Unless you've been sleeping under a mushroom, you probably know that
North Korea's leader, Kim Jong-il, stirred from his dormancy and fired
off not one but seven missiles, even after several countries cautioned
strongly against it. Warnings of this may or may not have been this
reason why South Korea suddenly backed off, a few days previous,
against blocking VoIP calls by U.S. Forces Korea members.
South
Korea had originally planned to block out U.S. calls due to
non-compliance to their Telecommunications Business Act. However, at
the request of US Forces Korea, they agreed to suspend the deadline.
It
all begs the question, however, of how secure VoIP really is that the
US Military would allow its individual members to use it. Or why they
wouldn't set up Internet access, say, via satellite.
VoIP may
generally be considered insecure, but it doesn't have to be. Calls
could be encrypted and decrypted on the fly, by caller and receiver,
respectively. However, to reduce the lag time on such encryption, the
process would have to be done on small packets of sound, possible a few
seconds at a time, else non-computer VoIP phones would have an extra
processing burden.
Now, without delving into the inner workings
of existing VoIP services, I'll hazard a guess that there already is
some level of encryption conducted on VoIP calls. However, with
encryption laws in the US and Canada being fairly strict (against
exportation of algorithms), the level of encryption might actually be
quite low.
Of course, the real issue in South Korea is over the
ISPs that regular officers use to access the Internet and make VoIP
calls. The service provider(s) they use allow unlimited VoIP calling,
which the three South Korean ISPs who requested the US military block
are upset about.
I seriously doubt, however, that the US
Military's necessarily secure communications are being conducted via
the same ISPs that individual members of the military are using.
On a related issue, Skype
was recently told by South Korea to stop signing up new SkypeOut
customers, until Skype adheres to telecom laws - in particular, two
e-business codes. In fact, Skype's Korean Market Manager recently
issued a statement that Skype was not currently doing business in South
Korea.
It's interesting to note that South Korea has been a center of a considerably number of technology trials in both VoIP and RFID technology. Part of the aforementioned restrictions have to do with protecting the interests of South Korean companies.
Sources: Stars & Stripes, ZD Net Korea [via Skype Journal].