Here's an interesting question that came from a reader.

I admit that I only know enough about computers to be dangerous but sometimes the person who does not know that something can't be done can ask the right question. I am sure that someone has though of this but what the heck. Would it not be possible to segment a portion of a users hard drive to a unique address for VOIP similar to an email address. The segment could then be protected much easier and a direct blocking could be developed to stop any passing of code or data between the new segment and the users own data. Saving call information etc would just not be possible between segments unless it is first saved to an external devise and then resaved to the users normal hard drive segment.

I just realized I hadn't responded to this for several days. My apologies for the delay.

I'm not sure partitioning the hard drive would present a viable solution, although it raises an interesting security question. Directing VoIP traffic to some specifically allocated drive partition might be a way to protect the files stored on the hard drive with some creativity. The resources most impacted are the network adapter using the TCP/IP stack and CPU or processing power. Since most systems only have a single IP address assigned to a single network adapter, separating traffic is challenging.

It might be possible to install a second network adapter (NIC) and use one for some data and one for some VoIP, buy even this present a nearly insurmountable challenge under Windows. Windows will always look for the default route and can only handle one. I don't know of an easy way in the operating system to route workstation traffic to multiple adapters. It can be done, but requires a pretty solid technical foundation and a bit of static routing. Dual NICs are generally only used in a server environment, and even then can be problematic.

While that might be technically achievable, in my experience, it's more effort than it's worth. There are just a lot of other ways to approach the problem.

Interesting question that I will think about some more.

Technorati Tags: reader question, VoIP, drive partitioning, dual NIC