Overview
ISO/IEC 21559-3:2022 - "Telecommunications and information exchange between systems - Future network protocols and mechanisms - Part 3: Networking of everything" defines the functional procedures, service access interfaces (SAPs), and protocols needed to implement a Future Network for Networking of Everything (FN‑NoE). The standard focuses on enabling thing‑user social networking and proximity‑defined networking (PDN) by specifying the service primitives and message-level protocols required to support thing‑user centric communication and coordination.
Key topics and technical requirements
- Scope: Specifies functional procedures for thing‑user social networking and PDN, plus the service access interfaces and protocols to support the FN‑NoE functional procedures.
- Core concepts and terminology: Defines terms such as thing, thing‑user, FN‑NoE, PDN, thing‑user social network, thing‑user centric communication, and related context/identifier models.
- Functional procedures (documented as procedures):
- Thing‑user social community organization and maintenance
- Thing‑user experiences sharing
- Coordinated thing‑user discovery
- Proximal path establishment and maintenance
- Service Access Interfaces (SAPs) and primitives:
- NoE SAP - thing‑user centric communication primitives and autonomous coordination services
- TSN (Thing‑user Social Network) SAP - primitives for social community organization, join/leave, maintenance, subscribe/publish
- PDN SAP - primitives for peer discovery, proximity measures, and proximal path management
- Protocols and message types: Defines TSN and PDN protocol messages such as search/report, setup group, join/leave, coordinator election/renewal, subscribe/publish reports, set proximity measure, discover peer, and maintain proximal path.
Practical applications and who uses this standard
ISO/IEC 21559-3:2022 is applicable to systems and solutions that require coordinated networking among devices and users in close proximity or social contexts, including:
- IoT and smart city platforms that enable device-to-device social interactions and context‑aware services
- Industrial automation and collaborative robotics where coordinated discovery and proximal paths improve task orchestration
- Telecom operators and network architects designing future network services that support device social networking and proximity‑based connectivity
- Device manufacturers, IoT middleware vendors, and application developers implementing thing‑user centric communication and subscribe/publish workflows
- Researchers and standards bodies working on future network protocols and architectures
Related standards
- ISO/IEC 21558-3:2022 - FN‑NoE architecture (normative reference)
- ISO/IEC TR 29181-9:2017 - Future Network problem statement and requirements for Networking of Everything
Keywords: ISO/IEC 21559-3:2022, Networking of everything, FN‑NoE, thing‑user, proximity defined network, PDN, future network protocols, service access interfaces, TSN SAP, PDN protocols.