Unified Signalling Firewall – Now with SIP!
The Cellusys Signalling Firewall was first to market with a firewall for SS7, then with a firewall covering Diameter protocols as well, and we didn’t stop there. The inclusion of the GTP firewall was also a market first, and we have done it again.
Session border controllers have always been the front line for protecting VoIP and VoLTE traffic. SBCs can be quite advanced and have a number of features to improve security, such as rate limiting and providing encryption, yet they are not a bulletproof solution.
A signalling firewall sits on its external links to other networks and filters messages from reaching the network, ensuring threats from individual messages, flooding or other issues are prevented from reaching the network.
The SIP Firewall module of our Unified Signalling Firewall performs deep packet inspection of SIP messages by processing the SDP payload as well as SIP header fields. This provides extra protection by screening data coming into the network, and detecting anomalies before they reach the session border controller. By validating each message, we are able to add another layer of security to VoIP and VoLTE traffic, reducing chances of ID, spoof, and TDoS attacks over SIP protocols. Additionally, the SIP Firewall is able to block known fraudulent numbers, preventing Wangiri or IRSF attacks.
Of course, the most tangible benefit of the SIP firewall is the ability to implement rules across all protocols, see all traffic, and run reports in one place–using the user-friendly GUI. This eliminates the need to rely on data from various points in the network, or implementing rule sets individually for a variety of components. Instead of configuring several SBCs, the SIP Firewall can be configured and applied to all nodes that intercept SIP traffic.
All phone calls are covered with the SS7 and SIP firewalls, while VoLTE is covered by the Diameter and SIP firewalls. The Unified Signalling Firewall can be deployed with all modules including SMS Firewall and GTP, or as individual firewalls depending on the needs of each network.
The main benefits of the firewall are:
- Consistent processing of rules over all protocols
- CAT1/2/3 checks in one firewall for all protocols
- Cross-protocol checks for complex threat scenarios
- MAP queries for location checks for all protocols (e.g. GTP Session Create)
- Common reporting over all incidents
- Virtual deployment or bare-metal servers
Our spirit for innovation drives us to be the first to offer new levels of cross-protocol security to mobile operators in our quest to make networks more secure, intelligent, and profitable.
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