Twang.net has traded successfully since 1999 with sustained year on year profitable revenue growth selling premium internet connectivity, voice and data solutions through its direct sales team. Twang.net’s owners and founding partners, James Sumsion (Managing Director) and Jeremy Sharp (Technical Director) will continue to lead and drive the growth of the company, which will remain headquartered in Newbury. Twang.net currently employs 35 people, which is expected to increase in line with the business achieving its growth ambitions. The company will run as a standalone subsidiary of the Timico Group and James Sumsion will join the Timico board of directors.

Colin Duffy, CEO of Voipfone, comments “Our business customers use their internet connections for more and more activities – email and web browsing of course, but also for document transfer, database back-ups, video upload and a whole host of other things. When telephony is added to all that, the broadband connection becomes a mission critical component of the business.”

Duffy continues: “And yet we often that find clients using a cheap and heavily contended consumer internet access service to do it all with, which of course it can’t. Something has to give and because a telephone conversation has to happen in real time it’s the first to suffer if the connection is poor and congested. Our new network is both voice prioritised and private peered so that our customers get the best possible call quality and line reliability – all the time.”

Best Consumer ISP - PlusNet
Best Business ISP - Eclipse Internet
Best Consumer Broadband - NewNet
Best Business Broadband - Datanet
Best Consumer Email - Entanet
Best Business Email - Eclipse Internet
Best Dial Up - Waitrose
Best Shared Hosting - Namesco
Best Dedicated Hosting - UKFast
Best Wireless ISP - Vodafone (Commendation: BOZII)
Best Internet Telephony - Entanet
Best Streaming - Astream (Commendation: Mydeo)
Best Portal - Bt.yahoo.com

The Internet Watch Foundation Award:
Richard Swetenham, Head of the eContent and Safer Internet Unit at the European Commission

The IWF was impressed with his involvement with the issue of Internet content since 1996, drafting the first Communication on illegal and harmful Internet content. He has been the driving force behind a variety of very successful EC Safer Internet Programmes, in particular the development of the INHOPE association of Hotlines.

The Corporate Social Responsibility Award:
BT

An ISPA spokesperson said, “The judges felt that BT has an excellent corporate social responsibility policy in place and acknowledged its Better World campaign aiming to create a more sustainable world through better communication.”

Internet Villain:
HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC)

HMRC won the Internet Villain category for failing to take the protection of people’s personal data seriously and highlighting bad practice in protecting data by losing computer disks containing confidential details of 25 million child benefit recipients.”

Internet Hero:
Peter Robbins OBE QPM, Chief Executive, IWF

Peter Robbins wins the Internet Hero award for his continued leadership of the IWF and approach to fostering extensive partnerships with the Internet industry, the government and law enforcement agencies to tackle illegal online content."

Tommy Jensen, Executive Chairman of Vyke, said, “The UK market represents a very exciting opportunity for Vyke, and the addition of Callserve provides us with key wholesale VoIP network infrastructure and additional domestic operational resources.

The acquisition also provides the opportunity to channel Callserve’s existing customer base into the Vyke product suite and I am confident that this will help to drive Vyke’s continued long term growth.”

In summary, if the victim visits our evil proof-of-concept webpage, his/her browser sends a HTTP request to the BT Home Hub’s web interface. After this, the Home Hub starts a VoIP/telephone connection to the recipient’s phone number specified in the exploit page.

This is what the attack looks like: the victim’s VoIP telephone starts ringing and shows an external call message on the LCD screen along with the recipient’s phone number. However, what’s interesting is that from the point of view of the victim, it looks like he/she is receiving a phone call from the number shown on the screen, but in fact he/she is calling that number!

Now, this attack will work even if the default admin password has been changed on the BT Home Hub. Reason for this is that the exploit relies on an authentication bypass vulnerability that we have reported a while ago and hasn’t still been fixed by BT! In our original report, we mentioned that the HTTP authentication mechanism can by bypassed by using double slashes in the target URL. Actually, the authentication can also be bypassed with many other characters, but I’ll leave this to the reader to discover.

Significantly, Gradwell is the first Tiscali channel partner to sign a WLVA (Wholesale Line Voice and ADSL) contract. The partnership will enable small to medium sized UK companies to benefit by merging their analogue telephone line, high quality broadband and a fully featured IP-PBX service into a single product from a single supplier.

In the WLVA product, Tiscali provides Gradwell with the whole copper pair at the local exchange and converts both voice and data into IP, routed straight into the Gradwell VoIP network. Therefore, there is no traditional phone line rental, resulting in a cost saving of over £11 per month.

Peter Gradwell, CEO of Gradwell Dot Com, says: "The key problem SMEs have with VoIP is making sure the service is consistent. By using Tiscali’s Voice Ready Broadband, connected directly to the Gradwell VoIP network, we can provide SMEs with a high quality, consistent and reliable end to end solution."

"Long contact centre queues frustrate customers and increase the likelihood of them looking for an alternative ISP. Vocalite gives the service provider a head start in fixing the fault and empowers their customers to diagnose the problem for themselves," said Gavin Johns, Managing Director of Epitiro.

Ofcom wants to ensure that users of mainstream VoIP services are not put in danger as a result of trying to call 999 or 112 using a service that does not offer them access. If consumers had to then locate an ordinary landline or mobile phone, they might face a delay of seconds or even minutes in getting through to the emergency services, which could prove critical.

The new rules follow research, where Ofcom found that as many as 78% of VoIP users who cannot currently use their service to call 999 or 112 either thought an emergency call was possible, or did not know whether or not this was the case.

The new rules will apply to:-

• “VoIP out” providers, which allow users to make calls to normal phone numbers but not receive them.


• “Two-way VoIP” providers, which allow users to make and receive calls to and from normal phone numbers.

01865 332211 becomes 1.1.2.2.3.3.5.6.8.1.4.4.e164.arpa where '44' is the UK's international dialling code, 'e164' is the name of the telephone numbering system and '.arpa' is the Internet infrastructure equivalent of ..uk or .com. A computer can understand and connect to this address in a fraction of a second which makes ENUM a quick, stable and cheap link between the telecommunications system and the Internet.

The first main use of ENUM will be to link different VoIP servers so that telephones within businesses that use Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) technology to connect users within an internal network can use the same technology to connect users to external customers via the Internet.

http://www.nominet.org.uk/tech/enum .

While telephone calls on the standard phone network (PSTN) may be monitored, access to the telephone companies networks is tightly controlled making unauthorized wiretapping virtually impossible. In most countries even the law enforcement authorities need to obtain the correct legal authorisation. Voice over IP (VoIP) changes all this. As the name suggests, VoIP calls run over an IP network. IP networks are much more open than the PSTN, this means that VoIP calls can be intercepted and monitored much more easily than PSTN calls.

The real threat will be intercepts by organised crime, hackers, and anyone else who wants to listen to your VoIP phone calls. All they have to do is to monitor the IP network at some point between the caller and call recipient. The monitoring point can be the corporate network, an unscrupulous ISP or a local PC infected with spyware. The recordings of monitored calls can be organised, indexed and remotely browsed from anywhere in the world.

So what can we do? Well, we can fully own the router remotely. At the moment we have three demo exploits which do the following:

* enable backdoor in order to control the router remotely

* disable wireless completely (can only be re-enabled if the user is technically capable)

* steal the WEP/WPA key

Of course there are other attacks you could launch! We can hijack any action with full admin privileges or steal any info returned by a router’s page. This means evilness of the exploits are only limited by the attacker’s imagination. Other examples of evil attacks include evesdropping VoIP conversations (change ’sip config primproxyaddr’ statement in config file), stealing VoIP credentials, exposing internal hosts on the DMZ, change the DNS settings for stealing online banking credentials, disable auto updates (change ‘cwmp.ini’ section in config file), etc.

Pico (or femto) cells offer the opportunity for license-holders to deploy tiny GSM cells. Connected to ADSL lines they can provide low-cost connectivity for any GSM mobile, converting a mobile call to VoIP while taking load off the operator's network.

But Orange wants to see companies who have trouble getting coverage in basements or back offices paying to have a picocell fitted and connected to their broadband to provide the coverage they need.

The firm is keen to emphasise that this will be part of a communications deal and the price will be negotiable.

Orange Home Max includes a landline connection offering free weekend and evening calls as well as an Orange Livebox – the wireless modem that gives you broadband coverage wherever you are in your home. A second new package, Orange Home Starter, has launched for customers who want to keep their existing fixed line supplier but still want to move over to Orange Broadband.

Customers can also make free international calls with an inclusive VoIP line. They will also be able to benefit from the launch of Orange’s digital TV service later this year.

Home Starter - £12 per month (Direct Debit):
(£5 per month for Orange mobile customers, saving £7 per month)

• Includes unlimited evening and weekend calls to UK landlines starting 01 and 02 from a home phone (fair usage applies)

• Includes a Siemens wireless router with speeds up to 2 Meg. Perfect for downloading music, photos and browsing the internet

• 6GB monthly download usage allowance, enough for browsing the internet, downloading music and photos

• Includes McAfee Privacy service

Home Max - £24 per month (Direct Debit):
(£15 per month for mobile customers, saving £9 per month)

• Includes line rental

• Includes a state of the art Livebox wireless modem with speeds up to 8 Meg (dependent on distance from exchange). Great for everything you can do with 2 Meg but faster, as well as downloading films and large files as well as hooking up with a games console or other computers around the home

• Includes unlimited evening and weekend calls to UK landlines starting 01 and 02 from a home phone (fair usage applies)

• Includes a second VoIP line with inclusive anytime calls to UK landlines starting 01 and 02 and to landlines in 30 countries and all Orange mobile numbers, via an active broadband connection using a phone plugged into the Livebox

• Unlimited downloads (fair usage applies)

• Keep your existing phone number

• Includes McAfee Privacy service

Users can also opt to have interleaving switched off from their connection to further improve the speed.

Available on a monthly contract, Broadband Your Way Pro is priced at £19.99 a month including a usage allowance of 10GB when online between 8am and midnight. At all other times, usage is free which is perfect for large downloads or gaming through the night.

Under Broadband Your Way Pro, gaming and VoIP traffic (such as Ventrilo and TeamSpeak) is prioritised under PlusNet’s Titanium service whilst all other activity such as browsing, email and streaming media is treated as Gold.

The term "Net neutrality" refers, in its most extreme sense, to the idea that all bits are created equal and that Internet traffic should under no circumstances be tiered in any way. Opponents of Net neutrality argue that certain types of traffic are already necessarily prioritized over other types--voice over Internet Protocol, or voIP, is a frequently used example--and that to mandate Net neutrality would limit both that functionality and the ability of Internet service providers to charge different rates for different connection speeds.

Because Internet users in the U.S. tend to have a smaller range of ISPs to choose from than do users in the U.K., the consensus in the U.K. has been that Net neutrality is a U.S.-centric debate.

"We might feel that we're happy with the degree of market force and flexibility in the U.K., but...what is clear is that some of the major content providers originate out of the U.S., and if things actually became tiered in any sense we would feel the impact in the U.K. and the EU," said Shadbolt. "When there are proposals floating around before Congress or whatever, whatever your view, it is required to examine the issues. It is a complex field."

Eli Katz, chairman of the ITSPA, said: "Things like unbundling, things like making it easier to sell - these are all critical requirements to enable significant market adoption of IP [telephony]."

Altogether, consumer BVAS brought in more than 25% as much revenue as basic broadband access during 2006. Telephone (Voice over IP, VoIP) and TV services (IPTV) and online gaming all did well.

The run-rate for consumer BVAS revenues increased by almost 81% during 2006, from $11.9 billion at the start of the year to $21.6 billion at the end of the year. This was steeper than the growth rate for the number of consumer broadband lines (34% to 246 million) or the run-rate of broadband access revenues (32% to $71 billion) during 2006.

Report author John Bosnell, Senior Analyst at Point Topic, said ‘Value added services are making an increasingly valuable contribution to overall broadband revenues. Our research shows that broadband value-added services were contributing an extra 30% to basic access revenues by the end of 2006.’

That figure compares with a contribution of 22% at the beginning of the year, 18% at the start of 2005 and 10% at the start of 2004.