[Fwd: [IP] Feds: VoIP a potential haven for terrorists]

Sun Jun 20 01:03:50 UTC 2004

Thus spake "Niels Bakker" <niels=nanog at bakker.net>
> * jeffshultz at wvi.com (Jeff Shultz) [Fri 18 Jun 2004, 21:42 CEST]:
> > Pay for it? If I remember from CALEA, the providers pay for it
> > (and eventually their customers), and as for "broadband Internet
> > providers"... I'm guessing anyone who offers end user customers
> > a circuit bigger than 53.333k.
>
> Pet peeve: broadband isn't a synonym for "faster than a modem."
> Cable and DSL are broadband due to those technologies using a wide range
> of frequencies.  Ethernet is not broadband (but baseband).

Congress can define a word (in the US legal context) to mean anything they
want; whether such has any relation to its technical definition is
irrelevant.  I doubt they care about the technology used to deliver IP
service, only the capabilities and typical users; defining "broadband" as
any circuit 56kbps or above would likely suffice for their intent,
regardless of how incorrect it is.

However, I fail to see how "broadband" or link speeds in general even matter
in this context; what matters is whether the link is of sufficient speed for
VoIP to be feasible, in which case anything from 9.6kbps cellular to WiFi,
from ARCnet to OC192/10GE might qualify -- or might not, if IP isn't running
over it.

S

Stephen Sprunk      "Those people who think they know everything
CCIE #3723         are a great annoyance to those of us who do."
K5SSS                                             --Isaac Asimov