ALERT All GVSIP connections rejected

weenus500

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Good to know. Looking at the link that Ward provided there was no mentioning of this. My trunks are still up, but I've removed my main GV number because I don't want to have my service disabled. The other two lines I only used for testing and they are still working.
I'm not getting it. How are the two other lines still working with gv?
 

weenus500

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I still think it is really shitty of company that has built itself into a behemoth with free open source software and touts that it doesn't do evil - to end this service with no explanation.
 

ajonate

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Wow. Thanks for putting this up. I will definitely have to try this and post feedback.

That post was made 2 weeks ago. Things have gone south again during the past few days. It looks like Ward's certs have been blocked. Some people have had luck using their own certs, but some haven't.

There is a group trying to keep up with Google Voice changes. You might find a solution there.

https://pbxinaflash.com/community/t...-registration-issues.23195/page-2#post-139416
 

ajonate

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I still think it is really shitty of company that has built itself into a behemoth with free open source software and touts that it doesn't do evil - to end this service with no explanation.

Maybe so, but since the service was free they don't owe us anything. I can't complain because I got free telephone service for nearly 9 years.
 

weenus500

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I'm not getting it. How are the two other lines still working with gv?
I followed the link over the dslreports and see that someone from GV engineering gave some minimal response which boiled down to "after all, google is all about making money."
 

billsimon

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I still think it is really shitty of company that has built itself into a behemoth with free open source software and touts that it doesn't do evil - to end this service with no explanation.

PBX connectivity was never offered as a service.
 

weenus500

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I'm not through complaining about this. As an end user, I have been doing the same thing for the whole time I have been using google as a voice trunk and all of a sudden google says I am violating "terms of service". A analogy to is if they said I am out of bounds because I am standing on the 60 yard line and we have decided to shrink the football field to 50 yards. I expect an honest explanation. Some ass wipe on here repeated their violation of terms of service explanation. I don't expect google to change their decision, but I expect an honest explanation such as, "we are primarily a profit making enterprise and as such we have determined that giving away free trunking services is not in the best interests of our share holders".
 

weenus500

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PBX connectivity was never offered as a service.
Also i didn't like being insulted and being made to look like a fool by Ward Mundy after sending him his $20 and having this stop working for good a couple of days later.
 

weenus500

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PBX connectivity was never offered as a service.
Please tell me what is. It seems like a service to me, anyone with the wherewithall(Ward Mundy) could create a certificate that anyone could use with their pbx to connect a voice trunk.
 

kdthomas

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Please tell me what is. It seems like a service to me, anyone with the wherewithall(Ward Mundy) could create a certificate that anyone could use with their pbx to connect a voice trunk.

Sounds like you are misguided. Like Bill mentioned, Google Voice was never intended to be used with a PBX. Some people put together some software to use it with Asterisk/FreePBX using the XMPP protocol many years ago (Google Voice Motif).

This is my theory.... Ward and others used this "free VoIP trunk" solution as a way to get more and more attraction to the Incredible/PBX in a Flash solutions, clicks to his websites, ad revenue, and selling support. Lots of people took advantage of this. Mostly hobbyists, but also small businesses. People found out about this solution the same way I did, by searching for "free VoIP service". Google eventually makes a deal with ObiHai to sell a legitimate device to connect a real phone to use with Google Voice service. ObiHai realizes people can get around buying their overpriced device by buying/setting up a RaspberryPi/Asterisk and they're not happy with Google. Also, probably a bunch of call centers/bad actors are using Google Voice for nefarious things using the same methods. Google switches to "GVSIP" in July 2018 after announcing that XMPP would go away back in what, May 2012? They gave us what....6 years notice that something was changing. A guy (Naf) on DSLReports forum reverse engineers the communication between a legit ObiHai box and Google Voice and writes a software implementation. Google clearly states that reverse engineering is in violation of their Terms of Service. Someone posting as the GV Head of Engineering responds on the website that this is a violation and asks everyone to stop using it outside of the ToS. Google has never provided "free trunking services". Sounds like you got to the party a bit late and didn't enjoy the free ride Google has given us.

Now, not sure why you sent Ward the $20. I'm assuming for "support"? Ward has nothing to do with Google Voice. Google Voice has never been intended to work with Asterisk. Google Voice still works with Asterisk if you know what you're doing, but you also run the risk of it not working at any time. This has been the same since the beginning. We all knew, or should have known, that this was the case and took advantage of "free" VoIP trunks. You can continue to use them, or if you rely on this service and you're not a hobbyist, I would suggest spending a couple bucks a month and port your GV numbers over to a VoiP SIP provider. Pretty simple.
 

billsimon

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It could be argued - which I did - that the XMPP connectivity to Google Voice was legitimate because of the clear public documentation of the Google Talk service, which included Jingle. The only missing piece from that documentation was JID format for outbound calls (easily discovered).

GVSIP was a 100% discovery effort, which is what I believe triggered the Google folks to sound the warning about reverse engineering.

The point is - echoing kdthomas a bit - there was legitimate connectivity from Asterisk to Google Voice (though never offered by Google officially as a "service" if you look through their descriptions of the GV product) but that ended around July 2018.
 

ajonate

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It could be argued - which I did - that the XMPP connectivity to Google Voice was legitimate because of the clear public documentation of the Google Talk service, which included Jingle. The only missing piece from that documentation was JID format for outbound calls (easily discovered).

GVSIP was a 100% discovery effort, which is what I believe triggered the Google folks to sound the warning about reverse engineering.

The point is - echoing kdthomas a bit - there was legitimate connectivity from Asterisk to Google Voice (though never offered by Google officially as a "service" if you look through their descriptions of the GV product) but that ended around July 2018.

I look at it differently. We're not doing anything TO their service, it's only a question of what we do WITH their service. It's only a matter is which telephone device we use to access Google Voice.

Regardless of how we access their service it doesn't have any effect on how Google Voice operates. Whether we access with an Obihai device, their web interface, Hangouts, or even Asterisk, it makes no difference on Google's end. Nothing is added, removed, or changed with regard to Google Voice service.

What is becoming apparent is that they're getting something from individual users that they're not getting from group users accessing Google Voice with Asterisk. It would seem that google gets marketing information by knowing who we call and who calls us. While that may sound creepy on the surface, keep in mind that traditional phone services also had that same information. They may not have sold or used that information, but they certainly had it.

But it's a lot more difficult to market products to a large group of people sharing a few phone lines. There's no telling what the individuals are interested in, or even how to contact them. With individual accounts Google knows who you are and what your email address is.

Whatever it is that Google gets, they're not getting it from Asterisk users. Discouraging Asterisk users from using Google Voice probably lowers google's cost pf providing Google Voice service. I think that's what's behind the recent changes.
 

tycho

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Just to play the Devil's Advocate:
I look at it differently. We're not doing anything TO their service, it's only a question of what we do WITH their service. It's only a matter is which telephone device we use to access Google Voice.

If you never have done so, take a gander at the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. To be able to do something WITH Google's service, with a "different device", arguably involved a violation of the DCMA. And/or the contractual terms of Google's TOS, which you are bound by when choosing to use Google's service. Even though I may not like these conclusions, the are not easily evaded.
Regardless of how we access their service it doesn't have any effect on how Google Voice operates. Whether we access with an Obihai device, their web interface, Hangouts, or even Asterisk, it makes no difference on Google's end. Nothing is added, removed, or changed with regard to Google Voice service.
I'm no engineer, but I doubt this is as definitive as you state. There might well be some impact on the Google side of things when someone uses a SIP interconnection sans Obi device as opposed to, for example, Google's web interface or Hangouts. I don't think you have anywhere near the amount of information required to state that "it makes no difference on Google's end."

And you've left out one important consideration: money. I have no clue what financial arrangements might exist between Obihai and Google. You don't either. It may well be that Google is paid something for every Google Voice labeled-and-capable device sold by Obihai. Us (well, naf) reverse-engineering and using GVSIP without an Obi device (IMHO) probably deprives Google of some level of monies. You can't just pretend that issue away. So, doh, of course they might choose to rattle the saber.
 

weenus500

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I have been up and running with the gvsip connectivity issue resolved for a number of months. Now all of a sudden outgoing calls on the google trunk stopped working with this message " pjproject:0 <?>: sip_msg ...Header with no vptr encountered!!". Googling hasn't turned up anything useful. Any help would be appreciated. :)
 

kenn10

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I don't understand why anyone is still wasting time and resources with Google Voice. They don't want anyone to use it except on smart phones. You can get a DID from Anveo-Direct for $0.19/month. Why waste your time on the garbage?


The incoming were working as of 30 minutes ago. . Now i am seeing that gvsip registrations are rejected. Outgoing stopped working yesterday.
 

ajonate

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The incoming were working as of 30 minutes ago. . Now i am seeing that gvsip registrations are rejected. Outgoing stopped working yesterday.

Use 64.9.242.172 for outbound_proxy in /etc/asterisk/pjsip_custom.conf and it should be fine, at least for the time being.

It's pretty obvious that Google Voice isn't suitable for production use. I'm only using it for my personal phone.
 
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shetu

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proxy unstable. Sometime connect and register trunk, sometime not connect.
 

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