Skype calls from UAE—too good to be true?

This seemed to be the shockingly pleasant news UAE residents woke up to on Friday and social media was soon abuzz with the question — have etisalat and du, the country’s two telecom providers, indeed, unblocked the service?

Although the free video chatting and Internet-to-phone pay services were accessible on both firms’ networks, confusion prevailed later in the day when etisalat’s social media posts regarding the unblocking of Skype were later withdrawn.

People were glued to their computers in the morning to see it for themselves after the news spread like wildfire, backed up by a message supposedly posted by etisalat on social media channels such as Twitter that UAE residents could now officially log on to Skype and buy credit to make international calls.

“@EtisalatUAE: The long awaited app is finally available for all, Enjoy calling your long distance friends,” the post declared before it was deleted.

“Wow! Good news! Nice! Finally! What about Viber?” were some of the comments posted by elated customers on the social media channels.

“Hi, has etisalat unblocked Skype? What about Google Voice, Facetime, iMessage and BB calling services? Are they all unblocked?” this reporter posted on etisalat’s twitter account, to which the company replied: “Hello, kindly note that they are not unblocked.”

“What about Skype? There was an etisalat message on the social media that Skype has been unblocked? Is Skype unblocked now?” we asked specifically, to which the telco said: “Yes it’s unlocked.”

Skype was, in fact, accessible, downloadable and useable on the etisalat network on Friday and people welcomed the decision to free up the service, whether official or not.

“We all know some people have been using the Skype service on laptops and PCs that came with the app pre-loaded. So people who have been using it discreetly can now rest assured that the law will not catch up with them. The nagging guilty feeling also won’t be there any more,” one resident commented.

Others wanted the much popular Google Voice and FaceTime unblocked.

“The Google Voice paid-calling service is much clearer than Skype. Unfortunately, that service is still blocked in the UAE. If Skype is unblocked, why not Google Voice?” Rejith Raveendran, a Sharjah resident, wondered.

S. Reddy, who almost every day keeps in touch with his family back in India, said: “There is no reason to block FaceTime on Apple devices as it’s purely an interaction from Internet to Internet and doesn’t infringe on the UAE policy of not letting voice calls go from the Net to mobile networks. Facetime is a free facility available on Apple devices but denied to Apple customers in the UAE.”

Contacted by Khaleej Times, etisalat said it would get back on such questions later.

Both etisalat and du have already entered the VoIP market, without any fanfare, with cheaper calling cards. Media reported earlier this year that etisalat’s five calling card offers discounted call rates to Bangladesh, China, India, Kuwait, Nepal, Oman, Pakistan, Philippines, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Sri Lanka for as little as 40 fils per minute. Users can also make calls to other countries at normal rates.

Officials had warned earlier that etisalat and du would have to hike the cost of local fixed line calls if Skype and other VoIP-based service were to allowed in the UAE, so the question that bothers customers at the moment is — will the telcos increase rates if such services come to hit their bottom line?