Picture this: you’re on summer vacation in Barcelona, and while walking throughout the city, you’re able to seamlessly and securely roam between various Wi-Fi networks. Essentially, you’ll be able to enjoy consistent connectivity at all times – this is the City Wi-Fi Roaming Project!
From June until the end of August, residents and visitors of the following 17 cities can take advantage of roaming between Wi-Fi networks:
Barcelona (Spain), Birmingham (UK), Bradford (UK), Dublin (Ireland), Kazan (Russia), Leeds (UK), Limerick (Ireland), Moscow (Russia), New York City (USA), Nizhny Novgorod (Russia), Perm (Russia), Saint Petersburg (Russia), Samara (Russia), San Jose (USA), Sendai (Japan), Singapore, and Yekaterinburg (Russia).
The City Wi-Fi Roaming Project, in conjunction with the Wireless Broadband Alliance‘s World Wi-Fi Day initiative, aims to accelerate affordable wireless connectivity across the world. The WBA has defined the framework and best practices for roaming for the project through its Next Generation Hotspot (NGH), which is based on PasspointTM technology and WRIX (Wireless Roaming Intermediary Exchange). The comprehensive framework for Wi-Fi Roaming services provided by the WBA covers interconnection, data clearing, financial clearing and the exchange of Wi-Fi location information between operators. Together, these elements ensure a secure experience is delivered to end users
Even in major cities, a large percentage of the population remains unconnected, and these initiatives are a part of WBA’s goal to bridge the digital divide. This wouldn’t be possible without our Interconnectivity Partners and Infrastructure Providers, which includes Accuris Networks, Syniverse, BSG Wireless, with Cisco, Aruba Networks, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, and Ruckus Wireless as the infrastructure providers. GlobalReach delivers the captive portal for the project, and is providing a Wi-Fi AAA/Hotspot 2.0 online signup (OSU) platform.
In addition, participating operators in each city include:
2 Degrees New Zealand, AT&T, Airtel, AIS Thailand, Bell Mobility, BT, Celcom Axiata Berhad, China Mobile, csl Hong Kong, Dialog Axiata, Etisalat Nigeria, Fon, Idea Cellular, JSC ER-Telecom Holding, Korea Telecom, M1, MegaFon RU, Mobilink, Mobily, Mobitel, MTN Nigeria, NTT DOCOMO, Omantel, Orange, Portugal Telecom, PT Telkom Indonesia, Robi Axiata, Shaw, SKT, Smartone, StarHub, Sudatel, Swisscom, TATA Teleservices, Telstra, Telus, TRUE, and Videotron.
You can view and download the Connecting Network Map below:
The full press release for the City Wi-Fi Roaming Project can be found here.
