Assume I've got a landline phone at my home. Is there any software that I can setup on my home server that would allow me to use an IP phone to register with my home server and place calls using my landline? Would this require something as complex as an actual IP PBX platform? Yes, I know you can order Vonage (or similar) service and get a wifi enabled phone, but that's not what I'm asking. ;)
Asterisk can easily do that, coupled to an ATA with an FXO port such as the Linksys SPA-3102 to interface the telephone line (the existing phone can be kept operational by connecting it to the SPA-3102's FXS port).
Yes, but authenticating the user to prevent calls to the PSTN by other unauthorized VoIP callers may prove tricky: the caller ID may be faked, PIN authentication is inconvenient and not so reliable (especially if the VoIPSP only support inband DTMF), and HTTP Digest Authentication may also fail depending on the VoIPSP's proxy.
How much more secure would Asterisk be, unless callback was employed? I can only think of two methods of authentication - by CLID or PIN (Three if you count both)
You can use SIP's "HTTP Authentication" (also called "WWW authentication": see Section 22 of
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In practice, with Asterisk you create for your SIP phone (softphone in this case) a "type=user" or (if you want it to receive calls as well as placing them) "type=friend" entry in sip.conf, and associate it to a context in extensions.conf that is not accessible by any unauthenticated device:
[mysoftphone] context=candialout type=friend host=dynamic secret=sphsecret
Of course, you'll have to define an entry also for the "Line1" section of the SPA-3102, which, if you are only interested in placing outgoing calls, might be:
- the SPA-3102 to register as user: spa3102l1, password: spa3102secret
- the softphone to register as user: mysoftphone, password: sphsecret
Now, any incoming call claiming to come from the user "mysoftphone" (with a SIP header "From: mysoftphone@...") will be challenged by Asterisk to authenticate (with HTTP Digest Authentication). Only devices that do it with the password "sphsecret" will trigger the context [candialout] and the execution of the Dial() command; any other will be rejected.
For the record, I got this working with Asterisk. I'm able to use a SIP phone from any Internet capable location to connect to my home Asterisk PBX and make calls that go out *from* my landline. Very cool. My only cost was a $15 card to interface my server with the POTS line.
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