Patent ID: 7289805

Claim:
A system for providing a temporary subscriber identity service to a mobile communications device roaming in a service area of a service provider network that does not serve the mobile communications device as a home subscriber, comprising: a temporary subscriber identity (TSI) server that receives and processes TSI request messages and provides temporary subscriber identities that were obtained from the service provider and provisioned in the TSI server, to permit the roaming mobile communications device to function as a home subscriber in the service provider network; and a TSI client on the mobile communications device that inspects service provider information received from the service provider network, directs temporary registration of the mobile communications device with the service provider network using a permanent subscriber identity assigned to the mobile communications device to open a data communications channel through the service provider network, and sends the TSI request messages over the data communications channel to the TSI server to request the temporary subscriber identity, receives the temporary subscriber identity from the TSI server and directs the mobile communications device to re-register with the service provider, so that the mobile communications device is registered with the service provider as a local service subscriber for at least a predetermined period of time.