Integrated ICN and CDN Slice as a Service

In this article, we leverage Network Function Virtualization (NFV) and Multi-Access Edge Computing (MEC) technologies, proposing a system which integrates ICN (Information-Centric Network) with CDN (Content Delivery Network) to provide an efficient content delivery service. The proposed system combines the dynamic CDN slicing concept with the NDN (Named Data Network) based ICN slicing concept to avoid core network congestion. A dynamic CDN slice is deployed to cache content at optimal locations depending on the nature of the content and the geographical distributions of potential viewers. Virtual cache servers, along with supporting virtual transcoders, are placed across a cloud belonging to multiple-administrative domains, forming a CDN slice. The ICN slice is, in turn, used for the regional distribution of content, leveraging the name-based access and the autonomic in-network content caching. This enables the delivery of content from nearby network nodes, avoiding the duplicate transfer of content and also ensuring shorter response times. Our experiments demonstrate that integrated ICN/CDN is better than traditional CDN in almost all aspects, including service scalability, reliability, and quality of service.