The CDR files generated in MSCs are in binary encoded format and

these files should be decoded to make them legible for reading. The encoded raw CDR files
are collected and decoded by the Trichy mediation server and the decoded ASCII format text
files are sent to the various billing servers for further processing. The collected binary raw files
are tape archived at Trichy mediation , while the converted ASCII text files are stored in the
intermediate staging server for a specified period (usually 1 month) after which they are
deleted. For furnishing the CDR details to Police and various LEAs , the raw binary files are
pushed to a special purpose server maintained at Salem on a daily basis from the mediation
center, where these files are further trimmed by filtering unwanted fields and stored as
indexed binary files. The CDRs of individual numbers can be retrieved quickly using binary
search of these indexed files. The Salem server is maintaining the data of all the circles in South
Zone, even though each individual circle is given access to their data only. The Salem team has
provided separate tools and user access for retrieving the CDR data of individual numbers
from their server to the LEA nodal officer of each circle in South Zone. The user access is strictly
maintained through permitted client login IPs and username / passwords and all retrieval
requests are strictly logged as per the DoT enforcement guidelines. The CDR data of each circle
is stored for 1 year duration which is as per the legal mandate. That is, in March 2014, the CDR
data from March 2013 will be available in the Salem server. From Salem server, the allowed
users can retrieve the CDR data of individual MSISDNs and IMEIs. The retrieved data includes
the Mobile Originated, Mobile Terminated, SMS Originated and SMS Terminated Call records of
individual MSISDN or IMEI. Each record contains the A-Party number, the B-Party number, call
type, Date, Time, Duration and BTS Cell ID of the call. The SMS CDRs are generated in MSCs
without the SMS contents and will only have the date, time and Cell Id information apart from
the A and B-Party numbers.

The Salem team has provided tools for retrieving full day CDR dump of a
particular circle for furnishing performance data like calculating Minutes of Usage, CDR count
etc. The requirement of TERM cell to furnish one day full CDR data is also met by using these
tools. The one day full CDR file contains minimum fields like A-Party, B-Party, Call Type, Date,
Time, Duration, IMEi and BTS Cell Id. The approximate size of full day data from Salem server is
about 8 Gb for Kerala circle (CDR data from all MSCs in Kerala for 1 day). From this one day
data, the SMS-MO and SMS-MT call types can be filtered out. By taking the one day data of
every day in a month and filtering out SMS calls only, we can prepare the SMS Call (both MO
and MT) database for the entire month. The approximate size of one month SMS CDR data is
estimated to be 50 GB. The data of 1 year duration only will be available in Salem server as
mandated by legal enforcement and also constrained by the storage requirements at Salem.

The SMS message created by the Mobile Station is forwarded to the serving MSC
through signaling channels via air and other terrestrial interfaces. Once the MSC receives a
SMS, it immediately forwards it to the corresponding message center (SMS-C), by encapsulating
the message contents inside the C7 signaling messages towards SMS-C. The SMS-C is just a
store and forward server which routes the message to the destination network , again through
C7 signaling messages and tracks delivery acknowledgement which it notifies back to the
originating Mobile Station if required. If the destination MS is out of reach or switched off , the
SMS-C stores the SMS for a specified time period, during which if the destination HLR notifies
the SMS-C of the availability of the destination MS , the SMS-C again forwards the message to
the intended destination. There is no mechanism in SMS-C to filter out SMS contents which are
encapsulated in the forward-Short Message C7 message. The SMS-C stores this C7 message if
it is unable to deliver it, and it does not track or store the SMS contents alone. In the SMS-C
CDRs also, the SMS message contents are not recorded. The contents of the SMS can only be
monitored by provisioning the particular number under Lawful Interception (LI) in MSC. If the
number is provisioned in LI, separate Lawful Interception CDRs (encoded in binary format) will
be generated in the MSC which contains a SMS content field. These MSC LI CDRs of the
monitored number can be decoded to get the SMS contents. The LI provisioning in all MSCs is
done through Verint LI mediation server installed at Ernakulam. The LI CDRs are fetched by this
mediation server and decoded CDRs are provided to the LEAs by nodal officers through secured
access mechanisms.