Lav Gupta | Washington University in St. Louis (original) (raw)

Papers by Lav Gupta

2021 18th International Conference on Privacy, Security and Trust (PST)

ArXiv, 2019

Service Function Chaining (SFC) is the problem of deploying various network service instances ove... more Service Function Chaining (SFC) is the problem of deploying various network service instances over geographically distributed data centers and providing inter-connectivity among them. The goal is to enable the network traffic to flow smoothly through the underlying network, resulting in an optimal quality of experience to the end-users. Proper chaining of network functions leads to optimal utilization of distributed resources. This has been a de-facto model in the telecom industry with network functions deployed over underlying hardware. Though this model has served the telecom industry well so far, it has been adapted mostly to suit the static behavior of network services and service demands due to the deployment of the services directly over physical resources. This results in network ossification with larger delays to the end-users, especially with the data-centric model in which the computational resources are moving closer to end users. A novel networking paradigm, Network Function Virtualization (NFV), meets the user demands dynamically and reduces operational expenses (OpEx) and capital expenditures (CapEx), by implementing network functions in the software layer known as virtual network functions (VNFs). VNFs are then interconnected to form a complete end-to-end service, also known as service function chains (SFCs). In this work, we study the problem of deploying service function chains over network function virtualized architecture. Specifically, we study virtual network function placement problem for the optimal SFC formation across geographically distributed clouds. We set up the problem of minimizing inter-cloud traffic and response time in a multi-cloud scenario as an ILP optimization problem, along with important constraints such as total deployment costs and service level agreements (SLAs). We consider link delays and computational delays in our model.

Controlling and managing networks has become a highly complex and specialized activity. Network o... more Controlling and managing networks has become a highly complex and specialized activity. Network operators are struggling to cope with integration of different types of networks, while meeting the challenges of increasing traffic. The traditional network tends to be rigid. Once the forwarding policy has been defined, the only way to change it is by changing the configuration of all the affected devices. This is time consuming and puts a limit on scalability and meeting challenges of mobility and big data. In this context software defined networking (SDN) is being looked upon as a promising paradigm that has the power to change the way networking is done. By centralizing control, and making forwarding nodes simple, SDN offers flexible control over the traffic flows and the policies networks use to manage these flows. Along with the excitement, there have been apprehensions regarding SDN. The perceived risks associated with SDN have prevented faster adoption so far. There have been a n...

Single cloud computing platforms, like Amazon’s EC2, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure, are common... more Single cloud computing platforms, like Amazon’s EC2, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure, are common and popular today. Obtaining resources from a multiple cloud system gives clients competitive pricing, flexibility of resource provisioning, better points of presence and reduced risk of a total blackout. When these clients happen to be carriers, like Internet service providers, seeking to deploy their network services over multiple clouds, there still are many research challenges that inhibit large-scale deployments. This talk revolves around some of the key issues that were designated as "challenges" at the beginning of the network virtualization journey, and still need considerable research to see any kind of resolution in the near future. Specifically, I will present my work on the techniques that improve availability of virtual network services and secure inter-domain flow of data in the context of Internet of Things and multi-cloud based health networks.

2020 Fourth World Conference on Smart Trends in Systems, Security and Sustainability (WorldS4), 2020

The costs of delivering critical services, such as healthcare, power, financial systems and trans... more The costs of delivering critical services, such as healthcare, power, financial systems and transportation are spiraling up while the performance expectations of them have risen manifold. The mechanics of providing these services (e.g., activities like processing satellite imagery for defense and civil applications, analyzing patient data for diagnosing acute ailments, ensuring uneventful working of unmanned vehicles and big data analytics for sustaining smart cities) all require unprecedented data acquisition, storage, computation and communication. Driven by the need to achieve agility, intelligence and high performance at lower cost and improve outcomes, these systems are increasingly relying on advanced methods and technologies. Trends show the prevalence of IoT for data collection, multi-cloud computing for storage and analytics and virtualization of communication components. The increasing sophistication of technology also increases susceptibility of these systems to cyberatta...

Fault and performance management systems, in the traditional carrier networks, are based on rule-... more Fault and performance management systems, in the traditional carrier networks, are based on rule-based diagnostics that correlate alarms and other markers to detect and localize faults and performance issues. As carriers move to Virtual Network Services, based on Network Function Virtualization and multi-cloud deployments, the traditional methods fail to deliver because of the intangibility of the constituent Virtual Network Functions and increased complexity of the resulting architecture. In this paper, we propose a framework, called HYPER-VINES, that interfaces with various management platforms involved to process markers through a system of shallow and deep machine learning models. It then detects and localizes manifested and impending fault and performance issues. Our experiments validate the functionality and feasibility of the framework in terms of accurate detection and localization of such issues and unambiguous prediction of impending issues. Simulations with real network f...

2017 IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC)

Lately application service providers (ASPs) and Internet service providers (ISPs) are being confr... more Lately application service providers (ASPs) and Internet service providers (ISPs) are being confronted with the unprecedented challenge of accommodating increasing service and traffic demands from their geographically distributed users. Many ASPs and ISPs, such as Facebook, AT&T and others have adopted micro-service architecture to tackle this problem. Instead of building a single, monolithic application, the idea is to split the application into a set of smaller, interconnected services, called micro-services (or simply services). Such services are lightweight and perform distinct tasks independent of each other. Hence, they can be deployed quickly and independently as user demands vary. Nevertheless, scheduling of micro-services is a complex task and is currently under-researched. In this work, we address the problem of scheduling micro-services across multiple clouds, including microclouds. We consider different user-level SLAs, such as latency and cost, while scheduling such services. Our aim is to reduce overall turnaround time for the complete end-to-end service in service function chains and reduce the total traffic generated. In this work we present a novel fair weighted affinity-based scheduling heuristic to solve this problem. We also compare the results of proposed solution with standard biased greedy scheduling algorithms presented in the literature and observe significant improvements.

IEEE Annual Ubiquitous Computing, Electronics & Mobile Communication Conference (UEMCON), 2018

A blockchain provides a secured paradigm to achieve consensus using a distributed and peer-to-pee... more A blockchain provides a secured paradigm to achieve consensus using a distributed and peer-to-peer network in which no trusted central party is required. As a result, it has the potential to resolve many challenges that are faced with current centralized controllers in globally distributed applications. To date, the blockchain technology has been used for recording transactions and tracking objects in which multiple participants reach a consensus on whether a transaction is valid or not. This paper introduces the novel paradigm of probabilistic blockchains, an extension of the current blockchains that allows building efficient and distributed risk assessment and decision-making applications in which multiple untrusting parties collaborate but may not completely agree on the outcome. The paradigm is particularly useful for risk assessment, where a group of decision-makers needs to decide or analyze an event based on imperfect information. The proposed approach can be used in applicat...

2019 IEEE International Conference on Blockchain (Blockchain),, 2019

Recently, leading research communities have been investigating the use of blockchains for Artific... more Recently, leading research communities have been investigating the use of blockchains for Artificial Intelligence (AI) applications, where multiple participants, or agents, collaborate to make consensus decisions. To achieve this, the data in the blockchain storage have to be transformed into blockchain knowledge. We refer to these types of blockchains as knowledge-based blockchains. Knowledge-based blockchains are potentially useful in building efficient risk assessment applications. An earlier work introduced probabilistic blockchain which facilitates knowledge-based blockchains. This paper proposes an extension for the probabilistic blockchain concept. The design of a reputation management framework, suitable for such blockchains, is proposed. The framework has been developed to suit the requirements of a wide range of applications. In particular, we apply it to the detection of malicious nodes and reduce their effect on the probabilistic blockchains' consensus process. We ev...

Network function virtualization (NFV) over multi-cloud promises network service providers amazing... more Network function virtualization (NFV) over multi-cloud promises network service providers amazing flexibility in service deployment and optimizing cost. Telecommunications applications are, however, sensitive to performance indicators, especially latency, which tend to get degraded by both the virtualization and the multiple cloud requirement for widely distributed coverage. In this work we propose an efficient framework that uses the novel concept of random cloud selection combined with a support vector regression based predictive model for cost optimized latency aware placement (COLAP) of service function chains. Extensive empirical analysis has been carried out with training datasets generated using a queuing theoretic model. The results show good generalization performance of the predictive algorithm. The proposed framework can place thousands of virtual network functions in less than a minute and has high acceptance ratio.

Applied Sciences

Efficient provisioning of 5G network slices is a major challenge for 5G network slicing technolog... more Efficient provisioning of 5G network slices is a major challenge for 5G network slicing technology. Previous slice provisioning methods have only considered network resource attributes and ignored network topology attributes. These methods may result in a decrease in the slice acceptance ratio and the slice provisioning revenue. To address these issues, we propose a two-stage heuristic slice provisioning algorithm, called RT-CSP, for the 5G core network by jointly considering network resource attributes and topology attributes in this paper. The first stage of our method is called the slice node provisioning stage, in which we propose an approach to scoring and ranking nodes using network resource attributes (i.e., CPU capacity and bandwidth) and topology attributes (i.e., degree centrality and closeness centrality). Slice nodes are then provisioned according to the node ranking results. In the second stage, called the slice link provisioning stage, the k-shortest path algorithm is ...

IEEE Access

Network slicing in 5G is expected to essentially change the way in which network operators deploy... more Network slicing in 5G is expected to essentially change the way in which network operators deploy and manage vertical services with different performance requirements. Efficient and secure slice provisioning algorithms are important since network slices share the limited resources of the physical network. In this article, we first analyze the security issues in network slicing and formulate an Integer Linear Programming (ILP) model for secure 5G core network slice provisioning. Then, we propose a heuristic 5G core network slice provisioning algorithm called VIKOR-CNSP based on VIKOR, which is a multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) method. In the slice node provisioning stage, the node importance is ranked with the VIKOR approach by considering the node resource and topology attributes. The slice nodes are then provisioned according to the ranking results. In the slice link provisioning stage, the k shortest path algorithm is implemented to obtain the candidate physical paths for the slice link, and a strategy for selecting a candidate physical path is proposed to increase the slice acceptance ratio. The strategy first calculates the path factor P f which is the product of the maximum link bandwidth utilization of the candidate physical path and its hop-count, and then chooses the candidate physical path with the smallest P f to host the slice link. Extensive simulations show that the proposed algorithm can achieve the highest slice acceptance ratio and the largest provisioning revenue-to-cost ratio, satisfying the security constraints of 5G core network slice requests.

IEEE Internet of Things Journal

Computer Communications

Carriers' network services are distributed, dynamic, and investment intensive. Deploying them as ... more Carriers' network services are distributed, dynamic, and investment intensive. Deploying them as virtual network services (VNS) brings the promise of low-cost agile deployments, which reduce time to market new services. If these virtual services are hosted dynamically over multiple clouds, greater flexibility in optimizing performance and cost can be achieved. On the flip side, when orchestrated over multiple clouds, the stringent performance norms for carrier services become difficult to meet, necessitating novel and innovative placement strategies. In selecting the appropriate combination of clouds for placement, it is important to look ahead and visualize the environment that will exist at the time a virtual network service is actually activated. This serves multiple purposes-clouds can be selected to optimize the cost, the chosen performance parameters can be kept within the defined limits, and the speed of placement can be increased. In this paper, we propose the PART (Predictive-Adaptive Real Time) framework that relies on predictive-deductive features to achieve these objectives. With so much riding on predictions, we include in our framework a novel concept-drift compensation technique to make the predictions closer to reality by taking care of long-term traffic variations. At the same time, near real-time update of the prediction models takes care of sudden short-term variations. These predictions are then used by a new randomized placement heuristic that carries out a fast cloud selection using a least-cost latency-constrained policy. An empirical analysis carried out using datasets from a queuing-theoretic model and also through implementation on CloudLab, proves the effectiveness of the PART framework. The placement system works fast, placing thousands of functions in a sub-minute time frame with a high acceptance ratio, making it suitable for dynamic placement. We expect the framework to be an important step in making the deployment of carrier-grade VNS on multi-cloud systems, using network function virtualization (NFV), a reality.

Transactions on Emerging Telecommunications Technologies

With the enhancements in the field of software-defined networking and virtualization technologies... more With the enhancements in the field of software-defined networking and virtualization technologies, novel networking paradigms such as network function virtualization (NFV) and the Internet of things (IoT) are rapidly gaining ground. Development of IoT as well as 5G networks and explosion in online services has resulted in an exponential growth of devices connected to the network. As a result, application service providers (ASPs) and Internet service providers (ISPs) are being confronted with the unprecedented challenge of accommodating increasing service and traffic demands from the geographically distributed users. To tackle this problem, many ASPs and ISPs, such as Netflix, Facebook, AT&T and others are increasingly adopting micro-services (MS) application architecture. Despite the success of MS in the industry, there is no specific standard or research work for service providers as guidelines, especially from the perspective of basic micro-service operations. In this work, we aim to bridge this gap between industry and academia and discuss different micro-service deployment, discovery and communication options for service providers as a means to forming complete service chains. In addition, we address the problem of scheduling micro-services across multiple clouds, including micro-clouds. We consider different user-level SLAs, such as latency and cost, while scheduling such services. We aim to reduce overall turnaround time as well as costs for the deployment of complete end-to-end service. In this work, we present a novel affinity-based fair weighted scheduling heuristic to solve this problem. We also compare the results of proposed solution with standard greedy scheduling algorithms presented in the literature and observe significant improvements. 1

IEEE Internet Computing

Network slicing for 5G is receiving significant attention from the telecommunications industry as... more Network slicing for 5G is receiving significant attention from the telecommunications industry as a means to provide network as a service (NaaS) for different use cases. Network slicing is a technology which allows network operators to build multiple virtual networks on a shared infrastructure. With network slicing, service providers can deploy their applications and services flexibly and quickly to accommodate specific requirements of diverse services such as augmented reality, online games, e-health and others. As an emerging technology with a number of advantages, network slicing has raised many issues for the industry and academia alike. In this article, we discuss the background and related work in network slicing and propose a framework for 5G network slicing. Finally, we discuss the challenges of network slicing and future research directions.

Computer Communications

Carriers' network services are distributed, dynamic, and investment intensive. Deploying them as ... more Carriers' network services are distributed, dynamic, and investment intensive. Deploying them as virtual network services (VNS) brings the promise of low-cost agile deployments, which reduce time to market new services. If these virtual services are hosted dynamically over multiple clouds, greater flexibility in optimizing performance and cost can be achieved. On the flip side, when orchestrated over multiple clouds, the stringent performance norms for carrier services become difficult to meet, necessitating novel and innovative placement strategies. In selecting the appropriate combination of clouds for placement, it is important to look ahead and visualize the environment that will exist at the time a virtual network service is actually activated. This serves multiple purposes-clouds can be selected to optimize the cost, the chosen performance parameters can be kept within the defined limits, and the speed of placement can be increased. In this paper, we propose the PART (Predictive-Adaptive Real Time) framework that relies on predictive-deductive features to achieve these objectives. With so much riding on predictions, we include in our framework a novel concept-drift compensation technique to make the predictions closer to reality by taking care of long-term traffic variations. At the same time, near real-time update of the prediction models takes care of sudden short-term variations. These predictions are then used by a new randomized placement heuristic that carries out a fast cloud selection using a least-cost latency-constrained policy. An empirical analysis carried out using datasets from a queuing-theoretic model and also through implementation on CloudLab, proves the effectiveness of the PART framework. The placement system works fast, placing thousands of functions in a sub-minute time frame with a high acceptance ratio, making it suitable for dynamic placement. We expect the framework to be an important step in making the deployment of carrier-grade VNS on multi-cloud systems, using network function virtualization (NFV), a reality.

2021 18th International Conference on Privacy, Security and Trust (PST)

ArXiv, 2019

Service Function Chaining (SFC) is the problem of deploying various network service instances ove... more Service Function Chaining (SFC) is the problem of deploying various network service instances over geographically distributed data centers and providing inter-connectivity among them. The goal is to enable the network traffic to flow smoothly through the underlying network, resulting in an optimal quality of experience to the end-users. Proper chaining of network functions leads to optimal utilization of distributed resources. This has been a de-facto model in the telecom industry with network functions deployed over underlying hardware. Though this model has served the telecom industry well so far, it has been adapted mostly to suit the static behavior of network services and service demands due to the deployment of the services directly over physical resources. This results in network ossification with larger delays to the end-users, especially with the data-centric model in which the computational resources are moving closer to end users. A novel networking paradigm, Network Function Virtualization (NFV), meets the user demands dynamically and reduces operational expenses (OpEx) and capital expenditures (CapEx), by implementing network functions in the software layer known as virtual network functions (VNFs). VNFs are then interconnected to form a complete end-to-end service, also known as service function chains (SFCs). In this work, we study the problem of deploying service function chains over network function virtualized architecture. Specifically, we study virtual network function placement problem for the optimal SFC formation across geographically distributed clouds. We set up the problem of minimizing inter-cloud traffic and response time in a multi-cloud scenario as an ILP optimization problem, along with important constraints such as total deployment costs and service level agreements (SLAs). We consider link delays and computational delays in our model.

Controlling and managing networks has become a highly complex and specialized activity. Network o... more Controlling and managing networks has become a highly complex and specialized activity. Network operators are struggling to cope with integration of different types of networks, while meeting the challenges of increasing traffic. The traditional network tends to be rigid. Once the forwarding policy has been defined, the only way to change it is by changing the configuration of all the affected devices. This is time consuming and puts a limit on scalability and meeting challenges of mobility and big data. In this context software defined networking (SDN) is being looked upon as a promising paradigm that has the power to change the way networking is done. By centralizing control, and making forwarding nodes simple, SDN offers flexible control over the traffic flows and the policies networks use to manage these flows. Along with the excitement, there have been apprehensions regarding SDN. The perceived risks associated with SDN have prevented faster adoption so far. There have been a n...

Single cloud computing platforms, like Amazon’s EC2, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure, are common... more Single cloud computing platforms, like Amazon’s EC2, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure, are common and popular today. Obtaining resources from a multiple cloud system gives clients competitive pricing, flexibility of resource provisioning, better points of presence and reduced risk of a total blackout. When these clients happen to be carriers, like Internet service providers, seeking to deploy their network services over multiple clouds, there still are many research challenges that inhibit large-scale deployments. This talk revolves around some of the key issues that were designated as "challenges" at the beginning of the network virtualization journey, and still need considerable research to see any kind of resolution in the near future. Specifically, I will present my work on the techniques that improve availability of virtual network services and secure inter-domain flow of data in the context of Internet of Things and multi-cloud based health networks.

2020 Fourth World Conference on Smart Trends in Systems, Security and Sustainability (WorldS4), 2020

The costs of delivering critical services, such as healthcare, power, financial systems and trans... more The costs of delivering critical services, such as healthcare, power, financial systems and transportation are spiraling up while the performance expectations of them have risen manifold. The mechanics of providing these services (e.g., activities like processing satellite imagery for defense and civil applications, analyzing patient data for diagnosing acute ailments, ensuring uneventful working of unmanned vehicles and big data analytics for sustaining smart cities) all require unprecedented data acquisition, storage, computation and communication. Driven by the need to achieve agility, intelligence and high performance at lower cost and improve outcomes, these systems are increasingly relying on advanced methods and technologies. Trends show the prevalence of IoT for data collection, multi-cloud computing for storage and analytics and virtualization of communication components. The increasing sophistication of technology also increases susceptibility of these systems to cyberatta...

Fault and performance management systems, in the traditional carrier networks, are based on rule-... more Fault and performance management systems, in the traditional carrier networks, are based on rule-based diagnostics that correlate alarms and other markers to detect and localize faults and performance issues. As carriers move to Virtual Network Services, based on Network Function Virtualization and multi-cloud deployments, the traditional methods fail to deliver because of the intangibility of the constituent Virtual Network Functions and increased complexity of the resulting architecture. In this paper, we propose a framework, called HYPER-VINES, that interfaces with various management platforms involved to process markers through a system of shallow and deep machine learning models. It then detects and localizes manifested and impending fault and performance issues. Our experiments validate the functionality and feasibility of the framework in terms of accurate detection and localization of such issues and unambiguous prediction of impending issues. Simulations with real network f...

2017 IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC)

Lately application service providers (ASPs) and Internet service providers (ISPs) are being confr... more Lately application service providers (ASPs) and Internet service providers (ISPs) are being confronted with the unprecedented challenge of accommodating increasing service and traffic demands from their geographically distributed users. Many ASPs and ISPs, such as Facebook, AT&T and others have adopted micro-service architecture to tackle this problem. Instead of building a single, monolithic application, the idea is to split the application into a set of smaller, interconnected services, called micro-services (or simply services). Such services are lightweight and perform distinct tasks independent of each other. Hence, they can be deployed quickly and independently as user demands vary. Nevertheless, scheduling of micro-services is a complex task and is currently under-researched. In this work, we address the problem of scheduling micro-services across multiple clouds, including microclouds. We consider different user-level SLAs, such as latency and cost, while scheduling such services. Our aim is to reduce overall turnaround time for the complete end-to-end service in service function chains and reduce the total traffic generated. In this work we present a novel fair weighted affinity-based scheduling heuristic to solve this problem. We also compare the results of proposed solution with standard biased greedy scheduling algorithms presented in the literature and observe significant improvements.

IEEE Annual Ubiquitous Computing, Electronics & Mobile Communication Conference (UEMCON), 2018

A blockchain provides a secured paradigm to achieve consensus using a distributed and peer-to-pee... more A blockchain provides a secured paradigm to achieve consensus using a distributed and peer-to-peer network in which no trusted central party is required. As a result, it has the potential to resolve many challenges that are faced with current centralized controllers in globally distributed applications. To date, the blockchain technology has been used for recording transactions and tracking objects in which multiple participants reach a consensus on whether a transaction is valid or not. This paper introduces the novel paradigm of probabilistic blockchains, an extension of the current blockchains that allows building efficient and distributed risk assessment and decision-making applications in which multiple untrusting parties collaborate but may not completely agree on the outcome. The paradigm is particularly useful for risk assessment, where a group of decision-makers needs to decide or analyze an event based on imperfect information. The proposed approach can be used in applicat...

2019 IEEE International Conference on Blockchain (Blockchain),, 2019

Recently, leading research communities have been investigating the use of blockchains for Artific... more Recently, leading research communities have been investigating the use of blockchains for Artificial Intelligence (AI) applications, where multiple participants, or agents, collaborate to make consensus decisions. To achieve this, the data in the blockchain storage have to be transformed into blockchain knowledge. We refer to these types of blockchains as knowledge-based blockchains. Knowledge-based blockchains are potentially useful in building efficient risk assessment applications. An earlier work introduced probabilistic blockchain which facilitates knowledge-based blockchains. This paper proposes an extension for the probabilistic blockchain concept. The design of a reputation management framework, suitable for such blockchains, is proposed. The framework has been developed to suit the requirements of a wide range of applications. In particular, we apply it to the detection of malicious nodes and reduce their effect on the probabilistic blockchains' consensus process. We ev...

Network function virtualization (NFV) over multi-cloud promises network service providers amazing... more Network function virtualization (NFV) over multi-cloud promises network service providers amazing flexibility in service deployment and optimizing cost. Telecommunications applications are, however, sensitive to performance indicators, especially latency, which tend to get degraded by both the virtualization and the multiple cloud requirement for widely distributed coverage. In this work we propose an efficient framework that uses the novel concept of random cloud selection combined with a support vector regression based predictive model for cost optimized latency aware placement (COLAP) of service function chains. Extensive empirical analysis has been carried out with training datasets generated using a queuing theoretic model. The results show good generalization performance of the predictive algorithm. The proposed framework can place thousands of virtual network functions in less than a minute and has high acceptance ratio.

Applied Sciences

Efficient provisioning of 5G network slices is a major challenge for 5G network slicing technolog... more Efficient provisioning of 5G network slices is a major challenge for 5G network slicing technology. Previous slice provisioning methods have only considered network resource attributes and ignored network topology attributes. These methods may result in a decrease in the slice acceptance ratio and the slice provisioning revenue. To address these issues, we propose a two-stage heuristic slice provisioning algorithm, called RT-CSP, for the 5G core network by jointly considering network resource attributes and topology attributes in this paper. The first stage of our method is called the slice node provisioning stage, in which we propose an approach to scoring and ranking nodes using network resource attributes (i.e., CPU capacity and bandwidth) and topology attributes (i.e., degree centrality and closeness centrality). Slice nodes are then provisioned according to the node ranking results. In the second stage, called the slice link provisioning stage, the k-shortest path algorithm is ...

IEEE Access

Network slicing in 5G is expected to essentially change the way in which network operators deploy... more Network slicing in 5G is expected to essentially change the way in which network operators deploy and manage vertical services with different performance requirements. Efficient and secure slice provisioning algorithms are important since network slices share the limited resources of the physical network. In this article, we first analyze the security issues in network slicing and formulate an Integer Linear Programming (ILP) model for secure 5G core network slice provisioning. Then, we propose a heuristic 5G core network slice provisioning algorithm called VIKOR-CNSP based on VIKOR, which is a multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) method. In the slice node provisioning stage, the node importance is ranked with the VIKOR approach by considering the node resource and topology attributes. The slice nodes are then provisioned according to the ranking results. In the slice link provisioning stage, the k shortest path algorithm is implemented to obtain the candidate physical paths for the slice link, and a strategy for selecting a candidate physical path is proposed to increase the slice acceptance ratio. The strategy first calculates the path factor P f which is the product of the maximum link bandwidth utilization of the candidate physical path and its hop-count, and then chooses the candidate physical path with the smallest P f to host the slice link. Extensive simulations show that the proposed algorithm can achieve the highest slice acceptance ratio and the largest provisioning revenue-to-cost ratio, satisfying the security constraints of 5G core network slice requests.

IEEE Internet of Things Journal

Computer Communications

Carriers' network services are distributed, dynamic, and investment intensive. Deploying them as ... more Carriers' network services are distributed, dynamic, and investment intensive. Deploying them as virtual network services (VNS) brings the promise of low-cost agile deployments, which reduce time to market new services. If these virtual services are hosted dynamically over multiple clouds, greater flexibility in optimizing performance and cost can be achieved. On the flip side, when orchestrated over multiple clouds, the stringent performance norms for carrier services become difficult to meet, necessitating novel and innovative placement strategies. In selecting the appropriate combination of clouds for placement, it is important to look ahead and visualize the environment that will exist at the time a virtual network service is actually activated. This serves multiple purposes-clouds can be selected to optimize the cost, the chosen performance parameters can be kept within the defined limits, and the speed of placement can be increased. In this paper, we propose the PART (Predictive-Adaptive Real Time) framework that relies on predictive-deductive features to achieve these objectives. With so much riding on predictions, we include in our framework a novel concept-drift compensation technique to make the predictions closer to reality by taking care of long-term traffic variations. At the same time, near real-time update of the prediction models takes care of sudden short-term variations. These predictions are then used by a new randomized placement heuristic that carries out a fast cloud selection using a least-cost latency-constrained policy. An empirical analysis carried out using datasets from a queuing-theoretic model and also through implementation on CloudLab, proves the effectiveness of the PART framework. The placement system works fast, placing thousands of functions in a sub-minute time frame with a high acceptance ratio, making it suitable for dynamic placement. We expect the framework to be an important step in making the deployment of carrier-grade VNS on multi-cloud systems, using network function virtualization (NFV), a reality.

Transactions on Emerging Telecommunications Technologies

With the enhancements in the field of software-defined networking and virtualization technologies... more With the enhancements in the field of software-defined networking and virtualization technologies, novel networking paradigms such as network function virtualization (NFV) and the Internet of things (IoT) are rapidly gaining ground. Development of IoT as well as 5G networks and explosion in online services has resulted in an exponential growth of devices connected to the network. As a result, application service providers (ASPs) and Internet service providers (ISPs) are being confronted with the unprecedented challenge of accommodating increasing service and traffic demands from the geographically distributed users. To tackle this problem, many ASPs and ISPs, such as Netflix, Facebook, AT&T and others are increasingly adopting micro-services (MS) application architecture. Despite the success of MS in the industry, there is no specific standard or research work for service providers as guidelines, especially from the perspective of basic micro-service operations. In this work, we aim to bridge this gap between industry and academia and discuss different micro-service deployment, discovery and communication options for service providers as a means to forming complete service chains. In addition, we address the problem of scheduling micro-services across multiple clouds, including micro-clouds. We consider different user-level SLAs, such as latency and cost, while scheduling such services. We aim to reduce overall turnaround time as well as costs for the deployment of complete end-to-end service. In this work, we present a novel affinity-based fair weighted scheduling heuristic to solve this problem. We also compare the results of proposed solution with standard greedy scheduling algorithms presented in the literature and observe significant improvements. 1

IEEE Internet Computing

Network slicing for 5G is receiving significant attention from the telecommunications industry as... more Network slicing for 5G is receiving significant attention from the telecommunications industry as a means to provide network as a service (NaaS) for different use cases. Network slicing is a technology which allows network operators to build multiple virtual networks on a shared infrastructure. With network slicing, service providers can deploy their applications and services flexibly and quickly to accommodate specific requirements of diverse services such as augmented reality, online games, e-health and others. As an emerging technology with a number of advantages, network slicing has raised many issues for the industry and academia alike. In this article, we discuss the background and related work in network slicing and propose a framework for 5G network slicing. Finally, we discuss the challenges of network slicing and future research directions.

Computer Communications

Carriers' network services are distributed, dynamic, and investment intensive. Deploying them as ... more Carriers' network services are distributed, dynamic, and investment intensive. Deploying them as virtual network services (VNS) brings the promise of low-cost agile deployments, which reduce time to market new services. If these virtual services are hosted dynamically over multiple clouds, greater flexibility in optimizing performance and cost can be achieved. On the flip side, when orchestrated over multiple clouds, the stringent performance norms for carrier services become difficult to meet, necessitating novel and innovative placement strategies. In selecting the appropriate combination of clouds for placement, it is important to look ahead and visualize the environment that will exist at the time a virtual network service is actually activated. This serves multiple purposes-clouds can be selected to optimize the cost, the chosen performance parameters can be kept within the defined limits, and the speed of placement can be increased. In this paper, we propose the PART (Predictive-Adaptive Real Time) framework that relies on predictive-deductive features to achieve these objectives. With so much riding on predictions, we include in our framework a novel concept-drift compensation technique to make the predictions closer to reality by taking care of long-term traffic variations. At the same time, near real-time update of the prediction models takes care of sudden short-term variations. These predictions are then used by a new randomized placement heuristic that carries out a fast cloud selection using a least-cost latency-constrained policy. An empirical analysis carried out using datasets from a queuing-theoretic model and also through implementation on CloudLab, proves the effectiveness of the PART framework. The placement system works fast, placing thousands of functions in a sub-minute time frame with a high acceptance ratio, making it suitable for dynamic placement. We expect the framework to be an important step in making the deployment of carrier-grade VNS on multi-cloud systems, using network function virtualization (NFV), a reality.