While most people I know are at either VoiceCon or CTIA this week, this one is worth staying home for. Also, I'm sure all the Skype followers are focused today on the news about working with the iPhone -- and that IS a big story. However -- for very different reasons -- I'm sure you'll find this one of interest too. This was a front page story in today's Globe and Mail, and no doubt many other Canadian dailies... more
ENUM (E.164 NUmber Mapping) is a technology that has been around for a little while that has promised much and, so far, delivered little to the average user. As Nominet has recently been awarded the contract to administer the UK 4.4.e164.arpa delegation, I thought it was time that I put my thoughts on this subject down in writing. I'm going to cover the potential of ENUM in the telecoms industry and what it could mean to you, along with how it is currently being used and what potential security issues surround ENUM. more
Nominet, the national registry for .uk domain names, has announced that ENUM, a registry service combining UK telephone numbers and the Domain Name System (DNS) for VoIP calls, is live. ENUM, also known as Telephone Number Mapping, is expected to allow companies and their customers and suppliers to make free or cheaper calls. In addition to the cost savings, other value-added features that ENUM is expected to provide for corporate communications include 'follow me' type function that will allow an individual to choose how (voice, fax, mobile, email, text messaging, location-based services and websites), and when they would like to be contacted throughout the day. more
I've been posting photos and snippets during eComm 2009 this week, but composing my overall impressions has been another matter. Sitting through 3 days mostly filled with continuous 15 minute presentations is a surefire recipe to fry your brain, and most people I talked to were topped out well before things wrapped up Thursday night. It's information overload of the highest -- and best -- order... Here's my top-line takeaway, and reading the rest of this post is really just detail. But it's detail you'll probably love if you really want to know what you missed... more
According to a new study, VoIP services are having a significant impact on the fixed line market in Europe. By mid-2008, just under 30 million consumer VoIP lines were in service in Western Europe, up from 20 million only a year earlier. TeleGeography, a research division of PriMetrica, estimates that the number of VoIP lines in Europe topped 35 million at end-2008... more
ipoque, a European deep packet inspection hardware provider has published an Internet study for 2008/2009 providing an overview of the Internet's current state based on analyzing 1.3 petabytes of Internet traffic -- "the amount of data equal to 300,000 DVDs" -- in eight regions of the world (Northern Africa, Southern Africa, South America, Middle East, Eastern Europe, Southern Europe, Southwestern Europe, Germany). The study includes the use of about 100 of the most popular Internet protocols including P2P, VoIP, media streaming, instant messaging. more
I recently had the opportunity to interview, Richard Whitt, Google's Washington Telecom and Media Counsel, who will be one of the keynote speakers at the upcoming Emerging Communications Conference (eComm 2009) being held on March 3-5 at the San Francisco Airport Marriott. The following is the transcript of our phone conversation and the audio recording of the interview. more
Here are my VoIP and Voice security predictions for 2009, limited to just a few, key predictions... The poor economy will slow the adoption rate for VoIP and Unified Communications (UC). This will continue to limit the size of the enterprise VoIP deployments for potential hackers to exploit. VoIP/UC will continue to be mostly an internal/campus application where the threat level for attack is low, so deployments will be largely secured along the same lines as other data network applications. more
I don't usually write sequels to my articles, but this time, it's warranted. My last column, "VoIP in 2008 -- I'm Not Dead," served as a year-end review and, for me, there were a lot of interesting things in 2008 related to VoIP that formed the basis of that article. I did not intend to rattle cages, but it did, and set off a lot of subsequent conversation, primarily in the blogosphere. more
Ok, ok - it's pretty hard to ignore the bombshell news that's on front pages everywhere today in Canada. It looks like Nortel is going to seek bankruptcy protection, perhaps as early as today. This may be a minor story in the U.S. business press, but it's a big story in tech/telecom, and a HUGE story here in Canada. You don't need me to tell you what Nortel means to Canada in terms of pride and joy, although that's more of a distant memory these days... more
Admittedly, I'm a not Johnny-come-lately with regards to surveillance, intelligence, telecommunications, network security, law enforcement, and a cross-pollination of all-of-the-above. I actually have a very colorful background of working within all of the aforementioned disciplines - at one time or another - either through the U.S. Military, U.S Government contractors, private industry, etc. ... And unfortunately, I am not generally "shocked" very often by much of the abuses being perpetrated on unwitting Internet users, both by supposedly "trusted" entities (e.g. Democratic Governments, ISPs, etc.) more
On New Year's Eve 2008 I felt compelled to respond to the stories being written about the Death of VoIP which lead to my recent blog post: VoIP is NOT Dead!. Since then, I've enjoyed many of the conversations that have continued to take place in the comment sections of a number of blogs, including this one. My belief is the future is unwritten and if the conditions are right people will return to the space. But we need to embrace innovation and change and encourage people to be disruptive. What follows is a continuation of the conversation. more
Here is a list of the most viewed news and blog postings that were featured on CircleID in 2008... Best wishes for 2009 and Happy New Year from all of us here at CircleID. more
VoIP remains a hot topic in the IP communications world, but it's definitely evolving. The following is my most recent article for a column that I write for TMCnet, and it's a year-end review on VoIP as well as my outlook for how it's changing for 2009. Colleague Alec Saunders posted his response to my article yesterday, and it's a good read. If you're interested in where VoIP is headed, then my article should help keep that dialog moving along within the CircleID community. Here we go... more
Last week American Airlines launched their Aircell wireless Internet access on a limited number of flights. It didn't take long before a few folks tried to make voice and video calls (in violation of Aircell's terms-of-service according to their PR folks), and it didn't take long before someone figured a way around their voice/video blocking efforts. more
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