Oceanth Generation| Internet on the Ocean

Project Details

Awards & Nominations

Oceanth Generation has received the following awards and nominations. Way to go!

Global Nominee

The Challenge | Internet on the Ocean

The internet is not easily accessible in many areas of the world, like the Earth’s oceans. Fishermen, sailors, and others have limited data connection with the rest of the world. Although satellite internet is widely available, it is very expensive for a user to implement. Your challenge is to design a low-cost method of delivering internet to people located far away on the ocean.

Let's Connect the Ocean

Connect people working in the ocean with their loved ones.

Introduction

In our daily lives we rely heavily on the internet, but imagine if we become totally disconnected because we are out in the ocean, how can you survive? Psychological research shows that lack of interactions result in a higher risks of mental illness, such as depression.

Currently, there are limited ways to connect to the internet while we are at the sea. Options are limited to satellites only, however there are significant cost for users and may be avoided.

Mission statement

Connecting people out in the ocean with their families, by providing them with a low-cost basic Internet service.

Goals

Providing intermittent internet coverage for disconnected areas around the world.
Minimizing the cost for end users, by reusing existing technologies and already available infrastructures

proposed solution

Imagine a letter being delivered in a traditional way, as the sender puts his/her message into a postal box, the message will be stored there until a postman arrives. A sequences of postmen will then pass the mail from one to another, and redistribute it throughout the mailing network. Finally it will be delivered to the receiver. This is a simple example to show how Disruptive Tolerant Networks (DTN) work [1].

The analysis of the traffic on and over the ocean demonstrates how boats and airplanes cross paths all around the ocean. When they are within range, an encrypted radio communication channel between them can be established by using current existing technologies.

By applying a networking approach to this environment, aircrafts and boats can be seen as dynamic and temporary nodes. In such a scenario, the DTN routing protocol already used by NASA, can be adapted and applied on this oceanic network.

Our idea is to allow end users (e.g. fishermen) to keep using their own personal communication devices (e.g. smartphones) to connect and register with their local DTN-enabled transceiver device, which will temporarily store the messages they want to transmit. As soon as a DTN-enabled aircraft comes in range, data exchange takes place and outbound messages are transmitted to the airplane, and possibly any inbound message is received and dispatched to the end user.

How to make it affordable

End users do not need to buy any new hardware.

DTN-capable transceiver devices will rely on Commercial Off The Shelf (COFS) products, which will provide a more reliable and cost efficient solution deployed on airplanes and boats.
No new investment on additional infrastructure, and related maintenance are required (eg. new cell towers)

Income: agreements could be achieved with airlines to provide free in-flight internet access to their passengers thanks to our solution. If enough airplanes are up in the sky, live internet connection could be established with the ground, by connecting aircraft to one another.

Business agreements with local governments, organizations and telecommunication companies to use our services, would allow end user to be offered to subscribe to our service at an affordable rate

Additional positive outcomes

Environmental

Fast to apply technology for providing internet service to civilians in areas affected by natural disasters (even in usually connected areas)
Can be applied to remote areas on land (road/rail vehicles can be used as well)
Providing internet connection for Scientific research/experiments in remote land/ocean areas
Can help revive the economy of remote communities
No additional satellite required, as well as ground antennas

Social

Allows remote communities to establish connections where it was once possible

Economical

Encourage businesses between land and sea
Accelerate decision making of companies where operations are located offshore
Create new opportunities for industries in the ocean

Scientific

The Ocean cover 70% of Earth's surface, however less than 10% are surveyed. Oceanth Generation's technologies provides scientific equipment such as sonars, an affordable way to transfer data through DTN. Allows researches to gather more information from shores, increasing efficiency of research.
NASA scientists may adapt for space missions, by using multiple satellites as relays to Earth, based on the concepts provided by Oceanth Generation.

Future-proof

By taking advantage of solar-powered unmanned autonomous vehicles (UAV), we could potentially extend the capabilities of this network (eg. increasing bandwidth, decreasing delays, providing longer lasting live internet connection links)

We will continue to assess and integrate relevant technologies as they are developed, in order to expand the capabilities of our service.