Private voice and data considerations for the AUTOPLEX cellular systems

The frequency spectrum in the 850 MHz range which has been made available by the FCC in 1981 to support cellular telecommunications has given carriers the opportunity to provide new communication services to the mobile public. Concurrent with this opportunity is a growing awareness of the need to protect cellular services against eavesdropping. Business and professional cellular system users will require confidential communication with offices and clients, and will therefore need the assurance of privacy in these transactions in order for the service to satisfy their needs. Similarly, the operations of industry, government, and the general public are expanding needs for access to data resources via the cellular radio network. Solving the problem of providing private voice and data services over the cellular radio channel in a way that satisfies the Compatibility Standards associated with the FCC´s 1981 Final Report and Order has led to an array of issues relating to the design of the service architecture and to the selection of performance requirements for the signal processing algorithms. This paper addresses these issues.