Gigabit Passive Optical Networks (GPON) is a fiber access technology used to deliver high-speed voice, data and video services to residential and business customers.
GPON works on a point-to-multipoint access mechanism with passive splitters in the fiber distribution network, enabling one single fiber feed from the provider's central office to serve multiple homes and small businesses.
GPON which is defined in ITU-T recommendation series G.984.1 through G.984.6 GPON, has a downstream capacity of 2.5 Gb/s and an upstream capacity of 1.25 Gbp/s that is shared among users. Encryption is used to keep each user's data secure and private from other users.
The latest version of GPON is a 10-Gigabit version called XGPON, or 10G-PON.