Telephony conferences are established within a packet network. Utilization of a plurality of conference bridge resources within the packet network is monitored. A database of user profiles is maintained associating authorized users of the conference bridge resources with respective PIN codes. A host user links to a call manager to initiate a request for a conference session. The host user is authenticated according to a respective one of the user profiles to determine an authenticated PIN code for identifying the conference session. A portion of the conference bridge resources are allocated in response to the authentication. The authenticated PIN code is forwarded to the conference bridge resources. The host user links to the allocated conference bridge resources. A guest user links to the call manager to initiate a request to participate in the conference session. The guest user identifies the authenticated PIN code. The guest user links to the allocated conference bridge resources. The host user and the guest user are bridged via the allocated bridge resources in response to the authenticated PIN code.