switched-on at home

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• Multi-site businesses
  and the public sector
• What it means
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Homepage » Multi-site businesses and the public sector » What it means » Network resilience and security

If the migrated network uses IP technology then isn't it part of the Internet and vulnerable to hacking and other security risks?

No - this is a privately owned IP network, protected by firewalls and other technologies that are not open to the Internet. Security, resilience and the ability to offer continuity of service were key design parameters of this new network from inception. BT is vastly experienced in managing IP-based networks as well as traditional, so there is considerable experience that can be brought to the switched-on programme. In addition, BT already manages many security conscious IP-based networks. In terms of physical security - 24 hour building access, surveillance and internal security measures for core/metro nodes (key equipment used in the network) - is planned for every exchange.

Just how resilient is the new IP-based network compared to the traditional PSTN?

From testing carried out resilience is equivalent to today's networks and in fact we have taken the opportunity to improve the network where possible. It should be noted that thorough site audits and preparations are carried out in every exchange to be migrated to ensure gas, fire and flood detection and protection. In addition, steps are taken to ensure that the location is not near any high risk property such as a petrol station for example. Finally, full emergency power generation facilities and Uninterruptible Power Supplies (UPS) are provided.

If the migrated network has fewer points of switching than the current PSTN network wouldn't an element failure cause more outages? How resilient is the new equipment that is being installed?

Although there are fewer switching elements in the new network, they are engineered with high availability and resilience in hardware and software. Limits will be placed on the number of customers served by each element and the devices deployed are individually resilient. All the protection and restoration features that we have come to expect in the PSTN are built into the new network design and the new network is designed with service-specific resilience. There are three management support centres in place for the new network and a fourth specifically for disaster recovery. 21CN enables the decoupling of the physical network and the services it supports (e.g. Broadband, PSTN, etc). Because of this separation we can engineer services to continue working in the event of a fault occurring within 21CN. Finally, should an incident occur and we experience total loss of an exchange, there are mobile units in place that are strategically located across the UK enabling rapid response.

What about the night of migration itself? How are we ensuring no loss of service during the migration process?

There is an extremely thorough process in place for the night of migration itself - from preparing the network, monitoring process overnight and moving to business as usual support on successful completion. All switched-on activities planned have been shared with the communications industry with every effort made to minimise end user disruption. A dedicated team called the 'migration control centre' will manage the transfer process and special measures have been put in place for emergency and essential services. In addition, established incident procedures come into play for unforeseen circumstances. In summary rigid processes are in place to ensure that ultimately end user service is not impacted during the migration process.