What are Diameter Interfaces?
by Bethany Hendricks on Glossary • September 8, 2020What are Diameter Interfaces?
Diameter interfaces are well-defined networking protocol interfaces that facilitate communication and coordination among diameter nodes.
Network devices capable of communicating using the diameter protocol interfaces are used by telecommunication service providers in their infrastructure to provide access to end-users while carrying out authentication, authorization and accounting (AAA) of usage.
Diameter interfaces are commonly used to enable 3G, 4G, LTE communication, interconnection, service policy and quality of service enforcement, billing and other telecommunications service provider related solutions.
Diameter interfaces and their associated protocols operate at the application layer of the computer networking stack and use TCP or SCTP for transport layer communication.
Well, known or vendor-specific diameter interfaces are usually assigned Attribute Value Pairs (AVP). Custom AVPs can be defined when defining new diameter interfaces by extending the diameter base protocol for custom functionality.