A new development aims to remove a communications and security obstacle that has prevented businesses from adopting Internet telephony, reports Network Briefing. Firewall vendors Check Point Software Technologies Ltd, Cisco Systems and Trusted Information Systems are set to allow users to send and receive audio and video phone calls through company firewalls and over the Internet while maintaining data security of corporate networks. According to Intel Corp, the companies will be using an Intel developed design to get H.323 standards-based Internet communications through firewalls. The new capability complies with the H.323 Internet communication standard. Intel says it worked with the firewall vendors to validate the H.323 standard in their upcoming products. Check Point Software, Cisco and Trusted Information Systems have all stated support for the H.323 standard and that they plan to offer standard-compliant firewall products later this year. Support for H.323 will be included in Check Point Software’s next release of FireWall-1, version 3.0, which will ship later this month. Cisco’s PIX Firewall will support H.323 technology with or without network address translation (NAT) making deployment and network expansion easier for users. By supporting H.323-based technology through the PIX Firewall, users are ensured expedient delivery of Internet telephony communications. Trusted Information Systems Gauntlet firewall will run a version of the H.323 proxy to monitor and control all H.323 calls between internal networks and the Internet (or between intranet domains). Trials of the new call capability will be carried out next quarter using a network shared between Cisco and Intel.
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