Vonage Complaining Of VoIP 'Blocking'

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

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From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>
Reply-To: <dewayne () warpspeed com>
Date: Mon, 14 Feb 2005 20:01:45 -0800
To: Dewayne-Net Technology List <dewayne-net () warpspeed com>
Subject: [Dewayne-Net] Vonage Complaining Of VoIP 'Blocking'

February 14, 2005
  

Vonage Complaining Of VoIP 'Blocking'
UPDATED: FCC Chairman Powell says agency is "actively on this case."
  By  Paul  Kapustka
<http://advancedippipeline.com/60400413>

  BOULDER, Colo. -- Leading Voice over IP service provider Vonage
Holdings has complained to the Federal Communications Commission that
competitors are blocking the use of its service, according to FCC
chairman Michael Powell and others close to the company.

  "We're very actively on this case and we are taking it pretty
seriously," said Powell, during an interview Monday here at the Silicon
Flatirons conference. In a speech at the conference Sunday, Stanford
law professor Larry Lessing said that Vonage has been telling the FCC
that other service providers are hampering Vonage's VoIP service by
"blocking" it from reaching certain SIP addresses for end-user devices.

  According to Powell, his understanding is that the blocking is not
coming from major service providers, but from rural Local Exchange
Carriers (LECs). Brooke Schulz, Vonage's senior vice president for
corporate communications, said Monday that the company would not
comment on the report.

  Reports of other providers using networking techniques to block
competitors' VoIP services have surfaced before, but none have involved
Vonage or major U.S. service providers.

  Since new sophisticated network-management tools allow service
providers to determine the types of traffic flowing across their
networks, the possibility exists that certain types of traffic -- such
as Vonage's VoIP services -- could be "blocked" or otherwise degraded.

  And since there is no current law or regulation prohibiting such
techniques, it's unclear what Vonage's complaints to the FCC might
accomplish. But Powell said the FCC might indeed have some enforcement
options, specifically if carriers are found to be violating
anti-competitive statutes.

  Lessig's claims gave other speakers at Sunday's program more fuel for
the telecom regulation reform debate, with most decrying any such
packet-based discrimination.

  "If Vonage is toast... because the ports are blocked, that's not
good," said Phil Weiser, associate professor of law and
telecommunications at the University of Colorado, the host of the
Silicon Flatirons Telecommunications Program.

  MCI executive and Internet co-founder Vint Cerf agreed, saying it was
bad for everyone if service providers suddenly started discriminating
against traffic types by competitive parameters.

  "The presumption [of the Internet] is that you're fully connected,"
Cerf said. Any attempts to block certain application types or types of
content, he said, "will destroy the utility of the Net."

  Qwest CEO Richard Notebaert, who also spoke at the conference Monday,
said his company has a commercial contract with Vonage. Carrying more
application traffic, Notebaert said, was an economic plus for Qwest.

  "I want to run a network utilized as fully as possible," Notebaert
said. "I want to sell wholesale [access] to everyone I can."

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