The Cisco 7600 Series Session Border Controller (SBC) builds on the continuous system operation and multimedia scalability provided by the market-leading Cisco 7600 series routers. With the integration of SBC functions into layer 2 and layer 3 services provided by the Cisco 7600 series, the Cisco 7600 SBC eliminates the need for overlay networks and standalone appliances. It provides an open and flexible architecture for all service provider deployments, whether for peering with other service providers or for direct end-customer access. With its ability to handle unified and distributed signaling deployments, the Cisco 7600 SBC offers cable, wireline, and wireless service providers superior deployment flexibility. A key element of the Cisco Service Exchange Framework (SEF), which supports IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) and non-IMS services, the Cisco 7600 SBC further accelerates network convergence while providing investment protection for Cisco 7600 series routers.SBCs control and manage real-time multimedia traffic flows between IP network borders, handling signaling and data, voice, and video traffic. As part of this function, the SBC performs native IP interconnection functions required for real-time communications such as access control, firewall traversal, bandwidth policing, accounting, signaling interworking, legal intercept, and quality-of-service (QoS) management. With its comprehensive suite of features, the Cisco 7600 series routers make a broad range of SBC applications possible.The Cisco 7600 SBC solution incorporates the security, QoS, and secure virtualization capabilities of the Cisco 7600 series router to facilitate support for service provider-to-service provider interconnect and service provider-to-access layer interconnect for data, voice over IP (VoIP), and video services.The Cisco 7600 SBC solution takes advantage of the advanced hardware-processing capabilities of the Cisco Application Control Engine (ACE) hardware to provide a flexible, scalable, and feature-rich implementation. The integration of SBC functions into the Cisco 7600 series routers facilitates the deployment of advanced services that require a combination of layer 2 and layer 3 functions along with SBC functions.