Wiretapping could stifle VOIP technology

WIRETAPPING COULD STIFLE VOIP TECHNOLOGY
[SOURCE: San Jose Mercury News, AUTHOR: Dean Takahashi]
[Commentary] In its zeal to pursue terrorists and criminals, the federal government could crush a nascent technology and, ironically, jeopardize the nation's security. That's one of the consequences of enabling wiretapping in the digital age. At the request of the FBI, the Federal Communications Commission is soon expected to require companies that provide certain kinds of Internet phone calls to enable law enforcement to conduct wiretapping, given court approval. Conventional phone calls are already subject to wiretapping when law enforcement obtains a court order. Internet phone calls, also called VOIP for voice over Internet protocol, can bypass phone-system charges by using the Internet to route calls from one Internet user to another. That makes for cheap or free calls -- but complicates wiretapping. To comply with the wiretapping rule, a service such as Skype might have to centralize its architecture and forgo communications innovations the current architecture offers. Or eBay might sell Skype to an offshore entity. Or Skype could design a backdoor, or vulnerability, into the technology to enable wiretapping. That not only would be ridiculous, but hobbling a communications network in such a way would also expose it to criminals with the technical know-how to exploit it.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/business/technology/16627393.htm