As the popularity of VoIP grows, governments are becoming more interested in regulating VoIP in a manner similar to PSTN services. Throughout the developing world, particularly in countries where regulation is weak or
captured by the dominant operator, restrictions on the use of VoIP are often imposed, including in
Panama where VoIP is taxed, Guyana, where VoIP is prohibited. In
Ethiopia, where the government is nationalizing telecommunication service, it is a criminal offense to offer services using VoIP. The country has installed firewalls to prevent international calls from being made using VoIP. These measures were taken after the popularity of VoIP reduced the income generated by the state-owned
telecommunications company.
Canada In
Canada, the
Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission regulates telephone service, including VoIP telephony service. VoIP services operating in Canada are required to provide
9-1-1 emergency service.
European Union In the
European Union, the treatment of VoIP service providers is a decision for each national telecommunications regulator, which must use competition law to define relevant national markets and then determine whether any service provider on those national markets has "significant market power" (and so should be subject to certain obligations). A general distinction is usually made between VoIP services that function over managed networks (via broadband connections) and VoIP services that function over unmanaged networks (essentially, the Internet). The relevant EU Directive is not clearly drafted concerning obligations that can exist independently of market power (e.g., the obligation to offer access to emergency calls), and it is impossible to say definitively whether VoIP service providers of either type are bound by them. ===Arab states of the
GCC===
Oman In
Oman, it is illegal to provide or use unauthorized VoIP services, to the extent that websites of unlicensed VoIP providers have been blocked. Violations may be punished with fines of 50,000 Omani Rial (about 130,317 US dollars), a two-year prison sentence or both. In 2009, police raided 121 Internet cafes throughout the country and arrested 212 people for using or providing VoIP services.
Saudi Arabia In September 2017,
Saudi Arabia lifted the ban on VoIPs, in an attempt to reduce operational costs and spur digital entrepreneurship.
United Arab Emirates In the
United Arab Emirates (UAE), it is illegal to provide or use unauthorized VoIP services. Websites of unlicensed VoIP providers have been blocked. Some VoIP services, such as
Skype, were allowed. In January 2018, internet service providers in UAE blocked all VoIP apps, including Skype, but permitting only 2 government-approved VoIP apps (C'ME and BOTIM). In opposition, a petition on
Change.org garnered over 5000 signatures, in response to which the website was blocked in UAE. On March 24, 2020, the United Arab Emirates loosened restrictions on VoIP services earlier prohibited in the country, to ease communication during the
COVID-19 pandemic. However, popular instant messaging applications such as
WhatsApp,
Skype, and
FaceTime remained blocked from being used for voice and video calls, constricting residents to use paid services from the country's state-owned telecom providers.
India In
India, it is legal to use VoIP, but it is illegal to have
VoIP gateways inside India. This effectively means that people who have PCs can use them to make a VoIP call to other computers but not to a normal phone number. Foreign-based VoIP server services are illegal to use in India. • PC to PC; within or outside India • PC / a device / Adapter conforming to the standard of any international agencies like ITU or IETF, etc., in India to PSTN/PLMN abroad. • Any device / Adapter conforming to standards of International agencies like ITU, IETF etc., connected to ISP node with static IP address to similar device / Adapter; within or outside India. • Except whatever is described in , no other form of Internet Telephony is permitted. • In India no Separate Numbering Scheme is provided to the Internet Telephony. Presently the 10-digit Numbering allocation based on E.164 is permitted to the Fixed Telephony, GSM, CDMA wireless service. For Internet Telephony, the numbering scheme shall only conform to IP addressing Scheme of
Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA). Translation of E.164 number / private number to IP address allotted to any device and vice versa, by ISP to show compliance with IANA numbering scheme is not permitted. • The Internet Service Licensee is not permitted to have PSTN/PLMN connectivity. Voice communication to and from a telephone connected to PSTN/PLMN and following E.164 numbering is prohibited in India.
South Korea In
South Korea, only providers registered with the government are authorized to offer VoIP services. Unlike many VoIP providers, most of whom offer flat rates, Korean VoIP services are generally metered and charged at rates similar to terrestrial calling. Foreign VoIP providers encounter high barriers to government registration. This issue came to a head in 2006 when
Internet service providers providing personal Internet services by contract to
United States Forces Korea (USFK) members residing on USFK bases threatened to block off access to VoIP services used by USFK members as an economical way to keep in contact with their families in the United States, on the grounds that the service members' VoIP providers were not registered. A compromise was reached between USFK and Korean telecommunications officials in January 2007, wherein USFK service members arriving in Korea before June 1, 2007, and subscribing to the ISP services provided on base could continue to use their US-based VoIP subscription, but later arrivals are required to use a Korean-based VoIP provider, which by contract will offer pricing similar to the flat rates offered by US VoIP providers.
United States In the United States, the FCC requires all interconnected VoIP service providers to comply with requirements comparable to those for traditional telecommunications service providers. VoIP operators in the US are required to support
local number portability; make service accessible to people with disabilities; pay regulatory fees,
universal service contributions, and other mandated payments; and enable law enforcement authorities to conduct surveillance pursuant to the
Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA). Operators of
Interconnected VoIP (fully connected to the PSTN) are mandated to provide
Enhanced 911 service without special request, provide for customer location updates, clearly disclose any limitations on their E-911 functionality to their consumers, obtain affirmative acknowledgements of these disclosures from all consumers, and may not allow their customers to opt-out of 911 service. VoIP operators also receive the benefit of certain US telecommunications regulations, including an entitlement to
interconnection and exchange of traffic with
incumbent local exchange carriers via wholesale carriers. Providers of
nomadic VoIP service—those who are unable to determine the location of their users—are exempt from state telecommunications regulation. Another legal issue that the
US Congress is debating concerns changes to the
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The issue in question is calls between Americans and foreigners. The NSA is not authorized to tap Americans' conversations without a warrant—but the Internet, and specifically VoIP does not draw as clear a line to the location of a caller or a call's recipient as the traditional phone system does. As VoIP's low cost and flexibility convince more and more organizations to adopt the technology, surveillance for law enforcement agencies becomes more difficult. VoIP technology has also increased federal security concerns because VoIP and similar technologies have made it more difficult for the government to determine where a target is physically located when communications are being intercepted, and that creates a whole set of new legal challenges. ==History==