Modern packet networks are highly complex and ever-evolving objects. Understanding, developing and managing such environment is difficult and expensive in practice. Traffic Monitoring and Analysis (TMA) has always been seen as a key methodology to understand telecommunication technology and operation, and the complexity of the Internet has attracted many researchers to face traffic measurements since the pioneering times. The recent advances in the field of TMA suggest that evolved TMA-based techniques can play a key role in the operation of real networks. Today, the lack of insight and early recognition of emerging risks and/or performance issues can expose the network infrastructure to stability and security problems. TMA is therefore the basis for prevention and response in network security, as typically the detection of attacks and intrusions requires the analysis of detailed traffic records, e.g. packet traces.

This Action will coordinate both Research Groups and Network Operators active in the field of TMA, promoting the development of novel techniques and focusing the research efforts towards commonly recognized problems, thus driving the research towards real-world applications. It will foster the adoption of common monitoring tools and analysis platforms, so as to catalyze the emergence of a European de-facto standard for traffic monitoring, ultimately increasing the impact of European research in the field.