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VoIP Backlash From Phone Companies
denis-The-menace writes "An article from the online edition of IEEE Spectrum says phone companies in France, Germany, Egypt and Saudi Arabia have announced they will block VoIP calls on their networks. Using new software from Narus Inc., the carriers can detect data packets belonging to VoIP applications and block the calls. Gotta love Ma Bell." From the article: "Narus's software does far more than just frustrate Skype users. It can also diagnose, and react to, denial-of-service attacks and dangerous viruses and worms as they wiggle through a network. It makes possible digital wiretaps, a capability that carriers are required by law to have. However, these positive applications for Narus's software may not be enough to make Internet users warm to its use. 'Protecting its network is a legitimate thing for a carrier to do ... But it's another thing for a Comcast to charge more if I use my own TiVo instead of the personal video recorder they provide, or for Time Warner, which owns CNN, to charge a premium if I want to watch Fox News on my computer.'"
Question for the knowledgeable: could VOIP companies invoke the WTO for anti-competitive practices?
Human being (n.): A genetically human, genetically distinct, functioning organism.
As if it wasn't on the way anyway...
The carriers will then have a choice: let the encrypted traffic through, or restrict their customer's Internet use to only approved (and monitored) traffic.
It will be interesting to see which option various countries choose...
The U.N. is comprised of many of these repressive anti-freedom regimes. Thankfully, they only control what happens within their borders.
To all slashdotters who want U.N. control of the internet- behold, internationalization and diversity prove inferior to plain old fashioned American ideals yet again.
They have been ripping us off for years because of their monopoly. Now they must compete or dye. Me, I already don't use the local telco and haven't looked back.
Good bye ma bell.... don't need you.
For instance, Cox Cable @Home explicitly says "No VPNs", but many users do anyway. It would be a simple matter for them to block IPSec traffic, or even regular UDP/500 traffic. (yes, there are SSL VPNs, blah blah blah). And you couldn't complain, because you signed the contract.
In other countries, not even Soviet Russia, there are State-owned Telcos, which have implicit or explicit Terms of Service. I'm sure the Telco in Saudi Arabia says things like "no porn, no homosexual activity, nothing critical of Islam" etc. They ALSO probably say "no VoIP".
Don't like it? Don't use the service... oh wait, you have to, because its a State owned monopoly. Oh well, strive for political change then.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
If they increase latency, online games start to suffer - and if Microsoft finds out it is happening they bring down the mightly legal hammer.
But I really don't think the cable companies are sophisticaed enough to pull this out wihtout breaking other things as well.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The only phone service in my house is Vonage. If my ISP were to try to block or restrict that, you'd better believe I wouldn't be switching over to their phone service. I'd be getting a new ISP.
So, if it's an all (buy their phone service AND their internet access) or nothing kind of thing, from me they'll get nothing.
How sad... If they only dropped their long distance rates people wouldn't care about "digital phone". I don't see what difference the underlying medium makes to their costs at all. Meanwhile primus has introduced a new long distance package that's as cheap as vonage. I can have primus phone service and unlimited North american long distance for $53 CDN so why exactly do I need a VOIP service on top of that? $53 - $27 for the phone service makes the long distance portion of that $26. Vonage charges $39.99 for something of lower quality. I'm seriously considering it.
This will probably lead to some sort of packet steganography and encryption which will make digital taps harder to do and "the terrorists will win."
Of course, spoofing the packets to look like non-VoIP packets might be a workaround.
It's all a cat-and-mouse game until someone files a lawsuit.
FTA...
Couldn't the FCC requirements that VoIP provide access to 911 emergency services be used as a legal precedent against carriers from degrading VoIP services in the US? If Vonage got in trouble for it, then any company that interferes with the call should be liable as well. Even if it isn't outright blocking the call, artificially deteriorating the quality could prevent proper communication in an emergency and endanger lives. Even jitter and latency in the call could possibly mean the difference between life and death in a critical situation.
"Better to loose business to yourself than to somebody else."
Damn right. Adapt or Die.
Or, you know, lobby yourself into immortality, but that only means a slower, prolonged death.
I think this is the better answer to the overall problem. When you pay for a phone line to your house, you buy it so people can call you. When the phone companies implement a POTS (T is optional in this case) they are supposed to accept calls. My guess is that a consumer group should go after companies that use this software feature, backed by users of said companies.
"I guess this is illegal in my country (Brasil)."
Funny thing about the law, that usually doesn't matter. Also think about the how much laws can change from country to country, even when they share borders (Canada and U.S. rules about TV rebroadcasting come to mind). In the case of TV rebroadcasting Canada shut down a lot of internet rebroadcasts just because the US government (backed by media companies) strong armed them.
This is one of those problems that theoretically shouldn't be completely fixable, but everyone knows that it is from past experiences.
"And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the World"
1 John 4:14
A much better strategy was already covered by slashdot a few months ago. The telcos just need to make other VoIP solutions suck, via COS (Class of Service). Then no one can get mad at them and they can roll out their own high quality VoIP solution.
--
The Switchboard - the free browser based internet phone
Please bear in mind that Germany, France, et al. are the same countries that are trying, through the UN, to forcibly take control of the internet's root servers.
To forcibly take control? They are questioning the status quo and are trying to persuade the world that it should be handled differently. It is their right to do this, and there is no force involved.
Also, please note that the article has nothing to do with the states of France and Germany. It mentions two cell phone companies, SFR and Vodafone, which apparently decided to block VoIP on their respective networks.
One of the first things they could do to prevent migration to VoIP is to include all the extra features like caller ID and other value added features in with basic phone service. VoIP is the future of telecommunications. It runs on data networks, and we all know data networks aren't going away anytime soon.
That is definately a good idea. Another would be to reduce or remove long-distance charges. Although there are various companies that charge lower long distance (many I'm sure using Voip), this needs to be much more widespread. I don't know how long-distance charging works, but it needs to be much more like how tier-1 ISPs peer for free with each other. If it already is, then it's just pure profit for them.. so they'll have to be willing to take a cut in that profit to prevent losing it altogher.
What would be even better would be to blur the line between VoIP and POTS. Provide digital service (even voip) right from the CO, then throw it on the TDM network. Provide some of the benefits of VoIP (multiple concurrent calls, digital signalling (ie, instant caller id)) without the problems that VoIP has on the internet (latency, outages).
At my small business, we use VoIP internally for our phone system, but also as a backup line. We have 3 voice POTS lines, which all hunt from our main number. The last one hunts to a VoIP 'wholesale' (no voicemail, call waiting, etc services -- our phone system does that stuff) number, where we can accept as many calls as we have bandwidth (and we have a decent chunk of bandwidth). We also use the VoIP line for outgoing long-distance calls, or if the POTS lines are all used up. This effectively gives us "unlimited" call handling capability, for much much much less than it would cost to have 3 or 6 or 10 more phone lines. We just pay a littler over a cent a minute, plus a couple dollars a month for a DID (local phone number). The phone companies have a way to go before they're going to be able to match that and that's probably what has them scared.
Of course, blocking VoIP seems very dumb. If my ISP was my phone company, and they blocked my VoIP calls, my response would be to get a new ISP -- not say "oh well, I guess I'll just pay more for a less-capable analog phone line". Not only are they driving away voice customers, but they're driving away their internet customers as well.
Speak before you think
One of the clearest and most insightful articles I have read on /. in a long while. Wish I had mod points today.
Sooo...
You don't like the way things are handeled and you:
Option A: just do it your own way, without talking to the others involved, risking to break a lot of things. "Who cares, I do what I want to do..."
Option B: Start a discussion about what you don't like, trying to convince as many of the others involved as possible that the current system needs in your opinion to be reformed.
What you are essentially saying that one should go with option A, because B just shows how much you hate the others? Strange thinking...