While systems like GSM have been designed with mobility in mind, the internet started at a time when no one had thought of mobile computers. Today‘s internet lacks any mechanisms to support users traveling around the world. IP is the common base for thousands of applications and runs over dozens of different networks. This is the reason for supporting mobility at the IP layer; mobile phone systems, for example, cannot offer this type of mobility for heterogeneous networks. To merge the world of mobile phones with the internet and to support mobility in the small more efficiently, so-called micro mobility protocols have been developed.

a) Goals, Assumptions and Requirements 

A host sends an IP packet with the header containing a destination address with other fields. The destination address not only determines the receiver of the packet, but also the physical subnet of the receiver. For example, the destination address 129.13.42.99 shows that the receiver must be connected to the physical subnet with the network prefix 129.13.42. Routers in the internet now look at the destination addresses of incoming packets and forward them according to internal look-up tables. To avoid an explosion of routing tables, only prefixes are stored and further optimizations are applied. A router would otherwise have to store the addresses of all computers in the internet, which is obviously not feasible. As long as the receiver can be reached within its physical subnet, it gets the packets; as soon as it moves outside the subnet, a packet will not reach it.

A host needs a so-called topologically correct address. So moving to a new location would mean assigning a new IP address. The problem is that nobody knows about this new address. It is almost impossible to find a (mobile) host on the internet which has just changed its address. One could argue that with the help of dynamic DNS (DDNS, RFC 2136,Vixie, 1997) an update of the mapping logical name – IP address is possible. This is what many computer users do if they have a dynamic IP address and still want to be permanently reachable using the same logical computer name. It is important to note that these considerations, indeed most of mobile IP‘s motivation, are important if a user wants to offer services from a mobile node, i.e., the node should act as server. Typically, the IP address is of no special interest for service usage: in this case DHCP is sufficient. Another motivation for permanent IP addresses is emergency communication with permanent and quick reachability via the same IP address. So what about dynamically adapting the IP address with regard to the current location? The problem is that the domain name system (DNS) needs some time before it updates the internal tables necessary to map a logical name to an IP address. This approach does not work if the mobile node moves quite often.

The internet and DNS have not been built for frequent updates. Just imagine millions of nodes moving at the same time. DNS could never present a consistent view of names and addresses, as it uses caching to improve scalability. It is simply too expensive to update quickly.There is a severe problem with higher layer protocols like TCP which rely on IP addresses. Changing the IP address while still having a TCP connection open means breaking the connection. A TCP connection is identified by the tuple (source IP address, source port, destination IP address, destination port), also known as a socket pair (a socket consists of address and port). Therefore, a TCP connection cannot survive any address change. Breaking TCP connections is not an option, using even simple programs like telnet would be impossible. The mobile node would also have to notify all communication partners about the new address.

b) Requirements

 Many field trials and proprietary systems finally led to mobile IP as a standard to enable mobility in the internet. Several requirements accompanied the development of the standard:

 Compatibility: The installed base of Internet computers, i.e., computers running TCP/IP and connected to the internet, is huge. A new standard cannot introduce changes for applications or network protocols already in use. People still want to use their favorite browser for www and do not want to change applications just for mobility, the same holds for operating systems.Mobile IP has to be integrated into existing operating systems or at least work with them (today it is available for many platforms). Routers within the internet should not necessarily require other software. While it is possible to enhance the capabilities of some routers to support mobility,

it is almost impossible to change all of them. Mobile IP has to remain compatible with all lower layers used for the standard, non-mobile, IP. Mobile IP must not require special media or MAC/LLC protocols, so it must use the same interfaces and mechanisms to access the lower layers as IP does. Finally, end-systems enhanced with a mobile IP implementation should still be able to communicate with fixed systems without mobile IP. Mobile IP has to ensure that users can still access all the other servers and systems in the internet. But that implies using the same address format and routing mechanisms.

 Transparency: Mobility should remain ‗invisible‘ for many higher layer protocols and applications. Besides maybe noticing a lower bandwidth and some interruption in service, higher layers should continue to work even if the mobile computer has changed its point of attachment to the network.For TCP this means that the computer must keep its IP address as explained above. If the interruption of the connectivity does not take too long, TCP connections survive the change of the attachment point. Problems related to the performance of TCP are discussed in chapter 9. Clearly, many of today‘s applications have not been designed for use in mobile environments, so the only effects of mobility should be a higher delay and lower bandwidth.

However, there are some applications for which it is better to be ‗mobility aware‘. Examples are cost-based routing or video compression. Knowing that it is currently possible to use different networks, the software could choose the cheapest one. Or if a video application knows that only a low bandwidth connection is currently available, it could use a different compression scheme. Additional mechanisms are necessary to inform these applications about mobility .

Scalability and efficiency: Introducing a new mechanism to the internet must not jeopardize its efficiency. Enhancing IP for mobility must not generate too many new messages flooding the whole network. Special care has to be taken considering the lower bandwidth of wireless links.

Many mobile systems will have a wireless link to an attachment point, so only some additional packets should be necessary between a mobile system and a node in the network. Looking at the number of computers connected to the internet and at the growth rates of mobile communication,

it is clear that myriad devices will participate in the internet as mobile components. Just think of cars, trucks, mobile phones, every seat in every plane around the world etc. – many of them will have some IP implementation inside and move between different networks and require mobile IP. It is crucial for a mobile IP to be scalable over a large number of participants in the whole internet, worldwide.

● Security: Mobility poses many security problems. The minimum requirement is that of all the messages related to the management of Mobile IP are authenticated. The IP layer must be sure that if it forwards a packet to a mobile host that this host receives the packet. The IP layer can only guarantee that the IP address of the receiver is correct. There are no ways of preventing fake IP addresses or other attacks. According to Internet philosophy, this is left to higher layers (keep the core of the internet simple, push more complex services to the edge).The goal of a mobile IP can be summarized as: ‗supporting end-system mobility while maintaining scalability, efficiency, and compatibility in all respects with existing applications and Internet protocols‘.

c) Entities and terminology

 The following defines several entities and terms needed to understand mobile IP as defined in RFC 3344. Figure 3.1 illustrates an example scenario.

 ● Mobile node (MN): A mobile node is an end-system or router that can change its point of attachment to the internet using mobile IP. The MN keeps its IP address and can continuously communicate with any other system in the internet as long as link-layer connectivity is given. Mobile nodes are not necessarily small devices such as laptops with antennas or mobile phones; a router onboard an aircraft can be a powerful mobile node.