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Written by Skype Journal on November 7th, 2006 with no comments.
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Written by Skype Journal on October 4th, 2006 with no comments.
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In spillover activity spurred on by the recent Hewlett-Packard "phonegate" scandal, Verizon is suing 20 data brokers for fraudulent activity re pretexting. Pretexting is where someone pretends to be someone else so that they can access their phone records. Interestingly, the president and vice chair of Verizon is on the HP board of directors. Verizon says it has spent $100,000 investigate the pretexting fraud.
In related news, Democrats in the US House of Representatives, controlled by the Republicans, stalled a bill to make pretexting illegal. The activity is illegal in some states, including California, where the alleged activities took place. As part of an US House of Representatives probe into the pretexting scandal, five private investigators and at least two HP executives have been subpoenaed. HP is also under investigation in California.
Written by ewriter on October 3rd, 2006 with no comments.
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The US House of Representatives has been busy subpoenaing people, including five private investigators and at least two HP executives, for the House probe into the Hewlett-Packard scandal. The whole mess was precipitated by now-former Chair Patricia Dunn when she had PIs access the private phone records of some board members.
Her actions were outside of any legal action such as CALEA. In fact, records were obtained by pretexting, an illegal method that involves having people impersonate someone else to access records. (I've had something similar happen to me. A now ex-friend impersonated me just over ten years ago and convinced my phone company at the time to transfer yet another person's phone bill to my phone. After a shouting match with the company, who denied they'd ever do such a thing - despite my friend's confession - I switched to cell phones, and now VoIP, and have not owned a landline since.)
Written by ewriter on September 27th, 2006 with no comments.
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After the arrest of five foreign nationals in Namibia providing VoIP service without a license, as well as goings on in various Asian and African countries in regards to VoIP, you might be wondering if VoIP is under attack there. Marcelo Rodriguez takes a crtical look [Voxilla] at what Russell Shaw [ZD Net] and Rich Tehrani [TMC Net] are saying.
Rodriguez points out that both Shaw and Tehrani mention "Third World" countries as locales where VoIP seems to be under attack, possibly due to affiliations between the government and the traditional telecoms, but that they leave out the US as being in a similar category. (Examples: Korea and the UAE blocking Skype.) He then goes on to reveal several examples of lobbying, campaign contributions, and all-expense golf vacations.
The Voxilla piece is very revealing and extremely politically charged. I'm going to take my cue to up the voltage. Let's take a few separate scenarios. First scenario, conspiracy: the entire telephony system in North America is fully wiretapped and all calls are monitored either by humans or machines, for whatever political purpose the real men with power wield. Second scenario: the first scenario is crock, but phone calls are a valuable commodity and thus extremely lucrative. Third scenario: a combination of both the first and second scenarios.
Choose your scenario. Either way, VoIP threatens the status quo, and hence spawns acts like CALEA, possibly attacks on Vonage's share price, and debates like neutrality vs tiered Internet service. Everything that is happening politically in telephony satisfies one of those three scenarios. Let's face it: VoiP is a threat no matter how you slice your political pie.
Written by ewriter on September 25th, 2006 with no comments.
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Written by Skype Journal on September 18th, 2006 with no comments.
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Written by Skype Journal on September 16th, 2006 with no comments.
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President Asks For Warrantless Wiretaps
US president George
Bush is asking for warrantless wiretaps, particularly in relation to
prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay. [via CNBC TV] Recently, US District
Court Judge Anna Diggs Taylor ordered a halt to the wiretapping
program, concluding in her report that warrantless wiretapping is unconstitutional. CALEA
allows a backdoor for law enforcement agencies to wiretap calls if
public security is threaten. However, the wiretapping program in
question was secretly signed by President Bush in 2001.
Telus Corp Wins 5-Yr Telecom Contract
The
government of the Province of Ontario (Canada) awarded Telus Corp
(second-largest Canadian phone company) a five-year, Cdn$140 M contract
to manage and supply various network services, including IP
communication. [via CNW] Telus recently announced that they were converting to an income trust.
Yahoo Messenger Plugins: Pandaf Sudoku Battle
Not sick of the immensely popular Sudoku number puzzles? The Pandaf Sudoku Battle plugin for Yahoo! Messenger 8
lets you battle against an opponent. I assume you race to finish first.
This is of course quite the variation on the puzzle, as it's
traditionally a one-player challenge.
Stratus Techologies Acquires Emergent
Stratus Technologies announced the US$10 M buyout of Emergent Network Solutions [Extreme VoIP], a VoIP infrastructure company.
Written by ewriter on September 15th, 2006 with no comments.
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Jupiter Web is giving away free copies of the Avaya edition of VoIP Security for Dummies eBook (PDF, 68 pages) in consideration for people joining the Avaya developer community. The link was sent to me in a regular Jupiter Web email, so I cannot guarantee you'll be able to use it, but I don't see why not.
The ebook is pretty "dummy-ish", in the sense that they've simplied a wide range of IP telephony security issues and summed each of them up in a few short paragraphs. It even mentions privacy issues such as CALEA (Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Agencies) and a number of US govt regulations that add up to considering why you should record VoIP calls in your company.
This is certainly not a book you would use to actually implement VoIP security measures, but it's not a bad place to start if you feel you don't know enough about the issues, or don't know where to start reading about them. (The book is of course geared towards discussing Avaya solutions, so it's not exactly vendor-neutral.) You can sign up free (just your name, email, and job function) at this Jupiter Web page and download your copy.
Written by ewriter on September 13th, 2006 with no comments.
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Written by Skype Journal on September 13th, 2006 with no comments.
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Your company has sensitive information and you think that one of your high-profile board members - not employees - is leaking details to the media. What do you do? If you're Hewlett-Packard's Chairwoman Patricia Dunn, you hire private investigators and obtain phone records [CRN] for the suspects. Problem is, those investigators used illegal means to acquire those phone records. Now, the California attorney general is investigating the whole mess.
Acts like Sarbanes-Oxley (aka Sarbox) were designed to protect investors by instituting a number of measures that would ensure transparency in accounting procedures of public companies. The act might even be interpreted in such a manner that a company would decide to record all employee conversations for Sarbox and even CALEA reasons. In this case, however, the records of home and cell phone calls of board member George A Keyworth were obtained, which I'm assuming is out of the scope of both Sarbox and CALEA.
In light of this, I'm wondering if soft VoIP calls stand a chance of not being put under the domain of CALEA. Soft VoIP does not yet have a backdoor (for law enforcement) for recording calls, but some politicians are pushing for it, for dubious reasons.
Written by ewriter on September 6th, 2006 with no comments.
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Recent talk was that India's mobile phone market would be the largest in the world. But not surprisingly, China might exceed that. The 400 million mobile phones they'll produce this year make up half the world's output and will be used in other countries, but they could just as well be used there, too.
As for India, its come a long way. One East Indian friend joked to me that in India, even the janitor has a cell phone. Which was not meant to be derogatory, but to indicate how far the country has come. Not so long ago, it had daily power outages, but now has the juice to drive cellular networks that include everyone in several financial classes.
However, with the increasing number of middle-class citizens in China, it's more than possible that the Chinese mobile market may exceed India's, where they're focusing on IPTV for some reason. The VoIP market in Asia in general is growing. Though with issues such as VoIP service being illegal in China, I'm not sure if certain types of phones and PDAs are allowed in the country or not.
Even if China and India actually run close numbers for mobile use, broadband use in China is growing at about 80% annually and expected to reach 130 million users by 2010. Part of the increase will be a side effect of hosting the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.
Given the political situation in China, and the fact that VoIP is illegal there, it might be difficult to understand how that government would allow the estimated 80 million users playing online games. When you run a country banning the use of certain words in print or online, it's hard to let any sort of digital interaction go unmonitored. This sort of atmosphere would permeate into a lot of things, including the way events are handled and technologies deployed.
However, dig deep into the history of the Olympics during the time that Juan Antonio Samaranch was top dog of the IOC (International Olympics Committee), and you'll see that the Olympics actually were repeatedly granted to countries and regions where there was political, civil, and/or social unrest,. The net result of hosting the Olympics in those locales actually improved conditions considerably.
Whether or not this happens in China, resulting in more open government policies, remains to be seen. But if it does, China will likely dominate in Internet use whether, whether mobile or stationary, and there will be an explosion of VoIP services and possibly some innovations.
Written by ewriter on September 5th, 2006 with no comments.
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Comverse's fugitive CEO, Jacob Alexander, who is wanted on securities fraud charges, apparently was traced to a town in Sri Lanka (island country off the south coast of India) because of a one minute Skype call to the US that he made. It's unclear whether CALEA was enforced, since soft VoIP services are not currently bound by it. But Skype does record the incoming IP address. Someone was obviously monitoring the recipient's computer. More details at VoIP News and The Register.
Comverse Technology is involved in a number of businesses and had recently purchased Netcentrex and more recently Netonomy (real-time billing and customer management).
Written by ewriter on August 25th, 2006 with no comments.
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Philips is giving Australian customers a choice for combining VoIP with PSTN. They now have a couple of cordless handsets that either use Microsoft Live or Skype (not both). You do need a PC and a broadband Internet connection to use the phones. [via The VoIP Weblog]
Because Baby Boomers are expected to migrate to specific urban or rural areas over the next twenty years or so, companies like ComSpan will beneft from offering triple play services. [via VoIP Magazine; free registration required]
Asterisk has just release a free voicemail client, Tycho, for Win32, Linux x86, and Mac OS X computers. [via Asterisk VoIP News] I assume Tycho has nothing to do with Tycho Softworks - who offer an open source telephony stack - but I could be mistaken.
Written by ewriter on August 21st, 2006 with no comments.
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Wiretapping is unconstitutional says US District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor in Detroit, Michigan. She ordered a halt to the wiretapping program which was apparently secretly authorized by President Bush in 2001. The actual action will be delayed until another hearing on Sep 7/06.
While privacy advocates are no doubt happy, not everyone thinks Judge Taylor reasoned well in her decision and have criticized her as a Liberal, despite that her verdict was based on a number of Act violations.
One of the most important comments in her 43-page decision (or as the Washington Post calls it, "opinion") is the following:
... are no hereditary Kings in America and no powers not created by the Constitution.
This standing of hers is quite likely the primary basis for her detailed decision, and since it is aimed directly at President Bush, is the reason why "Congressional Republicans quickly condemned" her ruling.
See the Washington Post [via 21Talks ] for more details.
Written by ewriter on August 21st, 2006 with no comments.
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CALEA, or Communcations Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, has a lot of misconceptions surrounding it in terms of its applicability to VoIP, as well as security issues. The IT Association of America (ITAA) has isued a report (PDF, 21 pgs) to educate VoIP service providers. [source: TMC Net]
The deadline for CALEA compliance for VoIP providers is May 14, 2007, and the ITAA questions the ability of smaller providers to comply in time, due to the expected financial cost. Amongst other things, they also question whether standards can be developed for CALEA for VoIP because of all the different VoIP types. The ITAA paper includes Vinton Cerf of Google as an author.
Another group, GLIIF (Global Lawful Interception Industry Forum) issued a rebuttal (PDF, 8 pages) with pretty much the exact same title as the ITAA document.
My pure gut instinct says that the GLIIF report sounds like a bunch of companies protecting their own investment in future CALEA solutions, because my educated guess indicates that their main rebuttal points are in turn refutable. In fact, from the glance I had at the GLIIF document, it contradicts the opinions and public statements about CALEA made by many well-known Internet experts earlier this year.
However, that's just my feeling, and without reading both documents thoroughly, I'm not make any definitive declarations. Ultimately, whether I support it or not, I think all types of VoIP calls will be wiretapped - maybe not immediately because of technical issues, but eventually. It's been that way for decades with PSTN lines, and governments are just not going to give up that kind of surveillance power. (Having worked for telcos, I've heard things that worry me, but things aren't going to change, especially in the current climate of fear.)
Written by ewriter on August 15th, 2006 with no comments.
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Hackers-cum-researchers performed an interesting security-testing experiment earlier this year using VoIP phone numbers and Internet social networks. They presented their findings recently at Defcon.
Their primary plan was to determine if secret signals could be passed right out in the open, from enemy agencies to their agents. They theorized that the use of social networks to transmit carrier messages might increase the noise ratio so that it would be harder for "unauthorized parties" to decode the secret but publicly-transmitted messages.
This is in fact a technique already used covertly by intelligence agencies. However, they use shortwave numbers stations, and all governments have denied such operations. The general technique is to broadcast streams of seemingly nonsensical numbers or words, often in a female or child's voice. Of course, the stream represents a code, and only a few parties have the cipher to decode it.
Strom Carlson, a security researcher, and the hackers collective Project Evil teamed up to see if someone could do the same thing using the Internet, particularly using any of the abundant social networks out there. What they did was set up their own numbers stations. But instead of using shortwave transmissions, they used VoIP phone numbers and recordings. If you called such a number, you would hear a stream of code words. They advertised the existence of the VoIP numbers stations using Craigslist pages, using fake messages, to see if anyone would participate.
In short, they were successful getting others with a cryptographic interest to participate and decode messages using a one-time key. They figure enemy forces could be too. This is something proponents of CALEA may want to take note of: if hostile parties want to use VoIP, they are not necessarily going to use unencoded messages. (On the other hand, this experiment by Carlson might just give CALEA proponents more fodder.)
CALEA stands for Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, and, in short, gives any Law Enforcement agency the right to wiretap communications networks, including the Internet and VoIP, in special circumstances. Although to date, it's not on the agenda to tap soft VoIP calls using clients such as GoogleTalk and Skype.
Of course, there are those people that believe that email spam is being used as numbers stations for intelligence communications. Although who is behind it is hard to say. (I particularly notice some interesting word patterns in the spam in my university alumni email account.) Public key cryptography concepts date back centuries, and the Internet is a perfect distribution vehicle. Just never thought VoIP could be used as a supplementary broadcasting outlet.
Additional sources: Slashdot, Homeland Stupidity, Defcon.
Written by ewriter on August 8th, 2006 with no comments.
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Written by Skype Journal on July 28th, 2006 with no comments.
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Om Malik paints an interesting VoIP application scenario with an in-beta service called Jangl. Jangl deals with issues of VoIP presence as well as security using a unique bidirectional phone number that allows two parties to communicate without revealing their own phone numbers.
The example Om gives is one applying to the dating scene. Considering that there are online dating services like Verbdate, which integrate Skype's VoIP software to allow people to talk to each other for free, there's obviously a market for VoIP dating applications. But with the way the world is, partial anonymity, or at least security from having to reveal personal info, is a boon. Jangl does this by assigning a phone number between two parties, which acts as a bridge, regardless of the numbers they are using to make the call.
Jangl joins the growing list of new companies that are opting for private financing instead of going IPO. However, history shows that when a VC firm pumps in money, they want to not only make their money back but get a return on it. That's kind of why VCs exist, right?
Jangl is only in beta, so it's yet to be seen whether they can make money from their model. Still, with all the free VoIP options available these days, the ones taking advantage of the Long Tail phenomena will be most likely to succeed. That is, give away parts of your service/ product offerings for free, and hope that a large number of people will use your paid services once in a while. Or if you're lucky, frequently. (Which is why I think that Skype's plan to enter the enterprise VoIP market is a bad idea, besides the fact that their Skype is not enterprise grade.)
But since so much VoIP service is free, it's the companies that give good value-added services at a reasonable price who are candidates for business success.
Here's my jaded prediction: new tech (and web 2.0) companies will continue to stay private for the next year or two, followed by a large number of IPO offerings in the very late 00s, capped by a market crash in 2010. History (i.e., market data and news archives) shows a recession at the beginning of every decade since at least 1970, which inevitably means tech stocks crash and burn. Only those VoIP companies who develop a stable footing in the next year or two are likely to survive, and that means having private funding, instead of suffering the vagaries of the stock market and suddenly finding that cash is low.
Written by ewriter on July 17th, 2006 with no comments.
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As mentioned in the previous post, CALEA and Sarbox regulations are reasons you should record corporate VoIP. The problem is, VoIP does not lend itself well to wiretapping. Fortunately, VoIP carriers have until May 2007 to comply, which provides the industry nearly a year to work out a solution.
While Sarbox is aimed at publicly-traded businesses, CALEA applies to any business or private citizen. Even people that do not use VoIP could be affected by this act.
Some of the drawbacks of eavesdropping on VoIP data for CALEA is that more than just voice traffic has to be captured. Thus, a significant amount of irrelevant data has to be filtered out, including other VoIP users calls. What it amounts to, from a privacy perspective, is that some law enforcement official could then know a private citizen's every activity online. This goes beyond the objective to wiretap calls "of interest" and moves towards something potentially more sinister.
There are also other technical issues such as firewalls, and even Wi-Fi access that is not secured. For example, if you have a Wi-Fi network at home but have left it as open access, either because you don't care or don't know how to secure it, you might have a problem. What if your scruffy-looking neighbour across the street conducts questionable phone calls from his VoWiFi (VoIP over Wi-Fi) handset using your Wi-Fi?
Similar issues will probably suuround calls over Municipal Wi-Fi. For example, a project in Taipei City, Taiwan, expects to have 200,000 VoIP phones in use, by year's end, by administrative and public school workers. After that, they hope that private citizens will use the network for VoWiFi calls. How do you wiretap VoWiFi calls that could be made anywhere in the city, outdoors or indoors?
Another question people are asking: should CALEA extend to soft clients such as Skype? Truth is, I wouldn't be surprised if text IM clients such as Google Talk or any of the Messenger-type of software are already "monitored". But VoIP clients are another issue.
Sources: Network World [via FierceVoIP]
Written by ewriter on July 14th, 2006 with no comments.
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Written by Skype Journal on July 9th, 2006 with no comments.
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Written by Skype Journal on June 23rd, 2006 with no comments.
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Written by Skype Journal on June 23rd, 2006 with no comments.
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A group of internet security experts have said that the efforts of the U.S. government which requires VoIP providers to permit law enforcement agencies to wiretap phone calls could result in cyber security problems to the internet.
Wiretapping would be requiring either a massive re-engineering of the internet or introduction of broad security risks. This could also stall innovations in the fields of internet in the U.S. as hundreds and thousands of dollars would be required for the set up and maintenance by the VoIP providers and other internet applications which provide voice services.
Via pcworld
Written by gautam.chabbra on June 15th, 2006 with no comments.
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As per a study conducted the Information Technology Association of America, it says that since VoIP relies on a different network architecture from that of traditional phone lines therefore it would result in enormous costs to the industry and could even cause security risks. This report is in response to snooping being permitted on VoIP networks.
The report also states that it would not be possible for the government to expect all products that make use of VoIP to comply with the FCC requirements mandating wiretapping backdoors for government surveillance. The requirement is being backed by Bush administration.
Via silicon
Written by gautam.chabbra on June 13th, 2006 with no comments.
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Pretty Good Privacy PGP creator Zimmerman is likely to launch Zfone, a free VoIP encryption program for Windows. Zimmerman launched Zfone for Mac and Linux sometime back this year. Zfone as designed by PGP creator will provide standard VoIP service to the users. Zimmerman's IP service will able to maintain secrecy in the communication.
The striking feature of Zfone is that it does not need a web of computers to hold the keys or long numbers. Rather it carries out the communication process inside the digital voice channel. Hence a third party has no keys.
Via: [VoIP Central]
Written by gautam.chabbra on May 22nd, 2006 with no comments.
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VoIP services have been blocked in the recent past in a number of countries in the Middle East. One of them, Jordan, recently reversed their decision and will unblock Skype in particular. The UAE (United Arab Emirates), however, have held to their ban.
Word is that this ban may be lifted by the TRA (Telecommunications Regulatory Authority). The UAE is blocking Skype and other VoIP services in some of the Emirates, including Dubai and Oman. On the other hand, other reports indicate that the TRA has claimed they are not ready to lift the ban just yet. They may be working with Etislalat and Du to license VoIP, but other services, including Skype, would probably remained blocked. That is, mostly legacy/ incumbent telecom providers would be allowed.
Seems to me like the status quo just found a way to remain the status quo - at least in small countries where the powers that be can gain something by blocking and selectively unblocking VoIP. The question is, are they doing this to gain monetarily or so that all calls can be monitored discreetly somewhere in a warehouse? Not to say that larger countries don't do they very same thing, but they don't block VoIP for the entire nation. The interesting thing, if I've understood correctly, is that a very large percentage of the UAE populace is made of foreigners (to them). So having affordable long distance rates to call friends and family is of high importance.
In short, for most people, especially fans of VoIP and VoIM clients such as Skype, AIM, MSN Messenger or Yahoo Messenger, there's no hope for their unblocking in the near future in the UAE.
[sources: Gulf News, TradeArabia, 7Days, VoIP News AU]
Written by ewriter on January 1st, 1970 with no comments.
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There's talk lately about futuristic applications, called crowdsensing, where cell phones with sensors are collectively used to predict weather or even the need for extra transit vehicles, etc. But the fact is, mobile handsets are already used in similar applications such as detecting traffic gridlock. This is what IntelliOne and AirSage are doing, starting in Atlanta, Georgia, with plans to expand to other locations in the US and Canada, including some unspecified location in the province of Ontario - which I assume must be Toronto.
Considering that Atlanta and Toronto are reputed to be the two absolute worst traffic hotspots in North America, that wouldn't be surprising. I've lived, driven, and worked in both Atlanta and Toronto metro areas, and that assessment is probably 100% accurate. I've literally been stuck in traffic 2 hrs going in and 3 hrs going out on particularly bad days. Transit isn't always any better, especially for those who live outside of either metro area. Privacy issues about being track notwithstanding, drivers in both metropolitan areas might be grateful for a solution that lets them bypass problem areas, even if they have to pay a monthly fee. Just don't tell your boss you were stuck in traffic if you weren't.
[sources: Globe and Mail]
Written by ewriter on January 1st, 1970 with no comments.
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Today, someone sent me my first real Skype spam (skam?) from Khurana + Company, possibly from Austin, Texas. (Text mode, not voice.) You spam me and I'll reveal you to everyone. I didn't bother reading the Skype message, but I think he's a lawyer, or offers some sort of legal services by Skype and email, not surprisingly. But don't assume that just because I have an East Indian (or similar) name like you that I'll be sympathetic to your business - or for whatever reason you picked me - especially if you approach me in this manner.
It's not vishing, but it's annoying. The first thing I'll do is block you permanently, the second announce you so that others watch out for your spam. Pick another way to advertise yourself; this is just bad publicity for you, equivalent to cold-calling me on the phone, which would earn you a nasty tirade.
Skype, you need to build a list of people that do this without the callee's permission and auto-block them. Will that work, you think? Anyone care to weigh in? On the other hand, Drew Barrymore and Beyonce can call me at any time, especially for a conference call, no matter what they're selling.
Written by ewriter on January 1st, 1970 with no comments.
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My first reaction to Jangl, an anonymity proxy service for phone numbers, was is that necessary? But dig a bit deeper and you find out there is value - albeit probably to a specific niche. But as niches go, it's potentially a big one. Jangl creates a unique phone number for any pair of people. It saves you from handing out your real phone number to someone, if you're not ready for that, but allows you to both communicate. Alec Saunders has some more details, garnered from a chat with Tim Johnson and CEO Michael Cerda. The service is being geared towards a dating community, for example.
Consider the mechanics behind generating unique call numbers between pairs of people. If you have, say, 1,000 members in a dating community, how many possible unique pairs of people do you have? C(1000, 2) = 1000-choose-2 combinations = [1000!/ (1000-2)!]/2! = 1000!/ 2x998! = 1000x999/2 = nearly a half-million generated numbers to serve all possible matchups, if I remember my math correctly. Of course, any one person wouldn't have to know all those numbers. But there's a lot of number management behind the scenes. More details to come.
Written by ewriter on January 1st, 1970 with no comments.
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It's pure coincidence but as I'm working on this brief article, I've just finished hearing Led Zeppelin's classic Communication Breakdown song. Radio 3net has their own 500 top albums for listening for free online. Yeah, 500. And all the classics are there; all you need is Windows Media Player to listen.
That said, this is a brief overview of some of the issues that could make or break how widespread IP communications becomes. Or at least delay ubiquity.
Written by ewriter on January 1st, 1970 with no comments.
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-- Pushpa Sathish, Staff Writer
It’s bad enough that your email is littered with spam, but can you imagine the frustration that occurs with voice spam? Picking up your phone just to hear an automated marketing call is the pits, especially when you’re in the middle of something important. These are the times when you wish you were important enough to merit a secretary who would screen your calls for you!
Well, NEC is doing its bit to keep out the voice spammers. The company announced the creation of an innovative technology that helps block VoIP spam. How? By identifying if a caller is human or machine after testing the caller’s capability to carry on a human-like conversation. The humans are let through while the androids are shown the door to the dumpster.
The company said that the product could be tailored to function well with most types of hardware, including SIP servers, home network equipment and session border controls. It’s come out with flying colors in tests against known botnets; NEC said that the technology was successful in identifying nearly all the VoIP spam thrown at it.
The new development, which is in its initial stages, will be showcased at the 3GSM World Congress in Barcelona later this month. And if you’re putting plans to hire a secretary on hold, I’d advise you against it – no specific date has been set for the commercial launch of NEC’s technology.
Written by pushpa27 on January 1st, 1970 with no comments.
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The US FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) reported well over 200,000 cyber complaints for 2005. These included cases of harrassment, stalking and generally inappropriate behavior, some via VoIP or VoIM soft clients such as Skype or Yahoo Messenger.
While I am fortunate not to have been harrassed to date, I do get cold-called by VoIP or VoIM increasingly of late, and usually by Skype. However, that may be because I have my SkypeMe status turned to "on". The FBI suggests that if you use Skype, that you turn off SkypeMe to avoid unwanted calls. (Other software offers similar features.) They also offer a few other suggestions:
If you are concerned for your safety and security for any reason, please contact the appropriate authorities.
[via PR Web]
Written by ewriter on January 1st, 1970 with no comments.
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