AI-Driven Traffic Steering xApp for Open RAN: A Cloud-Native Quantum-Safe Approach

While the O-RAN Alliance is gaining momentum in democratizing RAN innovation through multi-vendor interoperability, there remains a gap in empirical performance evaluation of O-RAN applications deployed with future-proof security measures on carrier-grade components. Furthermore, how implementing an advanced security measure impacts the overall O-RAN performance is largely understudied in true cloud-native deployments. This paper presents a comprehensive integration of an O-RAN-specific testbed that utilizes a quantum-safe security technology, an industry-leading O-RAN test emulator, and a carrier-grade Near-Real-Time (near-RT) RIC platform hosting our custom AI-driven Traffic Steering (TS) xApp. Our threefold contribution includes developing an innovative TS xApp for efficient RAN load-balancing on the fly, empirically measuring RAN key performance indicators (KPIs), and assessing the security solution's impact on overall system performance. Results demonstrate that our TS xApp enhances the downlink throughput by 3.88% and improves the median user QoS scores by 2.52%. In particular, the quantum-safe security measure implemented to secure the O-RAN E2 interface in the multi-vendor deployment, adds only 0.818 milliseconds of average latency which remains well below one second, the maximum acceptable threshold for near-RT RIC control loop response time.