Show HN: I built an international calling platform for the past 6 months

37•ahmgeek•2d ago

Comments

ahmgeek•2d ago

Ask me anything related to the technology/revenue and whatnot...

bignerd_95•2d ago

Extraordinary! Congratulations. I’ve always been fascinated by the world of telephony. How did you manage to get numbers for every country? Do you have direct access to SS7, are you a virtual operator, or do you use third-party services for each country?

ahmgeek•2d ago

Usually, you need a presence in each country, like an official entity. It's easy for a myriad of countries to do that for a fee; even in Dubai, you can form a company. Then you can acquire numbers easily in these countries. I am now supporting the UK (easy to get)/US/CA, and will soon support some European countries as well. What's hard are the countries that require authority talks like Egypt :D

I am Egyptian living in Europe, so I want to support it, but I left it for a bit.

There are a lot of telephony providers out there (Twilio, Bandwidth, etc.) So it's easy to start building.

KomoD•2d ago

He just uses Twilio, they handle everything, he just calls some APIs and takes a 257% markup for phone calls. Anyone can sign up, usually at most you'll need a local address.

ahmgeek•2d ago

I have no clue where you came up with these assumptions and the arbitrary markup.

KomoD•1d ago

Are you saying I'm wrong?

1. your privacy policy

> Third Parties

> - Twilio: Calls, SMS, phone numbers

2. your pricing and twilio's pricing

Twilio: $0.0140 / min

You: $0.05 / min

(0.05 - 0.0140) / 0.0140 * 100 = 257%

ahmgeek•1d ago

Thanks for pointing out the outdated content, we don't use twilio, we use telnyx.

our markup is mere 30% not 257%.

thanks for the checks up tho :)

netsharc•2d ago

Do scammers still try to get "local-seeming" numbers? Any mechanisms to prevent them registering, using stolen credit card numbers?

ahmgeek•2d ago

I have monitoring in place for such behaviour, also detection for too many calls under specific amount of time with locations. I am still very new to actually have scamers finding the website I think.

ianburrell•2d ago

Scammers have ways to spoof numbers. I doubt they will bother buying numbers unless they can get a bunch of them.

AxiomPraxis•2d ago

On the first page, there's the claim:

  Encrypted Calls
  
  All calls are encrypted with TLS 1.2+ for signaling and SRTP with AES-128 for audio. Your conversations stay private during transmission.

This can only be true on your (Voklit) end between the client and the server, it stops being encrypted both from signalling and audio perspective the moment it hits the PSTN in any country on any network.

I would consider re-phrasing this so that limitation is more clear, for people who may misinterpret that encryption claim, unless you've found a way to encrypt PSTN signalling and audio which would be a much more impressive feat.

ahmgeek•2d ago

You are right, I will change that now so I don't mislead users.

Thanks for flagging this.

whynotmaybe•2d ago

Could you display the rate in local currencies or at least show the actual currency in ISO ?

I'm guessing that the price in $ is USD but as we also have $ in Canada, it can be misleading, especially when 1USD~=1.35CAD

ahmgeek•2d ago

Of course, nice suggestion, on it <3

whynotmaybe•48m ago

And done, you're quick !

csomar•2d ago

Are these voip numbers or real phone numbers? Can they be used to receive 2FA codes?

compsciphd•2d ago

Assuming you are talking about a US Number. Most likely, even if the number you get is not classified as voip today, there's a good chance it will be classified as such in the future. (I've had numbers that I ported to google voice from cell phone that eventually started being classified as a voip #).

Cheapest reliable (as in 100%, GV works ok for me in general, but not perfect) way I've found in my research of this is to get a Tello Mobile #, as they are just a t-mobile MVNO, so the numbers are part of t-mobile's pool, so that costs $5-6 a month at the minimum, depending how you configure it.).

mishrapravin441•2d ago

Loved it, it's amazing. Few questions How many developers developed it? How much time it took? You started earning? How are you advertising? Why not people call from there phone for international call?

ahmgeek•2d ago

How many developers developed it? Just myself, I hardly slept enough during building it, but it paid off :D

How much time it took? I started in April, but started coding enf of May

You started earning? Yes, 2 paying customers, very very minimal but that prooves the need I think

How are you advertising? Hard, still trying to market to it

Why not people call from there phone for international call? It's expensive; this is a cheaper option for sure.

whynotmaybe•2d ago

In Canada, my provider charges 0.60cad/minute to Europe.

Voklit : 0.05$ / minute

Beijinger•2d ago

What? VOIP.MS

Countries like Germany start at $ 0.0147 / min

ahmgeek•2d ago

voip.ms requires setting up SIP credentials and configuring a softphone (or their app). Great for technical users who want maximum control and lowest rates. Voklit is for people who wish to download an app / use the browser and start calling immediately without touching any settings.

nutjob2•2d ago

You can do that with Google Voice for free and much lower rates. US/UK/Aus are 1 cent per minute versus 5 on your system, thats your competition.

whynotmaybe•2d ago

Google voice isn't available in Canada.

Mytello is 0.05CAD / minute.

nutjob2•2d ago

Google Voice is available everywhere with a little effort. I've used it outside of the US for over 10 years.

Even without GV there are other lower cost options. The actual (wholesale) cost of these services are around what GV charge or less, a 5+ times mark up is pretty rich.

whynotmaybe•1d ago

"little effort" = friction.

Many SaaS offer are just removal of friction.

felixg3•2d ago

Nice! Do you plan integrations with teams and other apps?

ahmgeek•2d ago

If you just want to use a Voklit number for meetings, you can already: - Set your Voklit number as caller ID when dialing out - Forward calls to your Teams/Zoom meeting dial-in

That's easy.

If you mean enterprise support, that's on the grid, if I have enough money to quit and focus / hire for Voklit. I would do that.

melhaddad•2d ago

This is awesome! When do you think the android or iphone apps could be available?

ahmgeek•2d ago

Very soon, working on them <3

qmarchi•2d ago

As soon an number porting is available, I'll be signing up for a Pro plan.

Been using Google Voice for _years_ and it's only gotten worse.

I know that the whole schtick is that you don't need an app, but is one on the table for Android? Things like native integration with the Dialer and Notifications are a strong candidate for a native integration.

Oh. And JP phone numbers, but that's a stretch goal.

ahmgeek•2d ago

The app is in the making, and it turns out it's needed for some customers.

Will put the number porting on our radar very soon.

DANmode•2d ago

> native integration with the Dialer and Notifications

“Native integration” as in?

Notifications on webapps aren’t a foreign concept today, either.

mishrapravin441•2d ago

https://pagespeed.web.dev/ Check your webiste u will get some insights, some performance thing can be improved.

aabdelhafez•2d ago

Used to being coerced into using clunky mobile apps for this sort of service. Quite refreshing to see a first-class browser experience here.

The sign-up and phone number acquisition flows were seamless. Excited to try calling now!

Remarkable work - thank you!

ahmgeek•2d ago

<3 you are awesome. Thanks for trying us.

imarkphillips•2d ago

Can't wait to test the quality. Looks really practical fir digital nomads.

ahmgeek•2d ago

Please let us know what you think after.

K2h•2d ago

Is it a beeb or a beep? Might be a type-o on the main page

cloudstorage•1d ago

I really like the website. Are you comfortable to share more details on its development as well as the stack you used ?

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Show HN: I built an international calling platform for the past 6 months

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