Example methods and apparatus for associating media devices with a demographic composition of a geographic area are disclosed. Disclosed example apparatus are to obtain a plurality of Internet Protocol addresses assigned to a media device associated with a panel member. Disclosed example apparatus are also to determine a most used Internet Protocol address from the plurality of Internet Protocol addresses, determine a geographic location corresponding to the most used Internet Protocol address, associate a geographic area with the media device in response to a determination that the geographic location corresponds to a location of an internet service provider, determine a demographic profile associated with the geographic area, and associate the demographic profile with the media device.

In an example, a Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) lease request from a client device connected to a network is received. Based on the DHCP lease request, an Internet Protocol (IP) address is assigned to the client device for a lease time. A first lease renewal request is received. A probability of utilization for a lease time block is predicted based on a historical lease pattern, device characteristics, traffic information, and DHCP information. Based on a combination of the probability of utilization and a reward value, the lease time block is allotted for lease renewal. For each allotment, the reward value is adjusted based on deployment characteristics and traffic load in the network, and a network connection duration of the client device. A normalized reward value for the lease time block is determined based on reward values for the lease time block over multiple allotments.

In an example, a Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) lease request from a client device connected to a network is received. Based on the DHCP lease request, an Internet Protocol (IP) address is assigned to the client device for a lease time. A first lease renewal request is received. A probability of utilization for a lease time block is predicted based on a historical lease pattern, device characteristics, traffic information, and DHCP information. Based on a combination of the probability of utilization and a reward value, the lease time block is allotted for lease renewal. For each allotment, the reward value is adjusted based on deployment characteristics and traffic load in the network, and a network connection duration of the client device. A normalized reward value for the lease time block is determined based on reward values for the lease time block over multiple allotments.

In selected embodiments, on-premises equipment of a cellular network provides local breakout functionality so that user plane data packets (PDNs/PDUs) are routed between the home/enterprise network and the Internet directly, bypassing a cloud-based core of the cellular network. The UE's control traffic is still routed to/from the core. The core may be an Evolved Packet Core (EPC) in a 4G LTE network, or a 5G Core (5GC) in a 5G network. The UE's IP addresses may be assigned by the core, or locally, by the on-premises equipment. Providing the IP context from the on-premises network allows the UE to connect to local devices, e.g., printers, disc raids, gaming and streaming nodes, and other local devices. The local IP context also pushes the complexity of the EPC core deployment to the cloud while reducing the overhead of cloud processing that comes with user plane data processing.

A system and method for internet numbers management is provided. Historical internet protocol (IP) block information associated with a plurality of IP blocks is received from a server database. The historical IP block information includes IP block size information and IP block type information. A machine learning model is trained based on the historical IP block information. Predictions are received from the trained machine learning model indicating a pool of IP blocks of the plurality of IP blocks to be audited. An electronic action is generated to obtain validation status information for each IP block of the pool of IP blocks. The historical IP block information in the server database is updated with the validation status information for each IP block of the pool of IP blocks.

Methods for configuring a monitoring device to communicate with a service server are provided. The method includes the monitoring device sending a message including a code used for authentication of the monitoring device to a control server, receiving one or more addresses of a service server associated with the monitoring device from the control server in response to the monitoring device being authenticated by the control server, storing the one or more addresses retrieved by the control server, and establishing a connection between the monitoring device and the service server using at least one of the one or more addresses received from the control server.

Methods for configuring a monitoring device to communicate with a service server are provided. The method includes the monitoring device sending a message including a code used for authentication of the monitoring device to a control server, receiving one or more addresses of a service server associated with the monitoring device from the control server in response to the monitoring device being authenticated by the control server, storing the one or more addresses retrieved by the control server, and establishing a connection between the monitoring device and the service server using at least one of the one or more addresses received from the control server.

A method for providing topology information, use of a name service server, a device, a computer program, a computer-readable medium and a method for configuring a device to be named within an industrial network, wherein a) the device to be named receives a neighbouring name message from a neighbouring device, b) a self-naming module creates a topological neighbouring domain name based on the neighbouring name message, c) the self-naming module transmits the topological neighbouring domain name to a name service server, d) the self-naming module receives from the name service server a response message, which includes at least one device name of the device to be named belonging to the topological neighbouring domain name, and e) at least one device name from the response message is assigned to the device to be named and this name is stored as the device name by the self-naming module.

A method for providing topology information, use of a name service server, a device, a computer program, a computer-readable medium and a method for configuring a device to be named within an industrial network, wherein a) the device to be named receives a neighbouring name message from a neighbouring device, b) a self-naming module creates a topological neighbouring domain name based on the neighbouring name message, c) the self-naming module transmits the topological neighbouring domain name to a name service server, d) the self-naming module receives from the name service server a response message, which includes at least one device name of the device to be named belonging to the topological neighbouring domain name, and e) at least one device name from the response message is assigned to the device to be named and this name is stored as the device name by the self-naming module.

A method, computer program product and a user equipment (UE) are provided for assisting a user equipment (UE) in selecting a network function. A first message is received from the UE. The first message includes UE request capabilities. A second message is sent to the UE. The second message includes an indication that promotes the UE attempting to connect to a particular Public Land Mobile Network (PLMN) using a network function belonging to the particular PLMN.