Patent ID: 9319867
Filing Date: 2016-04-19
CPC Classification: H04L,H04M,H04W

Claim Text:
1. A method of controlling user sessions at an IP Connectivity Access Network, hereinafter IP-CAN sessions, for a plurality of users of a Policy and Charging Control, hereinafter PCC, architecture through a unique session maintained between a Policy and Charging control Rules Function, hereinafter PCRF, and a Policy and Charging Enforcement Function, hereinafter PCEF, the method comprising the steps of: provisioning a number of user community profiles at a user database system, wherein each user community profile contains PCC-related information applicable to a plurality of users; associating at the user database system each user community profile with a group identifier that identifies user identifiers of the plurality of users to which the user community profile is applicable, the group identifier is a regular expression that identifies the user identifiers for the plurality of users by including an indication of a range of users to identify the plurality of users; upon establishment of an IP-CAN session from a first user of the plurality of users, a PCEF establishing a session with a PCRF and requesting PCC rules for the IP-CAN session by providing an identifier of the first user; upon request from a PCRF of a user profile for a user identified by the identifier of the first user, the user database system determining the group identifier that identifies the identifier of the first user, and providing the user community profile associated with the group identifier to the PCRF; generating at the PCRF community PCC rules corresponding to the user community profile and submitting the community PCC rules to the PCEF; at the PCEF, obtaining the group identifier and installing the community PCC rules to be applied for the first user and all subsequent users identified by the group identifier; providing from the user database system the group identifier along with the user community profile associated with the group identifier to the PCRF; submitting from the PCRF the group identifier along with the community PCC rules to the PCEF; and associating at the PCEF the group identifier with the community PCC rules.