n QoS: The Focus: No one is questioning the merits of good service quality. But the question is the technical pressures. Standards are evolving and hardware capabilities are advancing. Hardware and software compatibility issues are becoming more difficult to handle as new technology comes. Today, QoS is more than guaranteed bandwidth, a clear and continuous signal, and reliable roaming access. It has been observed that mobile users will use their phones more often, and stay on the phone up to 20 percent longer, when their calls are not hampered by noise, echoes, or other interruptions.

n Networks: Problems with voice transmissions are easy to hear and are very distracting to the parties on either end of the conversation. The subscriber doesn’t know about base stations and protocols, he is interested in voice quality. So voice quality is a major point of emphasis for network quality efforts. Several methodologies are accepted for managing voice quality in the network like drive tests, in-service non-intrusive measurement devices (INMD), traffic generation and analysis.

n Marketing: Marketing usually has no direct technical responsibility for implementing or enforcing QoS programs. However, QoS data informs the marketing activity, which in turn produces meaningful analysis of market trends and subscriber needs. In a well-run network business, marketing has ready access to the reports and logs that come out of the QoS monitoring process. Ultimately, marketing relies on many of the same tools the other departments use to monitor, detect, and troubleshoot QoS-related issues. The key here is to integrate these tools, already in place for operations and engineering activities, into the marketing process such that the data is always current and easily available.

n Security and Billing: The security and billing activities involves tracking network usage and the attendant revenues. Both rely on similar processes and tools. The security activity is chartered with minimizing fraud losses and preventing illicit network use. The billing group is interested in maximizing revenue from every legitimate call connection and network signaling transaction.

Many different fraud scenarios are common in today’s mobile network industry. They range from the opportunistic subscriber who sees a chance to make a ‘free’ call, to the calculating, systematic usurper of network
services.

Roaming fraud: This is the recourse of the subscriber who concludes that he or she can get away with making costly international calls for free. It often succeeds because of the normal 48-hour time span required to exchange transferred account procedure (TAP) files between networks. By the time the fraud is detected, the subscriber may be out of reach.

Excessive calls (amount): This type of abuse is characterized by an ‘inappropriate’ number of conversations or call attempts to a risky destination. This destination may be one that has had problems in the past. Similarly, there may be an excessive number of calls from a subscriber who is on a risk list.

Excessive calls (duration): This term refers to the accumulated duration of calls from a risk-listed subscriber, or to a risky destination. It also includes the duration of single calls.

SIM Cloning: This is in effect counterfeiting a subscriber’s identity. It is possible to purchase equipment that can duplicate SIMs, then program the cloned SIM into a second, or third mobile phone. This phone is used at the original subscriber’s expense until detected.

Black list: This denotes calls from individuals whose subscription to the network has been withheld for some reason (possibly for participating in one of the fraud schemes listed above).