TELECOM Digest Tue, 29 Mar 94 08:51:00 CST Volume 14 : Issue 153 Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson Caller-ID Will be Available Nationwide (FCC News via Steve L. Rhoades) Competition in Calls From China (Laurence Chiu) Receive Junkmail and Get Paid Cash Scam (Brock Meeks via Graham Toal) Observations About Area Code Splits (Linc Madison) Warning: Private Payphone "Fraud" (Clive D.W. Feather) Average Call Duration (Bob Schwartz) TELECOM Digest is an electronic journal devoted mostly but not exclusively to telecommunications topics. It is circulated anywhere there is email, in addition to various telecom forums on a variety of public service systems and networks including Compuserve and GEnie. Subscriptions are available at no charge to qualified organizations and individual readers. Write and tell us how you qualify: * telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu * The Digest is compilation-copyrighted by Patrick Townson Associates of Skokie, Illinois USA. We provide telecom consultation services and long distance resale services including calling cards and 800 numbers. To reach us: Post Office Box 1570, Chicago, IL 60690 or by phone at 708-329-0571 and fax at 708-329-0572. Email: ptownson@townson.com. ** Article submission address only: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu ** Our archives are located at lcs.mit.edu and are available by using anonymous ftp. The archives can also be accessed using our email information service. For a copy of a helpful file explaining how to use the information service, just ask. TELECOM Digest is gatewayed to Usenet where it appears as the moderated newsgroup comp.dcom.telecom. It has no connection with the unmoderated Usenet newsgroup comp.dcom.telecom.tech whose mailing list "Telecom-Tech Digest" shares archives resources at lcs.mit.edu for the convenience of users. Please *DO NOT* cross post articles between the groups. All opinions expressed herein are deemed to be those of the author. Any organizations listed are for identification purposes only and messages should not be considered any official expression by the organization. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: srhoades@netcom.com (Steve L. Rhoades) Subject: Caller-ID Will be Available Nationwide Date: Mon, 28 Mar 1994 19:24:12 PST The following news release is from fcc.gov under /pub/Common_Carriers/ nrcc4002.txt (lots of other neat stuff here too!) Report No. DC-2571 ACTION IN DOCKET CASE March 8, 1994 CALLER ID TO BE AVAILABLE NATIONWIDE; FCC ADOPTS FEDERAL POLICIES FOR REGULATION (CC DOCKET 91-281) The Commission has adopted a federal model, effective April 12, 1995, for interstate delivery of calling party number based services. These services include caller ID, which is available today in many states, as well as services that will permit businesses to serve customers more efficiently and will permit increased security of computer networks. The rules adopted today enable these services to become available to consumers and businesses nationwide and require free, automatic, per call blocking to protect privacy interests. They also require carriers to educate consumers about these services. The Commission also adopted rules to address privacy concerns raised by the reuse or sale of information generated by automatic number identification (ANI). Specifically, the Commission found that a federal model for interstate delivery of calling party number is in the public interest, that calling party privacy must be protected, and that certain state regulation of interstate caller ID must be preempted. The availability of calling party number based service, including caller ID, requires end to end interconnection of Signalling System 7 (SS7) networks between carriers, so that the calling party's number can be transmitted from the calling party to the called party. Interstate delivery of calling party based services is thus not feasible until interstate SS7 interconnection and calling party number delivery between local exchange carriers and interexchange carriers becomes widespread. The Commission noted that a consistent, nationwide interstate policy will contribute to economic growth as businesses employ the new technology for a number of uses. These uses may include pay- per-view television, order/entry verification, voice messaging storage, customized customer service, business fraud reduction, call routing, emergency dispatch, health care services, telephone banking, home shopping, dealer locator, and selective call message forwarding. While the technology for nationwide caller ID service is being deployed and used on an intrastate basis, several regulatory and legal issues have delayed its introduction nationwide. Today's action supports the efforts of carriers, standards setting bodies, states, equipment manufacturers and others to provide caller ID in an efficient manner. In the federal model the Commission recognizes the value and benefits to the public of this service and promotes the transmission of the calling party number from the originating carrier to the terminating carrier. The Commission has balanced the reasonable privacy expectations of both the calling and called parties and removed obstacles to the development of calling party based services posed by uncertainty and non-uniform state policies. In today's action the Commission found that: -- Common carriers using Common Channel SS7 and subscribing to or offering any service based on SS7 functionality must transmit the calling party number parameter (CPN) and its associated privacy indicator on any interstate call to connecting carriers; (The CPN is the subscriber line number or the directory number contained in the calling party number parameter of the call set-up message associated with an interstate call using SS7. The calling party number parameter includes an associated privacy indicator.) In other words, local exchange carriers (LECs) must transmit both the calling party number and its associated privacy indicator to interexchange carriers (IXCs) and vice versa; -- Carriers offering CPN delivery services must provide, at no charge to the caller, an automatic per call blocking mechanism for interstate callers. Terminating carriers providing calling party based services, including caller ID, must honor the privacy indicator; -- The costs of interstate transmission of CPN are so small that the CPN should be transmitted among carriers without additional charge; and -- Carriers participating in the offering of any service that delivers CPN on interstate calls must inform telephone subscribers that the subscriber's number may be revealed to called parties and describe what steps subscribers can take to avoid revealing their numbers. In the Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking in this proceeding, the Commission is seeking comment on whether more detailed customer education rules should be adopted and whether the policies adopted for interstate calling party number-based services like caller ID should be extended to other services that might identify the calling party. The Commission also adopted rules to limit the use of information generated by ANI to call set-up, routing, screening, billing and collection and other services by end users, with exceptions for most law enforcement and emergency uses and for marketing by the ANI recipient only. The reuse or sale of ANI would be prohibited absent affirmative subscriber consent, and carriers would be required to educate callers regarding ANI services. (ANI based services were developed in the pre-SS7 signalling environment as the billing telephone number of the calling party. Because this technology predates SS7 technology, ANI is not blockable in the same way as the calling party number in an SS7 network.) In considering whether to extend its existing rules governing disclosure of customer proprietary network information (CPNI) to cover residential and single line business customers as protection of their privacy interests, the Commission said it would seek comments through a separate public notice to be considered in the context of the Computer III Remand Proceeding. Action by the Commission March 8, 1994, by Report and Order and Further Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (FCC 94-59). Chairman Hundt, Commissioners Quello and Barrett, with Commissioner Barrett issuing a separate statement. - FCC - News Media contact: Rosemary Kimball at (202) 632-5050. Common Carrier Bureau contacts: Olga Madruga-Forti at (202) 634-1816 and Suzanne Hutchings at (202) 634-1802. -------------- Steve L. Rhoades Voice: (818) 794-6004 1000 Video Road Internet: srhoades@netcom.com Mt. Wilson, Calif 91023 Finger me for PGP public key. ------------------------------ From: lchiu@crl.com (Laurence Chiu) Subject: Competition in Calls From China Date: Mon, 28 Mar 1994 12:39:02 -0900 Organization: CRL Dialup Internet Access I just got told by my wife that AT&T was offering discounts for USA Direct Calls from China (if placed collect). The rate would be $1.70/minute which reflects a 20% discount. Apparently these are significantly cheaper than local calling rates. If the call is billed to a calling card there is a $3.50 surcharge but an additional 5% discount. The USA Direct caller calls 10810 (from memory) and reaches a Mandarin speaking operator in the US. As an aside when I tried to get information on this plan by calling my normal AT&T customer service number, I was put on hold for ten minutes and I eventually hung up. I asked my wife to call the number in the ad she had seen and reached a Mandarin speaking representative immediately. Of course not being telecom literate, I had to relay questions to her! Since I can call China for $0.59/minute in weekends on AT&T and $0.49 via MCI (to one specific number) if I use their International Friends and Family rate, it makes sense for our friends/relatives to call us collect, we eat a minute charge and then call them back. In fact I am sure there are ways to avoid even the 1st minute charge but I will leave that as an exercise for the reader :-) Laurence Chiu Walnut Creek, California Tel: 510-215-3730 (work) Internet: lchiu@crl.com ------------------------------ From: gtoal@an-teallach.com (Graham Toal) Subject: Receive Junkmail and Get Paid Cash Scam Revealed X-Organisation: An Teallach Limited Date: Mon, 28 Mar 1994 20:12:23 GMT This scam was discussed here before. Here is the latest update. Date: Tue, 8 Mar 1994 15:16:48 -0800 From: "Brock N. Meeks" CyberWire Dispatch//Copyright (c) 1994// Jacking in from the P.T. Barnum Port: Washington, DC -- Thwart the proliferation of electronic junk mail and make yourself some cash as the same time. Ask Me How! Interested? There's more. You get a free Internet account, accessible through a toll free number. All you have to do is let poor capitalist slubs pour junk mail into your free account and you get an average of 6.5 cents for every message that you receive. You don't even have to read the stuff. Remember, there's "absolutely no charge, periodic charge, hourly charge or phone charge." And for all your effort, you'll likely get an annual check of $500 "and likely more," according to a company called Electric Postal Service (EPS). Such are the claims made by the mysterious EPS during a February Internet E-mail blitzkrieg. All EPS said it required was that you "send E-mail to our internet address at eps@world.std.com." And be sure to include you name and address, EPS said. Or there was an 800 number to call. The EPS offer intrigued thousands of Internet users, who rushed to forward their electronic application and sat back to waiting to collect their piece of the Internet pie. Fat Chance. The EPS information never arrived. A month-long Dispatch investigation has revealed that EPS is nothing more than a shell company for a direct mailing scam run out of Canton, Ohio. Bait and Switch =============== After weeks of waiting, no information, electronic or otherwise, has ever appeared from EPS. Instead, those requesting information were sent a curious mailing from an outfit called "Suarez Corporation Industries" headed by one Benjamin Suarez. The Suarez information arrived in an envelope annotated "Important: The information you requested." Inside an "approved letter of requisition" tells how you can receive a new book called "Seven Steps to Freedom II -- How to Escape the American Rat Race." The book supposedly tells you how to birth a corporate creature called a "Net Profit Generation System" (NPGS). Such a deal! An NPGS can produce $30,000 to "over one million dollars a year" in income, Suarez says. The catch? The book and associated software only costs you $159. But that's a steal, Suarez says, because if you buy the book and software separately, they cost you almost $200. But hurry, the offer expires within ten days, because Suarez doesn't want "an order to be wasted on the curiosity seeker." Small problem: The supposed authorization letter contains no date, no authorization code, no bar code. Nothing to determine when it was received or when the supposed 10 day expiration clocks starts to tick. Oh... and the "Seven Steps" book ("not sold in stores") doesn't show up in the Dialog "Books in Print" database. Suarez claims in his letter to be one of the richest people in the nation, "one of the truly rich" unlike those that are "only paper rich" because they count stock. Published reports put Suarez Corp. Industries (SCI) worth at only $100 million, with some 630 envelope stuffing employees. What Suarez is, however, is a slick direct mail baron. The letterhead from SCI lists a host of "divisions" all of which operate out of SCI's headquarters in North Canton. One of those divisions is "CompuClub Software and Computer Services." Dispatch called SCI's main number to ask if EPS was, in reality, one of the infamous Suarez, Net Profit Generation System companies. After a few rounds of questioning, a Suarez operator admitted that EPS was, indeed, an NPGS, "a subsidiary of CompuClub." She wouldn't answer any further questions about EPS. Calls to CompuClub weren't returned. What's the real story on Benjamin Suarez? Let's flip this latest Internet scam on its back and gut that soft white underbelly. (Gloves, please ...) The Rap Sheet Two-Step ====================== Suarez, it appears, is attempting to pull off some kind of Internet P.T. Barnum routine. He's infamous for his questionable direct marketing scams. And he has a mean streak. His record speaks for itself. In February, Suarez agreed to quit all operations in the state of Washington, agreeing to pay more than $70,000 in refunds to some 4,500 consumers there who bought jewelry, cutlery and other products from his companies since 1992. The Washington State attorney general's office brought suit against Suarez, alleging his company violated the state's prizes and promotions laws by selling fake diamonds under the company name Lindenwold Fine Jewelers (also a Suarez "division"). One tactic that apparently pissed off the attorney general was an offer that gave a "free gift" of a cubic zirconia to customers along with an offer for a "discount" on the cost of getting it mounted. That arrangement violates Washington law: If a recipient must spend money to use an award, you can't use the term "free prize." Blaaaahhh!!!! Thank you for playing, Mr. Suarez. The suit so enraged Suarez that he began running negative campaign ads slamming the attorney general who was, at the time, running for the governor's office. Suarez even offered to pay the attorney general's opponents up to $50,000 to front his own hit-squad negative campaign ads. They declined. In a second case in Washington, Suarez offered the same rhinestones, claiming they were worth more than $100. Natch, said former Attorney General Ken Eikenberry, the real value of those stones were about $2.65 a pop. Eikenberry called the promotion, a "blatant deception." In that suit, Suarez settled out of court by paying $15,000. According to court records and published reports, other charges brought against Suarez by the state of Washington in 1992 include: (1) Making false promises of saving. (2) Making deceptive price represen- tations. (3) Conducting charitable solicitations without registering with the secretary of state. (4) Failing to state the odds of winning a sweepstakes. (5) Distributing a simulated check that doesn't have the phrase: "This is not a check" plastered on its front. For all those charges, Suarez is no prohibited from doing business in the State. Seems he's moved his operation to the Internet. The attorney general's office says Suarez is also involved in lawsuits in Indiana and Ohio, but could give no details. Suarez, in previously published interviews with the {Seattle Post- Intelligencier}, defended his company, saying he offers a money- back guarantee and has a return rate of less than two percent. Life On the Laugh Track ======================= For Suarez, adversity and conflict are his Rice Krispies and whole milk. A newspaper database search finds: * The Idaho attorney general making Suarez change its jewelry-marketing pitch. * FDA challenged a Suarez company claim of certain "health benefits" he advertised that arose from a 2,000-year-old secret recipe for Himalayan bread. Suarez successfully defended his right to advertise the alleged health benefits. * The U.S. Post Office files suit against Suarez in 1986, stemming from certain marketing tactics for his book on how to recover money from the government. All in the Family ================= For the Suarez boys, blood is thicker than lawsuits. In 1990, a company called Consumer Direct, run by Richard and Luann Suarez, was hammered by the Federal Trade Commission for making false claims about a product called the "Gut Buster," an exercising device. The company was also sued by government agencies over marketing tactics for a line of diet plans and pills. Seems only five minutes a day with the ol' Gut Buster had you buffed and ready for Muscle Beach. But the FTC didn't buy off on the hypefest. Instead, the FTC insisted that there was no "competent and reliable evidence" to prove such claims. You'd think with all these hard knocks, these guys would learn. What's the motivation? Do the math. Some 2.4 million Gut Busters were sold, according to FTC files, for total revenues of $55 million. (Minus a couple of slap-on-the-wrist fines. Question: Who's going to box their ears for scamming the Net??) Suarez headquarters were swamped with hundreds of reports of injuries to Gut Buster users when the springs on the damn thing broke. "Approxi- mately 1,000 people have reported injuries caused when the Gut Buster spring broke and snapped back to hit them as they exercised," the FTC testimony reads. Search and Verify ================= All this will come as no surprise to Benjamin "Gary Hart" Suarez. In his rogue mailing, it clearly states: "These facts are all verifiable by you, if you wish to investigate." Thanks for the tip, Ben. It's been real. Meeks out ... ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 28 Mar 1994 18:43:33 -0800 From: LincMad@netcom.com (Linc Madison) Subject: Observations About Area Code Splits I was looking at David Esan's 1/15/94 NPA-NXX list and noticed quite a number of surprising numbers. There were a couple of instances where I hope the answer is that a previously-effected split is not yet reflected in the number of exchanges shown for the old area code. For example, 212 shows 639 exchanges, and 168 for 917. I hope that the total for 212 still includes the prefixes now in 917 and/or the Bronx prefixes now in 718. Colorado's 303 is also one I hope is wrong: it shows 601 prefixes against 184 in 719. Atlanta's recent split apparently isn't yet (fully?) reflected: 404 shows 590 and 706 shows 308. Even if my suspicion about the number for 303 is correct, it still shows that the split was very poorly designed: at best, the split is 417/184, worse than a 2:1 margin. Clearly, a much larger portion of the state should have been moved into 719. The split in Dallas also should have been done more tightly -- 214 now has 585 exchanges against 291 in 903, again more than 2:1. Clearly, areas not local to Dallas should not have been left in 214. The split in Houston would have been difficult to tighten, but it was also a worse than 2:1 split. As for the 917 split in New York City, I recently read an article from someone who has a cellphone that has remained in 212, and his carrier stated that it has no plans to switch it to 917. I thought that the point of 917 was that *ALL* cellular and pager numbers in New York City would be moved to 917; deviation from that plan would seem quite unwise. The splits in areas like Detroit were performed much more judiciously: 313 will have 364 prefixes to 356 in 810. If I'm correct about Atlanta, its split is 282/308, which is quite good, although it would indicate that Atlanta was not nearly as ready for a split as other areas. Perhaps the source material on Atlanta has deleted some but not all of the old exchanges from 404. There are also some historical splits that look quite silly. For example, in Ontario, 705 and 807 between them have only 381 exchanges. In Massachusetts, 413 has fewer than one third the number of exchanges of either 617 or 508, and is one of the least populated NPAs. In New York, 607 and 315 between them have only 448 exchanges. Some splits that don't make sense from a telephony viewpoint have clear political and economic roots: Marin County logically belongs in 707, but has remained in the overpopulated 415. Upper Peninsula Michigan doesn't warrant its own area code, but the geographic logic is clear. Although I can't exactly lay claim to a crystal ball, I'll post in a separate article some predictions about area codes that will split soon and others that will probably *never* split in my lifetime. Linc Madison * Oakland, California * LincMad@Netcom.com ------------------------------ Subject: Warning: Private Payphone "Fraud" Date: Tue, 29 Mar 1994 02:29:32 BST From: Clive D.W. Feather The following appeared in uk.telecom recently: From: alon@ibmpcug.co.uk (Alon Risdon) Date: Sun, 13 Mar 1994 13:21:48 GMT SECTION: Business & City Page DATE: 12-03 HEAD: One penny worth 20 in phones BY: MARY FAGAN, Industrial Correspondent of The Independent Newspaper in London THOUSANDS of owners of private payphones are facing financial loss because the phones mistake some one penny coins for a 20p piece. More recent penny coins are copper-plated steel rather than bronze and, according to BT, have a different density that allows them to be mistaken for 20p. Although the plated coins have been in circulation since late 1992, the problem of people using them for cheap telephone calls has only recently come to light. BT said: "It is fraud, but it is not a problem for BT. The people who are losing out are those with private payphones." The company estimates that there are up to 70,000 private payphones, many in pubs and shops. Some large families also use them to avoid running up huge bills. BT charges the owners for the use of the line, but does not get any of the coins inserted by those who make the calls. BT said that it had been aware of the problem for some time and was adjusting payphones free of charge by changing the software. The spokesman said the adjustment itself was no problem, but that the company did not necessarily know all those who operated private payphones. BT said that one reason the problem affected private rather than public payphones was that they were often cheaper and less sophisticated or robust. It added that the Royal Mint was careful to warn in advance of changes to coins that could affect public telephones and other coin-operated equipment. University unions, which often obtain revenues from campus services including payphones, are likely to be among the main victims. The union at Surrey has asked the National Westminster bank on the campus to be wary of students asking for large quantities of pennies or asking cashiers to sort out new ones from old. Clive D.W. Feather | Santa Cruz Operation clive@sco.com | Croxley Centre Phone: +44 923 816 344 | Hatters Lane, Watford Fax: +44 923 210 352 | WD1 8YN, United Kingdom [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The problem of one coin successfully imitating another happens from time to time in automatic coin collection devices. Back in the early 1970's there was quite a problem here with people cheating the Chicago Transit Authority subway turnstiles. It seems CTA tokens were almost identical in size, shape and weight to the Brazillian centavo coin, a virtually worthless thing by our stand- ards here. It took a hundred or more of the darn things to equal just a few cents in United States money. When it was discovered these foreign coins were accepted by the subway turnstiles suddenly there was a big rush to purchase them from coin dealers and such here. Of course the excuse the buyers gave was they used them in 'costume jewelry' and such. The CTA started putting heat on the coin dealers to quit selling them, but there was nothing legally they could do to force the dealers to stop (other than use old-fashioned Chicago style political pressure by city hall) the sales, and eventually the Transit Authority had to change the size of their tokens and rework the turnstiles to accept the new tokens instead of the old ones. CTA lost a couple million dollars before they got it under control. PAT] ------------------------------ Subject: Average Call Duration From: bob@bci.nbn.com (Bob Schwartz) Date: Mon, 28 Mar 94 14:56:45 PST Organization: Bill Correctors, Inc., Marin County, California Does anyone have, or know where I can find, information on averege hold time which to me means average call duration (length of call) (number of properly billable minutes? Are they listed by industry group? My long distance bill shows a rate with a series of discounts. The discounts equal 30.33% which would put their Intrastate rate at about .09 for day calls! Problem is that I don't see this rate echoed by their competitors. It's too good to be true (sort of). The average call duration however is about 3.03 minutes. I thought the national average hold time to be more like 2.6 minutes. If they inflate the call duration there goes the benefit of my discounts! Oh yes, another important detail, this is a switched service. Also, thought I'd check another premise; does anyone in California see Intrastate rates for switched traffic at or about .09? Thanks, Bob Schwartz bob@bci.nbn.com Bill Correctors, Inc. +1 415 488 9000 Marin County, California [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Intrastate rates are peculiar things, aren't they? Very odd in how they are calculated, a very much left to the whims of the state PUCs, which frequently are nothing more than tools of the local Bell company. If you can figure this out Bob, an article here in the Digest would be welcome. PAT] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V14 #153 ****************************** -------------------------------------------------------------------------------