VOIPSA wants to make VOIP more secure

March 29, 2005      Page 3 of 3

Cisco declined the invitation because it's already working on enhancing VOIP security through standards organizations such as the Internet Engineering Task Force, International Telecommunication Union and SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) Forum, said Roger Farnsworth, a Cisco product marketing manager. Cisco believes it ships secure VOIP systems today and has published its own set of guidelines for implementing secure IP telephony as part of the Cisco SAFE Blueprint series, he said.

"We thought it would be redundant to join another group that is addressing these problems," Farnsworth said. "If they specify activities that are in the interests of the industry and aligned with Cisco's interests, we'll be the first to line up," he added.

IDC VOIP analyst William Stofega is cautiously optimistic about the alliance. "I think they have enough critical mass between carriers and vendors that it should provide enough momentum to solve some of the outstanding problems," Stofega said. However, the addition of more service providers and a dominant company such as Cisco or Microsoft Corp. would help, he added.

Other major threats to VOIP networks include spam calling, tapping into calls and denial of service, Stofega said.

One frequently overlooked area that should be addressed in VOIPSA's guidelines is physical security for server rooms, Stofega said. An attacker who gets access to a server can wreak havoc, and the results could be especially devastating if that server is running a company's phone calls, he said.

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Source: IT World Canada