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Google Apps Get Unified Communications

It was bound to happen... Google Apps have finally become connected to the world of Unified communications.

Thanks to Voice Mobility, you can now integrate Google Apps with your unified communications system in your campus or corporate environment. As you may know, the Google Apps suite includes Gmail, Google Talk, Google Calendar, Google Docs, Contacts, Mobile apps and other collaboration tools all using the workplace or campus domain.

The company's UCN Vmerge adds unified communications to complete messaging, collaboration, calendaring and presence functionality. The solution allows hosted or on-premise technology to handle the connectivity which is great for people who prefer the flexibility of choosing how they install this solution.

According to UCN spokesman Mike Seeley, Voice Mobility's VP of Global Sales, this total solution is like deploying Microsoft Exchange server, Active Directory and Office Communication Server at a fraction of the cost. In fact, Seeley compares this solution in the workplace and campus market to what Salesforce.com has done in the CRM space. I might have added that this solution is to communications as Salesforce.com is to CRM.

UCN Vmerge enables users to access voice, fax and email messages directly from their Gmail account and synchronize all messages across all their devices - in essence, gluing the Google Apps to the enterprise telephony infrastructure. For example, if an email is heard via the user's mobile device, it will be shown as read in their Gmail account. Other functionality enables users to:

• Send faxes directly from their Gmail account;
• Receive voice and fax messages in their Gmail account;
• Record and deposit office conversations in their Gmail account;
• Manage live calls from their desktop;
• Click-to-dial internal and external numbers from any Google application;
• Synchronize call logs;
• Import Google Contacts into UCN Vmerge for remote access;
• Utilize least cost routing available from the enterprise PBX;

You also get message waiting indication, message notifications, mobile workforce integration and offline access to the user's inbox. The company plans to release PBX presence integration with Google Talk soon.

UCN Vmerge is compatible with the majority of PBX and Centrex solutions on the market and the company can answer specific questions. For more information visit the Voice Mobility snapshot page or call John Gavin at 1.866.799.5577.

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VoIP Inc. May Sue You Soon

So yesterday I wrote an entry titled Intellectual Property, The Other Defition of IP and later I wished I had the opportunity to shorten the title to Intellectual Property, The other IP. You know, a play on "Pork, the other white meat" slogan.

Little did I know that one day later there would be a wonderful opportunity to cover the topic again as VoIP Inc., a company with a number of patents in the VoIP space has announced they too will be looking to VoIP patents as a way to generate revenue.

So why didn't I use my preferred title in this post? Simple... Because this post seems to apply to all companies using VoIP and moreover it could cause some damage in the industry. I wanted it to be clear that your company could soon be sued.

It is likely that VoIP Inc. will do better as a legal company then they have done in the service provider space. In fact the reason the company is shifting focus is likely because they couldn't figure out how to monetize their technology effectively.

The specific patent in question is USPTO-6501837 and it covers pay-per-call and click to call technology.

If you are using VoIP in your business you may be getting a  call from the company's lawyers soon.

Here is an excerpt from a press release the company distributed today:

Based on information provided from some of the industry's leading technology experts and the fact that this technology is being implemented at an ultra hyper rate domestically and internationally, Byron T. Ball, attorney at BALL LAW FIRM, LLP, stated, "I believe the current value of the patent could exceed 1.25 billion dollars."

"We have identified over 100 companies that have willfully infringed on our patents. We intend to stop the infringement and defend our technology and the patents behind it. These patents and the business they represent will be utilized to provide the shareholders with the value they deserve and have long awaited," stated CEO Anthony Cataldo. "Citing case studies, in reference to Click to Call, from Fortune 500 companies such as Continental Airlines, the ROI was 50x cost of service. The service showed a 35% lead conversion rate twice that of traditional leads and reduced website abandonment by over 25%."

The research firm Kelsey Group says Pay-Per-Call ad revenue in the U.S. in 2009 will top $4 billion. By comparison, all paid search ad revenue in the U.S. surpassed $4 billion in the first half of this year and is growing at more than a 40% per year clip.

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New VoIP Security Problem

Tom Keating alerted to me a new phone hack which is for now targeting SNOM IP phones.

The big hack involves the ability of some VoIP phones to make phone calls from the Web interface using a simple web POST request. The Snom 32x supports this feature which along with some security vulnerabilities is what GNUCitizen exploited to have some real fun, like ya know, making an outbound call using a spoofed CallerID.

Hackers will need the IP address of the phone being targeted to launch the attack, but using a simple scanner they can use a cross-site scripting attack to hack the phone’s built-in management interface.

Illegal stuff a hacker can do:

•  Steal the phone history from the logs including any other details attached to the calls via XHR.
•  Poison the address book with a persistent XSS - the name is encoded correctly but not the phone number.
• Inject a JavaScript worm to gain total control over the user by changing the visible output by performing XHR-CSRF attack.
• Change the settings of registered phones, including the displayed text on the phone’s display.

But the scariest problem is that a hacker can monitor the victim by making a phone call to the attacker’s number who in turn will accept the call and record the incoming sound. Worst of all, the phone doesn’t give any noticeable feedback (ring tones, etc) while the victim is under surveillance and the victim pays for the call!

Over the years, the SNOM team has been quite innovative and their technology has always been solid. I would imagine the fix for this problem should be pretty easy to write and now they need to roll it out quickly to all the phones on the market.

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What Caused the Blackberry Outage

It seems a single IP address refusing connections brought down the Blackberry network yesterday. Apparently a secondary IP address was accepting connections and those users who got some of their e-mails through were switching between IP addresses.

Thanks to Zenprise for sharing what happened to the Blackberry network yesterday.

See a detailed interview on what caused the Blackberry outage here.

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DECT Extends the Cell Phone

Here is the challenge with today's mobile devices. They are generally good at some things and bad at others. You need a device and a set of chargers for various functions. For example, on your vacation -- you need a cell phone and a camera. Some such as your truly will even add an e-mail device and web tablet to this list.

But what if you could take an ordinary cell phone and insert it into jackets which enable you to add to the device's functionality. A DECT jacket for example would turn your cell phone into a fixed-mobile device allowing you the best of wireless worlds. You could have a WiFi jacket and even a car stereo jacket which allows your device to seamlessly integrate with the car stereo.

While this may seem a bit far-fetched, a company named Modu already has a 2.5G GSM phone which will do some of these things. The company is in talks and has signed agreements with a number of cell phone providers worldwide and it will be interesting to see if this advance in communications changes how cell phones are made and marketed.

See Also:

• SKY MobileMedia's SKY-MAP Powers the modu Ecosystem
• modu Forms Strategic Partnership with VimpelCom
• moduUnveils Tiny, Modular Phone
• modu Announces Widespread Industry Support for the World's First Modular Mobile Phone 
• modu and Tele Atlas Join Forces to Combine Mobile Connectivity and Personal Navigation Content
• Mobile goes modular for features

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GooSue: Sueing Google Over Rankings

What's the latest trend in using the Internet? Why Suing Google of course. Don't like what someone says about you? Well... Whether you are a person or a city, the answer is the same; Sue Google and look to have them not rank the negative page as highly.

The Wall Street Journal has an article on the matter which discusses an Israeli city and real estate agents who are suing the world's largest search engine because negative comments are ranked high on the search engine.

It seems people do not understand that Google uses algorithms to determine search rank and subsequently shouldn't be held liable for results. Then again, I am no lawyer and who knows what the courts will decide. But looking at this objectively, the lawsuits seem ridiculous.

Oh, and by the way, I have come up with a new term... GooSue means suing Google for fun or profit. It seems the company is becoming so powerful that it will be a bigger and bigger target. My new term allows us all to have an easy way to describe what seems to be a new and interesting way to spend your time or make some extra pocket change.

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Phone Vs. Taser: Phone Wins

When a thief wielding a Taser entered the Alaskan home of a grandmnother, she faught back with her phone and eventually chased the thief away. Apparently she thinks she was Tasered but somehow didn't fall down. One wonders about this part of the story. Either way, the phone is now a weapon which means of course within six months the TSA will likely ban them from all flights.Yet another for travelers.

More

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UK Threatens to turn off Web Access

Russell Shaw discusses the talks in the UK which center around three strikes and your out legislation which will turn off broadband connectivity to those people who are repeated infringing downloaders.

What upsets Shaw most -- and I rarely see him this upset -- is the government's stipulation that ISPs can be prosecuted if they don't turn off service to their customers who infringe.

I see Russell's point but at the same time, someone has to enforce the rights of copyright holders and if it is not the government, who will it be.

What are your thoughts?

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Forbes on Mobile World Congress

Forbes does a good job of detailing the happenings at Mobile World Congress this week. In summary, the Android phone is not ready for prime time (not much of a surprise here) and there are a plethora of devices from camera-phones to candy bar styled devices being announced at the event.

The article points out that in response to heat from Google, Microsoft is acquiring Danger. Truth be told, one imagines the reason to make this purchase has more to do with RIM than Google but still, this single acquisition helps the software giant compete with both companies at once which probably means it is an easier purchase to justify.

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Packet8 MobileTalk Goes Free

Packet8 has done a good thing today by allowing charter subscribers to their MobileTalk service free access. In other words, there are no longer fees associated with signing up to use this service which allows you to seamlessly connect your long distance calls over their VoIP network. You still pay per-minute charges depending on the country you call.

These rates are ridiculously low by the way. A call to Paris is 3 cents per minute. Most calls to France mobile numbers will cost 15 cents. Calls to most of India will cost 5.9 cents per minute... Including mobile numbers.

I imagine the company's positive experience handing out free trial cards at CES and ITEXPO had something to do with this decision.

As you probably recall, I have had great experience using this service and eliminating fees that could be a barrier to people trialing the software and service makes a great deal of sense.

See Also:

• Big Things, Small Packages
• Podcast Interview: 8x8 VP Marketing Huw Rees
• Worldgate Problems
• ITEXPO East 2008 Recap
• California Broadband Task Force Recommendations

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Social Networking Decline

While social networks are still massive and generally doing well, there are more more reports of people getting fed up with such networks because they get too many friend requests and are not happy with the new advertising methods the sites use to generate revenue.

For example sharing a person's buying behavior is not making users of such services happy.

Today, the Wall Street Journal has an article that Bill Gates has stopped using FaceBook. The sad fact is that Microsoft has invested in the company.

While I have complained in the past about getting a few friend requests a day on such networks, Gates receives 8,000 each day. This is absolutely astounding and explains why he would want to leave the service.

The article also goes into the fact that you cannot ever delete your information on some of these networks.

Certainly, all this bad press can't be good for the likes of MySpace and FaceBook and could signal a broader trend that the world has lost interest in such sites.

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Samsung MBP-100

If you were hoping for the day that you could fit a video projector in your pocket, perhaps that day is finally here. Of course this depends a bit on how big your pockets are. From this picture it seems that the new Samsung MBP-100 is about the size of the cell phone it can connect to.

I suppose the market for this device is people who occasionally need a projector but don't want to lug a full-sized one with them.

On the business communications side, the company has been having a good deal of trouble lately keeping its dealers happy. Numerous changes have cut into dealer margins and put some out of business according to my sources. Rumors abound that the company could potentially sell its business communications division to Avaya.

More

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Russia: Spam Super-power

In the race to see which country is mightiest, Russia has rapidly muscled its way into the number two spot behind the US in terms of the amount of spam it sends. Here are the rankings:

Top Spam Producing Countries

Country	Percent of Spam Sent
US	21
Russia	8.3
China	4.2
Brazil	4.0
South Korea	3.9
Turkey	3.8
Italy	3.5
Poland	3.4
Germany	3.2
Spain	3.1
Mexico	3.1
Britain	2.5

If you thought the US was the runaway leader in tech, you would be right. As you can see from this chart, Russia is really coming on strong and this rate of growth will soon be in double-digits.

Here is an excerpt from an article on the matter:

"Countries that continually remain among the top spam-relaying countries need to ensure that they are doing more to proper defend computer systems," said Mike Haro, senior security analyst at Sophos.

"If they continue to sit back as compromised computers spread malicious emails and malware, then hackers will continue to look at these systems as easy targets in their efforts to turn them into botnets," which can be controlled by hackers.

In one of the latest efforts to bypass spam filters, Sophos said cybercriminals sent out their messages with supposed music files from stars such as Elvis Presley, Fergie and Carrie Underwood attached to the messages.

The files actually contained a monotone voice encouraging

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