Cisco Receives Defense Dept. VoIP Certification

Cisco Systems has passed the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) VoIP interoperability tests, confirming that its IP telephony solutions conform to the interoperability, reliability, resilience and security requirements of the DoD's multi-vendor voice network.

Cisco received JITC PBX2 certification, which allows DoD organizations to deploy Cisco IP Telephony solutions for switched call connections. The company is working toward PBX1 certification, which would allow DoD organizations to migrate Command and Control users to the same Cisco infrastructure.

The certified elements include Cisco CallManager 3.3 call processing software, Cisco Catalyst 3550 4500 and 6500 switches, and Cisco 2600 and 3700 gateways.

"This certification represents a significant milestone for enterprise IP networks," said Captain Chris Christopher, Deputy Director for Future Operations, Communications, and Business Initiatives of the U.S. Navy's NMCI Office. "It indicates that voice over an IP network has reached a level of maturity in the sector lifecycle that allows it to be viewed as an application like any other application...NMCI sees VoIP as a horizontal IP application which is vendor agnostic, allowing for a variety of choices combined with simplifying enterprise management."