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IB asks govt to block Skype, VoIP services
NEW DELHI — Citing security concerns related to the inability to track the origin of calls made via Internet telephony (Voice over Internet Protocol or VoIP), Intelligence Bureau (IB) has asked the Department of Telecom (DoT) to block VoIP services to and from the country.
According to a report, the IB has asked the DoT to block the calls until a mechanism has been put into place to track these calls. Terrorists have continuously been making use of such internet telephony services as they are aware that India doesn’t possess any mechanism to track such calls.
“In the absence of Caller Line Identification (CLI) parameters of calls landing from abroad, it’s next to impossible to identify the country of location of the caller,” IB sources said.
The IB has asked the government to consider blocking Skype as well after the VoIP company refused to accept India’s request to share the encryption code making it difficult for the IB to decipher conversations of suspected terrorists.
Skype, however, has shared its encryption code with the US, China and other governments.
In the US and Europe, there are mechanisms to trace each and every VoIP call. The companies providing internet telephony services in foreign countries have provisions for governments to trace the calls. Like the BlackBerry service, VoIP operators send their signals under a specific code which makes it difficult for others to decipher.
Requests to block VoIP services are nothing new. During the consultation on ISP licensing, certain stakeholders had raised the issue that Skype and Google (Talk) are not licensed to provide telephony services in India, and VoIP lacks the facility of lawful interception and monitoring.
Several telecom operators in India have begun offering VoIP services to broadband subscribers – MTNL has Pigeon powered by Aksh Optifibre, Sify provides the Way2Talk service.
The ban could affect thousands of people within and outside India who make cheap phone calls via VOIP services from Skype, Google, Yahoo and Windows Live. According to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), 130 million minutes of Internet telephone calls were made in India this year.
- AGENCIES
14 Responses to “IB asks govt to block Skype, VoIP services”
Yes develop programs to track the culprits instead of banning use of Skype
this is not really a good to ban skype, this is about the insufficency of Indain IT industry and security system
Many people use skype for eductional purpose especially for language learning … Banning skype will be a big setback..govt shoud think twice before implementing the ban on skype
I don’t mind losing Skype rather than lose my country to terrorists.
Hypocrisy of the highest order here…. they can give codes to the superpowers but not India. To hell with Skype.
Jai Hind
I don’t mind losing Skype rather than lose my country to terrorists.
Hypocrisy of the highest order here…. they can give codes to the superpowers but not India. To hell with Skype.
Leader of IT/BPO exports doesnt know how to solve the problem of VoIP.
Finally IB of India has proved that India have 99% of coders & only 1% of Programmer.
Govt. bodies should think before they act…….
Dear Mr.Prabhunath Singh, Our technology is not weak but political will is required to negotiate with foreign countries and the owner of Skype, until unless they do not allow us trackdown the sources and location exactly till that time we can not. So ultimately Goverment must negotiate with them to allow us or ban it.
i am not against the ban of this network,but sorry to say that our technology is so weak that we canot trace the call
it is samefull for us,we are so backward in telecom industy
p n singh
How can they block VoIP. And more than that why is Skype not sharing the encryption code with India if can do the same with other countries. Instead of blocking VoIP they should just track their IP!
well if skype can share its encryption codes with US and China it can do the same with India which has a known terrorist state as its neighbor.
i also live abroad and i know that this is going to affect my being in touch with my family. but i have no problems giving it up, if that makes my country a safer place.
Lots of ppl like me,who share lonliness with their relatives ,residing in other contries,will hv to pay a lot if such facilities got interrupted.
Instead of blocking such facilities,govt sud hire professional hackers,which can track the IPs of culprits.
Why IB thinks that Only caller ID will help to catch terriost ? VoIP means Voice over Internet protocals , Why they dont think to track IP ADDRESS to trace calls ?
We use mails / chat , Does it means that we should not send mails or chat ?
For your kind information VoIP is very secure as landline / cell and it is adopted by lots of countries. First they have to understand the technology , They should talk to voip experts. Even If they want to take my help, they are welcome.
If they block VoIP , There are lots of people who will be loosing their job. It will hit to govt. Revenue.
So It would be better to understand and make the machnism. It would hardly take 2 days to have secure voip connections if Govt wants.
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How can do that?there are so many people who are doing Bussiness through skyp and eduction etc.
this is not a good idea.we are in China.
Tsering
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