You got my attention. I already had one go around with Convey and LSI over this.
Convey Services is SAAS company that runs a portal for master agencies. LSI and ByteGrid hired Convey to handle their portals and an event. Convey did a poor job on the details of this. The email came from them, not LSI or ByteGrid. The email didn't explain clearly anything actually.
Convey tracks agent usage of the portal. Where they go, what they look at. I figured they scraped my email from that. Convey says it was provided by LSI, who got it from a LinkedIn connection with one of their executives.
Everything about these 4 or 5 emails has been the showcase for the Lazy Marketer. Quick, Dirty and Hurried.
It was a blast email, but the emails were CC'ed instead of BCC'ed. (So I will likely get even more spam.) If you can't Blind CC, do I really think you can handle Compliance issues?
For your own education, HIPAA is not HIPPA. This does not exude confidence.
I asked to be removed from the email twice - both to Convey and LSI. No idea how ByteGrid got it. I have never done business with any of these companies.
Also, it takes one minute to look at my website or my twitter or my LinkedIn profile to know that I reside in Tampa Florida. Why do I get invited to so many events in Atlanta and Miami? One is a 7 hour drive and the other is 4 hours. From companies I have no relationship with?
If you aren't careful with my email, why I would I trust you with my client?
I know you think I made a mountain out of a molehill, but I get tired of the pile of email I get that is this or even more irrelevant.
I understand you want to get the word out. It's a fun event. Let's Blast it out! NO!!! STOP!
It's like when a Channel Manager from a carrier I quoted but never sold, does the musical chairs to another company and pings me from there. I shake my head.
3 Things:
Don't Be Lazy.
]]>If I was starting my telecom agency today, what would I do?
When I started in 1999, I was selling basically one product (Wholesale DSL to ISPs). That was my entry drug of choice. It led to frame relay, ATM, IP Transit, DS1/DS3 and PRIs. But it was a single offering to a very targeted market. Most of those clients from 1999-2001 are still with me!
Certainly an agent starting out is going to be offering bandwidth in all its colors. However, I would build a multi-vendor bundle to sell to a specific audience. I am a big fan of vertical sales. Anyone can be a Generalist, but being a Specialist pays better. How many GPs (general practitioners) are left in medicine or law?
And being a Specialist doesn't mean that you have to turn away other business that comes to you, it just means that you have Focus. You have a target to aim at. You have an audience that you can get to know and develop a message for.
It is far easier to market a specific bundle aimed at a target vertical than it is to create a marketing message aimed at the generic masses.
Targeted marketing is cheaper. Easier to send email or postcards to every ISP in the BellSouth region than to target every SMB in a state.
One bundle I have been working on is the Verizon Wireless One Talk service with 4G backup, a Cradlepoint router, FiOS and a Square POS (point of sale) system. It is a targeted package - Retail. It allows for add-on sales: smartphones, video surveillance, email or Office365 and web hosting. You could also offer credit card processing and PCI DSS Compliance via EarthLink. You could go bigger with managed wi-fi. There are many add-ons, but the original 4 component bundle is where to start.
The bundle contains the essential ingredients of a small retail shop: broadband, backup (because retail can't make money without 100% uptime on the Internet for credit card processing and digital phone service), wireless network, phone system and cash register. Signing up with SYNNEX and any of the Alliance Partners would get you all the access you need to bundle that - and make commissions.
Anyway that is how I would start today. Chasing Verticals with a multi-vendor solution that I designed for them.
]]>Microsoft has been far behind AWS but then they started later too. This study shows that AWS has 45% share of public cloud infrastructure market -- more than Microsoft, Google, IBM combined.
Amazon launched a conferencing service called Chime.aws. They launched it with Vonage Business. Why? Unless the old Nexmo service is the back-end for the WebRTC voice and video and screen share. Vonage has 4 platforms - consumer VoIP; Vocalocity small biz; Broadsoft and Nexmo. I think they would have conferencing covered.
Amazon offers VPS and Hosting too. They also are a sales agent for Frontier and Comcast.
ABRY Partners owns StackPath which acquired Highwinds, a Florida based CDN company. StackPath will now offer secure CDN on top of firewall and DDoS mitigation services.
Dell announced that is unifying the Dell and EMC partner programs. Dell used partner feedback to make it simple, predictable and profitable. It is the best of both programs, says Dell. "It Preserves best of legacy Dell and EMC programs to reward partners who sell the full portfolio, including services, grow their business and win net new customers." One characteristic: "One deal registration program and a Zero Tolerance policy for deal conflicts."
Datto has acquired OpenMesh to further its pivot to be a premiere partner for MSPs. "The Open Mesh wireless access point and ethernet switching technologies will join the existing Datto Networking Appliance to create the Datto Networking line of products, optimized for small-to-medium sized businesses and delivered exclusively through Datto's global network of Managed Service Provider partners." I guess it will compete with Ruckus, Meraki (Cisco) and ADTRAn's managed wi-fi solutions.
In an interesting vertical move, "Evolve IP has partnered with Nimble Storage to provide healthcare organizations with on-premises Nimble Storage flash arrays, supported by HIPAA-compliant and HITRUST-audited hybrid cloud, cloud backup and disaster recovery solutions from Evolve IP." [channelvision]
]]>Healthcare is also buying MPLS. Healthcare has a mandate for private networking, encryption and security, all driven by the HITECH Act and Rule-making. Even the cellphones and VoIP have to be secure, which leaves room for MDM (mobile device management) to be sold. Lots of add-ons if you can explain the rules and the value. For example, wi-fi and TV for the waiting room and secure WLAN for the patient areas.
Businesses are buying Ethernet transport from the Duopoly (and fiber players like tw telecom and Zayo). If you call it Ethernet, they will even buy it delivered over fixed wireless service. TDM is so yesterday.
The Entertainment industry is buying really fat pipe (GigE). Those movie files are uncompressed and extremely large (think terabyte).
Retail has its own set of problems to solve including PCI Compliance for credit card processing. With a big enough broadband circuit, retail can get VoIP, video surveillance, credit card processing, CRM, and data backup.
Think about the problems facing the company you are trying to sell to. Compliance issues being just one of the issues facing business owners today. Stop selling Products and start selling the whole solution.
]]>BYOD means supporting a myriad array of devices (laptops, tablets, phones) on a number of platforms (Win7, Win8, iOS, Android, Blackberry) across time zones. Oh, and accomplish that without a training budget or any additional headcount.
For years, the promise of the future depended heavily on the inter-exchange of data between various legacy systems in the organization. This hasn't changed. The migration to the cloud involves taking a data set in one form and moving it into another computer system and data form, securing, backing it up, and allowing it to inter-exchange with other systems and users (securely and in compliance). Big Issue - bigger than Big Data.
The whole point of API's was to make applications talk to each other, but having an API doesn't necessary mean that the apps will talk to each other as needed or in a meaningful way. Just one more reason developers are in short supply.
If you can help alleviate any staffing problems or support issues for an Enterprise, then you have a prospect.
It may seem that the CIO list is buzz term heavy, but these issues became buzz terms because the problem is so far-reaching. Solve them to make money.
]]>CenturyLink wants more than the 30% of the $300M USF reform fund called Connect America. In fact, they want to overbuild on existing WISP's with that money. WISPA Opposes the new federal Subsidies for CenturyLink. Personally, I don't think that any LEC or MSO should receive federal funds. If we had the best broadband in the world, I would say okay - that's worth the money. We don't. They spend more than $300M in lobbbying per year!! Spend that money on broadband. Plus there are small businesses called Wireless ISP's already in that market that C-Link is going to spend tax dollars to put out of business! That's the Corporate Way!
MegaPath has the largest Ethernet over Copper footprint in the US. There are 600 Central Offices with ADTRAN Total Access 5000 gear to provide facilities-based EoC up to 20 MB.
Data Centers are growing. That was actually a headline yesterday. No kidding!
Health Care: What HIPAA Means for Data Centers. My understanding is that transport isn't a worry - and there is no such thing as HIPAA compliant transport! It is all about the storage, security and handling of the medical records - physical or electronic. That also means data centers have to be secure and tracking visitors, in case one gets access to a storage device. BTW, it is HIPAA, not HIPPA. How can you even say you are compliant if you get the acronymn wrong?!
Dell Voice is offered in Canada as a competitor to Vonage Mobile. Dell Voice is now on Blackberry, just in time for their corporate jet auction.
XO introduces a purple logo and a new XO Partner Program.
I remember all the WinTel articles about the Intel-Microsoft alliance dominating tech in the 90s. Today, not so much.
Voice Carrier wasn't thinking when it named itself. Branding rule number 1: if they can't find you in search, you don't exist. Didn't you learn anything from Xerox or Kleenex?
"Today services like Dropbox give people access to their work anywhere, any time, on any device, and users love it. (52% of our survey respondents said Dropbox is used in their organizations. Only 12% of IT departments are supporting it.)" How Mobile Consumer Devices Drive Cloud Applications in Enterprise IT.
Are you like a dog with a bone about anything?
]]>One of Sprint's points is: "because the VoIP originated traffic is jurisdictionally interstate, intrastate access tariffs cannot impose compensation obligations with respect to that traffic, even if those calls originate and terminate in the same state."
This issue was sort of addressed in 2010.
Kelley Drye explains it: "On February 18, 2010, a federal district court stepped in to fill the gap left by the FCC's silence on the issue of whether transmission of Voice over Internet Protocol ("VoIP")-originated calls is an information service exempt from access charges or a telecommunications service subject to access charges. The United States District Court for the District of Columbia in PAETEC Communications, Inc. v. CommPartners, LLC held that the transmission and net protocol conversion of VoIP-originated calls is an information service not subject to access charges and that a tariff imposing such charges is ultra vires and lacks legal force."
VoIP Logic points out that "the Court supported application of the FCC's $0.0007 reciprocal compensation cap, an amount to be paid for local traffic exchange between networks."
Other rulings have conflicted including the Pennsylvania PUC ruling. More importantly, "U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York reached an opposite conclusion in a suit pitting VoIP provider GlobalNAPs, Inc." against MetTel on March 31, 2010. "While acknowledging the findings in the CommPartners case, the court found that an inability to apply the tariff regime as did not preclude MetTel's entitlement to recover in equity for costs it assumed in terminating Global's traffic, and concluded that GlobalNAPs was not entitled to "unjust enrichment," e.g. was required to compensate MetTel for access." [VoIP Logic] GlobalNAPs petitioned the FCC for a ruling in 2010. The FCC has waffled as per usual.
They even waffled within months of each order. In October of 2011, this order was released with the Connect America Fund order. Then on April 25, 2012, the FCC released a revised Connect America Fund Order that revised the ICC/USF Reform. This order "permits local exchange carriers (LECs) to impose higher charges for originating intra-state toll calls that begin or end in VoIP format. Previously, in its USF/ICC Transformation Order the FCC determined that effective Dec. 29, 2011, originating access charges for such intrastate toll calls would be capped at the level of the LEC's normally lower interstate charges." JDSupra continues to explain, "The FCC's new decision establishes a transitional rate rule, under which intrastate VoIP toll traffic will be subject to intrastate rates for approximately two years." It all comes down to tariff rates, which, contrary to popular belief, can be updated at any time by the carrier and just need to be filed to be effective. (So when they hide behind the tariff, they are just saying they don't want to.)
If you are confused, you are not alone. Hence, why Sprint is petitioning the FCC. Maybe some day it will finally be settled.
]]>USTelecom is an organization made up of ILEC's. The org has filed for forbearance at the FCC on behalf of its members. Not certain THAT is legal.
The petition [pdf] comes from the ILEC executives "essentially telling the FCC that it's time to wake up and smell the coffee--"many rules were adopted in a different era, long before the advent of broadband networks or the creation of the public Internet."," as JSI describes it. JSI continues with, "it might be time for a new regulatory regime as even the 96 Act is becoming less and less relevant with each new cord cutter and cross-platform conglomerate. The petition is also in line with the White House and Congress' push to get the FCC to clean house, and "the Commission's commitment to eliminate unnecessary regulatory requirements.""
The petition states, "Forbearance is warranted because the rules have been rendered obsolete by technological and market changes. From a technological standpoint, the Commission's legacy telecommunications regulations are ill-suited to facilitating, and in fact hamper, broadband deployment." I'm not sure that's true. It hasn't hampered DSL; the LEC's have by not deploying, switching to fiber and, quite frankly, arrogantly thinking that they were still a Monopoly. In every respect, the trouble with ILEC's is NOT the federal (or dwindling state) regulations. The trouble with the ILEC's is a Monopoly Mindset.
They don't choose the best technology nor do the deploy technology well. Mismanaged spectrum just being a symptom.
FiOS failed because the numbers forecast was wrong. Basing it on 50% penetration was a mistake. Not considering that it would take 2 techs all day (or longer) to install triple-play FiOS. Thinking that the CPE - all 4 pieces of equipment - would be cheap to install.
Let's also look at three bigger problems for ILEC's Pensions, Unions, and USF. By shifting to a cellular and entertainment companies, the RBOCs - AT&T and Verizon - are moving toward a non-union shop. AT&T is dealing with CWA union contracts right now - and VZ had to deal with them last year (along with a strike). They want to eliminate the union. Cellular, entertainment, cloud and outsourced services mean less Union liability - and less pension liability. The ILEC's - Embarq, VZ, ATT, Qwest - are sitting on a chunk of pension payments. It's just another example of bad planning by the executives running these corporations. I know in my life time I will see one of these companies file BK papers. With all the debt they have - $109B just for the Big 2 - mixed with declining revenues, pension payments, probably healthcare costs, union troubles and hyper-competition, the C-Suites at the ILEC's - all of them - are as ill-suited to run them as Hesse is to turn Sprint around.
A Forbearance petition is nice, but it won't solve any of their problems.
With USF Reform, the RLEC's - and even some ILEC's (FFW+C) - will be in even more trouble. Not just competition and dwindling access lines, but decreasing government subsidies for those access lines PLUS a requirement to build out broadband, which means CAPEX! It is not a pretty horizon.
As I read this paragraph all I can think is: Monopoly MIndset is the problem, not FCC regulations. And claiming that it is regs that have created the current quagmire is sticking your head in the sand.
"Indeed, the most recent survey by the Center for Disease Control (which has been relied upon previously by the Commission) has found that more than 32 percent of households have completely "cut the cord" and have abandoned their wireline phone altogether. .... At the same time, incumbent carriers compete against a host of providers, including cable companies that offer service to at least 93 percent of American households, already serve approximately 20 percent of the residential voice market, and are the primary provider of residential broadband. Under these competitive circumstances, the current outdated regulatory regime imposes unnecessary costs on a limited subset of competitors to the detriment of these competitors and consumers alike." Plus it's a Duopoly. There isn't much competition in the Broadband space. It's DSL, cable or 3G.
Comments or Oppositions Due: April 9, 2012 TODAY>
And of course COMPTEL has filed opposition.
Category 10 (Service Discontinuance Approval Requirements); Category 9 (Rules Governing Notices of Network Changes); and Category 2: (Open Network Architecture and Comparably Efficient Interconnection Requirements, All-Carrier Computer Inquiry Rules and the Structural Separation Rule) would really make CLEC life miserable.
Think about this when thinking about regulations being the issue: "According to the Telecommunications Industry Association, wireless has become the preferred voice-services option. Wireless revenue in 2012 is forecast at $335 billion, while all other forms of fixed network voice revenue will only total $176 billion ($132 billion for wireline, $38 billion for broadband access and $6 billion in cable/television revenue)." Is it regulations doing this or our mobile culture? De-regulating ILECs will mostly hurt SMB who are the profit center of ITSP and CLEC businesses.
One last point: voice is being replaced by Skype, G+, Facebook, IM, chat, SMS, and other types of communications. These innovations were NOT brought to you by the telcos NOR will any innovation because they have a Monopoly Mindset. And that mindset screams: "We want to make more money off our old plumbing without having to morph, change or innovate!"
There's no fixing that.
]]>Now the ILEC's are going Cloud with Terremark, Savvis, and roll your own. This is shocking to me, since I was there in 2001 when BellSouth (and other ILEC's) first attempted data center and e-Commerce. At the time, BellSouth had partners like EMC to deliver the managed servcies and IBM for the data center. But this isn't something they knew how to sell or how to market. Certainly, the market has changed to make it easier to sell, but are the ILEC's the right partner for Cloud?
I look at how they are struggling with declining wireline revenue (and mounting debt). They have been grasping at TV for consumer triple-play; tech support for broadband customers; and managed services. A managed router from AT&T is configured and managed in Singapore! The slight time difference affects support. Plus it is by email mainly.
Is that what Enterprise customers want?
Then I look at the Telecom Subpanel talks on Cybersecurity, in which reps from AT&T, Comcast, Century Link and MetroPCS were featured speakers in front of The House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Communications and Technology hearing Wednesday morning on the cybersecurity threat to the nation's communications networks. The hearings are about regulation of security of the communications infrastructure - who will have oversight, what will be required, and the like, to be added to a bill. Like that will help. Sheesh!
And, of course, the carriers do NOT want to be regulated. In fact, CenturyLink is petitioning the FCC to forbear from "dominant carrier regulation and the Computer Inquiry tariffing requirement with respect to its packet-switched and optical transmission services" for those services subject to the regulations. "CenturyLink states that, because of recent mergers, its enterprise broadband services are subject to different regulations depending on which CenturyLink affiliate - Qwest, Embarq, or CenturyTel - previously provided (or didn't provide) those services." Whatever. They do what they want anyway. There isn't any FCC enforcement (of merger conditions or forbearance conditions).
That sentiment brings me back to cybersecurity and regulations. It would be kind of joke really. The FCC took over 10 years to come to grips with VoIP, how would it ever regulate something as fluid as security? And what would enforcement look like? Would it be something like CPNI?
There are over 1000 VoIP providers in the US plus the numerous LEC's, cablecos and cellcos. Does anyone really think that enforcement is a priority at the FCC?
So back to telco cloud services.
On the one hand, I like that Savvis is still Savvis and Terremark is still Terremark (without any telco infection, no offense). In fact, "Savvis is poised to lead in Gartner's Magic Quadrant for Public Cloud Infrastructure as a Service in addition to Gartner's Magic Quadrant for Cloud Infrastructure as a Service and Web Hosting," according to Seeking Alpha. Given that every data center company from TELX to QTS have launched Cloud services, not to mention every CLEC, TWC (via Navisite) and most VAR's, would you rather sell IT services from an IT company or IT services from a telco?
The whole "I don't want to be regulated, I don't want to be a common carrier" is fine if you understand that to stop being a monopoly, you have to stop acting like one! You HAVE to provide customer service. You can't finger point when handling Managed Services or Cloud Services. You have to ANSWERS to solve problems for your customers.
I think that Cloud is going to be a bust for telcos, in general. They have been the pipe, the plumbers, for so long -- and even if you want to reach up to Layer 7 (to grab the money) doesn't mean you have the ability or will be able to deliver on it. Going into cellular was just another Layer 1 project.
Let me point out a few things. Many fiber companies (or divisions) can't find or price out their fiber. A cellco has mismanaged its network to the point of disrupting users and its 4G future. An ILEC has done such a poor job planning Metro Ethernet that it has run out of VLAN's in two major metros!
Cloud may turn out like FTTH and Telco TV: an investment that didn't work out. Or it may work out despite what I think will be glaring holes.
]]>The FCC is really busy!
The FCC is still working on Inter-Carrier Compensation. It ordered Rural Call Completion.
It approved TWC's $3B bid for Insight. "Time Warner Cable last August agreed to buy Insight for $3 billion in cash. The nation's No. 2 cable operator will acquire control of Insight by merging Insight into Derby Merger Sub Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of TWC, with Insight as the surviving entity, according to the FCC. Insight will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of TWC," according to Multi-Channel.
The FCC is looking for comments on NFL Black out. (So is the Florida Legislature, since the stadiums are publicly supported.) 16 games blacked out this year included 7 by my Bucs. That's not any way to treat fans or build up a fan base.
Engadget reports, "Back in December, the FCC approved the first white space device and database for the lucky city of Wilmington, North Carolina....Spectrum Bridge finally launched its TV White Space (TVWS) network in Carolina, as part of Wilmington's ongoing "Smart City" initiative."
The Lifeline program for low-income households has also been re-vamped by this Commission. There is a $25 million pilot program for Lifeline for broadband to see if there are cost savings. [PCworld]
Clearly, the FCC is working on a lot of business. Here are some other topics:
A lot to keep track of.
]]>It started out coincidentally as VAR Dynamics CEO, Tony Francisco, was on my plane this morning. And he just recently moved from Silicon Valley to Tampa Bay, where I live. He is working with Gazelle Labs and spoke at BarCamp Tampa Bay, which is an un-conference I co-organize for the last 4 years. I had to go to Miami Beach to talk to him though. Go figure!
VAR Dynamics is the geeks in the cloud that run the servers that run the software that VAR's and service providers then re-label and sell to end-users. Back in the day, they would be labeled Master MSP as they enable MSP businesses. I called then an MSPE - a managed service provider enabler. Tony disliked that immediately. They are like the VAR Viagra - get them up and running on the Cloud in a day, fully turn key and automated through the magic of open API's. Tony didn't like that either, but his VP of Marketing, Darrek Porter, a man who was in politics once upon a time, did. This system allows VAR's to consume and re-purpose cloud apps in a self-service atmosphere.
I like it when the discussion is lively, more like buddies chatting over coffee than telling me your talking points. VAR Dynamics has almost 200 partners, which include telcos, VAR's and MSP's. What's the difference between VAR and MSP? Mainly mindset. Break/fix versus MRR (monthly recurring revenue).
VAR Dynamics white labels a lot of Microsoft products like Exchange, Sharepoint, CRM and soon Lync Lite. They also white label Blackberry Enterprise Server and Zimbra. Why Zimbra? "For those that don't like Microsoft." They have add-ons like archiving and "Compliancy", which means help complying with the myriad federal regs like PCI, HIPAA, GLBA, SOX, etc.
Francisco did name drop Autotask, ConnectWise, Jamcracker and Reflection as current or future partners -- again through the magic of well coded open API's.
Are you a company with a base of customers looking for MRR - "and control of their future"? Then VAR Dynamics wants to talk to you.
How do you control your own future? By selling white-label services, you are the provider - no carrier deciding that the bottom looks better when they stop paying commissions - so the monthly commission isn't going to get cut off, unless the customer leaves you.
]]>QTS Atlanta Metro Data Center is the second largest data center in the world with 990,000 square feet of total space (of which 300k sf is raised floor space) and its own on-site Georgia Power substation.
There is a lot of talk about green when it comes to data centers. (See this article about dirty data centers in InfoTech mag.) As data center space grows, so too does power consumption. I got to speak with Tom Burns of Greenhouse Data in Cheyenne, Wyoming, "the planet's greenest data center". Greenhouse offers managed hosting, vCloud, virtualization,and collocation, utilizing "40% less energy than its traditional data center competitors -- all while being powered 100% through renewable wind energy." Burns explained that the data center space will soon have a larger carbon footprint than airlines. That might be true but the two industries are inversely growing - data centers are increasing due to the unlimited hunger for data and apps while airlines are cutting routes and flights to stay as close to profitable as they can get.
Data centers consume power twice: once for all the hardware housed in racks throughout the space and again to power the air conditioning to cool that same space that is heated by the hardware housed there. See that cycle? Power is the limiting factor for most data centers (not space). Greenhouse Data does a few things here differently. One, they re-use the heat to warm up office space. Two, some utlity equipment is outside the building; thus not adding to the heat inside the building. Lastly, they design the hot and cold racks more efficiently to contain the heat and send it above the drop ceiling for re-use.
When we talk about data centers, it's location, location, location. Most colo customers want to be within 4 hours drive of their colo space. There are about 7000 data centers in America. How do you differentiate? Greenhouse Data uses its green initiative as its brand. What do you use?
PS Energy efficiency means more margin, too.
BTW, COLOTRAQ, the foremost global sourcing advisory firm and master agency for colocation, managed services and cloud computing, proudly announces successfully completing its one thousandth project. This milestone brings the total value of business that COLOTRAQ has brought to the industry to more than 45 million dollars in annually recurring revenue. Congrats!
From Brad Feld: "StillSecure has been nailing it in the service provider segment with deals with XO, ViaWest, CoreSite, and others recently. StillSecure fundamentally believes that service providers - telcos, datacenter, cloud providers - will be the channel to market for security solutions and I agree. They have built an amazing set of solutions for colocation and dedicated server environments and have solutions that can apply to some higher-end cloud users. Today they are announcing a new host-based firewall management solution in conjunction with SoftLayer - a leader in the cloud market. Aimed at all cloud users, StillSecure's new solution is the start of a major initiative for the company and is also a new category of solutions."
One last tidbit: Datapipe launched PCI Certified Cloud.
]]>There has been much talk lately about VoIP security.
The FCC has a page to warn consumers and businesses alike about Voicemail hacks. (The FCC calls it Voice Mail Fraud but it's really about hacking the voicemail system to enable toll fraud.) This actually happened to me a few weeks ago. I never go into my vmail system because I get all my vmail as email. Remind your users. Or change it yourselves.
This article about the 7 Types of VoIP Fraud is pretty interesting.
The Internet Telephony Service Providers' Association has developed some guidelines for secure deployment of IP-PBX. [PDF].
I know that you think you know it all and that you have the master genius in your NOC. However, everyone can use a reminder. Furthermore, most companies do not have documented processes and procedures or things like a checklist (which would include demonstrating voicemail and making them change the password on Day 2). This results in practices that have holes. Holes get exploited. Exploits cost you customers and money.
Another reason to develop procedure documents: it helps with scale. As you grow, you will have the processes written by the personnel that were most familiar with the procedure. McDonald's isn't successful because they have great fries. McDonalds is successful because they have systems and procedures in place that any $7 per hour person can perform. They don't need a chef or a cook. They just need someone who can follow directions off a laminated card. That is the secret to the success of McD's.
]]>