TELECOMS firms see the internet as the next means of spoken communication. Voice over internet protocol has become increasingly popular in recent years.

Yet relatively few firms are taking on established telecoms giants and cashing in on the idea of cheap calls.

But while that is good news for the consumer, it could also lead to more attacks on individuals’ personal information.

‘VOIP is entering the mainstream,’ said Broadsoft senior systems engineer Ben Bunn.

‘Companies like Skype are a lot less expensive compared to normal telecommunications and I think we will see it happen a lot more.’

But Mr Bunn warned there were a number of security issues.

This could involve hacking into someone’s voicemail or phreakers who steal ‘minutes’ from telephone companies.

Mr Bunn reckoned more than 200 million minutes were stolen every month at an estimated cost of $26m.

Other attacks include spit (spam-over-internet telephony), whereby advertising firms leave unwanted messages, and vishing, whereby fake banks ask people to call with details of their accounts.

‘Imagine your voicemail being filled up with Viagra adverts,’ he said.

Mr Bunn said that as VOIP became more commonplace, there would be greater pressure on IT firms to ensure internet connections remained strong and stable.

‘There is a much wider set of considerations when you apply VOIP,’ he said. ‘It’s very important to keep the network up and running and lots of work goes into preserving it.’

Mr Bunn said many of the problems were currently being solved by session boarder controllers. He said service providers were implementing their own security systems, but warned that businesses building their own VOIP networks would have to be very careful.