Aptilo Networks develops management solutions used for AAA (authentication, authorization, accounting system), provisioning, security, monitoring, roaming, pre- and post paid billing.


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Aptilo Access Controller™

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The Aptilo Access Controller is a high-performance product optimized for usage in demanding public access services together with the Aptilo Service Management Platform (SMP) and the Aptilo Service Portal. Access gateways and access controllers from other vendors may be used in combination with the Aptilo backend components, but the Aptilo Access Controller will offer unparalleled performance and richness in functionality.

Example of Aptilo Access Controller in a wireless network

Key Features

End-user Ease of use: mobile client devices do not require other than a standard browser or supported client software to connect. The Aptilo Access Controller automatically redirects user to the service captive portal providing necessary information to connect. The Aptilo Access Controller supports true Plug n’ Play and zero configuration i.e. it handles client devices with fixed IP addresses or configured with common proxies, in addition to DHCP support for automatic network configuration. The Aptilo Access Controller does not require public IP-address but can be placed behind firewall and/or NAT device. There is also an option to use a session window to provide an easy overview to the end-user of the service usage, logout and account top-up.

Security: secure environment for authentication and payment processing. SSL encrypted communication between the clients and the Aptilo system. Secure VPN tunnel to communicate between the Aptilo Access Controllerand Aptilo Service Management Platform. Firewall to protect from non-authorized usage. White listing (“Walled Garden”) and black listing of configurable sites. Support for IP address spoofing protection through session window monitoring.

Flexibility: For hotspot service usage the Aptilo Access Controller can be installed distributed at the site or centralized higher up in the network to serve multiple sites. Dynamic captive portal pages enables separate look & feel and payment/pricing configuration for each separate location or through separate virtual LAN’s.

Ease of management: The Aptilo Access Controller can be auto-configured. They can also easily and quickly be configured and installed remotely with support for remote software upgrade and updates.

Traffic control: The Aptilo Access Controller blocks users from access to the external network until successful authentication and authorization are attained. It also supports distribution of client IP Addresses (DHCP). It offers custom DNS support to resolve user-defined host names to user-defined IP address.

Mobile IP support: The Aptilo Access Controller comes with a Foreign Agent (FA) for Mobile IP. Mobile IP is an IETF standard aimed at supporting roaming between different wired and wireless networks. The main purpose with the FA is to save IP addresses and simplify mobility management when mobile users are visiting a foreign network.

Authorization, authentication and accounting support: The authentication process enables client terminals to be authenticated without the installation of any special software other than a standard browser with Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) support. The Aptilo solution supports the following types of authentication:

RADIUS Server located in the Aptilo Service Management Platform
Remote RADIUS server interaction via RADIUS proxy
Roaming support through RADIUS proxy
Online Credit Card payments
Mobile Phone account charging
SMS-OTP (One-Time-Passwords)
Vouchers and Scratch Card
E-Vouchers
802.1x ( MD-5, EAP-TLS, EAP-SIM, etc.)
Automatic MAC/Cookie-address logon
Software based clients for automatic end-user access from various vendors and service providers (e.g. WISPr compatible clients, iPass, Boingo and Vodafone)
PMS (Property Management System) interaction for hotel room billing

Reliability: The Aptilo Access Controller runs on reliable standard hardware or flash disk based hardware with no moving parts and Linux OS based software that offer support for redundancy, high availability and load sharing. This ensures high performance, scalability and reliability for the service provider.

Load sharing
In large broadband networks or in networks with high load and traffic, such as city wide networks, the number of concurrent users can become larger than a single Aptilo Access Controller can handle. The Aptilo system effectively addresses this issue by providing load sharing and automatic redundancy functionalities.

With the load balancing feature in the Aptilo system, adding capacity in the network becomes a simple task of adding an additional Aptilo Access Controller and including it in the server cluster.

One-to-many Redundancy
One backup Aptilo Access Controller can be on hot standby for all primary servers. Would an Access Controller enter a faulty state, the backup will take over operations for that specific primary Access Controller, with all the relevant settings mirrored from the primary configuration.

Flash disk based platform support: The Aptilo Access Controller comes also in a tailored version when flash disk based hardware with no moving parts is used. This provides a solution with minimal maintenance needs and a minimized risk for hardware failures when a distributed access control is required. A number of flash disk based models and brands are supported today from market leading vendors.

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