Patent ID: 8130703

Claim:
A method for facilitating packet switched operations in an unlicensed mobile access (UMA) network, the method comprising: establishing a transmission control protocol (TCP) connection between a network controller and a mobile station (MS); using the TCP connection to transfer signaling messages between the network controller and the MS to facilitate packet switched operations, each signaling message comprising: a protocol discriminator, a skip indicator, and a message type via which the message is to be identified; and receiving at the network controller an ACTIVATE-UTC-REQ message from the MS for activating a transport channel (TC) for General Packet Radio Service (GPRS) data transfer services, the TC for providing an uplink GPRS data transfer service from the MS to the network controller and a downlink GPRS data transfer service from the network controller to the MS, the ACTIVATE-UTC-REQ message comprising an MS User Datagram Protocol (UDP) port information element (IE) that indicates a port number of the MS for the downlink GPRS data transfer service.