van, Kristina B. "Videoconferencing arrives on the Internet," PC Week August 19, 1996. INFORMATION SECURITY AND VIDEO COMMUNICATIONS "The only secure computer is one that is turned off, locked in a safe, and buried 20 feet down in a secret location.' " Bruce Schneier CRASHING A VIDEOCONFERENCE? ideo communications have always been vulnerable to eavesdropping. However, when the only people on the call were a few executives, and the only people who could leavesdrop were telephone company central office administrators with nothing better to do, the subject attracted little attention. The purpose of this chapter is not to provide step-by-step instructions for protecting a video communications system and network. The pace of technological change and the disparity between environments make that impractical. Regulation as diverse as California SB-1386, the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, and the Basel II Accord have underscored that securing communications is critical from personal, organizational, and global levels. The purpose of this chapter is to foster appreciation for security as video communication adoption grows, and especially as that communication is migrated to the Internet and other shared packet-switched networks. Intercepting communications is not new. One can trace such noteworthy events as Hitler's defeat and Mary, Queen of Scots' execution to intercepted communications. Nor is Hacking new. During the 1960s, the blue box became popular for stealing long- distance minutes. One way it worked was thus: a telephone hacker or phreaker would place a toll-free call from a pay telephone. While the number was ringing, he would press a button on the blue box to generate a 2600 Hz tone, and thereby disconnect the ringing at the far end and leave the phreaker connected to the long-distance network. Then pressing touchtone pad keys in a certain sequence would allow the phreaker to place long-distance calls at no cost. Then there was the black box, a device that phreakers would use to attach to electromechanical gear in a central