Businesses failing to secure IP telephony

Despite the huge savings that can be made through installing VoIP technology, many businesses are still failing to sign up.

Security fears are said to be a major factor in many companies avoiding deploying VoIP - although new technology means that security need not be an issue.

Last month, Eric Vyncke, an engineer at Cisco Systems told delegates at a two-day RSA Conference that past security concerns were still influencing business-owners but that VoIP can be secure if the necessary precautions are taken.

Speaking to ZDNet at the conference, Mr Vyncke said: "When people deploy [VoIP], they don't deploy it in a secure way.

"What they've done is securing the network itself, which is a pretty good step, by using specific tracing to Layer 2 switches, preventing attacks like app spoofing.

"But [VoIP] telephony itself can be secured by encryption, authentication - they are not using it."

He added that company bosses can use a mixture of secure switches, firewalls and secure devices to make VoIP 99.9 per cent safe.