With the introduction of electronic switching in 1960, the telephone slowly went digital. The development of digital data communication such as the internet allowed digitizing data and transmitting it in real-time across networks. This system follows a certain set of protocols like Internet Protocol (IP). For telephone, it is voice over internet protocol (VoIP). VoIP replaced almost all telephone networks. IP telephone uses a high-bandwidth connection and special transmission equipment via the internet.

VoIP

Voice over internet protocol is implemented in various ways through proprietary and standard protocols. H.323, MGCP, SIP, RTP, RTCP, etc. are some of the protocols used today. H323 is one of the first used protocols that made its way in LAN services. However, new protocols like MGCP and SIP have replaced them. Today, Session Initiation Protocol SIP has widespread implementation.
A VoIP phone is necessary to connect to this service. It is done in the following ways:
1. VoIP phones connect to IP networks using Ethernet or Wi-Fi. This is the traditional way of connecting.
2. Sometimes they use an analog telephone adapter. It connects the network to conventional analog phone systems.
3. It uses electronics and firmware through a modular phone jack.
4. Softphone is a most modern version, which is installed on a computer that has a microphone and speaker set.
5. Software has a traditional dial pad on the display, which can be controlled by a simple keyboard and mouse.

Service Providers

Almost all telecommunication service providers have now switched to VoIP and they connect old telephone networks to public IP networks. This is called IP backhaul. Today, with the increasing use of smartphones VoIP is handy. All smartphone and Wi-Fi supporting devices have SIP built in their firmware.
There companies like Lingo, Ooma, Vonage, etc. who are popular for providing VoIP services for home-based customers. These companies provide services like voice, fax, SMS, etc. through the public internet. Early VoIP service providers offered business and technical solutions, which used similar telephone network technology. The second generation of service providers started providing services to private users like Skype. Sometimes they provide free call services and charge while accessing other communication networks. The third generation of providers like GTalk has use federated VoIP.

Advantages of these services

Voice over Internet Protocols has a large number of benefits over traditional PSTN.
Due to bandwidth efficiency, the cost is lower. The business has seen an 80 percent reduction in their expenses in phone communications.
VoIP solutions follow a business model, which provides unified communication services like calls, voice mails, emails, and video conference over the web, and many more. There are two types of companies one that provider to large enterprises and the other that provides service to small and medium-range business phone services.
It supports both voice and data communication using the same network, which reduces infrastructure costs.
Unlike PBX and key systems, VoIP switches run on cost-effective systems like computers.
With VoIP, customers get a good interface system for their communications.

Quality of these services

Today IP networks are the most reliable services for communication than circuit-switched networks, which were prone to mechanical errors. However, with IP services there no loss of data over the network. It uses Quality of Service (QoS) guarantees to protect the latency of data packets. Network router handles traffic over these networks. There is a chance of latency if traffic exceeds the threshold for VoIP. But it is minimized by marking voice packets with a method called DiffServ. VoIP usually waits for the completion of the transmission of the previous packet before the new is initiated.
Security for VoIP services is similar to those with internet-based devices. VoIP uses firewalls for routing traffic, which is often a challenge for a hacker. They also use network address translators to interconnect networks or the internet.

About The Author

Michelle Patterson is an avid technology blogger and writes extensively about IP/VoIP and Unified Communication. She works with some leading companies to understand the trends of these modern communication technologies.