Developing standards for better VoIP services

by Stuart Corner

Sunday, 17 June 2007

Page 1 of 3 ! VoIP services are rapidly gaining popularity in Australia and are increasing being promoted as a substitute for the standard telephone service, but much progress will need to be made before they can really achieve this. Don't miss the iTWire VoIP feature VoIP provider, Engin has just announced that it will resell Optus ADSL2+ services which it intends to bundle with its VoIP service. Customers will get a phone number, a phone service and broadband Internet access without having to pay line rental. They won't, however get a standard telephone service, but Engin sees this as no barrier: Engin CEO, Ilka Tales, told iTWire that, already 20 percent of Engin customers don't have a fixed line service. That bodes well for the future of VoIP. However, while VoIP providers like to claim that voice quality on their services is as good as PSTN, this is not always the case: especially if their VoIP service is delivered over a broadband access service over which they have no control. The Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) has mandatory standards for the PSTN that include among other things requirements for conformance to international standards on voice quality, specified by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). Such mandatory requirements are some way off for VoIP. However the Australian industry is well advanced in developing the technical and operational specifications that would enable VoIP service providers to provide services to specified standards, and across interconnected networks from different providers. The work is being undertaken through two working committees within the Communications Alliance (CA). One is looking at how QoS would be specified and implemented in ISPs' backbone networks and the other looking specifically at how VoIP quality would be defined and measured and specified in the traffic parameters being developed by the first working committee. The projects are part of CA's work on next generation networks. VoIP feature << First page <   1 2 3 Next page > Last page - Post your comment >>

 

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