Method and apparatus for voice-over-IP call recording and analysis

• US 7,873,035 B2
• Filed: 05/15/2009
• Issued: 01/18/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 12/19/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: AudioCodes, Inc. (Audiocodes Limited)
• Original Assignee: AudioCodes, Inc. (Audiocodes Limited)
• Inventors: Zeng, Lujia, Dutt, Abhay, Lan, Dongping, Howell, Donald, Sampath, Murali, Mzili, Aziz, Chen, Pin Lo, Kouretas, Stephen
• Primary Examiner(s): Jagannathan; Melanie
• Application Number:
  US12/466,670
• Publication Number:
  US 20090303897A1
• Time in Patent Office: 613 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 370/356
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5003 Managing SLA; Interaction between SLA and QoS
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 41/5087 wherein the managed service relates to voice services management of VoIP services H04M7/0081
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/2281 Call monitoring, e.g. for law enforcement purposes; Call tracing; Detection or prevention of malicious calls
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 7/006 Networks other than PSTN/ISDN providing telephone service, e.g. Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) , including next generation networks with a packet-switched transport layer H04L65/00 takes precedence; aspects not specific to the type of network H04M3/00; special services in those networks H04M3/42

Abstract

A method and computer-readable medium for obtaining information associated with a VoIP communication session includes tapping the computer network passively to obtain signaling and media information in a first format, separating the signaling and media information, determining transport information from at least one of the signaling and media information, transcoding the media information to a second format, and storing the transcoded media information in the second format. The media information includes data, voice, audio, and/or video information. A system obtain information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network includes a tapping device to passively tap the computer network to obtain signaling and media information in a first format, a processing device to transcode the media information from the first format to a second format, separate the signaling information from the media information, and determine transport information from at least one of the signaling and media information, and a storage device to store the transcoded media information in the second format.

Claims

1. A method of passively recording information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network comprising:

tapping, by a tapping device, the computer network passively to obtain signaling information and media information without establishing a voice session with a recording device, the media information being in a first format;

separating the signaling information from the media information;

determining transport information from at least one of the signaling information and media information;

transcoding the media information to a second format; and

storing the transcoded media information in the second format, thereby monitoring information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network without requiring modification to the computer network and without impairing operation of the computer network, the first and second formats being digital formats.

2. The method of obtaining information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network as defined by claim 1, wherein the first format comprises at least one of G.711, A-law PCM, mu-law PCM, linear PCM, G.723.1, G.727, G.722, G.729a, G.729b, GSM610, GSM-MS, NetCoder, and Oki-ADPCM.

3. The method of obtaining information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network as defined by claim 1, wherein the second format comprises at least one of G.711, A-law PCM, mu-law PCM, linear PCM, G.723.1, G.727, G.722, G.729a, G.729b, GSM610, GSM-MS, NetCoder, and Oki-ADPCM.

4. The method of obtaining information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network as defined by claim 1, wherein the transport information comprises at least one of a quality analysis, Quality of Service (QOS) analysis, checksum analysis, dropped packet error analysis, TCP/UDP transport error analysis, packet delay analysis, packet retransmission rate analysis, latent call setup analysis, packet transport error analysis, dropped packet analysis, latency analysis, call setup analysis, cause of call being abandoned analysis, out-of-order packet analysis, retransmitted packet analysis, RTCP analysis, jitter analysis, packet count analysis, and missing audio packet analysis.

5. The method of obtaining information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network as defined by claim 1, further comprising correlating the transport information to the VoIP communication session.

6. The method of obtaining information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network as defined by claim 1, further comprising abstracting the transport information across a plurality of formats.

7. A system to passively record information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network comprising:

a tapping device to passively tap the computer network to obtain signaling information and media information without establishing a voice session with a recording device, the media information being in a first format;

a processing device to transcode the media information from the first format to a second format, the processing device separating the signaling information from the media information, the processing device determining transport information from at least one of the signaling information and media information; and

a storage device to store the transcoded media information in the second format, thereby monitoring information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network without requiring modification to the computer network and without impairing operation of the computer network, the first and second formats being digital formats.

8. The system to obtain information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network as defined by claim 7, wherein the first format comprises at least one of G.711, A-law PCM, mu-law PCM, linear PCM, G.723.1, G.727, G.722, G.729a, G.729b, GSM610, GSM-MS, NetCoder, and Oki-ADPCM.

9. The system to obtain information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network as defined by claim 7, wherein the second format comprises at least one of G.711, A-law PCM, mu-law PCM, linear PCM, G.723.1, G.722, G.727, G.729a, G.729b, GSM610, GSM-MS, NetCoder, and Oki-ADPCM.

10. The system to passively record information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network as defined by claim 7, wherein the transport information comprises at least one of a quality analysis, Quality of Service (QOS) analysis, checksum analysis, dropped packet error analysis, TCP/UDP transport error analysis, packet delay analysis, packet retransmission rate analysis, latent call setup analysis, packet transport error analysis, dropped packet analysis, latency analysis, call setup analysis, cause of call being abandoned analysis, out-of-order packet analysis, retransmitted packet analysis, RTCP analysis, jitter analysis, packet count analysis, and missing audio packet analysis.

11. The system to obtain information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network as defined by claim 7, wherein the processing device correlates the transport information to the VoIP communication session.

12. The system to obtain information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network as defined by claim 7, wherein the processing device abstracts the transport information across a plurality of formats.

13. A tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions that, when executed by a processing device, cause the processing device to passively record information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network by:

tapping the computer network passively to obtain signaling information and media information without establishing a voice session with a recording device, the media information being in a first format;

separating the signaling information from the media information;

transcoding the media information to a second format; and

storing the transcoded media information in the second format, thereby monitoring information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network without requiring modification to the computer network and without impairing operation of the computer network, the first and second formats being digital formats.

14. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, wherein the media information comprises at least one of data, voice, audio, and video information.

15. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, wherein the first format comprises at least one of G.711, A-law PCM, mu-law, PCM, linear PCM, G.723.1, G.722, G.727, G.729a, G.729b, GSM610, GSM-MS, NetCoder, and Oki-ADPCM.

16. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, wherein the second format comprises at least one of G.711, A-law PCM, mu-law PCM, linear PCM, G.723.1, G.722, G.727, G.729a, G.729b, GSM610, GSM-MS, NetCoder, and Oki-ADPCM.

17. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, further comprising instructions that, when executed by a processing device, cause the processing device to passively record information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network by:

determining whether an internet protocol (IP) address associated with the media information matches an IP address associated with the communication session; and

discarding the media information in response to determining that the IP address associated with the media information does not match the IP address associated with the communication session.

18. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, wherein the information is organized in packets.

19. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, wherein the information in the second format requires less storage space than the information in the first format.

20. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, wherein the network comprises an internet protocol (IP)-based network.

21. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, wherein the network comprises at least one of a local area network (LAN) and a wide area network (WAN).

22. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, wherein the information is associated with a plurality of communication sessions.

23. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, further comprising instructions that, when executed by a processing device, cause the processing device to passively record information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network by:

retrieving the stored information; and

replaying the retrieved information in response to a request by a user.

24. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, wherein tapping the network passively to obtain media information in a first format further comprises tapping the network to obtain information flowing in an upstream and a downstream direction on the network.

25. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, wherein the signaling information comprises control information associated with the media information.

26. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 13, further comprising instructions that, when executed by a processing device, cause the processing device to passively record information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network by determining transport information from at least one of the signaling information and media information.

27. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 26, wherein the transport information comprises at least one of a quality analysis, Quality of Service (QOS) analysis, checksum analysis, dropped packet error analysis, TCP/UDP transport error analysis, packet delay analysis, packet retransmission rate analysis, latent call setup analysis, packet transport error analysis, dropped packet analysis, latency analysis, call setup analysis, cause of call being abandoned analysis, out-of-order packet analysis, retransmitted packet analysis, RTCP analysis, jitter analysis, packet count analysis, and missing audio packet analysis.

28. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 26, further comprising instructions that, when executed by a processing device, cause the processing device to passively record information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network by correlating the transport information to the VoIP communication session.

29. The tangible, non-transitory computer-readable storage medium as defined by claim 26, further comprising instructions that, when executed by a processing device, cause the processing device to passively record information associated with a VoIP communication session on a computer network by abstracting the transport information across a plurality of formats.