Unified communications (UC) is on a roll — according to Digital Journal, the market should be worth over $61 billion by 2018. It’s no surprise; as businesses look for ways to connect in-office, remote and mobile workers, advanced UC is a logical fit, since it offers near-limitless scalability combined with the ability to add new lines and services on demand. The evolution of UC technologies, however, raises an important question: How do companies provision these digital services? While public clouds and services have come a long way in the last decade, are unified communications over the public Internet always in your best interest? Here’s a rundown of UC in the private vs. public Internet connection to help you make the best choice for your business.
Security
The biggest driver of UC delivered through a private connection? Security. With 56 percent of companies already worried about data security and so many devices now a part of the unified ecosystem — from VoIP-enabled PCs to traditional phone handsets, mobile devices and laptops — it’s critical to find a solution that provides security across the board. While public offerings often come with assurances of zero-knowledge on the provider end, anything delivered over the Internet at large still carries the real risk of transmission interception or re-routing — and if you’re using public cloud it also means that UC data is stored alongside that of other companies. What happens if they suffer a breach?
Private solutions, meanwhile, offer several distinct advantages. First is the ability to use a virtual private network (VPN) to connect with off-site servers, allowing you to effectively shield traffic end to end. While calls out of your network still go over the public Internet, lines between your provider and local office are secure, meaning your provider can detect and ideally remediate any potential threats before they reach communications endpoints. Encryption is also a key offering of private solutions — by opting for high-level encryption from transmission origin to endpoint, you lower the chances of man-in-the-middle (MiTM) or data-theft attacks, and increase total UC security.
Compliance
Are your communications compliant? For many companies, this isn’t a question they’ve thought too much about, but as digital records become commonplace and consumers expect a higher standard of digital privacy, lawmakers are beginning to consider the implications of any data breach, including those of voice or video. The result? If communications data isn’t properly handled and a breach occurs, your company may be on the hook to manage the aftermath, or face government sanctions to improve security. For any company that transmits any type of health care, HR or legal data via UC channels, compliance is now a must rather than a “might be nice.”
Consider the case of a public offering: While your data may be properly encrypted and well secured, that of your digital “neighbors” may not. If a server breach occurs, your UC information could become collateral damage — a distinction that matters to you but offers no comfort to compromised users and comes with no defensible legal foundation. Better bet? Go private and manage your compliance step by step to ensure UC data is ideally handled, transported and encrypted.
Cost
Bottom line? Going private is often more expensive than a public option. Scale is the culprit: Public offerings provide services to a vast array of clients, in turn keeping total costs low. Private solutions, meanwhile, dedicate servers and connections to a single business, meaning they must charge more to make a profit.
Here’s the thing though: This isn’t always a drawback. As in UC, so in life: You get what you pay for. While choosing the cheapest public offering gets your foot in the digital door, it may cost more in the long term if data is breached or you discover “hidden” charges for add-on services or more bandwidth. Going private lets you manage these costs upfront and create a quality-based UC system. Also, since many private offerings also come with scalable, on-demand bandwidth, you won’t get stuck paying for resources that go unused or are struggling to keep up when a sudden traffic spike occurs. You get what you need, when you need it, and pay a fair price.
Control
Who controls your UC network? Ideally, local IT professionals should be in charge of everything from adding new local lines to linking new mobile phones or securing SIP trunks. In a public scenario, much of this control is removed and placed in the hands of a provider — ideal if you don’t have the time or staffing budget to manage this technology yourself. However, if you’re looking to build a UC deployment from the ground up and get it right the first time, private offerings come with much-needed, granular control.
This kind of control is also essential if there’s ever a breach in your network or problem with a specific aspect of UC services; if IT teams are simply end users rather than administrators, remediation lies entirely with your provider.
Customization
One key aspect of your UC deployment is the contract. Much like a cloud computing service level agreement (SLA), communications contracts lay out responsibilities, response times and potential penalties, and their terms can make or break the ROI of your solution. Opt for public and you typically get a “cookie cutter” contract that matches those of all other clients. Go private and you can build a contract that suits your needs, budget and leaves room to grow as your digital communication needs evolve.
In addition, private offerings allow to fully customize your deployment to meet changing needs, rather than giving you the most common set of services and allowing only minimal room to move. For many companies, the typical plans offered by public providers come with either too many services — meaning you pay for things you don’t need — or too few, leaving you on the hook to pay for expensive add-ons or contract a second provider.
Public solutions offer speed and simplicity, but for many companies that’s not enough: Private UC solutions may provide the ideal mix of security, compliance, cost, control and customization.
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