As we look back on the progress the communications technology world has made over the last year, one development stands out among the rest: the proliferation of cloud-based technologies. Last week, I touched base with one of the cloud-based contact center’s leaders, Frank Paterno, VP of marketing for Intelliverse (News - Alert), to find out more about the progress the contact center world has made in the realm of cloud technologies, and he shed some light on the benefits and challenges of moving a contact center to the domain of the cloud.

Paterno noted that in the coming months, contact centers will find it a challenge to communicate the message that a “hosted voice solution will bring the strength of experience, removal of physical barriers and cost savings to organizations.”

The security of data lies at the core of the questions around the cloud, and when it comes to compliance, Paterno made an important point of distinguishing the differences between on-premise contact center solutions and hosted ones: “Hosted Call Centers, the good ones, by design implement layers of protection within their systems…Because a premise-based solution is contained, depending on the type of transactions an organization conducts within its call center, they may not need to comply with all of the industry standards.  A cloud-based solution, by virtue of having many customers will have different requirements, must.  Cloud-based solutions also have the ability to cater to an individual organization’s specific security challenge.”

2012 will bring new challenges for the hosted call recording manufacturers and providers. The notion of a hosted voice service is a few years old, but Paterno mentioned that the idea and the buzz around “cloud-based” services are new. He said that the challenge will be taming the beast of physical and data security, while providers are required to keep up with newer threats and more complex ways of corrupting networks. “In addition to the potential threats organizations face from hackers, viruses, and other outside sources, providers will be required to keep up with updates to existing regulations and new compliance mandates set for by the U.S. Government,” he noted.

And keeping the cloud-based solution fresh was Paterno’s final musing on what those in the hosted call recording and hosted voice space have to look forward to, in terms of rising to the challenge. Anything from adding features to extending the services to include service experts in remote areas can help developers and providers “adjust to fit the needs of a global marketplace.”

The hosted call recording space is going to be more competitive in 2012 – that is for sure. Stay tuned on the hosted call recording channel for all the latest news from the players in the space.

Juliana Kenny graduated from the University of Connecticut with a double degree in English and French. After managing a small company for two years, she joined TMC (News - Alert) as a Web Editor for TMCnet. Juliana currently focuses on the call center and CRM industries, but she also writes about cloud telephony and network gear including softswitches.

Edited by Jamie Epstein