DiFi: A Go-as-You-Pay Wi-Fi Access System

Abstract

As video streaming services become more popular, users desire high perceived video quality, which has placed more stringent requirements on the quality of connection. Existing issues of cellular networks encourage users to seek alternative connections such as public Wi-Fi networks; however, expectations of both users and owners of Wi-Fi networks are not sufficiently satisfied and various concerns are yet to be addressed by a better Wi-Fi access system. Based on a go-as-you-pay scheme, we design and implement DiFi, a per-user-based system with dynamic resource allocation and pricing. DiFi offers data burst that accommodates user requirements on the burstiness of traffic, in addition to bandwidth. It better caters to the various individual requirements of users, and better utilizes the limited network resources for the owners. We leverage the blockchain-based smart contract to address realistic concerns on decentralized control, privacy and trustiness and our implementation is compatible with existing Wi-Fi infrastructures.