Security Gateway

In 2006, Collax Security Gateway expanded bandwidth management. The UTM solution in the latest version prioritized and guaranteed bandwidths in Virtual Private Networks; giving VoIP and ERP systems priority in the VPN tunnel. The software offered all the premises to enable VoIP in company networks. Tagged-VLAN technology with 802.1q ensured that data packages are separated from voice packages for the security of Internet telephony. The SIP-based Voice-Traffic was analyzed via stateful inspection. Combined with traffic shaping, these technologies ensured that the voice packages were filtered at the right part of the gateways and were offered priority in the VPN tunnel before other data streams for high quality realtime voice transfer across data networks.

What is SIP?

The Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) is a communication protocol used for initiating, maintaining, modifying, and terminating real-time sessions that involve video, voice, messaging, and other communications applications and services between two or more endpoints on IP networks.

Here are some key points about SIP:

1. Control Protocol: SIP is a signaling or control protocol. It doesn't itself transmit the actual media (voice or video); instead, it sets up the calls or sessions, and other protocols, such as the Real-Time Transport Protocol (RTP), handle the actual transmission of media.
2. Components: The main components of a SIP system are User Agents (UAs), which initiate SIP requests, and SIP servers, which respond to these requests. UAs can be devices like phones or computers. SIP servers include Proxy Servers, Redirect Servers, and Registrar Servers.
3. Messages: SIP uses various types of messages to manage sessions. INVITE messages initiate sessions, ACK messages confirm session establishment, and BYE messages terminate sessions, among others.
4. URI-based: SIP addresses are similar to email addresses and are based on Universal Resource Identifiers (URIs).
5. Applications: SIP is used in a wide range of applications, including voice and video calls, instant messaging, conferencing, and presence information, among others. It is an essential technology for Voice over IP (VoIP) and is also used in mobile telephony via 3G and 4G/LTE networks.
6. Interoperability: SIP supports interoperability between different devices, applications, and services because it's a standardized protocol developed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF).
7. Security: SIP can be made secure by using it in conjunction with other protocols like Transport Layer Security (TLS) for encryption, Secure RTP (SRTP) for secure transmission of media, and SIP Identity to provide a certain level of authentication.

SIP is a fundamental protocol in modern telecommunication systems and plays a crucial role in setting up and controlling the communication sessions in IP-based networks.

What is UTM tracking?

Urchin Tracking Module (UTM) parameters are widely used today for tracking the effectiveness of digital marketing campaigns across various channels. The concept of UTM tracking has a close connection with Google Analytics, but its roots go further back to a software company named Urchin.

1. Urchin Software Corporation: The UTM parameters owe their name to the Urchin Software Corporation, a web analytics company that was founded in 1998. Urchin's software was designed to run on the user's servers, an approach that was relatively common at the time, given the slower internet speeds and higher costs of data transmission. Their software introduced the concept of UTM parameters, which could be added to URLs to track the source, medium, campaign name, and other details related to digital marketing efforts.
2. Acquisition by Google: Google acquired Urchin Software Corporation in 2005. The technology and features from Urchin's software were integrated into what we now know as Google Analytics, a web-based service that provides detailed statistics and analytics about website traffic. Along with the other features of Urchin's software, Google also adopted UTM parameters as part of Google Analytics.
3. Google Analytics and UTM Parameters: Once integrated into Google Analytics, UTM parameters became widely adopted as a standard way of tracking digital marketing campaign performance. Google Analytics processes the UTM parameters in the URLs users click, and this information is used to provide detailed insights into the traffic sources, user behavior, and the overall effectiveness of different campaigns.
4. Continued Usage and Evolution: Since their introduction, UTM parameters have continued to be a staple in digital marketing analytics. They have evolved to track additional parameters and have been adopted by various other analytics tools outside of Google Analytics. They're used widely across different digital marketing channels, including email, social media, paid advertising, and more, providing valuable data that helps marketers optimize their strategies and maximize return on investment (ROI).