TELECOM Digest Mon, 12 Oct 92 22:03:10 CDT Volume 12 : Issue 774 Index To This Issue: Moderator: Patrick A. Townson Re: What it Costs to Have the President Over (John Holman) Re: What it Costs to Have the President Over (Barry Mishkind) Re: What it Costs to Have the President Over (Dave Levenson) Re: Highway Call Boxes -- Radio, But Not All Cellular (Lauren Weinstein) Re: Highway Call Boxes (Sue Miller) Re: Highway Call Boxes (John Gilbert) Re: Highway Call Boxes (Steve Forrette) Re: Highway Call Boxes (Hon Wah Chin) Re: Highway Call Boxes (Bob Turner) Re: Cellular Phones With Scramblers Attached (Ted Hadley) Re: Cellular Phones With Scramblers Attached (John Gilbert) Re: Cellular Phones with scramblers attached (Rob Bailey) Today's Price on Cellular Phones (Paul Robinson) Re: Cellular Interception in Private Talk (Macy Hallock) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Holmanj@uwwvax.uww.edu (John Holman) Subject: Re: What it Costs to Have the President Over Date: Mon, Oct 12, 1992 I just heard on the radio that the city of Milwaukee spent $25,000 for security alone for a Bush visit on Labor Day and $8,000 for a Clinton visit. The president was also just in another city (Fond du Lac) in Wisconsin and a friend of mine went to the rally with this report, "Anyone wearing a campaign button that was not the President's had to remove them!" Some were anti-Bush buttons were confiscated and people were told they could get them backafter the rally. ------------------------------ From: barry@coyote.datalog.com (Barry Mishkind) Subject: Re: What it Costs to Have the President Over Organization: Datalog Consulting, Tucson, AZ Date: Mon, 12 Oct 92 04:50:07 GMT Jim Thornton writes: > Finally, the author states that arrangements are made for the phone > even when the president is merely flying over the city. With all the travel due to the election, I wonder what all this costs? Barry Mishkind barry@coyote.datalog.com FidoNet 1:300/11.3 [Moderator's Note: It costs plenty. Of course with a deficit of umpty- trillion dollars, I guess it is a small outlay by comparison. Do you know how Perot got to the debate Sunday night? He flew on a commercial airline with a couple aides, and took a taxi from the airport to the hall. On the plane, he greeted people who came up to him to wish him well, etc. PAT] ------------------------------ From: dave@westmark.com (Dave Levenson) Subject: Re: What it Costs to Have the President Over Organization: Westmark, Inc. Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 03:33:48 GMT In article , MERRILL@stsci.edu (Clark) writes: > I saw Reagan come back from a trip once and land at the Pentagon > instead of the White house. A six lane road leading into DC was > closed off. And there were officers stationed everywhere. There was > no way to get anywhere near him. I was one of five people that > stopped and watched the landing from the Pentagon parking lot. I happened to be in New York City a few weeks ago when President Bush also happened to be in town. I was heading home to New Jersey, in the midst of the evening rush-hour, and had waited almost 45 minutes in line to enter the Holland Tunnel (it goes under the Hudson River, from lower Manhattan to NJ). When I was three cars from the tunnel entrance, three NYC police cars arrived from several directions, a dozen officers hopped out and stopped all traffic entering the tunnel. Nothing further happened for about five minutes (probably to allow the traffic already in the tunnel to reach the far end). Then a motorcade consisting of several NYPD cars, several un-marked cars with U.S. Government plates, a limousine, and several more U.S. Government cars entered the tunnel. Nobody else was allowed into the tunnel for another five minutes. Then a police car entered the tunnel, and drove slowly, straddling two lanes, in case anybody should try to pass, and the rest of us piled in behind him. When I reached the NJ end of the tunnel, I noticed that the motorcade was visible ahead, entering the NJ Turnpike. It continued, in splendid isolation, all the way to exit 14 (Newark International Airport). All six lanes of the turnpike, from about a half-mile ahead to a half-mile behind, were kept empty. If they wanted to hide what they were doing, they did a lousy job of that! But I suppose it is necessary. I found myself wondering if this was the real thing, or if it was a diversion, deliberately designed to attract attention, while the real president was whisked away with less fanfare, by another route. Dave Levenson Internet: dave@westmark.com Westmark, Inc. UUCP: {uunet | rutgers | att}!westmark!dave Warren, NJ, USA Voice: 908 647 0900 Fax: 908 647 6857 ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 Oct 92 00:25 PDT From: lauren@cv.vortex.com (Lauren Weinstein) Subject: Re: Highway Call Boxes -- Radio, But Not All Cellular Greetings. Not all of the call boxes with the short antennas are "cellular phones" -- at least not in the conventional sense. Around the L.A. area, there has recently been a massive upgrade of the call box system. Along major freeways, where there have mostly been wired call boxes for many years, the new radio/solar units were recently installed and the older units pulled. At the same time, identical radio call boxes appeared in some canyon areas which have never had call boxes before. However, since there is no cellular coverage in at least some of the areas where these canyon boxes are located, they must be other than cellular phones. Presumably they operate in a commercial or government service band. --Lauren-- ------------------------------ From: sue@netcom.com (Sue Miller) Subject: Re: Highway Call Boxes Organization: Netcom - Online Communication Services (408 241-9760 guest) Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 15:17:51 GMT In article lars@spectrum.CMC.COM (Lars Poulsen) writes: > These are stationary cellphones. Neat, huh? We have them every mile or > so on US 101 right through downtown Santa Barbara. In fact, I think > they are only half a mile apart in the urban area. Yeah -- real neat. We have them on US 101 in the SF Bay Area also. Tried one last May when my car blew its head gasket. No answer!! Maybe they are just for show. ;-) ------------------------------ From: johng@comm.mot.com (John Gilbert) Subject: Re: Highway Call Boxes Organization: Motorola, Inc. LMPS Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 15:31:45 GMT In addition to cellular, 800/900 Mhz trunking is available for call boxes. This would be a less expensive solution for a customer who already has a trunked radio system, such as a large corporate campus or university. John Gilbert johng@ecs.comm.mot.com ------------------------------ From: stevef@wrq.com (Steve Forrette) Subject: Re: Highway Call Boxes Organization: Walker Richer & Quinn, Inc., Seattle, WA Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 17:27:08 GMT In article morris@grian.cps.altadena. ca.us (Mike Morris) writes: > Paul_Gloger.ES_XFC@xerox.com writes: >> Along the highway, out in the country in California anyway, there are >> emergency telephone call boxes, with phones which connect you directly >> to the Highway Patrol or some such agency. > They are self-contained cellular phones. Supposedly they have > tamper and tilt-over switches, but I doubt it -- there's been one laid > flat in Eagle Rock (near Pasadena) now for almost two weeks. The > solar panel disappeared on day four. They do indeed have tamper alarms. There was a case a few months back of someone on I-580 in the Altamont Pass area taking them down to steal. When the CHP dispatcher saw the tamper alarms going off in succession for a few of the boxes, they got an officer out there pronto, who found a pickup truck with various call box parts in the bed. The driver was apparently stealing them for the metal recycling value rather than the cellular equipment. Either way, he got a free ride to the Greybar Hotel (appropriate for a phone thief, no? :-)) Here's another tidbit on the California cellular call boxes: I have a friend who is a civil engineer with CalTrans. He was lamenting that the wonderful California legislature passed a law saying that whereever these boxes are installed, they must be at intervals no further than two miles apart. This makes it not cost effective to install in very rural areas, where a box even every four or five miles would be a lot better than no boxes. But, as is the case in many instances the CA legislature knows what's best for the residents of the Golden State. Steve Forrette, stevef@wrq.com ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 Oct 92 11:46:23 PDT From: hwc@louis.pei.com (Hon Wah Chin) Subject: Re: Highway Call Boxes Reply-To: hwc@pei.com I used one last Monday on 101 in Menlo Park. It automatically called CHP. I described my location and they read back the ID number painted on a sign next to the phone, so I don't know whether they had the ID transmitted or from my location description. The most interesting thing is that the hanger for the handset (with noise canceling mike) did not appear to move for off-hook indication. I wasn't in a mood to investigate further but hypothesized some kind of magnetic sensor to activate an internal switch. ------------------------------ From: turner@udecc.engr.udayton.edu (Bob Turner) Subject: Re: Highway Call Boxes Organization: Univ. of Dayton, School of Engineering Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 00:45:22 GMT In article lars@spectrum.CMC.COM (Lars Poulsen) writes: > These are stationary cellphones. Neat, huh? We have them every mile or > so on US 101 right through downtown Santa Barbara. In fact, I think > they are only half a mile apart in the urban area. At a few of the NENA (Natl Emergency Number Assoc) (the E911 Industry and Gov Assoc) and APCO (Assoc of Professional Comm Officers aka Dispatchers) conventions I have seen GTE showing off their cell call box. Apparently, they work with local goverment to give a significant discount for usage charges. Alot of phones with low relative utilization. The sales droid didn't (or wouldn't, I can't remember) say what typical charges and costs were. Bob Turner System Engineer and Programmer 5134342738 turner@udecc.engr.udayton.edu CommSys, Inc. 77 West Elmwwod Drive, Suite 101, Dayton, OH 45459 ------------------------------ From: tedh@cylink.COM (Ted Hadley) Subject: Re: Cellular Phones With Scramblers Attached Organization: Cylink Corp. Date: Mon, 12 Oct 92 16:20:50 GMT In article mcharry@mitre.org (John McHarry(J23)) writes: > In tmkk@uiuc.edu (Scott Coleman) > writes: >> Do scrambled cell phones really exist, or was this just another >> Die-Hard-esque fudge on the part of the show's writers? > They do indeed. There are STU-III cellular phones available. I > believe the commercial versions use DES encryption. Manufacturers > include Motorola, I believe AT&T, and maybe others. I have no idea > what restrictions there are on their sale, however. We At Cylink also have SecureCell, a DES-encrypted cellular phone. It is compatible with our other DES telephone encryptors. As for restrictions on their sale, I believe anyone in the US or Canada can purchase them. The only restrictions I know of are for export outside [US | Canada]. Ted A. Hadley tedh@cylink.COM Cylink Corporation, 310 N. Mary Ave., Sunnyvale, CA 94086 USA 408-735-5847 All opinions expressed are my own, and probably not liked by my employer. ------------------------------ From: johng@comm.mot.com (John Gilbert) Subject: Re: Cellular Phones With Scramblers Attached Organization: Motorola, Inc. Land Mobile Products Sector Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 15:24:36 GMT In article mcharry@mitre.org (John McHarry(J23)) writes: > They do indeed. There are STU-III cellular phones available. I > believe the commercial versions use DES encryption. Manufacturers > include Motorola, I believe AT&T, and maybe others. I have no idea > what restrictions there are on their sale, however. All STU-III phones are comsec controlled items and are only available from the manufacturers after obtaining NSA approval. Motorola does make several models of wireline phones that use the same encryption types available in the land mobile products. These phones look like the STU-III phone, but are available to commercial users. Several flavors of encryption are available depending on who you are and where the equipment will be used. Last I heard the "STU-III Dynasec" cellular phones were not available off-the-shelf, but were made for a specific government contract. John Gilbert johng@ecs.comm.mot.com ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 Oct 92 02:12:06 EDT From: kiser@tecnet1.jcte.jcs.mil Subject: Re: Cellular Phones With Scramblers Attached Answer to question: YES. In the mall here someone (Schlage, I think) sells a scrambler that attaches to the cell phone handset. I don't know what technology it uses. Side note: I drive a ... well ... interesting looking car. It's a black Volvo 780 (the two-door Volvo sports sedan that you've probably never seen before) with five antennas on the trunk and back windows, and a big metal star on the license plate. To say the least, it slows down traffic on the interstate (the X-band transmitter doesn't hurt that any ;^). Anyway ... one day I was driving through town and happened to notice a very stereotypical dark-suit/dark-Chrysler/Dodge type car parked along side the road and a the suit-wearer talking into the adjacent pay phone. He looked at my car and followed me with his eyes the entire time I was in sight. Since I thought this a little suspicious/interesting, I rounded the block for another pass. Same response as before, but I noticed that attached to the payphone's handset was what appeared to be a cross between an overgrown calculator and one of those handheld inventory scanners that grocery stores use, replete with keypad. Anybody know what this thing was? Some top-secret scrambler/descrambler, or was this just some well-dressed grocery store clerk downloading the latest produce inventory? Hmmmm ... (for) Rob Bailey reply to: 74007.303@compuserve.com ------------------------------ Reply-To: TDARCOS@MCIMAIL.COM From: FZC@CU.NIH.GOV Date: Mon, 12 Oct 1992 19:16:37 EDT Subject: Today's Price on Cellular Phones In an ad in the Friday 10-9-92 {Washington Post}, Circuit City is selling a GE Transpak 5000 bag, rate $57.97, with Phone Company (Bell Atlantic) contract of 90 days. Paul Robinson -- TDARCOS@MCIMAIL.COM I alone am (stupid enough to be) responsible for these opinions. ------------------------------ Date: Mon, 12 Oct 92 08:53 EDT From: fmsys!macy@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu (Macy Hallock) Subject: Re: Cellular Interception in Private Talk Organization: The Matrix In article jrd5@po.cwru.edu writes: > In article louie@sayshell.umd.edu > (Louis A. Mamakos) writes: >> Why assert that conversations cannot easily be followed between cells? > Indeed, "someone" makes a suitcase for just this purpose. There is a company in CA that makes a modified Panasonic handheld cellular phone that does this and much more. Although its intended use is for law enforcement, its been used by a couple of cellular providers for diagnostic use. With a good enough antenna, this unit will track calls between cells. You can key in a phone number, ESN, channel number and lock on to a call, or you can scan calls and lock onto one as well. There was a provision for an external tape recorder, and provision for a DAT interface that would also record the data stream as well as audio was in development. Price of the unit was around $3500. It worked very well. I saw it demonstrated in the Washington D.C. area, and was thoroghly impressed. I almost bought one. I was also surprised at the content of some of the calls we picked up. Cellular encryption is available in D.C. from the carriers, and you'd think it would be used more that it apparently is. Some people never learn. Regards, Macy M Hallock Jr N8OBG 216.725.4764 macy@fmsystm.uucp macy@fmsystm.ncoast.org [No disclaimer, but I have no real idea what I'm saying or why I'm telling you] ------------------------------ End of TELECOM Digest V12 #774 ******************************