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Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes

twilio.com

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Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes

#131

Post by Thieum22 »

tyingq wrote: post #21
kevinburke wrote: post #2

This has been kicked around for a really long time and I'm happy they finally launched it. Around 2013 or so, one of the junior engineers on the Twilio Voice team pitched his innovation week project with a single slide saying "Fax: The time is now." The time has finally arrived! Congrats John.

Guessing this will kill Phaxio. Compare the pricing: https://www.twilio.com/fax/pricing https://www.phaxio.com/pricing/

Some of our customers have been using foiply : https://www.foiply.com/pricing-monthly/

The difference in pricing will certainly make them consider a switch.

Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes

#132

Post by dragonwriter »

markolschesky wrote: post #125
Edmond wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You actually can guarantee the transmission of information from one entity to another without sniffing or alteration...that is how internet transport layer security works....our API is built on those principles. Of course there may be other caveats that I am not aware of, I don't know much about HIPAA. EDIT: You don't need to trust twilio (or any intermediary)...You can transmit encrypted information end-to-end witho…

HIPAA doesn't care about the logistics of whether or not the intermediary can/cannot decrypt the data. If the intermediary touches the data and it's not exempt by the conduit exception, then there has to be a BAA in place. It's why even though FaceTime hypothetically has E2E encryption and Apple claims to not have the capability to decrypt the data, it's still inappropriate to use for patient-doctor communication due…

> HIPAA doesn't care about the logistics of whether or not the intermediary can/cannot decrypt the data. If the intermediary touches the data and it's not exempt by the conduit exception, then there has to be a BAA in place.

HIPAA cares deeply about the logistics, which is what the privacy, security, breach notification, etc. rules largely address. The logistics just don't come into play until after the determination that you are a business associate and therefore required to sign a BAA and comply with the rules.

Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes

#134

Post by sveit »

digi_owl wrote: post #37
patio11 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of the Uber-for-food-delivery startups use them for ordering at restaurants because there is no text-based API to restaurants and the UX of receiving an automated phone call is poor. They're pervasive in finance, insurance, employee benefits, etc. They're also a good one-to-many API multiplexer. So many businesses can take a fax and have a human operate on it that many software companies can use them to add act…

My understanding is that holding a fax copy of a contract with a signature is as good in court as holding the contract itself. But holding a PDF of same is not.

TradeHarbor offers a service called EmailToSign [1] that allows you to sign PDFs using your voice. [1] http://tradeharbor.com/2017/hosted-apps/

Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes

#135

Post by mjevans »

jandrese wrote: post #130
markolschesky wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Phone carriers are exempted under the carrier exception of HIPAA. Same thing with phone calls. API transactions are not exempted, even when encryption is used or data is not persisted in the middleware. http://www.hitechanswers.net/when-does-the-hipaa-conduit-exc...

Is this one of those cases where implementing a solution is practically impossible, so all of the existing solutions are just the horrible old ones that were grandfathered in?

The solution is: Do not FAX or use phone lines to transmit data.

Practically though there isn't a 'good enough' standard from an end user perspective. The very things that make FAX a poor security standard make it user friendly.

  * Fire and forget
  * 'Just works'
  * Short, simple destination identifier
  * No real crypto or other security.
A real solution would be for everyone to use (good) key-based SFTP transfers. This isn't that hard to setup (once you've done it once) but it IS difficult to have end users use such software.

The next best thing is FTPS, but that has account management issues (since if you were doing client certs, which are an option here as well, you'd just use SFTP).

What makes both of those harder are the lack of integration in to the existing infrastructure (clinics/hospitals don't have, E.G., WinSCP / FileZilla and/or another SFTP client already setup and in their whitelist of allowed software) and having end user accounts.

Ah also, SFTP has the benefit of transferring time-stamps correctly. FTP, even wrapped in a TLS connection, still doesn't have a standards approved way of transmitting file time-stamps.

Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes

#136

Post by tyingq »

kevinburke wrote: post #97
tyingq wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Guessing this will kill Phaxio. Compare the pricing: https://www.twilio.com/fax/pricing https://www.phaxio.com/pricing/

Rumors of the demise of telecom services based on their competitors' feature set and pricing are greatly exaggerated. https://kev.inburke.com/kevin/six-years-of-hacker-news-comme...

This is a smaller, more niche market though. Not just the "fax" or "online fax", but specifically "fax API" slice. There are not many players.

Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes

#137

Post by tyingq »

nck4222 wrote: post #101
beaconstudios wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's amazing that phaxio have gotten away with such high prices for so long.

After reading these arguments I was expecting something in the range of dollars per fax. Is 7 cents per page really that much? I'm not very knowledgeable about this stuff, but are there really that many places out there faxing thousands of pages where 7 cents per page vs 5 cents per page is really going to make a difference for them?

There isn't consensus on the 5 cents per page part. Some think it is closer to 3. If that's true, generally, I'm concerned if a competitor launches at less than half my price.

Even if it is 5 cents, that's a 30% discount, which seems significant.

Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes

#138

Post by dublidu »

nck4222 wrote: post #101
beaconstudios wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's amazing that phaxio have gotten away with such high prices for so long.

After reading these arguments I was expecting something in the range of dollars per fax. Is 7 cents per page really that much? I'm not very knowledgeable about this stuff, but are there really that many places out there faxing thousands of pages where 7 cents per page vs 5 cents per page is really going to make a difference for them?

It makes a difference at high volumes.

Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes

#139

Post by JoblessWonder »

bizzleDawg wrote: post #3

The shocking thing about this is that there must still be enough Faxes being sent to actually justify this new product. Where are they still used at 'scale'?

Faxes seem to be in use at places where there is an established system/bureaucracy. We use them regularly in aviation because our suppliers/customers/service providers require them for some reason. Medical offices use them to adhere to HIPAA requirements. The government and large corporations use them because it was how the system was developed at some point and they haven't gotten around to changing it yet. (UPS, for example, can't resend us certain invoices via e-mail, only fax. I have no clue why.)

Re: Programmable Fax – API for sending and receiving faxes

#140

Post by JoblessWonder »

bizzleDawg wrote: post #3

The shocking thing about this is that there must still be enough Faxes being sent to actually justify this new product. Where are they still used at 'scale'?

Faxes seem to be in use at places where there is an established system/bureaucracy. We use them regularly in aviation because our suppliers/customers/service providers require them for some reason. Medical offices use them to adhere to HIPAA requirements. The government and large corporations use them because it was how the system was developed at some point and they haven't gotten around to changing it yet. (UPS, for example, can't resend us certain invoices via e-mail, only fax. I have no clue why.)
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