Cellular network authentication control

1. A method in a cellular terminal comprising:

detecting, with the cellular terminal, a trigger for capability reporting with the cellular terminal;

in response to determining the capability reporting required for the detected trigger, producing, with the cellular terminal, a cellular network authentication capabilities message indicative of cellular network authentication capabilities available for the cellular terminal; and

transmitting, with the cellular terminal, the cellular network authentication capabilities message to a cellular network, wherein the capabilities message is conveyed using a set of bits of an authentication management field in an authentication token.

2. The method of claim 1 , comprising receiving from the cellular network a capability request message for the cellular network authentication capabilities.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein the cellular terminal comprises a secure element.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the secure element is configured for computation of authentication key management for cellular authentication.

5. The method of claim 3 , wherein the secure element is configured to form content for the capabilities message.

6. The method of claim 5 , wherein the secure element is configured to receive a request for the content for the capabilities message and to responsively produce the content for the capabilities message.

7. The method of claim 5 , wherein the secure element is configured to receive an authentication request and to respectively produce the content for the capabilities message.

8. The method of claim 3 , wherein the secure element is a software-based entity.

9. The method of claim 3 , wherein the cellular terminal is configured to receive an update command and to responsively update the secure element.

10. The method of claim 9 , wherein the cellular terminal is configured to update the secure element to support an earlier unsupported cellular authentication algorithm.

11. The method of claim 1 , wherein the capabilities message is contained within another cellular network authentication message that is produced with the cellular terminal for the cellular network.

12. The method of claim 1 , wherein the capabilities message is contained within an authentication failure message.

13. The method of claim 1 , wherein the capabilities message is contained within an authentication response message.

14. The method of claim 1 , wherein the cellular terminal is configured to support any one or more of a plurality of cryptographic algorithms for cellular authentication.

15. The method of claim 14 , wherein the cryptographic algorithms is selected from a group consisting of

MILENAGE;

128 bit TUAK; and

256 bit TUAK.

16. An apparatus comprising:

at least one processor;

at least one non-transitory memory including computer program code, the at least one non-transitory memory and the computer program code configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to:

detect, with a cellular terminal, a trigger for capability reporting with the apparatus;

in response to determining the capability reporting required for the detected trigger, produce, with the cellular terminal, a cellular network authentication capabilities message indicative of cellular network authentication capabilities available for the cellular terminal; and

transmit, with the cellular terminal, the cellular network authentication capabilities message to a cellular network, wherein the capabilities message is conveyed using a set of bits of an authentication management field in an authentication token.

17. A computer program embodied on a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium storing computer-readable code, which, when executed with at least one processor, causes the at least one processor to perform:

detect, with a cellular terminal, a trigger for capability reporting with a cellular terminal;

in response to determining the capability reporting required for the detected trigger, produce, with the cellular terminal, a cellular network authentication capabilities message indicative of cellular network authentication capabilities available for the cellular terminal; and

transmit, with the cellular terminal, the cellular network authentication capabilities message to a cellular network, wherein the capabilities message is conveyed using a set of bits of an authentication management field in an authentication token.

18. The apparatus of claim 16 , wherein the at least one non-transitory memory and the computer program code are further configured to, with the at least one processor, cause the apparatus at least to:

receive from the cellular network a capability request message for the cellular network authentication capabilities, wherein the capability request message comprises an identifier of a cryptographic algorithm used by the cellular network.

19. The apparatus of claim 16 , wherein the cellular network authentication capabilities message comprises an indication of a cryptography algorithm, wherein the indication of the cryptography algorithm is indicative of the network authentication capabilities available for the apparatus.