Maximum entropy based IP-traffic classification in mobile communication networks

In order to maintain sufficient mobile communication network capacity for value added services, 3GPP has recently introduced an architecture called ”SIPTO”(Selected IP Traffic Offload) to offload selected mobile IP traffic from the core network. This brings new challenge to on line traffic classification scheme needed to figure out the traffic which should be offloaded in real time. Although traffic classification methodologies have already been investigated in wired IP network, they are not applicable in mobile environment where high bit error rates (BER) and temporary disconnections are observed due to hostile wireless channel conditions. This paper proposes a maximum entropy based IP-traffic classification scheme (METCS) to address on line traffic classification problems in mobile communication networks. METCS extracts the application layer payload pattern using randomly arrived packets instead of the first few sequential packets of an application flow. Simulation results show that METCS outperforms existing methods by offering average 5%-8% improvement in classification accuracy with about 60% time.