zPDB

Ever since the deregulation of the telephone service market in 1998, subscribers have had the option of bringing their phone numbers with them as they move from one network operator to the next (porting). For the landline sector, regulations have since required each carrier to exchange porting data with every other carrier on a daily basis. With this data, each carrier can set up their own porting database. But there is no central point to which local exchange carriers (TNBs) can send data about a telephone number. Because both the original specifications for carriers to set up their own databases were sketchy, and carrier participation in the process was incomplete, the data in these databases varied greatly in quality.

So we took on the challenge of creating a central database that would furnish our customers - in this case primarily the carriers – with optimum data quality. Moreover, this central database was to be easily accessed, performant, reliable, and low-cost. Further, all other functions in addition to the dialogue interface were to be capable of communicating with other systems as well.

With InfPort43-zPDB, our telecom customers have access to high quality porting data – including the subscriber data of Deutsche Telekom, who treats these as trade secrets. The zPDB (central porting database) results from a sophisticated algorithm that consolidates data sent to us by many carriers. So our customers have the option of significantly improving the data quality of their own porting databases, or just accessing our porting data. It is possible to have all changes in the porting data since the previous query regularly delivered. If carriers use InfPort43 as an internal porting database, they can load these data into their system automatically. In such cases the data from zPDB are compared with their own data. If there are more recent data in the zPDB, or if the carrier is missing data, their porting data system will be brought up to date.

Also, when those customers without their own databases need to know where a phone number is active, for example for billing purposes, the zPDB can help. As soon as the carrier uploads a list of phone numbers to the zPDB, the current operator for each phone number is identified in the background. At the end, the carrier receives an output file which gives the porting identifier of the current operator for every phone number. The zPDB can be connected to other customer IT systems through the program interface. Our porting database zPDB thus provides the basis for smooth porting data exchange between carriers.

The zPDB gathers porting data from a large number of carriers in a central meta-database. Each individual porting notification is assessed, and only when additional quality criteria are met are they consolidated and recorded as the current ported status. This is how we achieve significantly better data quality than the porting databases that supply us.