Commission says no change in position of internet voice services

VoIP means sending voice information in digital form in discrete packets rather than in the traditional protocols of the public telephone network. A major advantage of VoIP telephony is that it avoids the charges of ordinary telephone services.

The Commission said that VoIP services usually do not meet each of the conditions for the definition of voice telephony in a 1990 "services" Directive and should therefore not be treated as such from a regulatory point of view.

In some cases, VoIP services might meet all the conditions laid down in the 1990 Directive. Certain internet telephony providers may qualify as providers of voice telephony, and therefore be subject to the regulatory regime applicable to voice telephony, as soon as they offer a quality of service equivalent to that of traditional voice telephony.

A public consultation held last Summer highlighted the need for clarifications on a number of points. The new communication from the Commission therefore clarifies the differences between voice over internet protocol and voice over the internet. It states, as a consequence of this distinction, that the conveyance of voice signals over dedicated private networks using the internet protocol is likely to produce a level of service comparable with that of voice delivered over conventional telephony networks.

The Commission said that internet telephony will only be defined as voice telephony and therefore be subject to standard voice telephony regulation if and when all the following conditions from the 1990 Directive are met:

• It is offered to the public commercially;
• The service is provided to and from public switched network termination points on the fixed telephony network; and
• It involves direct transport and speech in real time.

The Commission said the quality and reliability offered by already marketed services still do not meet the expectations of mainstream consumers. It acknowledged that sophisticated products tailored to the needs of professional users have been released, but as they usually combine voice features with other elements (e.g. text and image) it said that they cannot be assimilated with genuine voice telephony.