In recent years, SS7 (Signaling System No. 7), Diameter, and SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) have become invaluable for modern telecom operators. Although they are not used to transfer data within a network, they provide vital network elements for orchestrating communication. Their primary roles include call setups, roaming, number portability, messaging, voice/video calls, subscriber authentication, policy control, and more.
Signaling security has become a major issue for operators around the world. As modern networks use a hybrid structure, combining SIP, Diameter, and SS7, operators have to deal with a large attack surface, signaling-layer exploits, and interoperability issues. The biggest threats include DOS attacks, toll fraud, impersonation, overload attacks, AVP manipulation, SMS hijacking, location tracking, and more.
While some of these challenges might seem insurmountable, Titan.ium provides just the right solution for your daily security issues. By relying on its multi-protocol signaling firewall, the platform provides a unified defense across different technologies. Besides deployment flexibility, Titan.ium offers protocol-aware intelligence, real-time enforcement, and global variant support.
The Evolving Threat Landscape in Telecom Signaling
Given that SS7 was developed in a full-trust era, it is simply unable to handle suspicious traffic. This results in various issues, such as location tracking, SMS interception, call redirection, and roaming abuse. If we consider the technology's lack of authentication, SS7 becomes a common target in interconnect scenarios.
Unfortunately, the introduction of SIP and Diameter didn't stave off these threats. In fact, they further amplified the risks because of its open, IP-based architecture. By using commodity tools, attackers can freely exploit vulnerabilities within the systems.
To make things worse, we've seen an increased number of different fraud tactics. In Wangiri, for example, attackers make short calls and hang up, straining the system. IRSF, or International Revenue Share Fraud, is another issue that revolves around exploiting SIM boxes, roaming configurations, and PBXs. Robocalls have also become more common, causing a massive influx of spam within a network.
To stay ahead of ever-evolving security threats, operators must introduce proactive solutions that rely on real-time data processing. This technology relies on artificial intelligence and machine learning, which allows it to adapt to various attacks over time.
Titan.ium’s Unified Approach to Signaling Security
Titan.ium's SFW (Signaling Firewall) is perfect for telecom technicians who have to deal with complex signaling protocols. Our solution can detect different types of threats in real-time by performing message screening, rate limiting, and modifications. Furthermore, it introduces dynamic rules that help mitigate zero-day threats.
It is a multi-protocol solution, perfect for a combination of SIP, Diameter, and SS7. The platform is able to detect threats across different roaming interfaces and interworking gateways. As such, it is vital to identify multi-vector attacks.
The great thing about Titan.ium is that it can be deployed across different telecommunication generations and signaling layers. As such, it provides numerous financial, strategic, and operational benefits to operators.
The platform's modular architecture gives users unprecedented flexibility. With its InterGENerational signaling technology, Titan.ium can streamline subscriber data management, firewall processes, routing, and analytics.
Real-Time Detection: Going Beyond Post-Processing
The biggest issue with old FMS (Fraud Management Systems) is the delayed detection. The technology analyzes usage data and call records after suspicious behavior, which simply doesn't work against modern signaling threats. Furthermore, traditional FMSs use static rule sets, which can be easily evaded.
Our platform analyzes signaling behavior over time, which enhances SLA enforcement and threat detection. The platform sends alerts when signaling goes over certain preset thresholds, as well as any other traffic anomalies.Titan.ium also flags mismatches between different protocols.
Our solution is able to analyze the context of each threat. It protects your system by monitoring transaction states and message sequences. The platform relies on the same session context when analyzing all messages, which is critical for identifying invalid transactions, unexpected message types, and session hijacking attempts.
Titan.ium protects the company's revenues in real-time, while also ensuring a premium subscriber experience. Some of the most common use cases include SS7 location tracking, IRSF call burst, Diamater AVP manipulation, SS7 location tracking, and cross-protocol congruency violations.
Granular Message Control for SS7, Diameter, and SIP
With Titan. ium's solution, you'll have more granular control of the entire signaling security process. Our platform gives customers full access to various features, including deep packet inspection for nested AVPs (S6a, Gx, S9) and protocol layers.
The firewall gives users the ability to fine-tune different policies. For example, you can pair rule sets with messages by analyzing rate, content, context, and origin for better screening. You can also drop messages that go against plausibility checks and rules.
With dynamic gauges, operators can enforce thresholds and signaling velocity. The technology is vital for safeguarding downstream elements from signaling storms. Dynamic gauges also work for SLA guarantees.
With granular control, you can protect your telecommunication network from robocall fraud and Wangiri. When it comes to robocalls, Titan.ium is able to flag SIP INVITE floods that have invalid routing and spoofed headers. As for Wangiri, the technology quickly detects call bursts to expensive numbers. It adjusts to these anomalies by blocking callbacks.
Protocol-Specific Defenses and Standards Compliance
- SS7 Security Features
- SS7 is fully compliant with applicable GSMA standards, in particular, FS.07, FS.11, and FS.21.
- The protocol monitors TCAP, protects against spoofed or malformed messages, and tracks the signaling message rate.
- It is especially potent against DDoS migration, IRSF, and bypass fraud, which are considered the biggest signaling security threats.
- Diameter Security Features
- Similar to SS7, Diameter is compliant with GSMA FS.19, FS.21.
- Diameter performs inspection of AVP (Attribute-Value Pairs). Recently, GSMA has introduced new standards that would control the behavior of Diameter firewalls, bringing much more control and reliability to signaling security.
- Additionally, Diameter provides benefits in the form of TDOS (Telecom Denial of Service) protection and SLA enforcement.
- SIP Security Features (Covered via shared SFW capabilities)
- Through real-time monitoring, operators are able to detect SIP-based TDOS, spoofing, call hijacking, malformed message attacks, and SIP flooding.
- Tintan.ium monitors SS7 and Diameter traffic and compares them to SIP events to identify anomalies across different protocols.
The Power of Titan.ium’s Rules Engine
Titan.ium's rules engine is one of the most notable features present on the platform. It is a highly flexible solution allowing your security teams to create workflows with minimal coding. On top of that, you can change the rules within seconds, without interfering with users' experience.
Our platform is excellent for multi-event correlation, which is vital for hybrid environments. You can modify detection logic according to roaming agreements, network topology, and subscribers, making it perfect for different use cases.
The best thing is that you can introduce all these changes by yourself, without having to wait for our programmers to patch the platform. This flexibility gives you a chance to quickly adapt to regulatory changes, full-scale attacks, and zero-day threats.
For example, if Titan.ium platform can identify a Diameter zero-day exploit by the surge in CCR messages. Upon inspection, it will flag malformed AVPs. As a result, you can stave off the attack by yourself, within minutes, without suffering downtime or having to send us a support ticket.
Deployment Flexibility Without Network Disruption
Titan.ium offers three deployment models:
- Overlay Firewall: This deployment model provides fast rollout and is generally considered non-intrusive, relying on passive taps and traffic mirroring.
- Front-end/Back-end In-line Firewall: The best thing about this model is that you can deploy front-end in-line and back-end in-line at the same time, for complete protection.
- Integrated Firewall with STP/DSC: Operators use this model for modernization and greenfield deployments, as it makes management that much simpler.
Another benefit of Titan.ium solution is reflected in its integration across various topologies. Operators can accomplish this through protocol-aware filtering, a dynamic rule engine, and in-line/passive modes. All of this results in faster deployment, scalable protection, and unheard of simplicity.
Our solution works well with both cloud-native and legacy environments.
Collocation and Service Chaining in the Titan.ium Ecosystem
Hosting firewalls by relying on Titan.ium elements will provide a plethora of benefits, including low-latency threat detection, unified policy enforcement, simplified architecture, high scalability, and service chaining for advanced use cases.
Service chaining, in particular, will ensure traffic goes through network functions in a predetermined order. Through its modular architecture, protocol-agnostic routing, and centralized orchestration, Titan.ium ensures simplified network design. Furthermore, service chaining is essential for minimizing the hardware footprint.
Future-Proofing Signaling Security
Static firewalls have shown numerous flaws over the years. Due to their protocol rigidity, limited control, and manual rule updates, they simply can't keep up with the constantly evolving threats.
The good news is that you can address all these issues by introducing Titan.ium SFW into your workflow. Its flexibility gives you an enormous advantage over your competition by increasing scaling and adaptability across legacy and modern network generations.
Our solution can adapt to incoming threats without necessitating product updates. With its automated certificate lifetime management, microservices-based architecture, service mash integration, and dynamic threat intelligence, it gives rein to operators.
Titan.ium SFW is built on a carrier-grade, field-hardened platform, which has been tested numerous times in the past. As such, it is the solution of choice for operators across the globe.
Signaling security protects the underlying mechanisms that ensure seamless mobile communication and service delivery, thus increasing subscriber experience. Without products such as Titan.ium SFW, an ecosystem becomes vulnerable to ever-evolving threats.
The things that set this product apart are real-time defenses, multi-protocol protection, complete configurability, and flexible deployments. To enjoy all these benefits, contact Titan.ium team today and secure your network for years to come. Contact our team today to learn more about the product and how it can help your business.