Granted Patent B2

US 12,425,856 · App. 17/974,417 · Granted Sep 23, 2025

Inventors: Kevin Karlin (Highlands Ranch, CO); Prayash Mukherjee (Highlands Ranch, CO)

Assignee: DISH Wireless L.L.C.

H04W12/084H04W8/24H04W12/71

Abstract

Claims (43)

1. A method for enabling a universal unlock microservice for 5G user equipment (UE) that is remotely unlockable using a universal unlock microservice system, wherein locked 5G user equipment is a 5G device that is locked to one carrier or network with a software code, and wherein unlocked 5G user equipment is a 5G device with an unlocked software code that will function on multiple carriers or networks, the method comprising:

providing, by a mobile network operator, a distributed unit (DU) of a fifth-generation New Radio (5G NR) cellular telecommunication network radio access network (RAN) that is served by a particular 5G NR cellular site base station, wherein the DU:

is associated with a primary 5G NR Next Generation Node B (gNB) identified by a primary identifier (ID); and

is in operable communication with a corresponding primary central unit control plane (CU-CP) of a 5G NR primary centralized unit (CU) that is hosted on a cloud-native virtualized compute instance in a primary cloud availability zone and is also associated with the primary gNB identified by the primary ID;

obtaining a serial number of the 5G user equipment;

decomposing the serial number of the 5G user equipment;

in response to decomposing the serial number, determining an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) of the 5G user equipment;

in response to determining the OEM, determining a correct Application Program Interface (API) to receive an unlock request for the 5G user equipment out of multiple APIs that each correspond to a different OEM;

triggering an over the air (OTA) unlock request for the 5G user equipment using a microservice; and

sending a call to the correct API to unlock the 5G user equipment.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein obtaining a serial number of the 5G user equipment further comprises requesting an upstream system to supply the serial number of the 5G user equipment.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the 5G user equipment is a 5G phone.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the serial number is an International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) number.

5. The method of claim 1 , further comprising: receiving an unlock request from one or more of a user request, manufacture request, carrier request, an automated request based on a completion of a time period, an automated request based on a completion of a contract, or a government agency request.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the universal unlock microservice system does not know the OEM before the serial number of the 5G user equipment is decomposed.

7. The method of claim 1 , wherein the universal unlock microservice system does not know the correct API before the serial number of the 5G user equipment is decomposed.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein an upstream system does not process any logic associated with unlocking the 5G user equipment.

9. The method of claim 8 , wherein the logic associated with unlocking the 5G user equipment is encapsulated in the universal unlock microservice.

10. The method of claim 1 , wherein logic associated with unlocking the 5G user equipment is positioned to a lowest point in the universal unlock microservice right before a decision is made regarding where to send the call to unlock the 5G user equipment.

11. A system for enabling a universal unlock microservice for user equipment, wherein locked user equipment is a device that is locked to one carrier or network with a software code, and wherein unlocked user equipment is a device with an unlocked software code that will function on multiple carriers or networks, the system comprising:

at least one memory that stores computer executable instructions; and

at least one processor that executes the computer executable instructions to cause actions to be performed, the actions including:

obtain a serial number of the user equipment;

decompose the serial number of the user equipment;

in response to decomposing the serial number, determine an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) of the user equipment;

in response to determining the OEM, determine a correct Application Program Interface (API) to receive an unlock request for the user equipment out of multiple APIs that each correspond to a different OEM;

trigger an over the air (OTA) unlock request for the user equipment using a microservice; and

send a call to the correct API to unlock the user equipment.

12. The system of claim 11 , wherein obtaining a serial number of the user equipment further comprises requesting an upstream system to supply the serial number of the user equipment.

13. The system of claim 11 , wherein the user equipment is a phone.

14. The system of claim 11 , wherein the serial number is an International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) number.

15. The system of claim 11 , further comprising: receiving an unlock request from one or more of a user request, manufacture request, carrier request, an automated request based on a completion of a time period, an automated request based on a completion of a contract, or a government agency request.

16. The system of claim 11 , wherein the universal unlock microservice system does not know the OEM before the serial number of the user equipment is decomposed.

17. The system of claim 11 , wherein the universal unlock microservice system does not know the correct API before the serial number of the user equipment is decomposed.

18. The system of claim 11 , wherein an upstream system does not process any logic associated with unlocking the user equipment.

19. The system of claim 18 , wherein the logic associated with unlocking the user equipment is encapsulated in the universal unlock microservice.

20. A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having computer-executable instructions stored thereon that, when executed by at least one processor, cause the at least one processor to cause actions to be performed, the actions including:

obtain a serial number of a user equipment;

decompose the serial number of the user equipment;

in response to decomposing the serial number, determine an original equipment manufacturer (OEM) of the user equipment;

in response to determining the OEM, determine a correct Application Program Interface (API) to receive an unlock request for the user equipment out of multiple APIs that each correspond to a different OEM;

trigger an over the air (OTA) unlock request for the user equipment using a microservice; and

send a call to the correct API to unlock the user equipment.

Assignments (2)

Continuity (2)

References Cited (10)