Voice Over IP Deployment Eastern Michigan University

Gap Analysis of Current Telephony Solution

• High-cost service does not provide benefits that VoIP can at a lesser price

• Antiquated technology and infrastructure can’t possibly provide capacity for the demands of new technology

• Current solution has large, lengthy and unfairly-pricey contracts

• Missing services that only VoIP could implement at a reasonable cost

• Current telephone network unable to upgrade as fast as VoIP technology

VoIP Deployment Concepts

Voice Over IP

Cryptographically secure communications

Improved services

Automated Call Distribution

E911

Low-cost Software PBXs

Number portabilityUtilization of existing data network

Interactive Voice Response

More control over telephony services

No lengthy monopolistic contracts

Click-to-call

Cutting-edge advancements

IT management, less contractors

Reduction of complexity

VoIP Fundamentals• Voice Over Internet Protocol is an

assortment of technologies that provide services using existing data network infrastructures

• VoIP is able to be deployed with little modification needed to the existing data network

• The usefulness of an implementation stretches far past just making calls

• More simplicity than maintaining a large phone network on top of the necessary data network

VoIP Service Advantages• VoIP is able to provide many services not

found (or for free) with land lines, such as:

• Voicemail and faxes to your e-mail

• Easily configured multi-phone ringing

• Phone calls on your laptop from anywhere with your same number

• Cheap implementations of usually pricey PBX feature sets: IVRs, Music-on-hold, text-to-speech, dial by name, conference bridges

The Case for Transition• The following statistics are the

response of members of universities that have deployed VoIP regarding what the best result has been because of deployment

• Statistics a result of surveying done by “Association for Communications Technology Professionals in Higher Education”

End User FeaturesCost SavingsNetwork Efficiency

23%

31%

46%

Threats Against VoIP

• Software Threats: Exploitation of end-user clients, digital telephones, software PBXs, networked applications

• Telephony Threats: Spoofing, communications fraud, snooping

• Network Attacks: Denial of Service, fraudulent transmissions, transmission capturing, spamming (SMS, Faxing)

Threat Mitigation• Prevention: Network QoS heavily enforced;

additional security audits; network filtering; utilizing trusted vendors; cryptography; redundant systems

• Detection: Increase network monitoring; application monitoring; service reliability baselining; security auditing

• Response: Immediate service issue resolution through auxiliary networking and systems; thorough review of policies; updated threat matrix; mandatory deployment security audit; implementation review

Overall Commitment of VoIP Technologies

• Provide secure, reliable, high-quality communications of various mediums to the campus and beyond

• Allow for expandability of services as administration sees fit, always staying ahead of traditional telephone company offerings

• Effectively utilize network resources without degrading the quality of other services

• Provide users with confidence in VoIP

Infrastructure Verification• Comprehensive network Quality of Service

(QoS) for both VoIP connectivity and traditional data network access

• Baselining of all network services to ensure that service never stabilizes at below than ideal conditions

• Redundancy of networked systems as well as additional data connectivity as needed

• Mitigate any downtime for upgrades and patching during regular business hours

Usage of VoIP on Campus• Faculty

• Sending class updates via SMS, fax, voicemail boxes, and e-mails at one time.

• Provide more reliable voice-mail services for students to contact professors

• Intelligent call forwarding can reach professor with temporary numbers for privacy of professor’s personal numbers

• IT Help Desk Staff

• Quality Interactive Voice Response (IVR) system for assisting users in a more effective manner and providing information readily available 24/7

• Dynamic call forwarding based on call types, volume, usage, or topic

• More accurate caller statistics to improve service and efficiency

• Everyone on Campus

• Easily portable phone numbers

• Multiple methods of phone communication (office phones, softphones)

• E911 for added security infrastructure for campus safety

Support Methodology• Infrastructure

• Network engineering team will acquire multiple new positions to help fill caveats in order to adequately maintain systems

• Outside vendors will help by providing installation guidance, patching, best-use recommendations, and technical support

• Monitoring systems will be updated to support VoIP related technologies better to help baseline systems and the network

• End-User Support

• Help Desk staff will provide training sessions to staff and faculty to appropriately utilize implementation of VoIP technologies

• Efficiency upgrades in systems because of VoIP will help the help desk support clients through the usage of IVR systems to provide helpful information through minimal menu listings

• On-site technology upgrades will be supplemented with software based upgrades that can be centrally controlled

Service Agreement“Uptimes” and availability dependent on proper administration by localized team

• Initial Installation Period

• 95% general availability after cut-over from old telephony network

• 99.99999% emergency and critical infrastructure from minute-one

• Post-Installation Period (2 months following an installation)

• 99% general availability

• 99.99999% emergency and critical infrastructure

Service Metrics

• End-to-End Voice Quality

• IVR Service Availability

• External Calling

• Internal Calling

• Emergency Calling

• Voicemail Boxes

• Dial-by-Name

• Data-Network Throughput

• Automated Call Distribution

• Multiple-phone Forwarding

• Call Connectivity (drops)

• Faxing Services

• SMS/E-Mail Voicemail Services

• Softphone Usage

• Traditional VoIP Phone Usage

VoIP Impact Scenarios• Internet Connectivity to EMU Fails

• Traditional phone line infrastructure with limited lines still exist to make calls in case of emergency -- cellular service backups are ideal too

• Previous outages are generally very short, supplement with a cable modem or DSL line may be an option for emergency VoIP services

• Connectivity Fails Between EMU Buildings

• Outage affected by number of routes the data network has to a given building

• Possible outages could be avoided by multiple links to data network infrastructure for routing around a downed link

• Power Outage In A Building

• Like existing Nortel phones that require a power adapter, no service would be available in normal situations without a generator running

• Software Failure -- Key Components

• Implementation of redundant systems with mirrored copies of filesystems along with off-site backups of directories and system configurations

Network Resumption Data vs. Voice

• VoIP should be treated as a network service, and prioritized higher than certain services like student web sites; music streaming; non-essential web services; Residential Network

• VoIP will utilize the same network, but has a larger scope to communications than it does to work availability

• Inconvenience of employees is less important than communications in case of an emergency or availability of information dissemination

• The VoIP network should have segments of importance with QoS providing immediate resumption to those sectors and then to everyone else when available

Return On Investment• Long-distance savings

• No longer paying for each and every individual phone line

• Short-term contracts

• Increase feature set

• Profitability of investment in year 6(Project Begins Q4 2007)

$0

$37,500

$75,000

$112,500

$150,000

20072008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Investment Return

Vendor Selection• Cisco Systems

• Currently the infrastructure choice for networking systems -- easy integration

• Certifications for employees for their hardware implementations for VoIP

• Well-known industry leader; evolving product lines; quality hardware & software offerings for a variety of needs

• Digium

• Consistently at the forefront of all-things-VoIP

• Backers of Asterisk, the open-source PBX software

• Many technology offerings to fill gaps in product line

• Previous implementations for University of Pennsylvania; Sam Houston State University; and many businesses around the world

VoIP Solutions• Cisco VoIP Phones

• Wireless 7921G - Great phone for office members constantly moving around in the general area of the base station

• Wired 7941G - Standard offering for in-office desk phones; Large display, speakerphone, support for inline power

• Digium

• Asterisk Business Edition -- PBX Software, easily implemented on cheap hardware, developer kits, turn-key solutions

• Integration with Cisco phones without any phone licensing contracts -- LARGE savings

• Digital (TE420) and Analog (TDM800P) cards for various connectivity methods for external lines or on-campus connectivity methods -- utilize the existing copper network!

Five Years Of Implementation

• Refresh end-user handsets in progression based on original implementation order

• Review advancements in VoIP technologies and create a proposal for infrastructure refreshments if needed based on necessity

• Review information security, redundancy, and all other policy related to the reliability and availability of infrastructure

• Document & review implementations of VoIP that have been deployed at other universities

Ten Years of Implementation• Serious equipment refresh to update to new

current standards or review if something other than VoIP is now an industry leader (or going to be soon)

• Infrastructure: Major overhaul; Most likely starting 2-3 years prior with network upgrades; Progression into replacing exiting hardware solutions running PBX/Call Manager software

• End-Users: Begin refreshing user’s handsets again with similar equipment or different equipment if advances have made a change in telecommunications (all softphone?)

Deployment Scalability• VoIP Infrastructure allows for easy additions of

phones through existing or added data network drops -- single network jacks can be replicated through the unit of most phones

• Softphones can be deployed anywhere

• PBX units can be added simply in any intermediary closet to serve as a node in the greater network

• Networking solutions need only add data switches as wiring for full new buildings to be added into a solution

• Software can be upgraded on phones or servers

Infrastructure Reliability• Networking

• Dependent on existing network infrastructure of university; performance should be closely monitored to tweak in initial weeks

• Connectivity to MERIT will determine outbound connectivity

• Redundant network switches with fail-over should be used as the will limit a $500 piece of hardware for deciding who can talk and who can’t on a given day

• Hardware

• Server hardware running PBX software should be enterprise grade with redundant network links, redundant power supplies, with battery backups connected

• Phones in offices should have replacements readily available in small quantities to insure a single phone doesn’t ruin productivity if it has a bad firmware update or something

Product Life Cycle• Focus on keeping infrastructure functioning

• End-users able to refresh as needed, with large-scale refreshing after five year increments

• Look towards softphones as a cheap alternative in interim situations of budget problems

• Watch for evolutions in VoIP software, especially on the PBX side

• Networking infrastructure should be upgraded as available to do so, in order to give the most bandwidth the all VoIP services

Conclusion

• Transition to VoIP starts the university on path to providing high-quality, efficiency-increasing services while saving money

• A focus on infrastructure first will help guarantee success -- spend money where it’s really needed, not on service contracts anymore

• Questions?

Terminology• VoIP: Voice Over Internet Protocol, routing of voice conversations over the Internet or through any other

IP-based network.

• Encryption: The process of transforming information (referred to as plain-text) to make it unreadable to anyone except those possessing special knowledge, usually referred to as a key.

• Baselining: A method for analyzing computer network performance. The method is marked by comparing current performance to a historical metric, or "baseline".

• QoS: Quality of Service, can provide different priority to different users or data flows, or guarantee a certain level of performance to a data flow in accordance with requests from the application program or the internet service provider policy.

• Information Security: The process of protecting data from unauthorized access, use, disclosure, destruction, modification, or disruption.

• Interactive Voice Response: Phone technology that allows a computer to detect voice and touch tones using a normal phone call. The IVR system can respond with pre-recorded or dynamically generated audio to further direct callers on how to proceed.

• PBX: Private Branch Exchange, a telephone exchange that serves a particular business or office, as opposed to one that a common carrier or telephone company operates for many businesses or for the general public.

• Softphone: Software for making telephone calls over the Internet using a general purpose computer, rather than using dedicated hardware.

References• University Deployment Statistics

http://searchvoip.techtarget.com/originalContent/0,289142,sid66_gci1185377,00.html

• Information Security Threatshttp://www.networkworld.com/research/2006/051506-voip-guide-security.html?ts

• Terminologyhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voice_over_IPhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Encryptionhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baselininghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qoshttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_securityhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IVRhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PBXhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Softphone

• VoIP Solutionshttp://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/phones/ps379/prod_models_home.htmlhttp://www.digium.com/en/asteriskbusinesses/http://www.digium.com/en/products/hardware/digitalcards.phphttp://www.digium.com/en/products/hardware/analogcards.php