• Overview
• Phone Demonstration
• FAQs

FAQs

What is IP Telephony?
IP Telephony / Voice over IP (VoIP) is the routing of voice conversations over an IP-based public or private data network, like the Internet (public) or a VPN (private). The voice is digitized into packets that travel over the data network instead of the traditional, dedicated, circuit-switched voice transmission lines. BITS routes voice calls over a dedicated VPN instead of the public internet, to provide higher security and assure Quality of Service (see QoS below). VoIP providers can generally not offer quality of service since they transmit the voice calls over the public internet, which results in a “best effort call.”

What is MPLS?
Multi Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) is a converged data network which emulates properties of a circuit-switched network over a packet-switched network. MPLS was designed to provide a unified data-carrying service for both circuit-based clients (voice calls) and packet-switching clients (critical data). It can be used to carry many different kinds of traffic, including voice, video, image, and data and allows for end-to-end Quality of Service. BITS uses Cisco Integrated Services Routers, which were designed for transmitting converged traffic throughout the BITS MPLS network.

What is Class of Service (CoS)?
Class of Service (CoS) is a way of classifying and prioritizing packets based on application type (voice, video, image transfers, critical data transport, internet access), and the type of user group, based on a queuing mechanism for transmitting converged traffic. It allows community banks to optimize response times for latency-sensitive applications while maintaining high throughput for bulk data applications. CoS meets the demand for predictable performance of business-critical applications as well as the requirements for integrating latency-critical voice and video applications with data services calls for differentiated handling of network traffic.

What is Quality of Service (QoS)?
Quality of Service (QoS) is intended to handle what sheer bandwidth or data-compression techniques cannot - that is, guaranteed timely delivery of specific application data or resources to a particular destination or destinations. This is achieved by a prioritization mechanism (CoS) for guaranteeing the transmission of a packet on a data network between two points in the network. QoS guarantees bandwidth for key applications such as IP Telephony, Critical Data and Check Image transfer, over less important applications such as internet browsing. It can eliminate the need for faster network infrastructure and help in network planning by measuring and managing traffic flow.

What is a Converged Network?
Converged networks offer a complete integration of the telephone system with IP-based data networks. The architecture offered by BITS supports the transmission of all types of data packets such as telephony, video, image, and critical data through a single network connection. It supports multiple functions such as voice switching, enterprise routing, firewalls, VPN and Quality of Service. The BITS converged network eliminates the need for multiple networks inside a branch or multiple network connections to the branch.

What is a VPN?
Virtual Private Network (VPN). VPN’s are unlike the public networks that use the Internet to connect locations together to send and receive date. VPN’s are closed networks that use encryption and other security mechanisms to ensure that only authorized users can access the network and that the data cannot be intercepted.

What is a Firewall?
A system designed to prevent unauthorized access to or from a private network. Firewalls can be implemented in both hardware and software, or a combination of both. Firewalls are frequently used to prevent unauthorized Internet users from accessing VPN’s connected to the Internet. All packets entering or leaving the VPN pass through the firewall, which examines each packet and blocks those that do not meet the specified security criteria. BITS firewalls also supports anti-virus protection and are monitored 24 X 7 by VeriSign, the most reliable network security provider in the industry.