Page 431 - Handbook of Modern Telecommunications

3-222 CRC Handbook of Modern Telecommunications, Second Edition

Storage and archiving are critical parts of the process that is expected to be automated to a certain
extent to prevent errors and to reduce labor expenses.
A portable court playback solution replays original evidence for courtroom presentations.

3.8.9 Summary and Trends
Lawful interception will play an important role with telecommunications service providers. Honest
support is expected regardless of whether lawful interception is helping to generate additional revenue
or not. Combining lawful interception with powerful ISS is the optimal path for telecommunications
service providers. In addition to providing the basic functionality for lawful interception, an ISS can
support other important functions, such as real-time and usage-based billing, fraud avoidance, churn
avoidance, providing government agencies with the necessary data, and real-time traffic control. Cost
recovery is guaranteed somehow this way, assuming a certain level of reimbursement by governments.
Critical success factors for lawful interception are:
• Process: the functional steps of lawful interception, including request for lawful interception, pro-
visioning resources, accessing, delivering and collection of data, maintaining data, and converting
data into intelligence by telecommunications service providers, by LEAs, and by outsourcers.
• Products: all existing and future applications supporting process steps, including active and pas-
sive hardware or software probes, built-in intercept access points, management software, in-band
or out-of-band data communication networks, receiver applications, forensics, evidence collec-
tion, and court replays.
• People: necessary skills and experiences of subject matter experts of telecommunications service
providers, LEAs, and outsourcers to support process steps and available lawful intercept products
and tools.
Lawful intercept (LI) also referred to as wiretapping or communications interception, is the identifi-
cation, isolation, delivery, and collection of communication sessions (voice, e-mail, packet data, etc.)
for use by law enforcement. This critical law enforcement tool is used by many authorized government
agencies to investigate criminal activities. Law enforcement agencies (LEAs), telecommunications ser-
vice providers, and equipment manufacturers are continuously working together to develop products
and define technical standards for lawful intercept in the quest to aid LEAs in their role of protecting
the public.
At this time, the operating principles may be summarized as follows:
• The technology of intercepting practically all telecommunications services is available, but the
price tag may be high to pursue interceptions in particular for SMS, MMS, VPNs, VoIP, and for
encrypted traffic.
• Existing laws are usually for telephone systems and they actually do not work with Internet-based
voice, data, and video technologies; there is still argument about the border line between informa-
tion and communications services.
• There are practically no laws, rules, or guidelines for data retention, which causes problems with
very large volumes of stored e-mails, intercepted voice communications, video teleconferences,
and other communications-related applications.
• There are very few examples of direct dialogue among LEAs, outsourcers, and telecommunica-
tions service providers addressing technical, economic, and privacy challenges.
• Telecommunications service providers are usually not yet deploying ISSs with the result of offer-
ing segmented applications around otherwise powerful mediation solutions.
• In particular, the hand-over between LEAs and TSPs is not supported by the latest technology
with the result that state-of-the-art security solutions cannot be fully implemented to protect
sensitive data and intelligence.