Spring Voice on the Net San Jose, CA VoIP Clearinghouses: Update

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Spring Voice on the NetSan Jose, CAVoIP
Clearinghouses Update
Frank Estes festes_at_transnexus.com 404-526-6060
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What is a Clearinghouse?
Definition (Websters) Date 1832 1 an
establishment maintained by banks for settling
mutual claims and accounts 2 a central agency
for the collection, classification, and
distribution especially of information broadly
an informal channel for distributing information
or assistance New Definition Date 2001 An
entity or groups of entities with the credit
wherewithal to ensure financial remuneration for
all participants that exchange value added
transactions and clear and settle the financial
results of those exchanges on a periodic basis,
as well as, provide a set of standards for
interoperability among the participants.
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Examples of Clearinghouses

• The Securities Class Action Clearinghouse
  provides detailed information relating to the
  prosecution, defense, and settlement of federal
  class action securities fraud litigation.
  (Stanford Law School)
• SWIFT is the industry-owned cooperative
  supplying secure messaging services and interface
  software to 7,000 financial institutions in 198
  countries. SWIFT provides messaging services to
  banks, broker/dealers and investment managers, as
  well as to market infrastructures in payments,
  treasury, securities and trade.
• ATT Global Clearinghouse acts as a trusted
  intermediary for the financial settlement of VoIP
  traffic. This offers a cost-effective alternative
  to building and maintaining an international
  network infrastructure for voice traffic.

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Types of Clearinghouse
Clearinghouses generally have two forms of
ownership a). cooperatives/mutuals/ governments
established by a common purpose ownership -
SWIFT, Federal Reserve Check Clearinghouse b).
Established by a dominant industry entity (VoIP
telephony). - NTT, ATT, Primus, WorldCom,
(Multi-Platform, Multi- Vendor
(Open Standards) - ITXC, Common Vendor, must
use to participate
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Spoke and Hub Model (Geographic)
Clearinghouse
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Benefits and Characteristics of Clearinghouses

• Quicker and lower cost interconnection One
  arrangement with the Clearinghouse, not 360
  bilateral agreements. Reduced financial risk and
  financial relationship with only one entity.

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Benefits and Characteristics of Clearinghouses

• Expansion of global reach, expand to areas where
  PSTN expansion is expensive. Reduce the cost of
  expansion through partners rather than expensive
  PSTN presence.
• Not one hyper networks, but an mesh of island
  networks with a lower cost structure than a
  similar single network.
• A Clearinghouse can be based upon a geographic
  specialty, financial ability or dominance, or a
  group with similar interests (pre-paid calling
  card operators).
• Quickly penetrate new markets with the addition
  of new partners.

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The Role of Open Standards
Benefits for Clearinghouses! Open Standards will
enable simple and secure interconnection
exchanged with third party networks in a
multi-vendor and multi-protocol network. Open
Standards will lower technology and vendor risk
by making telecom equipment a commodity, not a
proprietary pricing game. Open Standards will
accelerate the development of Value-Added
services so VoIP becomes the equal to the PSTN.
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The Role of Open Standards

• Will It Happen (Ma Bell forced it on the PSTN,
  who will force it now)?
• Service Providers must demand quality and open
  standards, not just standards based language and
  promises because the vendor uses Windows 2000.
• Developing VoIP solutions based on open industry
  standards will unite an otherwise fragmented
  market and allow the industry to focus on serving
  customer needs through better quality features
  and value-added services. Business Week August
  2002.

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Circuit-Switched Interconnection

• Business Policy Interconnect Routing and Tariffs
• Enforcement Physical Authentication,
  Authorization and Accounting by Switch

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Next Generation VoIP Interconnection

• Business Policy Interconnect Routing and Tariffs
• Enforcement Policy server with cryptographic
  services supporting Authentication, Authorization
  Accounting

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Next Generation VoIP Interconnection

• Business Policy Interconnect Routing and Tariffs
• Enforcement Policy server with cryptographic
  services supporting Authentication, Authorization
  Accounting

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Interconnect Policy Server

• What is it?
• Stateless Routing Policy Server
• Uses Public-key Infrastructure (PKI) Services for
  inter-domain security over non-secure networks
• Certificate authority
• Issues X.509 digital certificates to clients
• Digitally signs authorization tokens
• All messages encrypted using SSL
• Uses Open Settlement Protocol standard for both
  H.323 and SIP networks

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The Basics of Public-key Cryptosystems
Security services between parties rely on the
exchange of public keys and secure secrecy of
corresponding private keys.

• Critical Points
• Public / Private keys used for encryption /
  decryption and digital signatures
• Public keys are public easy to distribute
• A digital certificate signed by a trusted 3rd
  party ensures the public-key is legitimate
• Digital signatures provide data integrity,
  authentication and non-repudiation
• Certificates may be chained from a root authority

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Establishing a Trusted Relationship
IXC Interconnect Policy Server (Certificate
Authority)
VoIP Device
Client Device requests public-key and
certificate from IXC
IXC sends its public key and its certificate
Client Device sends its public key and
certificate request to IXC
IXC returns signed client certificate
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Authentication
Interconnect Policy Server
Inter-Exchange Carrier (IXC) IP Network or Public
Internet
Carrier A

• Routing request to IXC is digitally signed with
  VoIP devices private key.
• Policy server verifies client signature with
  clients public key to authenticate routing
  request.

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Authorization
Interconnect Policy Server
Authorization Token
Inter-Exchange Carrier (IXC) IP Network or Public
Internet
Carrier A
Carrier B

• IXC digitally signs authorization token with call
  details
• time/date, IP address, called number, call length
• Carrier B has no trusted relationship with
  Carrier A, but verifies digital signature of with
  IXC public key
• Carrier can retain digital signature for
  non-repudiation

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Secure Accounting

• Carriers A and B encrypt CDRs with IXC public key
• IXC decrypts CDR with its private key
• For auditing, IXC can request in real time that a
  carrier digitally sign a batch of CDRs

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Benefits

• Advantages of Next Generation Interconnection
• No change in business processes
• Free of circuit connection constraints
• fast provisioning, software driven, flexible
• Leverages low cost, non-secure networks
• Entirely based on well defined standards
• Public-key infrastructure services
• Open Settlement Protocol (OSP)
• Supports H.323 and SIP
• Broad vendor support
• Alcatel, Cisco, Commworks, Lucent, MediaRing,
  RADVISION, SS8 others

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ATT OSP Implementation
Source ATT Global Clearinghouse
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NTT OSP Implementation
Source NTT 8 Oct 2002