[VOIPSEC] Session Border Controller use

[Hadriel Kaplan]

Comments inline...

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Voipsec-bounces at voipsa.org [mailto:Voipsec-bounces at voipsa.org] On
> Behalf Of micaela giuhat
> Sent: Wednesday, June 21, 2006 9:46 AM
> To: 'Kaalund, Bruce'; Voipsec at voipsa.org
> Subject: Re: [VOIPSEC] Session Border Controller use
> 
> Bruce,
> 
> 1. You don't need an SBC for handing calls to the PSTN.

That depends on many things.  In the service provider market, SBCs are
frequently deployed for PSTN-terminating service for various reasons.  Some
are security related, some are interop/fix-it related, some are
session-routing related, etc.  


> 3. SBCs are mainly use to solve demark issues such as FW and NAT
> traversal,
> as well as provide session admission control, session detail records, QOS
> mediation, and not really for security, although they may do some rate
> limiting for certain messages. Some SBCs will look at media, just to
> monitor
> whether media comes to ports after a call has been terminated.

That's an interesting statement, that they're not really for security.  Do
Enterprise SBCs not perform security functions?  In the service provider
deployments, as far as I can tell, that's their most popular reason for
deployment.  They do far more than just rate-limiting certain messages,
although certainly what they do will be different depending on the vendor.
FW/NAT traversal is not even in the top 3 (though it's #4 or 5).  

-hadriel