
Worried About VoIP Security And Encryption? We Aren’t
- by Tech Today News
- Posted on January 11, 2025
Any modern business using a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) phone system knows that maintaining security is essential for confidentiality, customer trust, and regulation compliance. Industries like healthcare, for example, have strict regulations governing communications, and HIPAA-compliant VoIP providers offer security, privacy, and access management tools to help companies follow these regulations — even when employees access the network from far away places. Meanwhile, poor encryption and security can also affect your bottom line, as scammers and fraudsters will find ways to exploit weaknesses to commit VoIP fraud on unsecured phone systems. Toll fraud works by hijacking a company’s phone system to make artificial and high-volume long-distance calls. The owner of the system gets charged for these calls (often without noticing), and then fraudsters are given a share of the revenue from colluding carrier services. Along with toll fraud, there are many other vulnerabilities of VoIP systems — but if you are using one of the best business phone services, your vendor is going to take over the challenging parts of VoIP security and encryption. You just have to promote basic network security at your organization (strong passwords, access control, etc.). Employees per Company Size Micro (0-49), Small (50-249), Medium (250-999), Large (1,000-4,999), Enterprise (5,000+) Any Company Size Any Company Size Features 24/7 Customer Support, Call Management/Monitoring, Contact Center, and more A hosted VoIP service is a cloud-based communications solution offering secure voice calling and messaging over the internet. The beauty of these services is that security and encryption come baked in. The VoIP providers update software and firmware, maintain hardware, and help follow regulatory compliance for you. Of course, fraudsters and scammers are constantly evolving their game, but VoIP providers respond to these attacks in real time and keep your system safe from the latest threats. With a hosted VoIP service, your employees have individual login credentials to access their VoIP accounts, and all calls your company makes go through the service provider’s network. That means the VoIP provider handles the security and encryption while routing calls, not you. That also means your business is kept safe no matter where your employees are because a VoIP service lets them access the secure communication network from any softphone. Your employees won’t be tasked with performing any extra security-related tasks either, as VoIP services apply the latest measures across the entire network. Many of the headaches involved with remote work security are now fully off your plate. A good VoIP provider should have robust encryption protocols to keep your data safe while it’s in transit. That way, voice calls and messages are indecipherable until they reach their destination, where only the recipient can decode them. Similarly, a stateful firewall and/or intrusion detection system helps prevent attacks and unauthorized access. Enhanced login security measures like multi-factor authentication (MFA) and two-factor authentication (2FA), for example, further secure access, and a password-and-token system can also be an effective measure against unwanted infiltration. The following technologies help VoIP providers secure their networks: Not every organization requires SBCs, but anyone using a cloud phone system could be the target of a VoIP DDoS attack. Work with your vendor to deploy a future-proof VoIP phone system that follows network security architecture best practices. The VoIP industry has standards and frameworks in place to guide companies with the best security practices available. In fact, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) publishes guidelines that cover this sector. A good provider should have the following accreditations and certifications: Secure VoIP providers also need to be aware of their human-layer security. Many scams originate from human error, so a business is only as safe if its staff members are reliable. As such, businesses are vulnerable to social engineering attacks. Social engineering is the process of manipulating individuals into giving up sensitive information. Rather than relying on technical vulnerabilities, many scammers use human psychology to obtain passwords, login details, and other sensitive information. Scammers often use phishing techniques to gain trust. This technique involves sending messages and emails that appear legitimate, ultimately leading individuals to give up passwords or new login details after trusting the source’s legitimacy. VoIP providers can limit opportunities for social engineering by implementing 2FA or MFA as part of IVR authentication workflows. Simply put, the more authentication steps required, the more information a scammer needs to extract, and the more information a scammer needs to extract, the lower their chances of infiltration. Employee training and awareness are also critical factors in reducing social engineering attacks, as monitoring communication patterns and identifying irregularities can root out social engineering attempts before they gain any traction. To combat these measures and educate employees even further, Udemy, Coursera, and edX run cybersecurity courses that include modules on social engineering. Similarly, Black Hat and DEFCON include workshops on the relationship between psychology and security. Some companies choose to host their own VoIP server on their company premises. This comes with some advantages, as creating a self-hosted system from the ground up gives you more options for customization and control. However, several challenges make hosting a VoIP service impractical for many businesses. These areas include: Additionally, self-hosting is often only possible with a dedicated IT team or managed services provider . Without one, your security and encryption probably won’t be as good as a hosted service provider — which has its own team dedicated to running the latest security protocols. Using a self-hosted VoIP also has complications for remote teams, as you must configure the network for remote access while also maintaining security. This process usually involves a virtual private network (VPN) or other secure remote access methods. VoIP security is complex and constantly evolving, so outsourcing to a VoIP service makes sense for a variety of reasons. Even the cheapest VoIP phone service providers do the heavy lifting for you, so there’s no need to buy, configure, and maintain costly on-premises VoIP infrastructure that’ll be obsolete in a few years. Meanwhile, security and encryption are the cornerstones of a good VoIP business, and most VoIP service providers will have better security and encryption than self-hosted solutions in the long run. So unless you’re in the telecom industry and have major communication security chops, it’s probably best to let the pros handle it. 1 CloudTalk
Good providers handle VoIP security and encryption
What should a secure VoIP provider have?
Self-hosted VoIP security and encryption is a challenge
Let the pros handle VoIP security and encryption
Any modern business using a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) phone system knows that maintaining security is essential for confidentiality, customer trust, and regulation compliance. Industries like healthcare, for example, have strict regulations governing communications, and HIPAA-compliant VoIP providers offer security, privacy, and access management tools to help companies follow these regulations — even when…