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pablo_stalteri_
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Feb 08, 2011

Tethering heuristics

Hi all,

 

 

I am looking for information about heuristics that can be implemented using iRule to identify if a subscriber is tethering using a mobile device (iPhone, iPad, handset, BlackBerry, etc).

 

 

Example: Galaxy Mobile 3150 has a Hot Spot application that allows to connect up to 3 devices (i.e., PC, iPad, iPhone). How to identify this scenario using iRule? Can it receive the IMEI of the 2 devices: tethered and tethering device? I have verified that the APN and session ID is the same for all of them. Is there any other clue (number of hops, etc)?

 

 

Thanks in advance,

 

Pablo
  • Hi Pablo,

     

     

    I think the first question is how can you identify the characteristics you're looking for using standard HTTP/HTML/scripting. Once you figure that out, you can try to implement it in an iRule.

     

     

    Can you determine whether a user is tethering from the User-Agent header? If so, you could look for this by parsing [HTTP::header User-Agent]. Else, can you use Javascript to ask the client to provide this data? If so, you could send an HTTP response using HTTP::respond. Or you could inject the Javascript into response content by collecting and modifying the payload with HTTP::collect and HTTP::payload, respectively.

     

     

    Aaron