Voice of VOIPSA

Over the past couple of years I’ve been keeping my eye on some of the several vendors’ solutions and emerging systems providing interoperability between disparate radios (800mhz, P25, push-to-talk, VHF, UHF, VoIP, cellular, etc.). Some of these solutions come as single device “magic boxes” like the JPS Raytheon ACU-1000, ACU-2000, ACU-M and ACU-T while others provide more IP-based solutions, such as Cisco Systems’ IPICS (IP Interoperability and Collaboration System).

As I’ve been working for some time on a whitepaper and presentation entitled “Emergency Communications Infrastructure: Asking The Difficult And Dangerous Questions” — I figured that the time has come to directly ask vendors some of the many questions I have as I’ve read through product literature, release notes, independent evaluations, journal coverage, and the like….even a little IPICS video action.

So, I was very surprised when the email I sent to ipicsasktheexpert@cisco.com bounced (screenshot here!) Rather than go through the various emails and personnel to actually get a response or email address that worked for contacting the Cisco IPICS Expert, I figured I would provide the IPICS Expert the opportunity and privilege to answer my questions in a public forum such as VOIPSA’s Blog, as well as let the community know when they fixed their email address. As the IPICS is a solution, I have focused first on the “heart” — the IPICS Server, described by Cisco Systems as:

A security-enhanced, Linux-based platform that provides an administration console and resource management and hosts the optional Cisco IPICS Policy Engine and Operational Views applications.

Below are the questions. Cisco Systems’ IPICS Expert may either answer the questions in this post’s comments sections or email me the answers. If people in the community have IPICS solution questions, please add them to the comments or email them to me and we’ll get the questions posted on the VOIPSA Blog in the next batch, or the one after, or the one after….you get the idea.

Question 1: The IPICS Server is described by Cisco Systems as “Security Enhanced” — please provide a formal, technical definition for this term.

Cisco Answer

Question 2: On each network interface, by default what TCP ports are open across the 1-65535 range?

Cisco Answer

Question 3: On each network interface, by default what UDP ports are open across the 1-65535 range?

Cisco Answer

Question 4: On IPICS Server 2.1(1), what type and version Web server is running?

Cisco Answer

Question 5: Has this IPICS Server 2.1(1) Web Server version or type changed from previous versions of IPICS Server software?

Cisco Answer

Thank you and I, as well as others I’m sure, look forward to your answers.

Shawn Merdinger

This entry was posted on Thursday, July 17th, 2008 at 5:22 pm and is filed under Platform Security, SIP, Security, Videos, VoIP Security, VoIP Security Companies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.