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Posted by Enzo Michelangeli on June 14, 2006, 11:18 am
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> Hello
>
> New to VOIP but can anyone tell me how secure is SIP especially
> if using it from a public hotspot or in a hotel.
As it's used today, not at all. There are protocols for securing bot
signalling (Secure SIP, i.e. SIP-over-TLS) and media flows (SRTP) but they
are only rarely used.
> VOIP providers claim it is more secure than an standard phone line as
> the packets have no meaningful identifying information in them and as
> they are routed through many channels it would very hard to capture
> information
Sounds like standard sales pitch to me :-) Have a look at these proofs of
concept:
http://vomit.xtdnet.nl/
http://www.oxid.it/cain.html
> although, if you're using a SIP phone in a public area like
> a hotspot or hotel surly your phone call could be intercepted?
Yes, unless you use countermeasures, which however require concerted action
by both endpoints. As long as you do peer-to-peer VoIP that's quite possible
(see e.g. http://www.philzimmermann.com/EN/zfone/ for SIP-based softphones,
or http://www.amicima.com/ for a non-standard but easy-to-use and - unlike
Skype - opensource and therefore verifiable solution); but if you require
PSTN termination, or simply provider-based service, you won't find any
provider willing to secure your communications, also because U.S. CALEA
regulations (http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Surveillance/CALEA/ ) force public
services to be easy to eavesdrop by three-letter agencies...
Enzo
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