) and other actors who
could be impacted by a compromised measurement deployment. The
measurement system must secure the various components of the system
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from unauthorised access or corruption. Much of the general advice
contained in section 6 of [RFC4656] is applicable here.
We assume that each Measurement Agent (MA) will receive its
Instructions from a single organisation, which operates the
Controller. These Instructions must be authenticated (to ensure that
they come from the trusted Controller), checked for integrity (to
ensure no-one has tampered with them) and not vulnerable to replay
attacks. If a malicious party can gain control of the MA they can
use it to launch DoS attacks at targets, reduce the end user's
quality of experience and corrupt the Measurement Results that are
reported to the Collector. By altering the Measurement Tasks and/or
the address that Results are reported to, they can also compromise
the confidentiality of the network user and the MA environment (such
as information about the location of devices or their traffic). The
Instruction messages also need to be encrypted to maintain
confidentiality, as the information might be useful to an attacker.
The process to upgrade the firmware in an MA is outside the scope of
the initial LMAP work, similar to the protocol to bootstrap the MAs
(as specified in the charter). However, systems which provide remote
upgrade must secure authorised access and integrity of the process.
Reporting by the MA must also be secured to maintain confidentiality.
The results must be encrypted such that only the authorised Collector
can decrypt the results to prevent the leakage of confidential or
private information. In addition it must be authenticated that the
results have come from the expected MA and that they have not been
tampered with. It must not be possible to fool a MA into injecting
falsified data into the measurement platform or to corrupt the
results of a real MA. The results must also be held and processed
securely after collection and analysis.
Reporting by the MA must be encrypted to maintain confidentiality, to
prevent the leakage of confidential or private information.
Reporting must also be authenticated (to ensure that it comes from a
trusted MA) and not vulnerable to tampering (which can be ensured
through integrity and replay checks). It must not be possible to
fool a MA into injecting falsified data and the results must also be
held and processed securely after collection and analysis See section
8.5.2 below for additional considerations on stored data compromise,
and section 8.6 on potential mitigations for compromise.
Since Collectors will be contacted repeatedly by MAs using the
Collection Protocol to convey their recent results, a successful
attack to exhaust the communication resources would prevent a
critical operation: reporting. Therefore, all LMAP Collectors should
implement technical mechanisms to:
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o limit the number of reporting connections from a single MA
(simultaneous, and connections per unit time).
o limit the transmission rate from a single MA.
o limit the memory/storage consumed by a single MA's reports.
o efficiently reject reporting connections from unknown sources.
o separate resources if multiple authentication strengths are used,
where the resources should be separated according to each class of
strength.
o limit iteration counters to generate keys with both a lower and
upper limit, to prevent an attacking system from requesting the
maximum and causing the Controller to stall on the process (see
section 6 of [RFC5357]).
Many of the above considerations are applicable to a "pull" model,
where the MA must contact the Controller because NAT or other network
aspect prevents Controllers from contacting MAs directly.
Availability should also be considered. While the loss of some MAs
may not be considered critical, the unavailability of the Collector
could mean that valuable business data or data critical to a
regulatory process is lost. Similarly, the unavailability of a
Controller could mean that the MAs do not operate a correct
Measurement Schedule.
The security mechanisms described above may not be strictly necessary
if the network's design ensures the LMAP components and their
communications are already secured, for example potentially if they
are all part of an ISP's dedicated management network.
A malicious party could "game the system". For example, where a
regulator is running a measurement system in order to benchmark
operators, an operator could try to identify the broadband lines that
the regulator was measuring and prioritise that traffic. Normally,
this potential issue is handled by a code of conduct. It is outside
the scope of the initial LMAP work to consider the issue.
8. Privacy Considerations for LMAP
The LMAP work considers privacy as a core requirement and will ensure
that by default the Control and Report Protocols operate in a
privacy-sensitive manner and that privacy features are well-defined.
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This section provides a set of privacy considerations for LMAP. This
section benefits greatly from the timely publication of [RFC6973].
Privacy and security (Section 7) are related. In some jurisdictions
privacy is called data protection.
We begin with a set of assumptions related to protecting the
sensitive information of individuals and organisations participating
in LMAP-orchestrated measurement and data collection.
8.1. Categories of Entities with Information of Interest
LMAP protocols need to protect the sensitive information of the
following entities, including individuals and organisations who
participate in measurement and collection of results.
o Individual Internet users: Persons who utilise Internet access
services for communications tasks, according to the terms of
service of a service agreement. Such persons may be a service
Subscriber, or have been given permission by the Subscriber to use
the service.
o Internet service providers: Organisations who offer Internet
access service subscriptions, and thus have access to sensitive
information of individuals who choose to use the service. These
organisations desire to protect their Subscribers and their own
sensitive information which may be stored in the process of
performing Measurement Tasks and collecting and Results.
o Regulators: Public authorities responsible for exercising
supervision of the electronic communications sector, and which may
have access to sensitive information of individuals who
participate in a measurement campaign. Similarly, regulators
desire to protect the participants and their own sensitive
information.
o Other LMAP system operators: Organisations who operate measurement
systems or participate in measurements in some way.
Although privacy is a protection extended to individuals, we include
discussion of ISPs and other LMAP system operators in this section.
These organisations have sensitive information involved in the LMAP
system, and many of the same dangers and mitigations are applicable.
Further, the ISPs store information on their Subscribers beyond that
used in the LMAP system (for instance billing information), and there
should be a benefit in considering all the needs and potential
solutions coherently.
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8.2. Examples of Sensitive Information
This section gives examples of sensitive information which may be
measured or stored in a measurement system, and which is to be kept
private by default in the LMAP core protocols.
Examples of Subscriber or authorised Internet user sensitive
information:
o Sub-IP layer addresses and names (MAC address, base station ID,
SSID)
o IP address in use
o Personal Identification (real name)
o Location (street address, city)
o Subscribed service parameters
o Contents of traffic (activity, DNS queries, destinations,
equipment types, account info for other services, etc.)
o Status as a study volunteer and Schedule of Measurement Tasks
Examples of Internet Service Provider sensitive information:
o Measurement device identification (equipment ID and IP address)
o Measurement Instructions (choice of measurements)
o Measurement Results (some may be shared, others may be private)
o Measurement Schedule (exact times)
o Network topology (locations, connectivity, redundancy)
o Subscriber billing information, and any of the above Subscriber
information known to the provider.
o Authentication credentials (such as certificates)
Other organisations will have some combination of the lists above.
The LMAP system would not typically expose all of the information
above, but could expose a combination of items which could be
correlated with other pieces collected by an attacker (as discussed
in the section on Threats below).
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8.3. Different privacy issues raised by different sorts of Measurement
Methods
Measurement Methods raise different privacy issues depending on
whether they measure traffic created specifically for that purpose,
or whether they measure user traffic.
Measurement Tasks conducted on user traffic store sensitive
information, however briefly this storage may be. We note that some
authorities make a distinction on time of storage, and information
that is kept only temporarily to perform a communications function is
not subject to regulation (for example, active queue management, deep
packet inspection). Such Measurement Tasks could reveal all the
websites a Subscriber visits and the applications and/or services
they use.
Other types of Measurement Task are conducted on traffic which is
created specifically for the purpose. Even if a user host generates
Measurement Traffic, there is limited sensitive information about the
Subscriber present and stored in the measurement system:
o IP address in use (and possibly sub-IP addresses and names)
o Status as a study volunteer and Schedule of Measurement Tasks
On the other hand, for a service provider the sensitive information
like Measurement Results is the same for all Measurement Tasks.
From the Subscriber perspective, both types of Measurement Task
potentially expose the description of Internet access service and
specific service parameters, such as subscribed rate and type of
access.
8.4. Privacy analysis of the Communications Models
This section examines each of the protocol exchanges described at a
high level in Section 5 and some example Measurement Tasks, and
identifies specific sensitive information which must be secured
during communication for each case. With the protocol-related
sensitive information identified, we can better consider the threats
described in the following section.
From the privacy perspective, all entities participating in LMAP
protocols can be considered "observers" according to the definition
in [RFC6973]. Their stored information potentially poses a threat to
privacy, especially if one or more of these functional entities has
been compromised. Likewise, all devices on the paths used for
control, reporting, and measurement are also observers.
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8.4.1. MA Bootstrapping
Section 5.1 provides the communication model for the Bootstrapping
process.
Although the specification of mechanisms for Bootstrapping the MA are
beyond the initial LMAP work scope, designers should recognize that
the Bootstrapping process is extremely powerful and could cause an MA
to join a new or different LMAP system with a different Controller
and Collector, or simply install new Metrics with associated
Measurement Methods (for example to record DNS queries). A Bootstrap
attack could result in a breach of the LMAP system with significant
sensitive information exposure depending on the capabilities of the
MA, so sufficient security protections are warranted.
The Bootstrapping process provides sensitive information about the
LMAP system and the organisation that operates it, such as
o Initial Controller IP address or FQDN
o Assigned Controller IP address or FQDN
o Security certificates and credentials
During the Bootstrap process for an MA located at a single
subscriber's service demarcation point, the MA receives a MA-ID which
is a persistent pseudonym for the Subscriber. Thus, the MA-ID is
considered sensitive information because it could provide the link
between Subscriber identification and Measurements Results.
Also, the Bootstrap process could assign a Group-ID to the MA. The
specific definition of information represented in a Group-ID is to be
determined, but several examples are envisaged including use as a
pseudonym for a set of Subscribers, a class of service, an access
technology, or other important categories. Assignment of a Group-ID
enables anonymisation sets to be formed on the basis of service
type/grade/rates. Thus, the mapping between Group-ID and MA-ID is
considered sensitive information.
8.4.2. Controller <-> Measurement Agent
The high-level communication model for interactions between the LMAP
Controller and Measurement Agent is illustrated in Section 5.2. The
primary purpose of this exchange is to authenticate and task a
Measurement Agent with Measurement Instructions, which the
Measurement Agent then acts on autonomously.
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Primarily IP addresses and pseudonyms (MA-ID, Group-ID) are exchanged
with a capability request, then measurement-related information of
interest such as the parameters, schedule, metrics, and IP addresses
of measurement devices. Thus, the measurement Instruction contains
sensitive information which must be secured. For example, the fact
that an ISP is running additional measurements beyond the set
reported externally is sensitive information, as are the additional
Measurements Tasks themselves. The Measurement Schedule is also
sensitive, because an attacker intending to bias the results without
being detected can use this information to great advantage.
An organisation operating the Controller having no service
relationship with a user who hosts the Measurement Agent *could* gain
real-name mapping to a public IP address through user participation
in an LMAP system (this applies to the Measurement Collection
protocol, as well).
8.4.3. Collector <-> Measurement Agent
The high-level communication model for interactions between the
Measurement Agent and Collector is illustrated in Section 5.4. The
primary purpose of this exchange is to authenticate and collect
Measurement Results from a MA, which the MA has measured autonomously
and stored.
The Measurement Results are the additional sensitive information
included in the Collector-MA exchange. Organisations collecting LMAP
measurements have the responsibility for data control. Thus, the
Results and other information communicated in the Collector protocol
must be secured.
8.4.4. Measurement Peer <-> Measurement Agent
A Measurement Method involving a Measurement Peer (or second
Measurement Agent) raises potential privacy issues, although the
specification of the mechanisms is beyond the scope of the initial
LMAP work. The high-level communications model below illustrates the
various exchanges to execute such a Measurement Method and store the
Results.
We note the potential for additional observers in the figures below
by indicating the possible presence of a NAT, which has additional
significance to the protocols and direction of initiation.
The various messages are optional, depending on the nature of the
Measurement Method. It may involve sending Measurement Traffic from
the Measurement Peer to MA, MA to Measurement Peer, or both.
Similarly, a second (or more) MAs may be involved.
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_________________ _________________
| | | |
|Measurement Peer |=========== NAT ? ==========|Measurement Agent|
|_________________| |_________________|
<- (Key Negotiation &
Encryption Setup)
(Encrypted Channel ->
Established)
(Announce capabilities ->
& status)
<- (Select capabilities)
ACK ->
<- (Measurement Request
(MA+MP IPAddrs,set of
Metrics, Schedule))
ACK ->
Measurement Traffic <> Measurement Traffic
(may/may not be encrypted) (may/may not be encrypted)
<- (Stop Measurement Task)
Measurement Results ->
(if applicable)
<- ACK, Close
This exchange primarily exposes the IP addresses of measurement
devices and the inference of measurement participation from such
traffic. There may be sensitive information on key points in a
service provider's network included. There may also be access to
measurement-related information of interest such as the Metrics,
Schedule, and intermediate results carried in the Measurement Traffic
(usually a set of timestamps).
If the Measurement Traffic is unencrypted, as found in many systems
today, then both timing and limited results are open to on-path
observers.
8.4.5. Measurement Agent
Some Measurement Methods only involve a single Measurement Agent.
They raise potential privacy issues, although the specification of
the mechanisms is beyond the scope of the initial LMAP work.
The high-level communications model below illustrates the collection
of user information of interest with the Measurement Agent performing
the monitoring and storage of the Results. This particular exchange
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is for measurement of DNS Response Time, which most frequently uses
UDP transport.
_________________ ____________
| | | |
| DNS Server |=========== NAT ? ==========*=======| User client|
|_________________| ^ |____________|
______|_______
| |
| Measurement |
| Agent |
|______________|
<- Name Resolution Req
(MA+MP IPAddrs,
Desired Domain Name)
Return Record ->
This exchange primarily exposes the IP addresses of measurement
devices and the intent to communicate with or access the services of
"Domain Name". There may be information on key points in a service
provider's network, such as the address of one of its DNS servers.
The Measurement Agent may be embedded in the user host, or it may be
located in another device capable of observing user traffic.
In principle, any of the user sensitive information of interest
(listed above) can be collected and stored in the monitoring scenario
and so must be secured.
It would also be possible for a Measurement Agent to source the DNS
query itself. But then there are few privacy concerns.
8.4.6. Storage and Reporting of Measurement Results
Although the mechanisms for communicating results (beyond the initial
Collector) are beyond the initial LMAP work scope, there are
potential privacy issues related to a single organisation's storage
and reporting of Measurement Results. Both storage and reporting
functions can help to preserve privacy by implementing the
mitigations described below.
8.5. Threats
This section indicates how each of the threats described in [RFC6973]
apply to the LMAP entities and their communication and storage of
"information of interest". Denial of Service (DOS) and other attacks
described in the Security section represent threats as well, and
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these attacks are more effective when sensitive information
protections have been compromised.
8.5.1. Surveillance
Section 5.1.1 of [RFC6973] describes Surveillance as the "observation
or monitoring of and individual's communications or activities."
Hence all Measurement Methods that measure user traffic are a form of
surveillance, with inherent risks.
Measurement Methods which avoid periods of user transmission
indirectly produce a record of times when a subscriber or authorised
user has used their network access service.
Measurement Methods may also utilise and store a Subscriber's
currently assigned IP address when conducting measurements that are
relevant to a specific Subscriber. Since the Measurement Results are
time-stamped, they could provide a record of IP address assignments
over time.
Either of the above pieces of information could be useful in
correlation and identification, described below.
8.5.2. Stored Data Compromise
Section 5.1.2 of [RFC6973] describes Stored Data Compromise as
resulting from inadequate measures to secure stored data from
unauthorised or inappropriate access. For LMAP systems this includes
deleting or modifying collected measurement records, as well as data
theft.
The primary LMAP entity subject to compromise is the repository,
which stores the Measurement Results; extensive security and privacy
threat mitigations are warranted. The Collector and MA also store
sensitive information temporarily, and need protection. The
communications between the local storage of the Collector and the
repository is beyond the scope of the initial LMAP work, though this
communications channel will certainly need protection as well as the
mass storage itself.
The LMAP Controller may have direct access to storage of Subscriber
information (location, billing, service parameters, etc.) and other
information which the controlling organisation considers private, and
again needs protection.
Note that there is tension between the desire to store all raw
results in the LMAP Collector (for reproducibility and custom
analysis), and the need to protect the privacy of measurement
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participants. Many of the compromise mitigations described in
section 8.6 below are most efficient when deployed at the MA,
therefore minimising the risks with stored results.
8.5.3. Correlation and Identification
Sections 5.2.1 and 5.2.2 of [RFC6973] describe Correlation as
combining various pieces of information to obtain desired
characteristics of an individual, and Identification as using this
combination to infer identity.
The main risk is that the LMAP system could unwittingly provide a key
piece of the correlation chain, starting with an unknown Subscriber's
IP address and another piece of information. For example, a
Subscriber utilised Internet access from 2000 to 2310 UTC, because
the Measurement Tasks were deferred, or sent a name resolution for
www.example.com at 2300 UTC.
8.5.4. Secondary Use and Disclosure
Sections 5.2.3 and 5.2.4 of [RFC6973] describes Secondary Use as
unauthorised utilisation of an individual's information for a purpose
the individual did not intend, and Disclosure is when such
information is revealed causing other's notions of the individual to
change, or confidentiality to be violated.
Measurement Methods that measure user traffic are a form of Secondary
Use, and the Subscribers' permission should be obtained beforehand.
It may be necessary to obtain the measured ISP's permission to
conduct measurements, for example when required by the terms and
conditions of the service agreement, and notification is considered
good measurement practice.
For Measurement Methods that measure Measurement Traffic the
Measurement Results provide some limited information about the
Subscriber or ISP and could result in Secondary Uses. For example,
the use of the Results in unauthorised marketing campaigns would
qualify as Secondary Use. Secondary use may break national laws and
regulations, and may violate individual's expectations or desires.
8.6. Mitigations
This section examines the mitigations listed in section 6 of
[RFC6973] and their applicability to LMAP systems. Note that each
section in [RFC6973] identifies the threat categories that each
technique mitigates.
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8.6.1. Data Minimisation
Section 6.1 of [RFC6973] encourages collecting and storing the
minimal information needed to perform a task.
LMAP results can be useful for general reporting about performance
and for specific troubleshooting. They need different levels of
information detail, as explained in the paragraphs below.
For general results, the results can be aggregated into large
categories (the month of March, all subscribers West of the
Mississippi River). In this case, all individual identifications
(including IP address of the MA) can be excluded, and only relevant
results are provided. However, this implies a filtering process to
reduce the information fields, because greater detail was needed to
conduct the Measurement Tasks in the first place.
For troubleshooting, so that a network operator or end user can
identify a performance issue or failure, potentially all the network
information (IP addresses, equipment IDs, location), Measurement
Schedule, service configuration, Measurement Results, and other
information may assist in the process. This includes the information
needed to conduct the Measurements Tasks, and represents a need where
the maximum relevant information is desirable, therefore the greatest
protections should be applied. This level of detail is greater than
needed for general performance monitoring.
As regards Measurement Methods that measure user traffic, we note
that a user may give temporary permission (to enable detailed
troubleshooting), but withhold permission for them in general. Here
the greatest breadth of sensitive information is potentially exposed,
and the maximum privacy protection must be provided. The Collector
may perform pre-storage minimisation and other mitigations (below) to
help preserve privacy.
For MAs with access to the sensitive information of users (e.g.,
within a home or a personal host/handset), it is desirable for the
results collection to minimise the data reported, but also to balance
this desire with the needs of troubleshooting when a service
subscription exists between the user and organisation operating the
measurements.
8.6.2. Anonymity
Section 6.1.1 of [RFC6973] describes a way in which anonymity is
achieved: "there must exist a set of individuals that appear to have
the same attributes as the individual", defined as an "anonymity
set".
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Experimental methods for anonymisation of user identifiable data (and
so particularly applicable to Measurement Methods that measure user
traffic) have been identified in [RFC6235]. However, the findings of
several of the same authors is that "there is increasing evidence
that anonymisation applied to network trace or flow data on its own
is insufficient for many data protection applications as in [Bur10]."
Essentially, the details of such Measurement Methods can only be
accessed by closed organisations, and unknown injection attacks are
always less expensive than the protections from them. However, some
forms of summary may protect the user's sensitive information
sufficiently well, and so each Metric must be evaluated in the light
of privacy.
The techniques in [RFC6235] could be applied more successfully in
Measurement Methods that generate Measurement Traffic, where there
are protections from injection attack. The successful attack would
require breaking the integrity protection of the LMAP Reporting
Protocol and injecting Measurement Results (known fingerprint, see
section 3.2 of [RFC6973]) for inclusion with the shared and
anonymised results, then fingerprinting those records to ascertain
the anonymisation process.
Beside anonymisation of measured Results for a specific user or
provider, the value of sensitive information can be further diluted
by summarising the results over many individuals or areas served by
the provider. There is an opportunity enabled by forming anonymity
sets [RFC6973] based on the reference path measurement points in
[I-D.ietf-ippm-lmap-path]. For example, all measurements from the
Subscriber device can be identified as "mp000", instead of using the
IP address or other device information. The same anonymisation
applies to the Internet Service Provider, where their Internet
gateway would be referred to as "mp190".
8.6.3. Pseudonymity
Section 6.1.2 of [RFC6973] indicates that pseudonyms, or nicknames,
are a possible mitigation to revealing one's true identity, since
there is no requirement to use real names in almost all protocols.
A pseudonym for a measurement device's IP address could be an LMAP-
unique equipment ID. However, this would likely be a permanent
handle for the device, and long-term use weakens a pseudonym's power
to obscure identity.
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8.6.4. Other Mitigations
Data can be de-personalised by blurring it, for example by adding
synthetic data, data-swapping, or perturbing the values in ways that
can be reversed or corrected.
Sections 6.2 and 6.3 of [RFC6973] describe User Participation and
Security, respectively.
Where LMAP measurements involve devices on the Subscriber's premises
or Subscriber-owned equipment, it is essential to secure the
Subscriber's permission with regard to the specific information that
will be collected. The informed consent of the Subscriber (and, if
different, the end user) may be needed, including the specific
purpose of the measurements. The approval process could involve
showing the Subscriber their measured information and results before
instituting periodic collection, or before all instances of
collection, with the option to cancel collection temporarily or
permanently.
It should also be clear who is legally responsible for data
protection (privacy); in some jurisdictions this role is called the
'data controller'. It is always good practice to limit the time of
personal information storage.
Although the details of verification would be impenetrable to most
subscribers, the MA could be architected as an "app" with open
source-code, pre-download and embedded terms of use and agreement on
measurements, and protection from code modifications usually provided
by the app-stores. Further, the app itself could provide data
reduction and temporary storage mitigations as appropriate and
certified through code review.
LMAP protocols, devices, and the information they store clearly need
to be secure from unauthorised access. This is the hand-off between
privacy and security considerations (Section 7). The Data Controller
has the (legal) responsibility to maintain data protections described
in the Subscriber's agreement and agreements with other
organisations.
9. IANA Considerations
There are no IANA considerations in this memo.
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10. Appendix: Deployment examples
In this section we describe some deployment scenarios that are
feasible within the LMAP framework defined in this document.
The LMAP framework defines two types of components involved in the
actual measurement task, namely the Measurement Agent (MA) and the
Measurement Peer (MP). The fundamental difference conveyed in the
definition of these terms is that the MA has a interface with the
Controller/Collector while the MP does not. The MP is broadly
defined as a function that assists the MA in the Measurement Task but
has no interface with the Controller/Collector. There are many
elements in the network that can fall into this broad definition of
MP. We believe that the MP terminology is useful to allow us to
refer an element of the network that plays a role that is
conceptually important to understand and describe the measurement
task being performed. We next illustrate these concepts by
describing several deployment scenarios.
A very simple example of a Measurement Peer is a web server that the
MA is downloading a web page from (such as www.example.com) in order
to perform a speed test. The web server is a MP and from its
perspective, the MA is just another client; the MP doesn't have a
specific function for assisting measurements. This is described in
the figure A1.
^
+----------------+ Web Traffic +----------------+ IPPM
| Web Client |<------------>| MP: Web Server | Scope
| | +----------------+ |
...|................|....................................V...
| LMAP interface | ^
+----------------+ |
^ | |
Instruction | | Report |
| +-----------------+ |
| | |
| v LMAP
+------------+ +------------+ Scope
| Controller | | Collector | |
+------------+ +------------+ V
Figure A1: Schematic of LMAP-based measurement system,
with Web server as Measurement Peer
Another case that is slightly different than this would be the one of
a TWAMP-responder. This is also a MP, with a helper function, the
TWAMP server, which is specially deployed to assist the MAs that
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perform TWAMP tests. Another example is with a ping server, as
described in Section 2.
A further example is the case of a traceroute like measurement. In
this case, for each packet sent, the router where the TTL expires is
performing the MP function. So for a given Measurement Task, there
is one MA involved and several MPs, one per hop.
In figure A2 we depict the case of an OWAMP responder acting as an
MP. In this case, the helper function in addition reports results
back to the MA. So it has both a data plane and control interface
with the MA.
+----------------+ OWAMP +----------------+ ^
| OWAMP |<--control--->| MP: | |
| control-client |>test-traffic>| OWAMP server & | IPPM
| fetch-client & |<----fetch----| session-rec'ver| Scope
| session-sender | | | |
| | +----------------+ |
...|................|....................................v...
| LMAP interface | ^
+----------------+ |
^ | |
Instruction | | Report |
| +-----------------+ |
| | |
| v LMAP
+------------+ +------------+ Scope
| Controller | | Collector | |
+------------+ +------------+ v
IPPM
Figure A2: Schematic of LMAP-based measurement system,
with OWAMP server as Measurement Peer
However, it is also possible to use two Measurement Agents when
performing one way Measurement Tasks, as described in figure A3
below. In this case, MA1 generates the traffic and MA2 receives the
traffic and send the reports to the Collector. Note that both MAs
are instructed by the Controller. MA1 receives an Instruction to
send the traffic and MA2 receives an Instruction to measured the
received traffic and send Reports to the Collector.
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+----------------+ +----------------+ ^
| MA1 | | MA2 | IPPM
| iperf -u sender|-UDP traffic->| iperf -u recvr | Scope
| | | | v
...|................|..............|................|....v...
| LMAP interface | | LMAP interface | ^
+----------------+ +----------------+ |
^ ^ | |
Instruction | Instruction{Report} | | Report |
{task, | +-------------------+ | |
schedule} | | | |
| | v LMAP
+------------+ +------------+ Scope
| Controller | | Collector | |
+------------+ +------------+ v
IPPM
Figure A3: Schematic of LMAP-based measurement system,
with two Measurement Agents cooperating to measure UDP traffic
Next, we consider Measurement Methods that measure user traffic.
Traffic generated in one point in the network flowing towards a given
destination and the traffic is observed in some point along the path.
One way to implement this is that the endpoints generating and
receiving the traffic are not instructed by the Controller; hence
they are MPs. The MA is located along the path with a monitor
function that measures the traffic. The MA is instructed by the
Controller to monitor that particular traffic and to send the Report
to the Collector. It is depicted in figure A4 below.
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+-----+ +----------------+ +------+ ^
| MP | | MA: Monitor | | MP | IPPM
| |<--|----------------|---traffic--->| | Scope
+-----+ | | +------+ |
.......|................|.........................v...........
| LMAP interface | ^
+----------------+ |
^ | |
Instruction | | Report |
| +-----------------+ |
| | |
| v LMAP
+------------+ +------------+ Scope
| Controller | | Collector | |
+------------+ +------------+ v
Figure A4: Schematic of LMAP-based measurement system,
with a Measurement Agent monitoring traffic
Finally, we should consider the case of a router or a switch along
the measurement path. This certainly performs an important role in
the measurement - if packets are not forwarded, the measurement task
will not work. Whilst it doesn't has an interface with the
Controller or Collector, and so fits into the definition of MP,
usually it is not particularly useful to highlight it as a MP.
11. Acknowledgments
This document is a merger of three individual drafts: draft-eardley-
lmap-terminology-02, draft-akhter-lmap-framework-00, and draft-
eardley-lmap-framework-02.
Thanks to Juergen Schoenwaelder for his detailed review of the
terminology. Thanks to Charles Cook for a very detailed review of
-02.
Thanks to numerous people for much discussion, directly and on the
LMAP list (apologies to those unintentionally omitted): Alan Clark,
Alissa Cooper, Andrea Soppera, Barbara Stark, Benoit Claise, Brian
Trammell, Charles Cook, Dave Thorne, Frode Soerensen, Greg Mirsky,
Guangqing Deng, Jason Weil, Jean-Francois Tremblay, Jerome Benoit,
Joachim Fabini, Juergen Schoenwaelder, Jukka Manner, Ken Ko, Lingli
Deng, Michael Bugenhagen, Rolf Winter, Sam Crawford, Sharam Hakimi,
Steve Miller, Ted Lemon, Timothy Carey, Vaibhav Bajpai, William
Lupton.
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Philip Eardley, Trevor Burbridge and Marcelo Bagnulo work in part on
the Leone research project, which receives funding from the European
Union Seventh Framework Programme [FP7/2007-2013] under grant
agreement number 317647.
12. History
First WG version, copy of draft-folks-lmap-framework-00.
12.1. From -00 to -01
o new sub-section of possible use of Group-IDs for privacy
o tweak to definition of Control protocol
o fix typo in figure in S5.4
12.2. From -01 to -02
o change to INFORMATIONAL track (previous version had typo'd
Standards track)
o new definitions for Capabilities Information and Failure
Information
o clarify that diagrams show LMAP-level information flows.
Underlying protocol could do other interactions, eg to get through
NAT or for Collector to pull a Report
o add hint that after a re-boot should pause random time before re-
register (to avoid mass calling event)
o delete the open issue "what happens if a Controller fails" (normal
methods can handle)
o add some extra words about multiple Tasks in one Schedule
o clarify that new Schedule replaces (rather than adds to) and old
one. Similarly for new configuration of Measurement Tasks or
Report Channels.
o clarify suppression is temporary stop; send a new Schedule to
permanently stop Tasks
o alter suppression so it is ACKed
o add un-suppress message
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o expand the text on error reporting, to mention Reporting failures
(as well as failures to action or execute Measurement Task &
Schedule)
o add some text about how to have Tasks running indefinitely
o add that optionally a Report is not sent when there are no
Measurement Results
o add that a Measurement Task may create more than one Measurement
Result
o clarify /amend /expand that Reports include the "raw" Measurement
Results - any pre-processing is left for lmap2.0
o add some cautionary words about what if the Collector unexpectedly
doesn't hear from a MA
o add some extra words about the potential impact of Measurement
Tasks
o clarified various aspects of the privacy section
o updated references
o minor tweaks
12.3. From -02 to -03
o alignment with the Information Model [burbridge-lmap-information-
model] as this is agreed as a WG document
o One-off and periodic Measurement Schedules are kept separate, so
that they can be updated independently
o Measurement Suppression in a separate sub-section. Can now
optionally include particular Measurement Tasks &/or Schedules to
suppress, and start/stop time
o for clarity, concept of Channel split into Control, Report and MA-
to-Controller Channels
o numerous editorial changes, mainly arising from a very detailed
review by Charles Cook
o
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12.4. From -03 to -04
o updates following the WG Last Call, with the proposed consensus on
the various issues as detailed in
http://tools.ietf.org/agenda/89/slides/slides-89-lmap-2.pdf. In
particular:
o tweaked definitions, especially of Measurement Agent and
Measurement Peer
o Instruction - left to each implementation & deployment of LMAP to
decide on the granularity at which an Instruction Message works
o words added about overlapping Measurement Tasks (measurement
system can handle any way they choose; Report should mention if
the Task overlapped with another)
o Suppression: no defined impact on Passive Measurement Task; extra
option to suppress on-going Active Measurement Tasks; suppression
doesn't go to Measurement Peer, since they don't understand
Instructions
o new concept of Data Transfer Task (and therefore adjustment of the
Channel concept)
o enhancement of Results with Subscriber's service parameters -
could be useful, don't define how but can be included in Report to
various other sections
o various other smaller improvements, arising from the WGLC
o Appendix added with examples of Measurement Agents and Peers in
various deployment scenarios. To help clarify what these terms
mean.
12.5. From -04 to -05
o clarified various scoping comments by using the phrase "scope of
initial LMAP work" (avoiding "scope of LMAP WG" since this may
change in the future)
o added a Configuration Protocol - allows the Controller to update
the MA about information that it obtained during the bootstrapping
process (for consistency with Information Model)
o Removed over-detailed information about the relationship between
the different items in Instruction, as this seems more appropriate
for the information model. Clarified that the lists given are
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about the aims and not a list of information elements (these will
be defined in draft-ietf-information-model).
o the Measurement Method, specified as a URI to a registry entry -
rather than a URN
o MA configured with time limit after which, if it hasn't heard from
Controller, then it stops running Measurement Tasks (rather than
this being part of a Schedule)
o clarified there is no distinction between how capabilities,
failure and logging information are transferred (all can be when
requested by Controller or by MA on its own initiative).
o removed mention of Data Transfer Tasks. This abstraction is left
to the information model i-d
o added Deployment sub-section about Measurement Agent embedded in
ISP Network
o various other smaller improvements, arising from the 2nd WGLC
12.6. From -05 to -06
o clarified terminlogy around Measurement Methods and Tasks. Since
within a Method there may be several different roles (requester
and responder, for instance)
o Suppression: there is now the concept of a flag (boolean) which
indicates whether a Task is by default gets suppressed or not.
The optional suppression message (with list of specific tasks
/schedules to suppress) over-rides this flag.
o The previous bullet also means there is no need to make a
distinction between active and passive Measurement Tasks, so this
distinction is removed.
o removed distinction
o added a Configuration Protocol - allows the Controller to update
the MA about information that it obtained during the bootstrapping
process (for consistency with Information Model)
13. Informative References
[Bur10] Burkhart, M., Schatzmann, D., Trammell, B., and E. Boschi,
"The Role of Network Trace anonymisation Under Attack",
January 2010.
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[TR-069] TR-069, , "CPE WAN Management Protocol",
http://www.broadband-forum.org/technical/trlist.php,
November 2013.
[UPnP] ISO/IEC 29341-x, , "UPnP Device Architecture and UPnP
Device Control Protocols specifications",
http://upnp.org/sdcps-and-certification/standards/, 2011.
[RFC1035] Mockapetris, P., "Domain names - implementation and
specification", STD 13, RFC 1035, November 1987.
[RFC4101] Rescorla, E. and IAB, "Writing Protocol Models", RFC 4101,
June 2005.
[RFC4122] Leach, P., Mealling, M., and R. Salz, "A Universally
Unique IDentifier (UUID) URN Namespace", RFC 4122, July
2005.
[I-D.ietf-lmap-use-cases]
Linsner, M., Eardley, P., Burbridge, T., and F. Sorensen,
"Large-Scale Broadband Measurement Use Cases", draft-ietf-
lmap-use-cases-03 (work in progress), April 2014.
[I-D.manyfolks-ippm-metric-registry]
Bagnulo, M., Claise, B., Eardley, P., and A. Morton,
"Registry for Performance Metrics", draft-manyfolks-ippm-
metric-registry-00 (work in progress), February 2014.
[I-D.ietf-homenet-arch]
Chown, T., Arkko, J., Brandt, A., Troan, O., and J. Weil,
"IPv6 Home Networking Architecture Principles", draft-
ietf-homenet-arch-16 (work in progress), June 2014.
[RFC6419] Wasserman, M. and P. Seite, "Current Practices for
Multiple-Interface Hosts", RFC 6419, November 2011.
[RFC6887] Wing, D., Cheshire, S., Boucadair, M., Penno, R., and P.
Selkirk, "Port Control Protocol (PCP)", RFC 6887, April
2013.
[I-D.ietf-lmap-information-model]
Burbridge, T., Eardley, P., Bagnulo, M., and J.
Schoenwaelder, "Information Model for Large-Scale
Measurement Platforms (LMAP)", draft-ietf-lmap-
information-model-00 (work in progress), February 2014.
[RFC6235] Boschi, E. and B. Trammell, "IP Flow Anonymization
Support", RFC 6235, May 2011.
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[RFC6973] Cooper, A., Tschofenig, H., Aboba, B., Peterson, J.,
Morris, J., Hansen, M., and R. Smith, "Privacy
Considerations for Internet Protocols", RFC 6973, July
2013.
[I-D.ietf-ippm-lmap-path]
Bagnulo, M., Burbridge, T., Crawford, S., Eardley, P., and
A. Morton, "A Reference Path and Measurement Points for
LMAP", draft-ietf-ippm-lmap-path-03 (work in progress),
May 2014.
[RFC4656] Shalunov, S., Teitelbaum, B., Karp, A., Boote, J., and M.
Zekauskas, "A One-way Active Measurement Protocol
(OWAMP)", RFC 4656, September 2006.
[RFC5357] Hedayat, K., Krzanowski, R., Morton, A., Yum, K., and J.
Babiarz, "A Two-Way Active Measurement Protocol (TWAMP)",
RFC 5357, October 2008.
[RFC3444] Pras, A. and J. Schoenwaelder, "On the Difference between
Information Models and Data Models", RFC 3444, January
2003.
Authors' Addresses
Philip Eardley
BT
Adastral Park, Martlesham Heath
Ipswich
ENGLAND
Email: philip.eardley@bt.com
Al Morton
AT&T Labs
200 Laurel Avenue South
Middletown, NJ
USA
Email: acmorton@att.com
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Marcelo Bagnulo
Universidad Carlos III de Madrid
Av. Universidad 30
Leganes, Madrid 28911
SPAIN
Phone: 34 91 6249500
Email: marcelo@it.uc3m.es
URI: http://www.it.uc3m.es
Trevor Burbridge
BT
Adastral Park, Martlesham Heath
Ipswich
ENGLAND
Email: trevor.burbridge@bt.com
Paul Aitken
Cisco Systems, Inc.
96 Commercial Street
Edinburgh, Scotland EH6 6LX
UK
Email: paitken@cisco.com
Aamer Akhter
Cisco Systems, Inc.
7025 Kit Creek Road
RTP, NC 27709
USA
Email: aakhter@cisco.com
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