Patent ID: 8706148

Claim:
A method of routing legacy messages between a message centre and a mobile telecommunications device registered with a mobile telecommunications network, the mobile telecommunications network including a plurality of base stations each serving a plurality of mobile telecommunications devices, and a plurality of mobility management entities, each serving a plurality of said base stations, the mobility management entities being adapted to communicate using a legacy protocol with a legacy network for routing the legacy messages between the message centre and the mobile telecommunications device via the legacy network, the method comprising: providing a legacy message interworking function, wherein the legacy message interworking function is a stateless component that does not maintain a location or authentication status of each mobile telecommunications device registered with the mobile telecommunications network, wherein the legacy message interworking function performs the following: receives a legacy message from at least one of the mobility management entities using the legacy protocol; and directly routes the legacy message to the message centre without routing the legacy message via a mobile services switching centre of the legacy network.