SMBs: VoIP is unreliable, unsafe

As you probably know, telecommunications services don't come cheap, especially not for businesses. And if there's one end of the spectrum where budgets are the tightest, it's the small and medium-sized businesses. VoIP is a technology that promises to bring not only advanced functionality but also considerable savings to the enterprise. So why is it that mostly large businesses are deploying VoIP, while SMBs wait on the sidelines? If a new study from the Computing Technology Industry Association (CompTIA) is any indicator, the primary reasons are security and reliability. According to the study, only half of SMBs have faith in VoIP technology as opposed to 82 percent who feel they can trust traditional phone systems. The most common reasons cited are security (and the unease involved with making yet another service reliant on a vulnerable LAN) and call reliability. "If the delivery of an e-mail is delayed by 30 seconds, neither the message sender nor the receiver is likely to notice," noted CompTIA president and CEO John Venator. "But a 30-second gap in the middle of a phone call is another story entirely."

For more on VoIP in the SMB:
- see this eWeek article