Build a temporary wireless network for "Super Bowl"

In addition to providing services for Super Bowl event staff and media, the wireless network established on a temporary basis has also been extended to access control, ticket checking, video surveillance, and other purposes.

IT Director David Port claims that he does not have a favorite football team, but he was busy with the 25th super bowl some time ago. As vice president of information technology at the Alliance, Port and his IT staff are responsible for building a temporary network that supports the NFL staff and thousands of journalists during the "super bowl" event.

Migration to Wireless Networks

The technology used on the site may not be recognized by the former Port when the Arizona redque team and the Pittsburgh steel team competed in Tampa, Florida. "I have seen many changes over the years and technology is becoming more and more important," said Port, who has been playing for the NFL for 25 years ."

Port recalled his first "Super Bowl" Work and said, "At that time, we were using a Host-Based Terminal System for transmission through a slow communication link, and now everything is broadband. The information required by the media to complete the work, as well as the services we must provide, including video, voice, and data, must be transmitted through high-speed networks ."

Port Said That the most challenging and most valuable change in recent years is that networks supporting the "Super Bowl" operation are being migrated from wired networks to wireless networks. "We are still laying cables," he said. In the past, however, we had to build several miles of cables. Now we can use wireless bridging technology and Wi-Fi devices to provide the same reliable services while reducing costs ."

Preparations for each session of "Super Bowl" usually start two years in advance, including cooperation with the host city and the venue where IT operations and media professionals are placed. More intense planning starts around 11 months before the opening of this major event. The NFL will actually build a small data center, the servers of the data center are placed at the temporary headquarters, a local Marriott hotel near the Super Bowl competition venue. Technical staff need to build infrastructure consisting of approximately 300 hosts, PCs and laptops, as well as wired and wireless networks for core operations, competitions, and business operations of the NFL, A large part of the infrastructure is also used for media reporting.

The temporary setup task also involves creating a media center in a Tampa convention center that contains more than 4000 journalists. In this conference center, Port and his team have established a wireless network consisting of more than 10 access points, supporting approximately 500 simultaneous connections.

Intense competition day

On Competition Day, the demand for wireless Internet will "explode" as journalists flood into the stadium. About 20 Motorola access points are installed in the stadium for news reports, and 10 other access points are installed outside the stadium for media work tents.

Wireless networks are also required for access control, ticket check, and video surveillance systems. On the "Super Bowl" day, video surveillance was more intense than any other activity previously held at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa. A new door has been set up hundreds of feet away from the stadium and security checks are carried out using X-ray equipment. All "Super Bowl" tickets are scanned to compare with a database maintained by the NFL and Ticketmaster.

Hacker protection is clearly a major concern of Port and its staff. They have built wireless network firewalls and other security products for the Super Bowl. "The biggest challenge is to maintain security while handling a large number of continuous connections in a small area," Port Said ."

Port's 70 employees are distributed across the NFL headquarters in Manhattan, the Los Angeles office, and the New Jersey Film Production Building. About 30 IT professionals traveled to Tampa to serve the event.

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