Home VoIP is cool, but needs safety and reliability fixes first.
By Deb Radcliff, Network World, 06/06/05
Eight million households are using VoIP, according to Synergy Research Group - no doubt, some of your friends and family among
them. And they're probably unaware that VoIP raises safety and reliability issues that have yet to be worked out.
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So here's the best piece of advice you can give them: Don't ditch your land line or wireless service just yet. For starters,
there's no guarantee that when they need it most, home VoIP users will get a connection to a live, 911 operator.
That's because of a lack of standards between service providers and transport carriers, particularly at the trunks to the
call centers, where a call could potentially drop off.
Houston family dials 911
That happened to a Houston family when Peter John and his wife were shot during a botched home robbery and couldn't reach
911 on their VoIP phone, according to an April Associated Press report. When the couple's daughter discovered her injured
parents and dialed 911 on the VoIP phone, she got a recording telling her to hang up and dial 911 on another phone.
Providers such as Vonage , which has no direct trunks to 911 operators, will place the calls for you as long as you remember to register your phone's
whereabouts and update the registration when you move. Otherwise, Vonage has no way of knowing that the emergency call should
be dispatched to the emergency services center in your new location, says Louis Mamakos, CTO of Vonage.
There are signs this problem will be resolved by year-end. Deals are being cut between VoIP service providers and trunk operators.
VoIP providers have 120 days from June 6 to have e-911 services in place for their consumers.
And network providers such as Level 3 Networks are trunking cable into public services answering points so VoIP users of its Enhanced 911 service can reach emergency dispatchers
regardless of the phone's location.
Other security issues around VoIP require proper authentication, firewall and VPN tunneling, which have yet to become standard.
In the meantime, remind users that the Internet is less reliable than dedicated circuits.
Calls could, for example, be slowed or lost in the event of a widespread virus or worm affecting traffic, such as SoBig and
others.
To be safe, tell them they should have a back-up telephone system.
Radcliff (www.deb.radcliff.com) is a freelance writer specializing in online safety and network security.
BEST PRACTICES FOR SECURING VOIP
Four safety tips to ensure a successful VoIP migration: 1. Secure the account: During account setup and updates, the provisioning of resources to users should be conducted over an encrypted tunnel with
strong authentication. Be wary. Not all service providers do this. And that leaves the boxes vulnerable to hijacking and malicious
code injection, says Louis Mamakos, Vonage CTO.
Cisco in March announced its shipment of more than 1 million VoIP ports, making it the most successful product launch in the company’s history.
2. Secure the network: VoIP opens vulnerable ports through network address translation firewalls and forgets to close them. Look for hardware that
provides an all-in-one firewall and voice. Service providers also offer firewall/VoIP boxes, or, at the least, the voice adapters
should be able to synchronize with existing firewall/routers.
3. Secure the call: Pick a box that includes easy VPN setup. While most VoIP service providers don’t encrypt calls across the Internet yet, they
will, especially because companies already demand this, says Doug Makishima, vice president of products for Intoto Software,
platform provider to residential and SOHO gateway vendors.
4. Secure the chain: Competing signaling security standards and carriers can cause outages and delays as VoIP data traverses the Internet. Look
for vendors that use SIP to support multiple standards, such as Secure Real Time Protocol and IPSec.
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