Internet telephony jumps off the wires

After years of unfulfilled hype, a growing number of service providers have begun offering Internet telephony, in which voice data from phone calls is broken up into packets and sent across the Internet. In response, more individuals and companies have begun using the technology. The providers are offering wireless Internet telephony, which adds convenience by letting users make Internet calls from their mobile phones via IEEE 802.11 (Wi-Fi) wireless LAN and third-generation (3G) cellular technologies. Wireless Internet telephony is less expensive than regular mobile telephony because carriers can use the existing Internet, rather than build a new infrastructure, to route calls. Using the Internet enables wireless telephony to offer good reception indoors, which is not always the case with traditional cellular service. However, despite rosy marketplace-growth projections, Internet telephony faces several important concerns, particularly power usage, security, and quality of service (QoS).