April 21, 2009

Love coffee and VoIP?

Filed under: VoIP — Tags: , , — admin @ 1:52 pm

In a recent deal, not only will Starbucks being servering up coffee, but they will also be providing their customers with Wi-Fi access.

The coffee giants have done a deal with BT to provide around 650 starbucks coffee shops across the UK and Ireland with Wi-Fi access and the ability to ’surf the web, email and make VoIP calls‘.

The partnership will include O2’s iPhone customers, who are already benefitting from the new Skype app.

The idea came about after it became clear that the number of people using BT’s Wi-Fi doubled last year and the popularity of being able to work or log onto the internet in a coffee shop became apparent.

Read more about this at Brand Rebublic

VoIP gets ready to fight its corner

Filed under: Hosted IP Platform, VoIP, VoIP in the Workplace — Tags: , — admin @ 1:38 pm

According to a recent article published on Multichannel News, the issue with integrating VoIP technology isn’t that people don’t understand the benefits, but that they are loathe to undertake such a big job.

Kristine Faulkner, Cox Business vice president of product development explained that “nobody wakes up and says ‘I am going to change all the phones in my business,’”. The issue that people face when switching to VoIP services is not that they don’t understand the benefits or why they should look to VoIP networks to streamline their business communications, but the fact that it can be a daunting task. Companies become complacent and adopt a ‘better the devil you know’ attitude.

Regardless of how these companies feel about the overhaul of their telephone systems, VoIP is where the commercial market is headed and a lot of a businesses will be dragged kicking and screaming into the new age of communications.

As cable companies widen their rollouts of hosted IP services, there will be more and more options available to businesses. Although, VoIP services for businesses are still in the early stages, it is very much the way that business-class technology is going to be heading.

For more information on this, go to the Multichannel News article.

The iPhone goes Skype

Filed under: VoIP — Tags: , , , — admin @ 12:41 pm

Last month iPhone users were able to download a Skype application from iTunes.

Users who have downloaded the new app from Apple will not be able to make calls over 3G connections and will not have all of the functionality offered by alternative Skype clients, so many have asked why have they bothered?

The news was announced at the CTIA – The Wireless Association – the iPhone application will allow users to make free calls to other Skype users and will provide them with cheaper calls using SkypeOut, but one of the users will have to be connected to a Wi-Fi network.

Although many industry bods have said that this is a great step and development, other functionality such as text messaging, file transfer and integrated voicemail are still missing. You also cannot pay for the additional Skype services in the usual way and instead have to go through iTunes, which seems a rather cumbersome way around the issue.

The iPhone is not able to run more than one application at once, which will make multi-functional applications like Fring and NimBuzz a lot more popular as these use multiple messaging and VoIP networks, including Skype.

There is much discussion around Skype and the iPhone, which seems to be advancing all of the time. Read more about this at The Register.

April 20, 2009

VoIP is in Top 5 of CIO investments

Filed under: VoIP — Tags: — admin @ 4:53 pm

According to a survey conducted by Robert Half Technology, VoIP is in the top 5 areas of IT that CIOs will be investing in within the next 12 months.

Around 1,400 Chief Investment Officers (CIOs) with 100 or more employees were interviewed sighting that VoIP technology had to be the next place to invest in order to take their businesses IT and communications forward.

The statistics are interesting though. 43% said that they would be looking to Information Security, and in this day and age, who can blame them for putting protecting their confidentiality at the top of their list. 28% plan to invest in Virtualisation and more cost effective solutions for servers, storing data and networking whereas 27% see the need to improve their data efficiency. 26% of those polled were looking into subscribing to Software as a Service, rather than purchasing licences and another 26% were looking at VoIP technology. The main reason that CIOs were looking into VoIP was to lower bills and to have greater network flexibility.

You can read the rest of the article on the Robert Half Technology website.

The Top VoIP Conference Phones

Filed under: VoIP in the Workplace, voip phones — Tags: — admin @ 12:43 pm

Over the past few months a number of new IP conference phones have hit the market, giving you more choice.

For many this has been an utter delight, whereas some of you have mentioned some confusion over which conference phones are really pressing all of the right buttons.

Having recently read an article by Garrett Smith for VoIP Supply our thoughts on what really makes a great conference phone have been confirmed, although we have a few favourites of our own.

This is our current top 4:

Polycom IP 6000
Polycom has always been at the top of its game and this particular model comes with a microphone picking up your conversation, up to 12 foot away – a 20% greater range than previous generations. 14Khz for high-fidelity calls and strong, robust SIP software making advanced call handling and security a piece of cake.

Avaya 4690 IP
This stylish Avaya conference phone comes with a whole host of features including support for SNMP, DHCP client and a manually configurable IP address. As the phone technology moves forward you also have the option to upgrade and download new software – so that your phone moves with you and the times.

Polycom SoundStation IP 7000
Like the Polycom IP6000, the IP7000 has a huge microphone range, but this time we are looking at around 20 foot. Again, strong, robust with the most advanced SIP software in the industry. It speaks for itself.

Polycom Nortel IP2033 Conference Phone
This conference phone offers you a full duplex, hands free conference phone – ideal for your desktop.

Compare our list with Garrett’s

April 16, 2009

VoIP Security and how to do it yourself

Filed under: VoIP, VoIP in the Workplace — Tags: , — admin @ 12:34 pm

VoIP technology is predicted to surpass even the large telecoms and may even close the gap on third world communications, improving the way that we communicate with the rest of the world.

VoIP is quickly becoming the way that a lot of businesses are preferring to do business and many believe that in time VoIP will become the standard way of telecommunications.

What has to be considered is the threat to security that VoIP could open you to.

Like other types of data networks, VoIP is susceptible to the usual attacks like viruses, spam, phishing, Dos attacks, lost and stolen data, toll fraud (when someone uses your network to make toll or long distance calls at your expense) and eavesdropping. The risks to your company security are many, but there are some things that you can do now to help protect yourself against attacks of this kind.

1. Keep your network away from the Internet
2. Make sure that you update patches regularly
3. Equip your system with firewalls
4. Restrict VoIP data to one VLAN (Virtual Local Area Network)
5. Keep track of your traffic and watch for any suspicious patterns
6. Lock down VoIP Servers
7. Multiple layers of encryption to deter
8. Build in redundancy into VoIP networks

Currently, the VoIP industry itself has not introduced measurements to protect businesses from VoIP fraud and attacks, but these points will help you to cover yourself and your communications.

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