VoIP and ENUM

Jeremy McNamara knew something was up when he saw the odd trail of calls to Liechtenstein. A customer in Austria ran a scam using the NuFone Network, McNamara's startup in the booming business of VoIP, to route calls to premium numbers (similar to 1-900 numbers) in the 200-year-old principality known for its discreet bankers.

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He had signed an Austrian reseller to a bulk deal at 9 cents a minute. NuFone was paid $20,000 over six weeks to route the client's customers over the Internet via NuFone's links to big carriers like Global Crossing.

In came the calls to Liechtenstein, to several dozen $1.90-per-minute numbers set up, he thinks, by the Austrian himself. Then, McNamara believes, the guy cranked out the pricey minutes, collected the charges and disappeared, sticking NuFone with a $450,000 bill owed to the carrier that had zapped the calls to Liechtenstein.

"He would manipulate call times and durations to avoid detection. It was a work of art," McNamara says. He is disputing the charges, but it is unclear whether he can get out of the obligation.