Today we are going to
discuss about the trichotomy of routes and the way they function in the telecommunication
business. The telephone companies around the world make use of international
telecoms routes to send traffic to each other. They can be diversified into
three categories being white, grey and black. These routes depict the legality
in the telecommunication sector. Let’s start with the clean route or the white
route. It is a clean route as in, the source of the route and the destination
of the route are both legal in the respective region. This means that the
region where it is generated from treats the route as legal and the destination
of the route is also treated as legal. The government of both countries grants
access for such routes.
The opposite of the
earlier one is called a black route. This route is illegal in the region where
it is derived from and also the destination of the route. A Sim box is an
unofficial device which uses multiple mobile telephones and GSM cards for PSTN
connectivity, while connecting to the internet by conventional means. Using
multiple sim cards in the sim box causes the network providers to bear heavy
losses. As they are illegal in most regions, they are secretly operated in
third world calling destinations as the black route where conventional private
branch exchange lines are not available to VoIP operators due to hostile local
regulatory environment. In India an internet service licensee is not granted
access to have PLMN connectivity as voice communication to and from a telephone
connected to PSTN which is following E.164 numbering is prohibited in India.
Usage of licensing restrictions and
regulations ensures that the interconnection between the PSTN network and
internet is not permitted. The Indian government delivers a profit making
monopoly to international long distance service providers licensed under the
section 4 of Indian telegraph act. The only carriers officially allowed to
carry international long distance traffic into India.
The third kind is the Grey route, which is common in voice
over internet protocol technology. Grey routes are arrangements that are
different from the regular course of business between the licensed telecom
companies in each country. This is a route which is legal for one country or
the party on one end, But illegal on the other end. The grey part of the route
is generally at the far end where the call is terminated. There are normal
arrangements to deliver the call from the subscriber to the sending carrier and
between the sending carrier and the cable operator for the trunk part of the
call. It appears as if the call is originated locally, a domestic call rather
than an international call. There are a multiple types of grey routes.
