The serval mesh: A platform for resilient communications in disaster & crisis

Paul Gardner-Stephen, Romana Challans, Jeremy Lakeman, Andrew Bettison, Dione Gardner-Stephen, Matthew Lloyd

    Research output: Contribution to conferencePaperpeer-review

    38 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    The challenges of many crisis communication needs can be summarised as: the need to allow civilians to safely communicate with one another, and with the outside world, without reliance on any domestic terrestrial infrastructure, or on the import of physical materials. Therefore, any solution should place high precedence on infrastructure-independent operation, and the re-use of existing hardware technology. Expanding on this concept, we present a prototype solution, the Serval Mesh, and briefly discuss the design decisions that were made, and summarise the trial and pilots conducted to date. Together, these show that the Serval Mesh is well placed to provide secure, resilient mobile communications services in a variety of situations, and in conjunction with the air-droppable UHF-packet-radio enabled Serval Mesh Extender concept, to provide such services over longer distances than is possible for Wi-Fi based mobile mesh networks. Thus we argue by example that it is possible to enable effective use of mobile phones during periods of infrastructure-deprivation.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages162-166
    Number of pages5
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2013
    EventIEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference -
    Duration: 20 Oct 2013 → …

    Conference

    ConferenceIEEE Global Humanitarian Technology Conference
    Period20/10/13 → …

    Keywords

    • MANET
    • resilience
    • Serval Mesh
    • smart-phone

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