Science and technology news blog

Over the last few days millions of internet users were affected by a Skype outage. The VOIP leader had an unexpected breakdown when millions of computers were restarted at the same time due to the installation of Microsoft updates. Since Skype depends on peer-to-peer technology, such a large number of users logging off at around the same time caused a lack of resources. An article from PC-World discusses what exactly happened:

“The disruption was triggered by a massive restart of our users’ computers across the globe within a very short timeframe” Skype says. But careful read of Skype’s explaination today shows that that led to two seperate meltdown-inducing problems.

There is also widespread speculation about the service as discussed in the following article:

“Outages and quality problems with VoIP service providers are sadly still too common – most service providers have glitches that can last from a few minutes to a few hours,” Main said. “That Skype has gone so long without a prolonged problem is quite an achievement.”

Internet phone services, already eating at fixed phone line rentals, are now moving threateningly into the mobile phone market.

Engin, a leading Australian “voice over internet protocol” (VoIP) provider, today announced that users of the Nokia N80 Internet Edition handset could now use it to make VoIP calls over the Engin network.

Ilkka Tales, Engin’s chief executive, predicted the price differential between internet phone calls and regular mobile calls could spell trouble for traditional mobile network operators.

“[Engin provides] internet phone calls for 10 cents nationally, whereas that call from a mobile network carrier perspective is usually charged per 30 second lots and averages around 27 cents or 30 cents a minute.”

Provided they are within reach of a wireless hotspot, users of the new service could make 10-cent untimed calls to Australian landlines, and 20-cent untimed overseas calls, Mr Tales said.

Click here for full article

THE Internet phone service Skype is introducing new domestic calling plans for 24 countries and regions, plus Hong Kong, where users will pay a monthly subscription and a connection fee but no per-minute charges.

The monthly fees for the new Skype Pro plans have not yet been finalized, but they were expected to be set at less than 5 euros, or about US$6.50, an executive told The Associated Press yesterday.

The per-call connection fee for Skype Pro calls within a given country to a regular phone or mobile device within that same country will be 3.9 euro cents, or roughly 5 US cents, said Stefan Oberg, general manager for Skype Telecoms.

Skype calls are dialed over a high-speed Internet connection using either a personal computer, a cordless handset configured to communicate directly over a broadband modem, or certain cell phones with Wi-Fi capability. Each user can call other Skype users for free.

The new options were being launched a month after Skype, a subsidiary of eBay Inc, introduced a North American service offering unlimited calls within the United States and Canada with no connection or per-minute fees for about US$30 per year—or less than half as much as Skype Pro appears likely to cost.

Click here for full article

Internet telephony provider Skype plans to offer bloggers and others the ability to hold audio chats in the next version of its Net telephone product, co-founder Niklas Zennstrm said Tuesday night at the Web 2.0 Summit here.

The next version of Skype will enable people to post a link on a blog or Web site that will take people to a public chat room when clicked on, he said during a question-and-answer session during dinner.

The live chats would be “Skypecasts,” which Zennstrm described as public conversations or audio conferences that people can moderate. He would not provide a timeline for the features except to say it would be “soon.”

Click here for full article

Skype has announced cordless phones that do not require a running computer to be used with the popular VoIP (Voice over IP) service. This new class of phone enables Skype users to make and receive both Skype calls over the Internet and traditional landline calls, without a computer, offering the added convenience of a cordless phone.

The first series of products to be launched in this class are the Philips VOIP841 cordless phone (pictured) and NETGEAR’s cordless phone for Skype.

Cordless phones offer increased mobility throughout the home or office, giving consumers the freedom and flexibility of not being tethered to their computer. Also, consumers with multiple cordless phone handsets in their home have the ability to hold separate conversations simultaneously (one on Skype, the second on the traditional line) each from a different handset.

Both the Philips and NETGEAR cordless phones have Skype running on them out of the box, and they can act as a replacement for an ordinary cordless phone, because they can make and receive traditional telephone calls through the landline line connection.

Existing Skype users can sign into their account, downloading all their contacts to the cordless phone. Users also have the ability to search for Skype contacts directly on the phone, and add them to an integrated contact list for both Skype contacts and traditional phone numbers.

(more…)

Everyone knows and loves VoIP telephony services, because they offer cheap (often free) calls between computers, even if they are located in different parts of the world. However, not many people know just how dangerous these services can be for your computers security.

Thus, VoIP services could provide a means for cybercriminals to send spam and launch attacks that cripple Web sites, experts have warned. Moreover, because many voice over Internet protocol applications use proprietary technology and encrypted data traffic that can’t easily be monitored, the attackers will be able to go undetected, according to news.com.

“VoIP applications could provide excellent cover for launching denial-of-service attacks,” the Communications Research Network said Wednesday. The Communications Research Network is a group of industry experts, academics and policy makers funded by the Cambridge-MIT Institute, a joint venture between Cambridge University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

The group urges VoIP providers to publish their routing specifications or switch to open standards. “These measures would…allow legitimate agencies to track criminal misuse of VoIP,” Jon Crowcroft, a professor at Cambridge University in the U.K., said in a statement. (more…)

Skype, which was acquired by eBay for $2.6 billion last summer, is late to the video game—AOL, Yahoo and others have been offering video calling for some time—but said it intends to make video more ubiquitous. Skype-certified Webcams will be available from Logitech online and from Creative in Europe, through retailers, the company said.

Peer-to-peer VoIP provider Skype today launched the beta version of its 2.0 software, which includes video calling and is designed to be easier to use. The company also announced partnerships with Webcam makers Logitech and Creative and weblog software and services company Six Apart.
“At Skype, we want to make talking over the Internet the most natural, simple thing for people all over the world to do,” said Niklas Zennstrom, CEO of Skype, in a prepared statement. “With the release of our new software, it’s never been easier for people to talk to one another for free, and now they can see each other with video as well.”

Skype, which was acquired by eBay for $2.6 billion last summer, is late to the video game—AOL, Yahoo and others have been offering video calling for some time—but said it intends to make video more ubiquitous. Skype-certified Webcams will be available from Logitech online and from Creative in Europe, through retailers, the company said. (more…)