Scalable and flexible internet fax architecture

A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium tangibly embodying a set of instructions, which when executed by one or more processors of a call mediation system of an Internet fax system, cause the one or more processors to perform a method comprising:

• receiving, from a telecommunications system of the Internet fax system, an inbound fax call having associated therewith a source address, a destination address and a fax signal, wherein the destination address corresponds to a particular subscriber of the Internet fax system;
• determining desired fax protocol technical call processing capabilities for processing the fax signal based on a plurality of the source address, the destination address and whether the inbound fax call was received through a circuit-switched or packet-switched connection;
• identifying a subset of fax processing resources of a plurality of fax processing resources associated with the call mediation system that have the desired fax protocol technical call processing capabilities;
• causing a digital representation of the fax signal to be delivered or otherwise made available to one or more users associated with the particular subscriber switching the inbound fax call to a selected fax processing resource of the subset of fax processing resources, which translates the fax signal into the digital representation.

An Internet fax system comprising:

• a plurality of call mediation systems;
• a plurality of fax processing resources associated with each of the plurality of call mediation systems;
• a telecommunications system having a plurality of circuit and packet switched connections, the telecommunications system configured to receive an inbound fax call and switch the inbound fax call to a call mediation system of the plurality of call mediation systems, the inbound fax call having associated therewith a source address, a destination address and a fax signal, wherein the destination address corresponds to a particular subscriber of the Internet fax system;
• wherein the call mediation system:
• determines desired fax protocol technical call processing capabilities for processing the fax signal based on a plurality of the source address, the destination address and a type of connection of the plurality of circuit and packet switched connections through which the inbound fax call was received;
• identifies a subset of fax processing resources of the plurality of fax processing resources that has the desired fax protocol technical call processing capabilities;
• and
• switches the inbound fax call to a selected fax processing resource of the subset of fax processing resources;
• and
• wherein the selected fax processing resource translates the fax signal into a digital representation causes the digital representation to be delivered or otherwise made available to one or more users associated with the particular subscriber.