Cisco releases new VoIP security book

Global telecoms giant Cisco has launched a new guide book on how to properly secure VoIP networks and protect against threats.

The paperback manual assesses the dangers being posed to VoIP end users and providers, as well as the particular vulnerabilities to converged communications networks.

Patrick Park, author of the book, told IT World that intercepting VoIP is not a simple task in a real service environment, which makes calls harder to eavesdrop.

Despite this, Park warned that VoIP still has "too many sources of vulnerability" which makes it difficult to gain 100 per cent control over every component.

Vulnerable aspects can derive from the legacy infrastructure, the operating system, web servers or the applications being run by each user.

The book also addresses SPIT, or VoIP-orientated spam, which is growing in popularity as a malicious threat and rapidly reaching parity in prevalence with email spam.

Problems are exacerbated by the fact that the spam is delivered in real-time, meaning that users typically listen to the call before realising it is malicious.