MECHANISM TO UNIQUELY IDENTIFY AND UNIFY A USER'S SET OF PACKET BEARER CONTEXTS IN A MOBILE TELECOMMUNICATIONS NETWORK

摘要

A traffic plane entity (e.g., user plane entity (UPE), serving gateway (S-GW)) and method are described herein for allocating a unique identifier (e.g., UPE/S-GW UE-Context-Id) which identifies and unifies a set of bearers within a UE context that is associated with a given UE. In operation, the traffic plane entity can then send the allocated unique identifier to another entity (e.g., mobility management entity (MME)) which at a subsequent time re-sends the unique identifier back to the traffic plane entity along with a request to have the traffic plane entity perform a specific operation or procedure on the bearers associated with the UE context of the given UE. Upon receiving the request, the traffic plane entity uses the unique identifier to perform the requested operation or procedure simultaneously on all of the bearers associated with the UE context of the given UE.