Hi Tom, and welcome to the forum! You've made some interesting observations and assertions. In particular, you stated:
"VoIP telephone service is NOT subject to the same wiretapping protection of a "regular" land-line. VoIP can be tapped "legally" and many care not about the morality and serious privacy issues involved."
There are so many areas where one could start to reply here that I'll just pick one at random. Maybe it shouldn't make a difference, purely from the standpoint of protecting privacy, but I think it would be a good idea if you clarified which of the packet modes of voice you consider to be "VoIP", and which fall under your heading of "regular land-line". Keep in mind, while you're at it, that many VoIP calls start out as POTS when they leave the residence, and then become fair game to being picked up on an ATM route at one point, and then on the Internet over IP.
I ask these questions and present the example above not to be elusive or coy, but due to all of the many gray areas that exist, both in terms of legal and technological (and dare I suggest, "combinatorially-derived") definitions. And perhaps equally, from the standpoint of uniformed (parroted) or cajoled (lobbied) orientations and perceptions, which is how it appears these days that many laws and regulations are being passed and instituted. Hm, on second thought, let's leave those intentionally vague definitions out for now, and see if we can't get along here by identifying (or attempting to define) some rational ones, instead.
Moving along, when you state that VoIP conversations can be tapped "legally", what measure, or framework of law, are you citing? FCC Rulings? Presidential Wartime Letters? Case law? Constitutionality and the rights that citizens have in connection with reasonable expectations of privacy, no matter which form of telephony they use? And even if the act of wiretapping VoIP calls is "legal", as you suggest, are the proceeds from those acts admissible as evidence?
Just in case things are not muddy enough already, VoIP has often been likened to just another application that rides over the Internet using IP, like e-mail and streaming video. As such, does Sarbanes-Oxley come into play with VoIP to the same extent that it affects how email messages must be stored and retrievable at a later date on demand? If not live conversations, then what about VoIP-based voice-mail?
I invite you and all others looking in here to respond to the above questions and add your own questions and observations, since this is an area of debate that is not so cut and dry that a single pat answer to most of the questions raised will do. Thanks for stirring this one up; it should prove to be quite an edifying discussion by the time we're done.
FAC
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