Since the dawn of civilization, communication has played a vital role in the way we interact. From the smoke signals used by ancient peoples to modern telecommunications systems, we witnessed an unprecedented technological evolution. Pigeon post (which, for centuries, was the fastest and safest way to convey messages in different historical contexts) was replaced by telegraphs, which revolutionised distance communication through the use of Morse code. In 1876, Alexander Graham Bell made remote voice communication possible with the invention of the telephone. This was followed by radio and television, which allowed the mass dissemination of information and entertainment; in the 1990s, the Internet became a popular phenomenon. Mobile devices became smartphones over a 20-year period, and 40 years later, no one remembers how it all began. Every day, we excel in this mission of breaking down the physical and time barriers that separate us. From this side, words flow through a computer keyboard to get to you – and you just need a single click.
The miniaturisation of devices, the development of new materials and the improvement of telecommunications networks have enabled the creation of increasingly fast, reliable and affordable communications systems. Telecommunications play a crucial role in economic growth, enabling online financial transactions, fostering collaboration between companies and facilitating business expansion. In addition, they have driven technological progress in several sectors, like Artificial Intelligence (AI) or virtual reality (VR).
What’s our current context? Where do we go from here? What are the challenges associated with the technological developments in telecommunications? Come and find out, with the help of our researchers! .–. .-. . .–. .- .-. .- -.. — ..–..
From generation to generation: the evolution of telecommunications
In 1986, INESC TEC worked on the project SIFO: Services Integrated with Optical Fibres; the objective, as the name implies, was to provide integrated communications services with optical fibres to convey data, allow voice calls and videocalls, etc. – all of these directly from people’s homes. Manuel Ricardo, Associate Director of INESC TEC, talked about it. “At the time, we used analogue phones connected to the network, and we had to dial the numbers with disks. There was no data transfer, there was no Internet, there were no cell phones. The television signal came from the antennas placed on the rooftops. I remember talking to people who weren’t familiarised with technology and nobody understood the type of work I was doing. INESC TEC was working on the frontline, and the Institute work was ground-breaking”.
Being at the forefront, INESC TEC has always played a key role in the technological evolution of telecommunications. Today, research focuses on 6G, even though most of us have only just begun to hear about 5G, which isn’t totally implemented yet. Why is this so? Given that there are many players in the telecommunications industry (manufacturers, operators, research groups), this technology must be standardised and regulated. This process usually takes place on a regular basis; and every 10 years, a new generation emerges. The 3G emerged in 2000, while the 4G and 5G occurred in 2010 and 2020, respectively; according to the predictions, the sixth generation of telecommunications will emerge in 2030. In one or two years, the international community will set objectives and requirements on 6G standardisation, regulation, and manufacturing. Right now, there are only visions and ideas.
Telecommunication with superpowers: from sensing to reconfigurable surfaces
Can you imagine telecommunications networks that, besides communicating, can operate as radars? This is the basis of sensing. “Besides communicating with mobile phones, the antennas placed on rooftops will be able to perceive and interpret the environment, beyond what’s observable, with a centimetric or millimetric precision. These systems will be able to observe everything that surrounds them”, explained Manuel Ricardo.
Luís Pessoa, researcher at INESC TEC Centre for Telecommunications and Multimedia, has also been working on this area, and he believes that sensing will change significantly with the introduction of 6G. “The scientific community has realised that wireless communications equipment shows great potential as sensing solutions, which is even more interesting as operating frequencies rise, allowing one to reach an accuracy of centimetres or millimetres”. These changes could have an impact on the life of the average user, even more so from the point of view of business and industry. “5G already addresses some of the needs of enterprises by being able to – through private networks – ensure services with higher quality and reliability, but without the sensing component. Sensing will enable digital insight, creating models of what is happening, and allowing one to locate people and terminals with greater precision. For example, in the factories of the future (one of the scenarios we are exploring), the integration of increasingly autonomous robots that collaborate with each other will be a potential scenario. Therefore, a completely digital model of the entire environment will be needed to perceive, and even to anticipate, possible accidents; or even to change tasks to achieve more efficiency”, he stated.
When we talk about business contexts, 6G seems to play a quite relevant role. “Wi-Fi is also a widespread technology, but it’s mostly used for home/office networks. Why? Because of the scope and spectrum sharing. Concerning Wi-Fi, the power cannot be too high, and the access points’ density is a crucial aspect to ensure good coverage, e.g., inside a building. That’s why companies perceive 5G or 6G as the future, both in terms of coverage and reliability”, mentioned Luís Pessoa.
Another of the great benefits of 6G will be the communication capacity, allowing higher transmission speeds: we will move from a Gigabit/s to a Terabit/s, with implications in other technologies, like virtual reality and augmented reality. Manuel Ricardo also talked about this: “In the future, the football stadiums environments will enter our homes, thanks to immersive solutions. For this to happen, it is necessary to transmit a lot of information simultaneously, with great speed”.
We communicate within the 3 GHz scope[1]; but we’re expected to reach 30 GHz with 5G working in full. With 6G, it will be possible to work with frequencies between 100 and 300 GHz – which could pose several challenges, namely in terms of signal coverage. In this sense, INESC TEC is working on the development of reconfigurable surfaces (in this case, antennas), within the scope of the TERRAMETA project; this initiative aims to explore higher frequencies, in order to address coverage issues. “In large cities, when there are many buildings, it’s hard to get signal in certain areas. The same happens inside buildings, where there are many obstacles that can block said signal. These smart surfaces will redirect the signals to where the users are. They work almost as signal duplicators, relaying the signal and tracking the user. We may have these antennas on windows, walls and ceilings, or even on car windows or billboards”, said Luís Pessoa.
Smarter and more sustainable communication systems
It is estimated that 20.000 low-altitude satellites are enough to cover the Earth’s surface, something that could happen in the upcoming years, with the arrival of the so-called non-terrestrial telecommunications network. It will act as complementary network to the one we already have installed to increase communication capacity in specific situations. Scenario 1: A music festival in a rural area, unable to withstand the high density of mobile phones per square meter. Scenario 2: An incident in an area where there is no communications network, e.g., forest fire.
In both scenarios, the solution could rely on the use of mobile cells. “We have been developing several research projects in this area. We’ve deployed a drone that monitors the movement of firefighters or emergency teams on the ground, providing them coverage, and allowing them to make voice and video calls, and to access maps”, explained Manuel Ricardo. INESC TEC has also carried out research in underwater communications, using robots with antennas, connected to low-altitude platforms supported, for instance, by helium balloons.
Behind telecommunications networks there is a very complex system, composed of hundreds of functions performed at different points of the network, while also operating among themselves. 6G networks will be the perfect backdrop to replace certain functions by neural networks or artificial brains. The main benefit will be the increased speed and efficiency of said functions. In this sense, INESC TEC has been collaborating (since 2007) in a telecommunications network simulator – Network Simulator 3 (ns-3) – written in programming languages accessible to everyone; therefore, all research groups can have access to it and contribute to the simulator’s improvement. And the work done thus far has been ground-breaking. “On the one hand, we are trying to understand how new AI functions can be integrated into telecommunications networks and, on the other hand, we’re using the simulator to generate synthetic data, non-existent at the time, which are necessary to train neural networks in the foreseeable futuristic scenarios. Our goal is the development of solutions capable of implementing the functions usually done by algorithms”, said Manuel Ricardo.
Ambitious in terms of technology, but also sustainability, the latest projects in which INESC TEC has been involved (SUPERIOT and TORIS) seek to understand how environmentally friendly materials can be used in the development of antennas. “We align ourselves with the trend of sustainability, environmentally as well as economically. From an environmental point of view, we seek manufacturing processes without significant footprints, and the use of recyclable materials. Moreover, we’re also exploring technologies that can be manufactured on a larger scale, at a lower cost”, said Luís Pessoa.
Manuel Ricardo went even further, remembering that, in the telecommunications community, there is a mission to reduce energy consumption. “Our ongoing research focuses on making the radio access points and the equipment behind the antennas to stop or start working with less power, namely when they are not needed. Basically, we will switch off communications the same way we usually turn off the lights”.
The project CONVERGE, for instance, aims to develop a set of innovative tools to support research infrastructures, based on several of these concepts. Combining wireless communications, computer vision, sensing and machine learning, the project, led by INESC TEC, is based on the “see-to-communicate and communicate-to-see” paradigm.
“There are many initiatives focusing on the creation of scientific equipment to complement a set of laboratories in Europe and the United States of America, which will be used by researchers around the world to carry out experiments or access data sets[2]. Computer models (Digital Twin), inspired by the network simulation techniques we have learned with ns-3, will also be deployed to replicate these laboratory environments under development. It is a truly relevant and universal process. I would not say it is the First League; I think we are performing very well in the European Champions League of telecommunications”, stated Manuel Ricardo.
Trust in telecommunications: will we answer the call?
With this grandiose commitment to sensing in the sixth generation networks, a question emerges: are we safe?
António Pinto, researcher at INESC TEC Centre for Advanced Computing Systems (CRACS), has been working on security and privacy issues; he added that, considering the hyperconnectivity of 6G, there is a lot of work to be done. “6G allows us to develop completely disruptive and innovative services. But it also generates a significant problem, from the point of view of people’s exposure: in practical terms, we become motion sensors. And even if the technology has a purpose other than controlling the masses and the people, nothing tells us that the data cannot be used by less adequate agents, e.g., hackers, financed by powerful groups and even governments. It is important not to let our fear become a technological barrier; but it is also important that the new technology that emerges is already equipped with protection mechanisms”, he suggested.
The European Union has shown clear signs of concern about the issue of security, by providing funding mechanisms for research in the area. This is where the PRIVATEER project comes in – featuring INESC TEC participation. This initiative explored the so-called security enablers, i.e., features or components that promote privacy and security and that can be used in future 6G networks. The project identified potential scenarios, like smart cities, but there is still great uncertainty. “We want to find out what are the core technologies of 6G and build cybersecurity and privacy promotion mechanisms that any operator is able to install. For example, with 6G, there will be intensive monitoring in public places; but unlike a video surveillance system that does not automatically identify people, sensing will allow us to collect identifiers associated with people, without them realising it and without them being able to protect themselves”.
The study on mobility “Unique in the crowd“, carried out at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was able to identify 95% of people from a universe of 1.5 million individuals, through telephone calls or SMS. If this was possible through GSM antennas, what can we expect from 6G?
“There are two premises at play here. People know that they are being monitored and can adjust their behaviour by turning off their phone, for example. Or they don’t know they’re being monitored, and then we must detect those intrusive behaviours. One of the security enablers that PRIVATEER is working on is the detection of malware and misbehaviour, and the sharing of indicators of said behaviour. The other is Artificial Intelligence. There is a significant problem in the use of AI, which operates via machine learning. Therefore, we want to create security enablers based on explainable AI“, concluded António Pinto – reinforcing that, with the development and implementation of these new technologies, the secret will be to find a balance for their use.
We’re not in the final stage of telecommunications development; at a time when television shows us ads that promise the advent of 5G, with 6G already on the horizon, it makes sense to go back almost 50 years, and remember that George Lucas used holograms as a means of transmitting messages in 1977’s Episode IV of the Star Wars saga. Are we walking in that direction?
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