Voxbone has announced that it has been selected to provide a means for United Nations (UN) agencies responding with humanitarian aid in times of natural disasters to stay in contact and communicate with one another quickly and easily via a unique United Nations country code – 888. Under agreement with the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), Voxbone has been authorised to implement the country code 888 that the ITU has assigned to OCHA for UN agencies engaged in rendering assistance to nations or regions affected by natural disasters, such as the Southeast Asian tsunami or the earthquake in Haiti.
Having its own special 888 country code will allow the UN to assign specific numbers to agencies providing humanitarian relief to victims of such disasters. The agreement states, in part: ‘… OCHA appoints Voxbone as its agent to assist OCHA with the implementation and routing of the +888 numbering range/country code, and to take any actions needed to ensure that calling parties on multiple fixed and mobile access networks can call the +888 numbering range/country code under conditions specified by OCHA.’