Apparatus for collecting charging information of a data service and charging method thereof

• US 8,488,597 B2
• Filed: 04/28/2006
• Issued: 07/16/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 10/28/2003
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. (Huawei Investment & Holding Co., Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. (Huawei Investment & Holding Co., Ltd.)
• Inventors: Shan, Mingjun, Wang, Li, Nie, Yanbo, Huan, Xuanyi
• Primary Examiner(s): Vu, Huy D
• Assistant Examiner(s): Baig, Adnan
• Application Number:
  US11/414,476
• Publication Number:
  US 20060193344A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,636 Days
• Field of Search: 370/259, 370/353, 370/395.21, 451/406, 451/408
• US Class Current: 370/353
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/14 Charging , metering or billing arrangements for data wireline or wireless communications
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/1403 Architecture for metering, charging or billing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/141 Indication of costs
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/31 Distributed metering or calculation of charges
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 15/43 Billing software details
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/22 Bandwidth or usage-sensitve billing
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2215/96 Distributed calculation of charges, e.g. in different nodes like for mobiles between HLR and VLR, or between the terminal and the billing function

Abstract

The present invention discloses an apparatus for collecting charging information of data service and charging method thereof. The apparatus comprises: a protocol distribution processing module, for classifying service data received from a gateway service node in the wireless network by the protocol type, and sending the classified service data to a protocol processing module of the corresponding protocol type; receiving service data from said one or more than one protocol processing module and sending the service data to the gateway service node; at least one protocol processing module, for receiving the classified service data from the protocol distribution processing module, obtaining charging information of the service data and sending the charging information to a charging system, and transparently transmitting the service data to a packet switched domain network; receiving the service data from a packet switched domain network, obtaining the charging information of the service data and sending the charging information to the charging system, and transparently transmitting the service data to the protocol distribution processing module. This invention can accurately collect the charging information of service data of various classes.

Claims

1. A charging method for data service in a wireless network, the method comprising:

receiving, at a protocol distribution processing module within a proxy device, first service data from a mobile Station (MS) via a gateway service node, wherein the proxy device is located between a gateway service node and a packet switched domain network and the first service data comprises at least one of the following;

Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP) service data, Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) service data, Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) service data or Real Time Protocol/ Real Time Session Protocol (RTP/RTSP) service data;

classifying the received first service data according to a protocol type of the first service data;

distributing the classified first service data to one of a plurality of protocol processing modules within the proxy device according to the classified protocol type;

at the one of the plurality of protocol processing modules, extracting charging information of the classified first service data, wherein the charging information comprises the protocol type of the first service data;

sending the charging information to a charging system for charging;

transmitting, from the one of the plurality of protocol processing modules, the respective classified first service data transparently to the packet switched domain network;

wherein when a service server has collected charging information of second service data, wherein the second service data has a second protocol type, and the second service data has been charged based on one charging mode according to the collected charging information of the second service data at the service server by the charging system, the method further comprises;

determining, by the charging system, if the first service data from which the charging information is extracted at the proxy device has the same protocol type as the second service data from which the charging information is extracted at the service server according to the charging information of the first service data collected by the proxy device;

if the first service data has a different protocol type than the second service data, at the charging system, charging the first service data by a charging mode corresponding to the protocol type of the classified service data received at the proxy device, wherein the first service data is classified by the protocol type, wherein the charging modes of data services include a volume based charging mode and a content based charging mode; and

if the first service data has the same protocol type as the second service data, the charging system does not charge for the first service data according to the charging information of the first service data collected at the proxy device.

2. A charging method according to claim 1, wherein sending the charging information to a charging system comprises:

deciding a type of the mobile subscriber; and

sending the charging information to a charging system depending on the type of mobile subscriber.

3. The method according to claim 1, further comprising:

receiving, by the one of the plurality of protocol processing modules, first service data from the packet switched domain network according to the protocol type of the first service data;

at one of the plurality of protocol processing modules, extracting the charging information of the first service data and sending the charging information to the charging system for charging;

transmitting, from the one of the plurality of protocol processing modules, the first service data transparently to the protocol distribution processing module; and

transmitting, from the protocol distribution processing module, the first service data transparently to the MS via the gateway service node.

4. The method according to claim 1, wherein said protocol type of the service data comprises at least one of HTTP, WAP, TCP/IP, or RTP/RTSP.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein the charging information comprises:

time and date for receiving the service data, an MSISDN of the MS for receiving the service data, an IMSI, protocol type adopted by the service data, IP port number of the service data, APN, QoS, and transmitted bytes of uplink or downlink service data; and

when the protocol processing module is an HTTP processing module, said charging information further comprises;

a URL.

6. The method according to claim 1, wherein the charging information comprises:

time and date when the transmission of the service data starts, MSISDN for receiving and sending the service data, an IMSI, HTTP transport protocol of the service data, a URL, a Gateway GPRS Support Nodes (GGSN) IP address, a Serving GPRS Support Nodes (SGSN) IP address, transmitted bytes of uplink or downlink service data.

7. A system applied in a wireless network for collecting charging information of a data service, the system comprising a proxy device and a charging system,

the proxy device comprising:

a protocol distribution processing module configured to classify first service data according to a protocol type of the first service data which is received from a Mobile Station (MS) via a gateway service node in the wireless network and to send the classified first service data to one of a plurality of protocol processing modules corresponding to the protocol type of the first service data wherein the first service data comprises at least one of the following;

Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP) service data, Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) service data, Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) service data or Real Time Protocol/ Real Time Session Protocol (RTP/RTSP) service data;

said one of the plurality of protocol processing modules, each of which corresponds to a protocol type, configured to receive the classified first service data from the MS via the protocol distribution processing module corresponding to the protocol type, extract charging information of the classified first service data, wherein the charging information comprises the protocol type of the first service data, send the charging information of the classified first service data to a charging system for charging by a charging mode corresponding to the protocol type of the first service data, and transmit the classified first service data transparently to a packet switched domain network; and

the charging system configured to, when a service server has collected charging information of second service data having a second protocol type and the second service data has been charged based on one charging mode according to the collected charging information of the second service data at the service server by the charging system, determine if the first service data from which the charging information is extracted at the proxy device has the same protocol type as the second service data from which the charging information is extracted at the service server according to the charging information of the first service data collected by the proxy device, wherein

if the first service data has a different protocol type than the second service data, the charging system is configured to charge the first service data by a charging mode corresponding to the protocol type of the classified first service data received at the proxy device, wherein the first service data is classified by the protocol type, wherein the charging modes of data services include a volume based charging mode and a content based charging mode; and

if the first service data has the same protocol type as the second service data, the charging system is configured to not charge for the first service data according to the charging information of the first service data collected at the proxy device.

8. The system according to claim 7, wherein

the protocol distribution processing module is further configured to receive third service data from at least one protocol processing module connected to a packet switched domain network and to transparently transmit the third service data to the MS via the gateway service node;

wherein said at least one protocol processing module is further configured to receive the third service data from the packet switched domain network according to a protocol type of the third service data, extract charging information of the third service data and send the charging information of the third service data to the charging system for charging by a charging mode corresponding to the protocol type of the third service data, and transmit the third service data transparently to the MS via the protocol distribution processing module and the gateway service node.

9. The system according to claim 7, wherein said proxy device is situated on a Gi interface between the gateway service node of the wireless network and the packet switched domain network.

10. The system according to claim 7, wherein the proxy device is integrated into the gateway service node of the wireless network or a Wireless Application Protocol gateway of the wireless network.

11. The system according to claim 7, wherein said at least one protocol processing module further comprises at least one of the following modules:

a Hyper Text Transfer Protocol (HTTP) processing module configured to receive HTTP service data from the protocol distribution processing module, obtain charging information of the service data and send the charging information to the charging system, transparently transmit the service data to the packet switched domain network, receive HTTP service data from the packet switched domain network, obtain charging information of the service data and send the charging information to the charging system, and transparently transmit the service data to the protocol distribution processing module;

a Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) processing module configured to receive WAP service data from the protocol distribution processing module, obtain charging information of the service data, send the charging information to the charging system and transparently transmit the service data to the packet switched domain network, receive WAP service data from the packet switched domain network, obtain charging information of the service data and send the charging information to the charging system, and transparently transmit the service data to the protocol distribution processing module;

a Transmission Control Protocol/ Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) processing module configured to receive TCP/IP service data from the protocol distribution processing module, obtain charging information of the service data, send the charging information to the charging system, transparently transmit the service data to the packet switched domain network, receive TCP/IP service data from the packet switched domain network, obtain the charging information of the service data and send the charging information to the charging system, and transparently transmit the service data to the protocol distribution processing module; and

a Real Time Protocol/ Real Time Session Protocol (RTP/RTSP) processing module configured to receive RTP/RTSP service data from the protocol distribution processing module, obtain charging information of the service data, send the charging information to the charging system, transparently transmit the service data to the packet switched domain network, receive RTP/RTSP service data from the packet switched domain network, obtain charging information of the service data, send the charging information to the charging system, and transparently transmit the service data to the protocol distribution processing module.

12. The system according to claim 7, wherein the charging information comprises at least:

time and date for receiving the service data, a Mobile Subscriber ISDN Number (MSISDN) of the MS for receiving the service data, an International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI), protocol type adopted by the service data, Internet Protocol (IP) port number of the service data, Access Point Name (APN), Quality of Service (QoS), and transmitted bytes of uplink or downlink service data.

13. The system according to claim 12, wherein when the at least one protocol processing module is an HTTP processing module, said charging information further comprises:

a Uniform Resource Locator (URL), wherein a service class of the service data is recognized by the URL.

14. The system according to claim 7, wherein said classifying the first service data by protocol type comprises:

performing the classification according to an Internet Protocol (IP) port number of the first service data.