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Utility VoIP

Four Reasons Why You Need Voice to Text

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Four Reasons Why You Need Voice to TextVoice to Text

We’ve added Voice to Text transcription to our Utility VoIP service! Reading messages instead of listening saves time and avoids noisy distraction. With at-a-glance convenience you can efficiently hone in on specific transcribed messages to find exactly the information you need.

What is Voice to Text?

As the name suggests, a Voice to Text solution uses artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning to transcribe spoken words into written text automatically. Utility VoIP’s Voice to Text solution currently allows end users to have voicemails automatically transcribed and sent to them via email, SMS, or the Utility VoIP Mobile App. The solution leverages Google’s AI and machine learning capabilities to ensure maximum accuracy and quality of transcriptions. English language transcription is now available, and Spanish language transcription is coming soon.

Why do you need Voice to Text?

Businesses benefit from a Voice to Text solution because it can substantially boost productivity. Let’s face it; employee productivity is not what it used to be. Employees spend much of their time on phone calls, listening to voicemails, reading emails, and participating in meetings. These combined activities often leave workers little time to do the actual work they were hired to do. However, with Voice to Text, employees can prioritize transcribed messages, addressing less important messages later and skipping unwanted messages altogether.

1. Convenience

Most professionals spend a significant amount of time in meetings where it’s not convenient to answer the phone or listen to voicemail. However, with Voice to Text, users can simply read each transcribed message to determine if the call is urgent and requires immediate attention.

The same principle applies to employees who are out of the office. Most people, whether they are out of the office on business or on vacation, would rather prioritize the calls they tend to in order to best support their schedule. If the call is important enough to leave a voicemail, a transcribed message of that voicemail is automatically sent. Users can review transcribed voice messages at a time and place that’s most convenient, and can quickly hone in on specific messages. Voice to Text is ideal for busy professionals who can’t be accessible at a moment’s notice, are often in meetings, or in an environment where it’s not feasible to listen to messages in sequential order.

2. Save Time

Navigating voicemail menus and listening to voicemails in order is a thing of the past. Busy professionals don’t have time to listen to every voicemail, and with Voice to Text, they can skip the voice messages they’re not interested in reading. Considering the growth in robocall voicemail spam problems, the ability to skip voicemail messages is a crucial phone system feature.

In addition, professionals who receive dozens of voicemails every day should not have to listen to all their voicemails again if they forget which callbacks are the most important. With Voice to Text, users can receive messages via email, SMS, or mobile app, and read the transcribed voicemails to refresh their memory. They don’t have to waste time listening to voicemails again and again.

3. Quickly Find Information & Prioritize Messages

Users can efficiently hone in on specific transcribed messages to find exactly the information they need – from contact information, to payment details, to an address for their next meeting. With Voice to Text, users don’t have to listen to every voicemail to capture specific information.

Voice to Text offers a practical, at-a-glance way to keep up with the messages that need attention. Users can quickly scan transcribed messages and address messages based on importance or time sensitivity. When it comes to personal calls, people often choose to return the call instead of listening to a voicemail first. However, it is important to listen to voicemails for business. Voice to Text allows users to find out what a business call was about without having to call their voicemail. Users can quickly decide if they must take immediate action or can respond at a later time.

4. Easily Accessible

Users can access transcribed voicemails on the go and on various devices via email, SMS, or the Utility VoIP Mobile App (available for iOS and Android). The initial offering of the Utility VoIP Voice to Text solution includes automatic transcription of voicemail. However, in the coming months, additional services will be added to the solution.

New to Utility VoIP? If you’d like to learn more about our award-winning, business class Voice over IP cloud phone system and it’s powerful communications platform contact our Sales team for your free consultation.  How do you seamlessly transfer an old system to a cloud based, fully digital solution? Read more…

Ready to add Voice to Text to your Utility VoIP phone service? For current customers call or email our Client Services Team to get started. The addition of the Voice to Text feature may require a free upgrade to your software and firmware. 

Contact Client Services at 856.210.5800 or clientcare@104.219.251.195

 

Utility VoIP

VoIP is not immune to security threats

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VoIP is not immune to security threats

VoIP securityThe many benefits of switching to a VoIP system from traditional telephony are why it has become widely adopted by businesses everywhere. But since most businesses view the switch to VoIP as just an upgrade to their phone system, the importance of VoIP security rarely crosses their mind. VoIP’s technology has inherent vulnerabilities that can pose a risk, but with the right security measures set in place, VoIP can be secured to prevent attacks or misuse of services. Security specifically for VoIP communications can be examined in three important parts:

What do you need to protect?

  • Keep your VoIP service running continuously, without disruptions or downtime
  • Protect sensitive customer information and business data, including call transcripts and transaction records
  • Prevent unauthorized users from making calls, and gaining access to your network
  • A secure VoIP system will help your business maintain compliancy standards

Who are you protecting against? Understanding where threats may come from and the motivations behind the attacks is critical. The main threats generally come in three forms:

Toll Fraud: A person or organization that wants access to VoIP services can piggyback on your system to gain free international or long-distance calls and data transmissions.

DoS attacks: Denial of Service attacks, organized assaults on a VoIP system are initiated to gain access to confidential information, along with telephone numbers, IP addresses, etc. This sensitive data can then be sold to competitors, or used to redirect calls for other purposes. DoS attacks are not always financially motivated. Sometimes the intent is simply to disrupt or shut down a network and may have been initiated by a disgruntled ex-employee or a sneaky competitor.

SIPVicious attacks: SIPVicious in its benign form is a developer tool used to audit the state of your SIP network. But the tool can be corrupted for bad intentions and used to gain access to a network or shut down systems, crippling your business.
What security measures are needed? VoIP security measures are not that different from data network security and layered steps work best.

Encryption – Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) and Transport Layer Security (TLS) are the standards for data encryption. These measures encrypt or scramble information so that it cannot be easily deciphered if the data transmission is intercepted.

VLAN – A VLAN segregates broadcast domains between networks. Because it separates voice and data, you can apply different security measures to your voice and data packets while improving the performance of your VoIP system. A VLAN is a good security measure for remote phones that connect to the business network.

Network security – It is just as important that your business network infrastructure is secured with firewalls, antivirus, gateway protection, end point security measures. Software patches and updates should be run regularly to keep systems up to date and eliminate vulnerabilities. To prevent outages and downtime, a redundant power supply, backup servers and regular data backups should be built into your VoIP network.

User Security – Educating the user is vital to preventing human error. Employees must use strong voicemail passwords, be educated about threats and how their actions can either help or hurt security. Employers must set and enforce security policies. For instance, applying a pin code for international calling is a common security measure to prevent unauthorized international calling. If a business is lax with precautions, they may not even know when a breach has occurred until after the damage has been done.

Businesses shouldn’t shy away from a VoIP phone system due to security concerns. The benefits far outweigh the risks! Just as with any technology, when you take the necessary steps to ensure that your system remains secure, risk becomes greatly minimized. Many of the VoIP systems available today include robust security protocols as part of their offerings. Be sure to inquire with a VoIP service provider about built in security options if you are planning a move to VoIP.

Take a look at Ancero’s Utility VoIP cloud based phone system. Our award winning Managed Communications services can help you plan a communications strategy perfect for your business needs.