Supporting Dynamic Secure Interdomain Routing

Path aware networking (PAN) is an approach that allows endpoints to participate in the end-to-end path selection, letting them choose paths best suited for each application. This approach offers numerous potential benefits including rapid fail-over, concurrent use of parallel paths, and QoS enabled networks, even spanning multiple domains. The dynamic interconnection of different autonomous systems (ASes) in path aware networks offers both challenges and opportunities for network service providers, which in turn provide opportunities for traffic engineering previously not possible. The SCION path-aware network architecture has been designed from the ground up with security in mind, and features a trust structure that can serve as a basis for more dynamic interconnection between ASes. In this paper, we describe a prototype spot market that lets the ASes sell time-limited excess capacity, allowing buyers to divert traffic to cheaper alternatives temporarily. We believe this market allows for new opportunities both in traffic engineering and inter-domain connectivity that have not existed before. The market benefits all parties involved, as the formerly wasted bandwidth is now used, and provides additional revenue - in varying degrees - to all the participating entities.