Mobile traffic analytics enable the study of the movement and service consumption of mobile subscribers at large scales. The rise of mobile traffic analytics is fostered by an unprecedented availability of data, collected by mobile operators through probes deployed at the access and core networks, or gathered by dedicated research initiatives via monitoring apps running on users’ smartphones. Both approaches can harvest information about large populations, from hundreds to millions individuals, over long time periods, from weeks to years. The richness of mobile traffic datasets is paramount to research in a wide range of disciplines, including, e.g., sociology, transportations, statistical physics, epidemiology, and – of course – networking. However, several technical challenges need to be tackled to release the full potential of such data sources, including the assessment of statistical robustness of inferred knowledge, the overcoming of scalability issues, and the consideration for data access limitations imposed by privacy regulations that tend to reduce data usability.
The aim of this Special Issue is to gather contributions presenting state-of-the-art research dealing with all facets of mobile traffic analytics. We expect submissions to present quantitative evaluations carried out on substantial real-world datasets of mobile traffic. Here, we intend the term “traffic” in its wider acceptation. We thus invite works on data collected via, e.g., Call Detail Records (CDR), access (RNC) and core (MSC, GGSN/PGW) network probes, or smartphone monitoring apps; data can be limited to mobility patterns, it can concern traditional user-to-user mobile services (i.e., calling and texting), it can focus on the mobile data traffic demand (at any granularity, from throughput volumes to the precise services and protocols employed), or it can contain any combination of such information types.
We especially encourage the submission of interdisciplinary research works at the interface between networking and disciplines such as those mentioned above. Special attention will be deserved to findings and results that have practical applications in terms of technological innovation, sustainable development, data and network management, and mobile services. Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
Original (open) mobile traffic datasets
Preparation and management of mobile traffic datasets
Generative models for synthetic mobile traffic datasets
Algorithms, structures, and (visual) tools for mobile traffic analysis
Privacy and security issues in mobile traffic analysis, including countermeasures
Inference of social features and mobility patterns from mobile traffic
Profiling of mobile device and mobile users from mobile traffic
Characterization of the mobile subscriber demand from mobile traffic
Comparison of mobile traffic features across cities, regions, and countries
Mobile traffic analytics for Intelligent Transportation Systems
Mobile traffic analytics for cognitive and anticipatory networking
Mobile access and core network enhancements from mobile traffic analysis
Mobile traffic analytics for device-to-device and opportunistic communication
Mobile service marketing strategies from mobile traffic analysis
Schedule
Manuscript submission deadline: October 16, 2015
First notification: January 22, 2016
Submission of revised paper: March 11, 2016
Notification of acceptance: April 16, 2016
The submission website for this journal is located at http://ees.elsevier.com/comcom. To ensure that all manuscripts are correctly identified for inclusion into the Special Issue, the authors have to select “SI Mobile Traffic Analytics” when they reach the “Article Type” step in the submission process.
