This page is dedicated to describing terminology used in AMR, HBES,Security and Communications. It is intended to assist the user but Telemetry Associates Limited cannot accept liability for any inaccuracies which may be on this page and users are recommended to check other sources before using this information in documents.

3DES Data Encryption Standard performed three times to double key length

3G An informal name for the 3rd generation of digital mobile telephony in Europe – more formally UMTS (see below)

ADSL Asynchronous Digital Subscriber Line - a digital telephone service offering data rates greatly in excess of ISDN. It used frequencies in bands which are well above those used to deliver analogue voice telephony across the Local Loop (between the local exchange/central office and the subscriber's premises) thus it is possible to add ADSL to the existing telephone connection so that as well as offering high speed internet access the subscriber can still use the analogue phone line..

AES Advanced Encryption Standard (also called Rijndael)

AH Authentication Header (IP security protocol)

ALG Application Layer Gateway

AMR - Automatic Meter Reading - The reading of utility and other meters remotely by automatic means

AMRA The American Automatic Meter Reading Association which consists of many bodies interested in AMR including utilities, vendors, telephone network operators and consultants

ANSI American National Standards Institute (US standards body)

ARP Address Resolution Protocol

ARQ Automatic Retransmission reQuest

ASN.1 Abstract Syntax Notation (ITU-T X.208) (ANSI X9TG-9-1995)

ASP Application Service Provider

ATM Asynchronous Transfer Mode

Authenticode Microsoft Code signing mechanism

BACNET Building Automation and Control Network - a commercial and industrial building control bus originating from the American Heating Research Establishment (ASHRAE)

Batibus A French Home Bus System similar to EIB but requiring less complex installation techneques. Batibus, EIB and EHS have now been converged into Konnex.
BG British Gas now divided into The Lattice Group (186k, Advantica, Transco - the gas distribution part) and Centrica plc (BGT, BGS, AA, One-tel, Goldfish and many others - now a customer focussed service provider)

BGS Border Gateway Service

BRAN Broadband Radio Access Network

Broadband "High bandwidth network. The actual bit rate that constitutes “broadband” as opposed to “narrowband” is not well defined, but frequently the ISDN rate is used as the divide – i.e. 128kbits/sec or less is narrowband and above 128kbits/sec is broadband."

Brown Goods Domestic Entertainment equipment such as Radios, TV, HI-FIs and other portable devices
BSI British Standards Institute

BT British Telecom

CA Certificate Authority (Agency that issues Digital Certificates)

CABA The Continental Automated Building Association - an association of parties interested in Automated Buildings in North America and World Wide

CCK Complementary code keying

CD Compact Disk - Originally developed by Sony and Philips to replace the Long Playing Music Record (LP) but now used for software and data distribution
CD ROM A PC Peripheral which can read CDs
CD R a CD which can be written to once but read many times

CD R-W a CD which can be written to many times and read by a CD ROM device

CE Consumer Electronics

CEBus Consumer Electronics Bus - a US standard Home Bus system (similar to EHS)
CEN Committee for Normalisation - The European Standards Organisation for all non electrical equipment

CENELEC Committee for Standards for Electrical Equipment - One of the three European Standards Organisations (ESOs).

Ciphertext Unintelligible output of encryption algorithm

COFDM Coded Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing

Convergence - In respect of Home Automation systems is the proces whereby the three current European systems are being merged to form a single interoperative HA system - now named KONNEX

CPU Central Processing Unit

CRC Cyclic Redundancy Check

CSMA/CA Collision Sense Multiple Access/Collision Avoidance

Cyber attack Electronic attacks made using software via a network.

DAVIC Digital Audio-VIsual Council

DDoS Distributed Denial of service attack

DECT Digital Enhanced Cordless Telecommunications

DES Data Encryption Standard (Common symmetric encryption cipher)

DFS Dynamic Frequency Selection

DLC Distribution Line Communication

DMZ Demilitarised Zone (Intermediate region between public and private)

DNS Domain Name System (Translates friendly names to IP addresses)

DOCSIS Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification

Dongle Device that attaches to a computer to control access

DoS Denial of Service attack

DPRS DECT Packet Radio Service

DSL - Digital Subscriber Line - generic name for digital services over the analague local telephone line (sometimes xDSL) covering ADSL, VDSL ...

DSLAM - DSL Access Multiplexor - A server device located in local telphone exchanges that serves local telephone lines with DSL services

DSSS Direct Sequence Spread Spectrum

DVB Digital Visual Broadcasting

DVD (often) Digital Versatile Disk - a system which places up to 5 times as much data on a disk similar to a CD and thus can feature full length films complete with surround sound and digital output for video equipment
DVD RAM/ROM A PC peripheral which enables the user to write data to a DVD disk and can be used for back up, preparation of multimedia presentations and publicity distribution

DVD -R, DVD +R - DVDs that can be written to only once (WORM)

DVD R-W - DVDs which can be written to many times and read from

EDGE Enhanced Data GSM Evolution

EHS European Home Systems - an initial European attempt at a standard Home Bus system which is intended for consumer installation and features "Plug-n-Play" now part of the Konnex Standard

EHSA European Home Systems Association - a Club of European Home Systems manufacturers and installers. It is the body that controls the converged European standard. It is now known as the KONNEX Association.

EIB Equipment Installation Bus - Siemens version of a Home Network Bus which is intended for installation by expert engineer

EIBA Equipment Installation Bus Assocation - A club of EIB users and installes

EIBG The European Intelligent Building Group - an association of many parties interested in Building Control and Automation in Europe (now IBG)

EPG Electronic Programming Guide

ESO European Standards Organisations (CEN, ETSI and CENELEC)

ESP Encapsulation Security Payload (IP security protocol)

Ethernet Common name for IEEE and ISO/IEC CSMA/CD LAN

ETSI European Telecommunications Standards Institute

FHSS Frequency Hopping Spread Spectrum

FIPS Federal Information Processing Standard (US government standards)

Firewall Mechanism to prevent unauthorized access

Firewire (IEEE 1492) a serial interface between computers and entertainment equipment capable of high data rates. Originally developed by Apple Computer Corporation, (also marketed as I-Link by Sony)

FQDN Fully Qualified Domain Name

FTP File Transfer Protocol

GPRS General Packet Radio Service

GSM Global System for Mobile Communication

HA Home Automation - Systems which automate the operation of the home These are often based on HA Busses or networks which convey data and commands between devices and the environment out side the home

HAN Home Area Network - A network for home systems bounded by the home referes particularly to the home environment and home systems as opposed to a Local Area Network which is characterised more for office applications.
HBES Home and Building Electronic Systems

HAVi Home Audio Video interoperability

HES Home Electronic System

HFC Hybrid Fibre Coax

HGI HAN to Gateway Interface

HTML Hypertext Markup Language (Common Internet display language)

HTTP Hypertext Transfer Protocol (Method used to transmit HTML)

IBG Intelligent Building Group - an association of many parties interested in Building Control and Automation

ICMP Internet Control Message Protocol (Used for IP management)

IDS Intrusion Detection System

IEC - International Electrotechnical Committee - The International Standards Organisation for Electrical Standards

IEEE Institute of Electronic and Electrical Engineers (of US)
IEEE 1394 (Firewire) a serial interface between computers and entertainment equipment capable of high data rates
IEE Institute of Electrical Engineers (of UK)

IETF Internet Engineering Taskforce (Creates Internet standards “RFC”)

IGMP Internet Group Multicast Protocol

IKE Internet Key Exchange (IP authentication)

IP Internet Protocol See IETF

IPpsec IP Security

IPv4 IP Version 4 (current IP)

IPv6 IP Version 6 (future IP)

IRDA Infrared Data Association

ISDN Integrated Services Digital Network - An end to end digital telephone network service providing both voice and data at high data rates (ISDN 2 - 2 "B" Channels at 64Kbs and a Control "D" channel at 16Kbs) (ADSL may be delivered by the same lines as ISDN)

ISM Industrial Scientific Medical (unlicensed radio band)

ISO International Standards Organisation - Part of the UN
ISTxx International Standards (number xx)

ISP Internet Service Provider

IT Information Technology
ITC Information Technology and Communications
LAN - Local Area Network an electrical network (mainly) connecting computers and computer peripherals (often) in an office environment.

LONWORKS Local Operating Network - a proprietary Commercial and Home Bus system characterised by is use of data variables being placed on the bus and intelligent nodes acting on the received data

JVM Java Virtual Machine

KEY Secret data used to encrypt or decrypt message

KONNEX "The name of the Converged European Standards EIB, EHS and Batibus"

L2CAP Logical Link Control and Adaptation Protocol

LAN "Local Area Network (usually regarded as PC related connecting servers, printers, PCs and peripherals)Local Area Network (Computer network that spans relatively small area)"

Last Mile Connection between user premises and local service provider

LLC Logical Link Control

LMP Link Manager Protocol

MAC Media Access Controller

MAC Message Authentication Code

MIB Management Information Base

MITM Man in the Middle (impersonation security attack)

MPEG Moving Pictures Experts Group

MPLS Multi Protocol Label Switching

NAPT Network Address Port Translation (Same as NAT but also translates Port #)

Narrowband A low bandwidth network (see Broadband above)

NAT Network Address Translation (Translates one IP address to another)

NDIS Network Driver Interface Specification (Microsoft networking)

NIST National Institute of Standards and Test (US standards body)

NRC - No Ring Calling - the ability to ring up a device on a shared analogue telephone system without ringing the voice telephones on the circuit and hence access the device silently

NPV Net Present Value - The value now of future income streams used in business case modelling

OFDM Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing

OSGi Open Services Gateway Initiative

PA Personal Assistant
PAN - Personal Area Network - a network of communicating devices which interact within the personal space (up to 5 metres radius) of a person using a suitable communicating device such as a mobile phone or WebPad.

Passphrase "Secret character string that controls access, commonly called a password"

PBX Private Branch Exchange - a telephone exchange which can support a number of local interconnections and access to the main telephone network
PC Personal Computer
PDA Personal Digital Assistant - a hand held device often using a stylus for information input via a touch sensitive screen.

PIN Personal Identification Number (Short password)

PIR Passive Infrared

Plaintext Data feed into an encryption algorithm

PLC Power Line Carrier (LAN over Power Line)

POTS Plain Old Telephone Service

PPC Processing and Protocol conversion

PSTN Public Switched Telephone Network

QM Quality Management

QPSK Quadrature Phase Shift Keying

R&D Research and Development

RADSL Rate Adaptive Digital Subscriber Line

RC-4 Symmetric stream cipher

RFC Request for Comment (IETF document reference)

RFI Request for Information
RFP Request for Proposal

RG Residential Gateway

RGIP Residential Gateway Internal Process

RIP Routing Information Protocol

RSVP Resource Reservation Protocol

RTCP Real Time Control Protocol

RTP Real Time Protocol

RTSP Real Time Streaming Protocol

S/MIME Secure/Multi Purpose Internet Mail Extensions –

SATV Satellite Television

SBGI Society of Briish Gas Industries
SBWI Society of British Water Industries

SCxxx Standards Committee (number xx)
SDK Software Development Kit

SIM Subscriber Identity Module

SNAP Subnetwork Access Protocol

SNMP Simple Network Management Protocol

SPAM Email version of junk mail

Spoof Methods used to fool hardware or software

Spyware Software installed as part of an application to report user activity

SSL Secure Sockets Layer (Internet security)

SSL/TLS Secure Sockets Layer/Transport Layer Security -

STB Set Top Box delivery device used by video networks

SWI Specific WAN Interface

TCxxx Technical Committee (number xx)

TCP Transport Control Protocol - See IETF

TDMA Time Division Multiple Access

TLS Transport Layer Security (IETF version of SSL)

Trojan Destructive program that masquerades as benign

TUV Rheinland Berlin Brandenburg (German quality agency)

UDP User Data Protocol (Unreliable packet delivery over IP)

UDP User Datagram Protocol

UL Underwriters Laboratories (US safety standards organization)

UMTS Universal Mobile Telephone System (also known as 3G)

UPnP Universal Plug and Play

URL Uniform Resource Locator (IP naming scheme)
USB Universal Serial Bus (high speed serial bus mainly used by PCs and peripherals)

UTC Coordinated Universal Time (Corrected Greenwich Mean Time)

VCR Video Cassette Recorder

VDSL Very high bit rate Digital Subscriber Line

Virus Software installed without user’s consent

VPN Virtual Private Network (Allows remote access to network via public network to be used securely)

W3C World Wide Web Consortium (Web based presentation standards)

WAN - Wide Area Network - often the network outside the premises and is characterised by Internet and most telephone networks. It may also be a private network of a large organisation which connects many LANs together

WCDMA Wideband Code Division Multiple Access

WEP Wired Equivalence Privacy (Security for 802.11 Wireless LAN)

WGxxx Working Group (number xx)
White Goods Domestic Equipment such as Washing Machines, Cookers and Fridges

WiFi Wireless Ethernet Compatibility Alliance (IEEE 802.11 Promotion group)

WORM Write Once Read Many

Worm Program that replicates over a network

xDSL Digital Subscriber Line –. A (Asyncronous), V (Very High Speed)

XML Extensible Markup Language (W3C standard)

Zombie Compromised computer used in DDoS attack