Remote management of mobile devices with broadband forum's TR-069

Remote device and network management can play an important role in realizing efficient and user-friendly deployment of fixed-mobile converged network services. TR-069 is currently the most popular remote-management protocol in the DSL world, but is not used in mobile networks. This paper investigates the applicability of TR-069 for remote device management of mobile devices. We installed a TR-069 client on a mobile phone, and measured the performance of the protocol in relation to the properties of the mobile data connection and the small footprint of the mobile device. The results confirm theoretical considerations derived from literature. The main conclusion is that TR-069 can be safely used for remote management of mobile devices, but requires a higher connection capacity of the remote management server due to the longer connection times in mobile networks.