Why we do not have VOIP

[Grant3wishes]

This is the accommodation agreement signed in secret by the Prime minister and the BTL Chairman Keith Arnold 19TH September 2005. The principal document is 31 pages and is built around this, government’s agreement to cover its Intelco losses by selling 4 former Intelco properties to BTL for $19.2 million.

Government also agreed to a 15% minimum rate of return for BTL – and according to schedule 2, that minimum return must be calculated to include, quote “any assets acquired...by BTL in the performance of this agreement.” So that means the $19.2 million used to cover Government’s Intelco exposure, is to be paid by you the ratepayer, in your phone bill.

And article 11.4 is where all the current problems begin. It notes that in the event that BTL fails to achieve its minimum rate of return, the government has to compensate BTL – and if that isn’t paid in full by a specified deadline, then the shortfall “can be set off by BTL against the amount of any taxes including business tax, sales tax or other taxes” payable by BTL to government.

But that’s not all the agreement does. There are also 10 other undertakings that make blanket giveaways and concessions to BTL, including government’s undertaking that only BTL and Speednet – which is SMART can operate as phone companies in Belize for a period of 15 years. As regards Voice over internet, Government undertook for a period of 15 years that no class license holder is permitted to use voice over internet known as VOIP technology.

[deadserious]

Has the VOIP block been removed now that BTL is owned by the GOB?

[MaryMoore]

When I live in SP I found ways around it that worked daily for me.

[caribbeantravel4]

As of Friday evening there has been no BTL dsl on the south end of the island.  Nothing, nada.  Worked like a charm until the government took it over.  The only response you get is, we have problems and are working on it. 

[caribbeantravel4]

BTL Update.  Seems there was some of the BTL servers and equipment that burned Friday.  The fix involves a BTL tech coming to your dsl modem and reprogramming the codes to it.  Once we finally got them here, it only took about 30 minutes.  So if you are down, nevermind you would not be able to read this!!!!!

[deadserious]

When I live in SP I found ways around it that worked daily for me.

BTL blocked my work VPNs the last couple of times I was there.  Not much I can do if they take down my lifeline to work.

I could occasionally get Skype to work, but I think they are tracking vpn activity on IPs that have attempted to connect to skype. If a vpn connection is made, they then add that to their blacklist.

So if you wish to get skype to work, you must make sure to start skype only after making your vpn connection and be sure to kill it before shutting down the vpn.  Otherwise, you risk losing access to your vpn.

I just would like to see the GOB remove this blocking tech all together.  When they do, they'll get at least two new residents.

[klcman]

might be a no-brainer for BTL, when you put it that way   

[Moose in Belize]

I'm afraid that all this VOIP, VPN and SKYPE stuff is way over my head.  How does it impact the casual internet user who only wants to use a web browser and send/receive emails, like me?

[deadserious]

I'm afraid that all this VOIP, VPN and SKYPE stuff is way over my head.  How does it impact the casual internet user who only wants to use a web browser and send/receive emails, like me?

Actually, most of the blocking technologies used to catch Skype and VPNs, which themselves you might not use, can also degrade performance of normal web browsing activities. 

Skype and VPNs both will pretend to be normal web activity in order to try to get around blocking technologies.  Therefore, in order to completely block them, the ISP will have to monitor normal web browsing ports and do deep packet inspection on each web request.  If something on the line looks like it may be a skype or vpn request instead of web request, it kills the connection.  If the inspector software makes a mistake and accidentally kills your normal web browsing connection, to you it seems like the server you are browsing to is down.  The end result is that you feel like you are using a flaky connection.  Also, the process of simply digging through each packet for skype or vpn traffic will add latency to the connection which then also unnecessarily slows down your browsing experience.

Having said all that though, Skype is a relatively casual internet use (text/audio/video chat with family and friends).  In fact, it's not usually the business user who would be benefiting from the use of Skype as business tends to use more standards based voip solutions based on the SIP protocol (which is also blocked by the way). 

VPNs are more of a business use, but it is also used by the more casual user to try to get around Skype blocking technologies.