The words of our trades, in plain English.
Our sector loves acronyms. Here are the twenty-eight that come up in a quote, and why they concern you.
B2B Telecoms
Ten terms — from the fibre connection to the portability of your numbers.
Cybersecurity
Seven terms — the real threats and the protections that hold.
AI agents
Six terms — to understand what you are being sold before you buy it.
Online presence
Five terms — your site, your address and your visibility.
Updated in August 2026. A term missing? Tell us.
Jargon
is not inevitable.
The same vocabulary from the first meeting to the invoice.
The words of the link
and of telephony.
The terms on an operator’s quote — explained before they are billed.
FTTH — shared fibre
FTTH stands for “Fiber To The Home”, fibre all the way to the home. It is the same type of connection as in private homes: the fibre is shared between several subscribers in the same area. It is the most economical way to connect a site, with a speed that can vary according to how the other subscribers use theirs.
Why this concerns you: for many companies, a properly sized FTTH link is amply enough. What is still needed is for someone to check that your real use — telephony included — fits on it. That is the purpose of our telecoms assessment.
FTTO — dedicated fibre
FTTO stands for “Fiber To The Office”, fibre all the way to the office. That fibre is pulled for you alone: the speed is guaranteed, symmetrical (identical for sending and receiving), and the contract includes a restoration commitment in the event of a fault.
Why this concerns you: if your business stops when the link goes down — a hotel, a shop, a telephone switchboard, production — this is the type of connection that carries that responsibility. The difference with FTTH is not the speed, it is the commitment.
GTR — the guaranteed restoration time
It is the maximum time, written into the contract, within which the operator undertakes to put your link back into service after an outage. It is not an observed average nor a sales promise: it is a contractual commitment, with compensation if it is not met. The exact time depends on the offer chosen and appears in black and white in the contract.
Why this concerns you: that is the question to ask before signing, of us as of anyone: “if it goes down, how long until it is repaired, and where is that written?”. The three questions from our method start there.
PSTN — the legacy telephone network
The switched telephone network is the telephone over copper, the one that has been around for a century. It is being shut down for good: no offer has been sold in France since 31 January 2026, and the lines will be cut batch by batch, town by town, until November 2030.
Why this concerns you: alarms, lifts, payment terminals, fax machines — a great deal of equipment still uses a copper line without anyone giving it a thought. The full timetable and the list of equipment to check are on our end-of-copper page.
VoIP — voice over the internet
Voice over IP is telephony that travels over your internet link instead of over a dedicated copper line. It is what replaces the switched telephone network, and it is already the norm for almost all recent installations.
Why this concerns you: the quality of your calls now depends on the quality of your internet link. That is the argument for entrusting the link and the telephony to the same team: when a call degrades, nobody can pass the blame to the other provider.
SIP trunk — the bundle that feeds your switchboard
A SIP trunk is the “bundle” of lines that connects your existing telephone switchboard to the network, over the internet. Your equipment stays in place: only the line that feeds it changes, and your numbers are kept.
Why this concerns you: if your switchboard works well and only its copper line is disappearing, this is often the simplest and cheapest way out — there is no need to replace everything to leave copper.
Centrex — the switchboard in the cloud
With Centrex, your telephone switchboard is no longer a cabinet in a cupboard: it is hosted remotely and administered from a browser. Your handsets connect to it over the internet, from the office just as from another site.
Why this concerns you: nothing left to maintain on your premises, and changes — an extra handset, a new greeting message, an emergency divert — take a few minutes instead of an on-site visit.
SD-WAN — several links driven as one
SD-WAN is a technology that drives several internet links — fibre, a second connection, the mobile network — as though they were one, continuously choosing the best path for each use: voice this way, backups that way.
Why this concerns you: especially if you have several sites. Your calls keep priority when the network is busy, and the loss of one link does not turn into the loss of a site.
4G/5G backup link — the second path
It is a second internet connection, over the mobile network, which automatically takes over when the main link is cut — a digger through the cable, a network incident, an equipment failure. The switchover happens with no action on your part.
Why this concerns you: now that telephony travels over the internet, a link outage is also a telephone outage. Backup turns a day of downtime into a few moments of switchover.
Number portability — your numbers follow you
Number portability is the right to keep your telephone numbers when you change operator. It is governed by regulation: it is the new operator that handles the formalities, and the old one cannot object.
Why this concerns you: your numbers are part of your goodwill. A provider that drags its feet on number portability is telling you something about its idea of loyalty — ours is written down on the trust page : we do not slow down departures.
Words, yes.
And equipment.
The words of the threats
and of the protections.
Fear sells, so the industry overuses it. Here is what protects.
Segregation — sealed-off zones in your network
Segregating a network means cutting it into separate zones that communicate only when necessary: your visitors’ WiFi does not see your till, the cameras do not see the accounts, the old machine that cannot be updated lives in its own corner.
Why this concerns you: an intruder who gets into one zone does not reach the others. It is one of the most effective protections there is, and it is decided when the network is designed — it is the heart of our approach to security.
Firewall — the filter at the entrance to the network
The firewall is the equipment that examines everything coming in and out of your network, and allows only what its rules permit. Everything else is blocked.
Why this concerns you: a firewall installed then forgotten protects very little. It is its rules, their updating and their monitoring that make the protection — the box on its own does nothing but blink.
Phishing — the fake message that makes you click
Phishing is a message — email, text message, sometimes a call — that imitates a legitimate sender: your bank, a supplier, a colleague, a delivery company. Its purpose: to make you click, type in a password or approve a payment.
Why this concerns you: it is the way in for most successful attacks, and it targets your teams, not your machines. Training people is therefore part of the protection, just as much as the technology.
Ransomware — your files held hostage
Ransomware is malicious software that encrypts your files — quotes, invoices, schedules, photos — then demands a ransom to give you access back. Paying guarantees nothing, and marks you out as a confirmed target.
Why this concerns you: the defence is played out before the attack, not during it: backups out of reach and tested, a segregated network, teams who have been warned. Afterwards, it is too late to decide well.
VPN — the encrypted tunnel for working remotely
A VPN (virtual private network) creates an encrypted tunnel between a remote workstation and your corporate network. Someone working from home reaches their tools as if at the office, without their exchanges travelling in the clear.
Why this concerns you: the alternative to a VPN is often an access “left open on the internet to make things simpler”. It is precisely through those doors left open that intrusions get in.
3-2-1 backup — the rule that saves you
The 3-2-1 rule fits on one line: three copies of your data, on two different media, one of them kept off site — out of reach of a fire and of ransomware that has got into your network.
Why this concerns you: a backup that has never been restored is not a backup, it is a hypothesis. The question to ask is not “do you back up?” but “when did you last test a restore?”.
GDPR — the regulation on personal data
The General Data Protection Regulation is the European law that governs information about people: collect only what is necessary, say why, protect it, and be able to correct or erase it when asked.
Why this concerns you: it applies to every company, whatever its size. And it becomes much simpler to comply with when your data stays in France, with identified providers — that is how we do it, set out in detail on the trust page.
A misunderstood word
is a badly covered risk.
Nobody should sign what they do not understand. An engineer goes through each term with you.
The words of
artificial intelligence.
Six terms for asking the right questions of anyone selling you “AI”.
AI agent — the software that acts, not the one that chats
An AI agent does not merely answer a question: it carries out a task from end to end — qualifying an incoming enquiry, preparing a reply, updating a file — following rules that you define, and handing back to a human as soon as the decision calls for it.
Why this concerns you: the repetitive work that occupies your teams is exactly what an agent knows how to take on. What we build, and how a first project starts, is explained on the AI agents page.
LLM — the large language model
An LLM (large language model) is the engine that understands and produces text, trained on huge volumes of documents. It is a component, not a solution: the raw model knows neither your company, nor your clients, nor your rules.
Why this concerns you: all the useful work consists of connecting that engine to your data and framing it. That is our role: we select and manage the models for you — you do not have to become a specialist in the subject.
RAG — the AI that answers using your documents
RAG (retrieval-augmented generation) is the technique that makes AI answer from your own documents — prices, procedures, contracts — rather than from its general memory alone. The answer rests on identifiable sources.
Why this concerns you: it is the difference between an AI that talks about everything and an AI that knows your reality. An answer whose source can be found again is an answer that can be checked.
Knowledge Graph — the map of your information
A Knowledge Graph (a graph of knowledge) organises your information like a map where everything is connected: this client owns this site, which hosts this equipment, covered by this contract. The AI then reasons on connections, not on a jumble of documents.
Why this concerns you: it is what makes it possible to answer questions that cut across several files. It is the approach taken by ZENBAI CRM by SkyNet, the agentic CRM we offer in partnership.
Token — the unit of measure of AI
The token is the unit of account for a language model’s work: one word represents roughly one to three of them. Models are billed on the volume of tokens processed — both in and out.
Why this concerns you: AI usage is measured and managed, like telecoms consumption. A serious project starts by estimating that volume — and carries on by tracking it, not by discovering it on the invoice.
Hallucination — when AI asserts without knowing
We speak of hallucination when a model states false information with complete confidence — an invented reference, a figure that does not exist. It is not a fault: it is a known limit of the technology, to be contained from the design stage onwards.
Why this concerns you: that is exactly why the AI is plugged into your documents (the RAG above) and why a human is kept in the loop on decisions. Anyone who promises you an AI “that never gets it wrong” has just got it wrong for the first time.
The words of your
online presence.
Five terms from any website project — and the traps they avoid.
Domain name — your address on the internet
The domain name is your address on the internet — votre-entreprise.fr. It is reserved year after year with dedicated bodies, and it also carries your email addresses.
Why this concerns you: it must be registered in your name, not in your provider’s. It is the classic trap of the sector: the day you want to change provider, you discover that your address does not belong to you. With us, the domain is yours — see the Digital acceleration division.
Hosting — where your site and your data live
Hosting is the computer — somewhere, at somebody’s premises — on which your site and your data physically exist. “The cloud” is not a cloud: it is a building, in a country, subject to that country’s laws.
Why this concerns you: the two questions to ask are “where?” and “who has access to it?”. At SkyNet, 100% of the data is hosted in France, and our services rely on ISO 27001 and HDS certified data centres located in France. The details are on the trust page.
Search ranking — being found without paying for advertising
Search ranking (SEO) is all the work that makes a search engine offer your site when a customer looks for what you do: content that really answers the questions, a clean technical build, and consistency.
Why this concerns you: it is an investment built over months, not a button you switch on. Be wary of promises of a “guaranteed first place”: nobody controls the search engines, and those who promise it know that.
HTTPS — the padlock in the browser
HTTPS encrypts the exchanges between the visitor and your site: what is typed into a form does not travel in the clear. It is the padlock shown by the browser, made possible by a certificate installed on the site.
Why this concerns you: without it, browsers display “not secure” next to your name — and search engines penalise you. It is a prerequisite, not an option, and it is included in every site we deliver.
Mobile responsiveness — a site that adapts to the screen
A “responsive” site automatically reorganises its content according to the screen: comfortable on a computer, readable on a tablet, usable with one thumb on a phone. It is not a cut-down version: it is the same site, designed for each use.
Why this concerns you: the majority of visits today come from a phone. It is also the principle behind TellMiz, the in-room app designed by SkyNet: everything happens on the guest’s phone, with nothing to install.
A glossary is no substitute for
a conversation.
Thirty minutes with an engineer — not a salesperson — to ask your questions in whatever order suits you, with no commitment and no jargon.