1230 Via

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The Via header field indicates the transport used for the transaction

   and identifies the location where the response is to be sent.  A Via

   header field value is added only after the transport that will be

   used to reach the next hop has been selected (which may involve the

   usage of the procedures in [4]).

 

   When the UAC creates a request, it MUST insert a Via into that

   request.  The protocol name and protocol version in the header field

   MUST be SIP and 2.0, respectively.  The Via header field value MUST

   contain a branch parameter.  This parameter is used to identify the

   transaction created by that request.  This parameter is used by both

   the client and the server.

 

   The branch parameter value MUST be unique across space and time for

   all requests sent by the UA.  The exceptions to this rule are CANCEL

   and ACK for non-2xx responses.  As discussed below, a CANCEL request

   will have the same value of the branch parameter as the request it

   cancels.  As discussed in Section 17.1.1.3, an ACK for a non-2xx

   response will also have the same branch ID as the INVITE whose

   response it acknowledges.

 

      The uniqueness property of the branch ID parameter, to facilitate

      its use as a transaction ID, was not part of RFC 2543.

 

   The branch ID inserted by an element compliant with this

   specification MUST always begin with the characters "z9hG4bK".  These

   7 characters are used as a magic cookie (7 is deemed sufficient to

   ensure that an older RFC 2543 implementation would not pick such a

   value).