Multimedia information service access

Real time delivery of multimedia information accessed either through the Internet (150), or otherwise, simultaneously, or sequentially time delayed to one more users, is enabled by delivering the multimedia information over a switched network (160) via a multipoint control unit. A client establishes a connection with a server (130,140), or other remote location (120) where desired multimedia information is resident, identifies the desired multimedia information and provides client information identifying the locations of the users. The client information may include the telephone numbers or other access numbers of each of the multiple users. The multimedia information is then delivered by a multimedia server (140) to a bridging apparatus (170) through a switched network guaranteeing high quality of service, secure connection and billing control. Connecting one or more users to a live agent (270) is also made possible by providing the telephone numbers of the users and the live agent directly to the multipoint control unit. The delivery of the multimedia information can be secured by comparing the client information to a segmented "to call" list (304) to determine whether the client is authorized to receive the requested multimedia information. Alternatively, or in addition, security can be implemented by mounting a video camera (301) at the client's endpoint and connecting a database (303) running face recognition software to the multimedia server. The multimedia server's call to the user triggers the camera to take a picture of the user. The selected content is restricted to authorized users by comparing the picture to pictures of authorized faces stored in the database.