User Identification Solutions in
Converging Networks
Mike Pluke
Castle Consulting Ltd.
Leader of :
ETSI Specialist Task Force STF 157
Document IPW-10
ETSI STF 157
• The Human Factors group within the
European Telecommunications Standards
Institute (ETSI) is leading this work.
• The Specialist Task Force comprises 3
people funded to study “User Identification
Solutions in Converging Networks”and
produce an “ETSI Guide” document on the
topic.
The Terms of Reference
• Discover real user requirements for user identification
• Develop an implementation-free expression of these
requirements
• Identify potential solution options
• Create an implementation “Roadmap” for solutions
• Solutions must work in a competitive environment
So What Is The
“User Identification” Issue
• The number of communications systems is increasing
• Each system has its own identification system
• Telephone Numbers mean very little
• Contacting people isn’t necessarily getting easier
• Identification-system developments are uncoordinated
A Typical Case
A person can have:
• A fixed telephone on their office desk
• A mobile telephone
• A fixed (shared) telephone at home
• An email address used for work purposes
• A personal email address used at home
Which of these is Mike Miles?
Communicating Today
What’s Wrong?
• The caller has to guess the most successful way to
communicate
• Most callers don’t know all the user identifiers
• Terminals linked to communication type
• User identifier schemes linked to communication type
• Some user identifiers linked to terminals
• Some user identifiers portable – telephony
• Some user identifiers linked to provider – email
• Terminals/user identifiers linked to users’ roles
Solution Attempts
• Supplementary services can match people to locations
e.g. Call Diversion
• Mobility solutions can map people to roles
e.g. UPT solutions can locate the called party on one of
a group of terminals
• BUT frequently these systems give the wrong results
Problems With Current Solutions
• Many solutions lock users to 1 provider
• Proprietary solutions are incompatible
• Most solutions rely on fixes applied to
legacy systems
• Most solutions are unfriendly – to the caller
and/or called party
• There is probably no fully comprehensive
global solution
Human Communication Needs
Modern communications systems can create
new communication needs
BUT
Basic communication needs have changed
very little since the dawn of man
Historic Communications Needs
People have always needed to contact:
An Individual
A Role
A Place
“Mary Jones”
A local locksmith
“23 Dearing Lane”
Tomorrow
People will still need to contact:
Individuals, roles, groups and places
People Not Terminals
“People are outsiders in the current
communications revolution. Computer hosts,
pager terminals and telephones are
addressable entities throughout the Internet
and telephony systems.”
Extract from “The Mobile People Architecture”
from Stanford University
High-level User Requirements
• A unified way of setting up a communication
• Reduce the complexity for the calling party
• Make it easy for the called party to manage
their communications
• Give more options to the called and calling
parties
What’s Needed?
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
One user identifier per individual or role
An integrated user identifier search mechanism
Recognise that Martin Böcker = Martin Boecker
Protect privacy of personal data
Protect location privacy
Automatic capture of user identifiers
Intelligent agents to manage complexity for the
calling and called parties
• ……
The User Identifier In Use
• This format is not a proposal
• The User Identifier must be unique
• The format should be “user friendly”
How It Might Be?
What next?
• ETSI STF 157 will continue to work on refining
the user requirements for User Identification
solutions
• At the same time potential solutions will be
investigated to validate the practicability of the
requirements
• A draft ETSI Guide will be available in August
2000
• Publication is likely in October 2000
What next?
• ETSI STF 157 is very keen to liaise with all
groups with an interest in this area
• We are also very happy to receive ideas
from individuals within these groups
• My email (as STF Leader) is:
Mike.Pluke@castle-consult.com
• ETSI HF Chairman is Knut Nordby:
knut.nordby@telenor.com