Happy Holidays from the staff of WBAI Pacifica Radio to all our members, listeners, and friends.
And many thanks again for your support, which makes our programming possible.
This is Valerie VanIsler, General Manager of the station, wishing you the blessings
of the season and a peaceful, productive new year from everyone at WBAI, your community
station which delivers news that really matters to you and to the world.
And you are listening to WBAI in New York.
It's just about nine o'clock now, and that means, since it's Wednesday night, it's time
for Off The Hook.
Off The Hook.
And good evening to one and all.
The program is Off The Hook.
My name's Emanuel Goldstein.
We're on until ten o'clock, talking about all kinds of fun and games in the world of
high tech and what we have to look forward to in this brand new year, the year of 1992,
the year that Western Europe becomes unified, the year that Eastern Europe becomes disunified,
and the year that we all continue to look for answers here in whatever this place is.
Well, some of the fun things that are going on that we've culled from various news reports
and newsletters and things like that.
Listen to this one.
Jean-Paul Barrett, a convict serving 33 years for forgery and fraud in a Pima County jail
in Tucson, Arizona, was released on December 13th, 1991 after receipt of a forged fax ordering his release.
Yes, it appears that a copy of a legitimate release order was altered to bear his name.
Apparently, no one noticed that the fax document lacked an originating phone number
or that there was no formal cover sheet.
The error was discovered when Barrett failed to show up for a court hearing.
The jail releases about 60 people each day and faxes have become standard procedure.
Sheriff Sergeant Rick Castigar has said procedures are being changed
so the error will not occur again.
That came from the San Francisco Chronicle of December 18th.
It's amazing. Even something as crude as a fax is enough to convince a lot of people that something is authentic.
And, you know, you can change that little phone number.
I don't know how many of you out there are familiar with faxes, have seen them,
but most faxes come with the phone number of the person who sent you the fax
as the top line of every page.
And what a lot of people don't seem to realize is that that's a programmable feature.
That's not the voice of God saying where that particular fax came from.
It's simply you typing in what your phone number is.
So if you were to put in, let's just say, Dan Quayle's phone number,
a lot of people would believe that the fax actually came from him.
It's that simple.
Yeah. All right.
Here's some news from overseas.
This comes from the Risks Digest.
A contributor from the Netherlands, Erling Christensen,
who was complaining about something that I think maybe we have a right to complain about here, too.
Let's do what they have to put up with.
In the Dutch telephone numbering plan,
all area codes starting with 06 were unused until a few years ago,
presumably reserved for future use.
When this empty can was finally opened,
well, it quickly turned into a can of worms.
You see, within the 06 prefix today,
you'll find toll-free services like our 800 numbers.
You'll find services carrying a surcharge,
like party lines, sex lines, things like our 900 numbers.
You'll find phone company known as PTT,
special services such as information,
fault reporting or repair service, time, weather, that kind of thing.
And you'll also find private and public companies and institutions
wanting a nationwide number.
And that's not all.
Since mid-1991, the nationwide emergency number is 0611.
So that little 06 area code has become quite popular for many different reasons.
Now, the first digit following the 06 does provide some classification.
For instance, 06-0 and 06-4 are the beginning of what are toll-free numbers,
equivalent of our 800 numbers.
But this is not consistent.
Obviously, 0611, the nationwide emergency number, is toll-free,
as you might assume.
But the number as such is not in the 06-0 or 06-4 number group.
Sound confusing? Yeah, well, that's part of the point here.
Now, the significance of the third digit is not widely publicized.
So, it's not obvious what the charge for a certain number will be
unless you study the subject rather carefully.
Now, many companies have programmed their PBXs,
private branch exchanges, phone systems, fax machines,
to disallow calling 06 numbers
because most of these have little or no relevance to the company.
And many carry rather heavy surcharges,
sort of like our companies here, blocking 900 numbers.
But by doing this, they've also blocked the 0611 emergency number.
Now, some companies have started to realize the problem
and have started to do something about it.
But obviously, the real problem is a bad numbering plan.
After all, an emergency number should really stand out from common numbers
and be grouped together with surcharge numbers.
And this person goes on to say that
he believes more standardization is called for in numbering.
After all, I travel quite a lot to several countries
and often have difficulty remembering the international prefix
when calling out from a particular country.
That's just one of the confusing things.
In this country, a lot of confusion also prevails.
When you pick up the phone these days,
you don't know if you're going to be charged some outrageous amount
for calling what looks like an innocent number.
For instance, how many people there know
how much a call to the 970 exchange will cost?
How many of you actually know that?
I've got an idea.
This will just take a moment to set up.
Let's see if we can get a straight answer.
A straight answer from a telephone company person.
All right, we're going to actually reach out
and call an operator using our magic dial tone.
And we'll see if we can get a reply to this.
Well, unfortunately, the BAI phone system has hung up on us again,
so we're going to try that one more time.
That happens far too frequently.
All right, I think it went through.
Can you telephone Rodriguez, may I help you, please?
Yes, hello, operator.
We're trying to find out how much a call to the 970 exchange costs.
A call to the 970 exchange costs?
970, you must contact the business office tomorrow
to verify the charges for those numbers.
What if I wanted to call tonight?
If you want to call tonight, sir, then you dial the number,
you'll be charged, and whatever it costs,
I assume you have to pay it, sir.
You don't have the rates for 974,
only the business office has that information.
974? I mean 970.
970.
Ah.
But I meant to say the business office has the numbers,
the rates for the 970 numbers.
So they're all different?
Different rates, I assume.
Yeah. Okay.
Would you know the 540 exchange?
What, the rates for those calls?
Yeah.
Rates?
Uh-huh.
No, sir.
You don't know that either?
No, see, those numbers are special numbers
that the business office has the rates for.
We do not have those rates.
I see.
I only have the rates for 976 numbers,
like the lotto or the time.
Right.
But not the other numbers that you're talking about, sir.
Okay.
Not even the 900 numbers.
I don't have that information.
Okay.
Thank you so much, anyway.
You're welcome.
Bye-bye.
They don't have that information.
Remember, the operator used to know everything.
You could call the operator and ask what the capital of Peru was
and they'd know.
But lately, when you call the operator,
they can't help you.
There's so much they cannot do.
Imagine not being able to tell you
how much a phone call costs.
I have to wait till tomorrow,
call the business office.
That's absurd.
So the problem that they're having over there in Holland
is the same problem
that we're having here in this country
as far as confusion goes.
You dial an 06 number
and you don't know for sure
what you're being connected to
and how much it's going to cost
unless you really understand
how those numbers are put together.
Same thing with our 900 numbers,
970 numbers, 540 numbers
and 550 numbers.
And the last three, by the way,
are only within New York.
You folks in New Jersey,
I can't help you.
You folks in Connecticut, sorry.
You might have some special exchanges there
that charge a certain amount
and I know there's lots of places
in the country where
people's home phone numbers
begin with 970 or 540
or 550.
Think nothing of it.
But if you call a number like that here,
you better know
what you're getting into.
Now 976 is another story
because that's your mass announcement
service
that uniformly charges you
36 cents per call
which in itself
is a bit of a rip-off but
you may not know this.
If you run down to your local pay phone
it will only cost you a quarter
and nobody knows why.
Another thing that perhaps
you could also point out
as long as we're talking about
running down to your local pay phone
while you have to pay outrageous amounts
for every call to information
I believe it's 40 cents for local information
and 60 maybe even 65 cents
for national information
if you run down to your local pay phone
and I mean your local New York telephone pay phone
not one of those
other pay phones that
do all kinds of unpredictable things
it doesn't cost anything
within the
local area meaning
516, 212, 718
914
and soon 917
that's right 1992
will bring a new area code into
the New York metropolitan area
the 917 area code
and also the Bronx
you folks in the Bronx
you'll be moving to 718
we'll be happy to have you aboard
in the 718 area code
but 917 will be
the most unusual area code
in the whole country
never before has an area code
been devoted exclusively
to beepers
and cellular phone calls
and other technological things
that don't involve
real human beings
or some such thing
so that's something we have to look forward to
this year
another thing that just happened
I believe it was only a week ago
and this is very unfortunate
for folks like us
for years
it was possible to call overseas
information
and not be charged
for that call
because it was so complicated
they only knew who to charge what
and how to collect or anything like that
they figured it all out
they've managed to impose
a $1.50 charge for every call
to overseas information
and mind you, you cannot call overseas information directly
you have to go through an operator
and often times
you won't even get the information you were asking for
but that won't stop them
from charging you
so keep that in mind
however, I am told that
if you go through MCI
there still is no charge
for overseas information
you have to dial 10222
followed by a zero
to get the operator
unless you already have MCI
in which case you would just dial 00
and you ask them for
overseas information
for the particular city and country you want
they're a bit more annoying though
because they insist on staying on the line
and doing all the talking themselves
but what are you going to do?
ok, a couple more things
some in studio and out of studio guests
and phone calls
and other fun things like that
according to the AP
on December 18, 1991
18 private investigators
and social security administration employees
in 9 states
were charged
with buying and selling
confidential data
from SSA
and FBI computers
the information included
criminal histories
and criminal records
I imagine they added
themselves to that database
the private investigators
many advertising in legal journals
sold the information to companies
and if convicted on all counts
the defendants faced
sentences of up to 150 years
and multimillion dollar fines
that's right
your data is being sold now
and
an unverified report indicates
that a German private detective agency
that was thought to be operated
by former Stasi members
bought a computer database
containing the names and salaries
of 97,058
members of the Stasi
in 1989
for those that don't know
Stasi is the East German
secret police
the detective agency
then pressed charges
against the computer specialist
who sold them the information
the charges are not indicated
although they may be
under the strict West German
privacy laws
if so Stasi support for privacy
is new
in addition to that
prying into the lives of
East German citizens
the Stasi had agents
actively hacking into West German systems
including Berlin's
driver's license agency
that comes to us from
Sanford Sherazin
off the Risks Digest
and finally
something out of England
from Nick Rothwell
there's another phone company in England
it's called Mercury Communications
number two to British Telecom
and this concerns
what we started out with
outgoing fax numbers
Mercury offers an
alternative long distance telephone network
which is available to ordinary users
who have the standard British Telecom
connections
and which offers improved itemized billing
lower costs all kinds of things like that
and this is implemented by issuing
Mercury users
a long personal identification number
which represents their account
and which is known
only by the user
very much like
bank card pins only
much longer
Mercury calls
are made from standard British Telecom phones
by dialing a special prefix
followed by
the secret
Mercury pin
doesn't that sound ominous
the secret Mercury pin
and then the real phone number
see the problem yet?
I can't send teleport faxes this way
because the destination fax number
is printed on the cover page
and this is not like what we were talking about before
this is actually
this is not user programmable
this simply reads off whatever it is that you dial
and since part of what you dial is your pin number
that gets read into it as well
the system doesn't know to distinguish
between the pin
and the actual phone number
so
that includes my Mercury pin
which could be compromised by any
fax that I sent using it
this is a serious drawback I'll say
and also a serious indication
of how little thinking goes into some of these things
and that's pretty much
what's been going on
in our exciting world over the past couple of weeks
what do we have to look forward to
in the weeks and months
and year to come
1992
as more technological advances
are introduced
as more hackers
find themselves living under the gun
as the government
steps up efforts
to catch
and prosecute people
that are asking too many questions
and doing things that they don't think is proper
we have two guests with us today
and we'll be taking your phone calls
also at 212-279-3400
on the telephone with us
hopefully still awake from Amsterdam
is Rob the editor of Hacktic
hello there
hi you're there and you have a static connection I understand
well I have a little bit of a static connection
but I could pick up another phone hang on
ok
this is better right?
yes and I imagine over there there's no shortage of telephones
well in this place there's plenty yeah go on
ok we also have with us
here in the studio FiberOptic
hacker extraordinaire I suppose
let me make sure that microphone is working there
hello there
ah yes ok
and he is right here in New York City
so we have kind of a meeting of the minds here
so Rob what is your take
on the year that just went by
and what is lying in wait
for us in 1992
let me first tell the folks that Amsterdam
is one of the last remaining places
where computer hackers are not seen
it's actually encouraged in a way
is it not
well encouraged is a strong sentence
they are thinking about making it illegal here as well
although there has been some opposition to that
it's quite funny to see
that the American authorities
at least part of them
are fairly pissed off about the fact
that it's not illegal here
the FBI was said to be less than amused
when they came to the Dutch authorities
with the request to
catch somebody that they had traced
as playing with their military
computer systems
I see
and they were basically told
that there was no law against it
and there was not much that the Dutch authorities could do for them
now this is the first
incursion of 1991
into the military systems correct
oh there's been
constant breaking
into American systems
not just military but anything that was funny enough to do
right I mean the first
publicized one
because there were two if you recall
two publicized ones in 91
I think there was one that was in 90 still
but yeah there could be
I don't really keep tabs
okay I was trying to clarify which ones
they're interested in anyway
I have some interesting information
from 1990 still
do you okay well sometimes it takes information
a couple of years to get to us
so tell us what you have
well this is a document that comes from
Lawrence Livermore Laboratories
and although they don't say that
it's not real but they say that they
distance themselves from the people that
wrote it and from the document itself
in other words it's from Lawrence Livermore
Laboratories it's from their computer
security department but they
themselves would rather not have written this
article in the present time
um
that's a good lead in let's hear what
they have to say now
it's a long story
I only have one page of it
the page that leaked out that everybody has
more or less and the document
describes break-ins into military computer
systems among which the
Lawrence Livermore Laboratory computer systems
and then it goes on
to say our hacker sources
claim that two Dutch
individuals ROP
alias Ron Honkleib which is me
and another guy that I know but I'm not
really familiar with are principal
players in these attacks although
there may be as many as 12 hackers involved
Honkleib is allegedly a contributor
or co-editor of Hacktake a magazine
for hackers in Amsterdam
he is linked with the second set of attacks
he is the individual who allegedly
has bragged about his ability to break
into the Autovan system
army intelligence describes him
as hardened and capable of making
considerable trouble
in one electronic conversation
two months ago with a system manager at the
University of Chicago a person
identifying himself as Ron
claimed that he has spent one year in jail
three days ago the FBI
informed me that Honkleib is an alias
Honkleib is
according to our hacker sources
presently this is the summer of 1990
in the United States
on business
actually at that particular time I believe we were
traveling around California together weren't we
yes we were we were sitting in a car driving
around California and Mexico
but this source said that I was on business
you weren't supposed to say that
now the funny part is at the end of this document
where it says
Rob if I could just break in here
we weren't in Mexico because we weren't supposed to take that rented car
into Mexico if you remember
ah yeah ok no we weren't
our hacker sources have informed us
that both individuals
so me and the other guy
have had a substantial increase in standard of living
over the last few months
both are said for example
to travel more frequently
and now travel first class
well that's quite an improvement
yes it is
especially since that flight I took to you
was like
lower than standby
it was like you're flying Turkish Airlines
out of Belgium
yeah and I believe they even spat on you at one point
sorry?
they even spat upon you at one point on that airline
that's how low you were in the rungs
oh yeah yeah it's real funny
the German magazines are paying Dutch hackers
and they are not
publishing anything of it
because they are not really in it for the publishing
they're just funneling money
for the Iraqi
intelligence
now where do these people get their information
any idea about that?
well it says our hacker sources
it basically
wherever they say something that's really outrageous
it says anonymous sources
make believe sources
I'm in the phone book here
but it's my real name
and they say here
three days ago the FBI informed me that
Gronkheip is an alias
now the FBI is pretty stupid
I will not say anything about that
but
I think they could find somebody on the planet
if he was in the phone book
well that's true but
keep in mind it is a foreign country
and sometimes they get disoriented
that's true
but I mean it's like
a picture
they've heard a few things from here and there
and they've made their own nice picture to go with it
I mean if you can prove
that you have Iraqi spies in your computers
it's a lot more interesting
and it brings in a lot more money and extra knowledge
than if you can prove that some kids are
hanging around in your computer and having a party in there
so are you saying Lawrence Livermore
would somehow benefit from this?
well
I would say so
you benefit because
you are more important
it's easier, you benefit because
you keep your status
I mean there's not much you can do against
ultra high tech teenagers
that are paid by the Iraqis to do damage
to your computer system
it's something else if some kids
from the suburbs are having fun in your computer system
you're supposed to stop that
most interesting
I should say we've got FiberOptic with us
in the studios here, he's no stranger to
defamation of character
by various anonymous sources
any comments on what
Rob has been telling us?
it's not surprising that
people from such an organization or organizations
would fabricate such nonsense
since the fall
of the so called evil empire
being the Soviet Union
I think the American government is eager
to find a
new scapegoat to point the finger at
because if they're not constantly
reminding who the bad guy is
to the general public
then they might just snap out of it
and really realize that the bad guy
is the government
that's quite an observation
what do you think of that Rob?
I'm grabbing the lousy mouthpiece again
because some other people are trying to hear the phone here
I'll grab the other one
oh this is really, yeah this is much better
um
yeah that's true, it's completely
true that things are being fabricated
and they are being fabricated to keep
a machine intact
and the machine
has trouble admitting that some parts of it
have no knowledge whatsoever about computers
let alone about computer security
well it's um
it's difficult for us to
a lot of us who are just entering into
this particular field
the field of computers, telephones
that kind of thing, to think of
government agents
um
constantly looking at us
and interrogating us
and writing memos about us
and that kind of thing
why are they so concerned
with the actions of people that are really just
interested in learning how things work
well because if you admit
that such people are inside your computer system
it means that you've done something wrong
and big companies that make their money off
thinking that they are trustworthy
like defense contractors
don't want the image of kids
hanging around in their computer system
even if that's exactly what's happening
you run a multi-million dollar defense contractor
I do?
suppose you do
and then these kids hang out in your computer system
or just anybody can hang out in your computer system
because it's not protected well
you have two options, either you write a memo
saying well it's just a bunch of people
that wanted to learn about how our system worked
or you write a memo that says
well it's Iraqi secret agents
and they're out to destroy all of society
so they kind of take the blame off themselves
by doing that
but in the process they make a very scary situation
sure
I mean if somebody anywhere
believes all this nonsense that's written about me
I am an Iraqi agent
with a very high standard of living
that flies first class
and that brags about breaking
the Audubon network
and was in jail for a year
you would know if you were in jail for a year
would you not?
I must have been hella stoned if I didn't remember that
now
over there in Holland
is there any kind of conception of what it's like
to be woken up at gunpoint
by federal agents as we are here in this country
simply for tapping into a computer system
or making a few phone calls
without paying for them
does that kind of thing ever happen over there?
authority misbehaves
anywhere
it's just a matter of proportions
I think it happens less here
but it happens
there's been the case at Radio 100
a Dutch or Amsterdam radio station
that was raided a couple months ago
under article 140
which is an infamous article
in our law that says
that it's illegal to participate
in an association
that has as its
in this case was making radio
that has been considered
a crime many times
around here
I know that a lot of people
feel that way about BAI but
it's also called freedom of speech
yeah yeah of course
authorities misbehave
anywhere and if you bother them
enough if you're enough of a pain in the ass
they will come after you
it's just that in some systems it's easier than in others
ok Rob I want to get a prediction from you
as to what's going to happen in the future over there
then we're going to go to some phone calls
if you want my hopes
I'd say
things are going to stay as they were
a year ago
if you want my predictions
things are basically changing into one Europe
politically as well
even though people aren't noticing it very much
and if that's going to happen
if that's going to continue
it's not going to be good for Holland
now what exactly does the EC mean
for an open society
like Holland
how open will you be able to remain
as a unified part
of a bigger nation
in effect
well that all depends on how much power
the central European government is going to get
for now they're planning on a complete
European governmental structure
that has all sorts of authorities
but they haven't even planned
a real European parliament
there is a parliament
but it doesn't have any real power
so they're planning on a complete new layer
on our
government
and they haven't planned on any democratic controls
on it so it's really
not travelling in the right direction
here that's for sure
considering this is the year that it's going to be taking effect
how could they not have planned for this yet
well the year that the first step
is really going into effect
is the 1st of January 1993
that's when the borders actually
disappear this is just the year
that they've chosen as the symbol year
but really not much is going to happen
in the course of this year
and one European currency is going to happen
from 1997 onwards
the ECU
this is just the beginning
from this year on a number of
regulations will go into effect
it's going to move slower than most people think
do you think there's any kind of positive thing
can Holland's way of
looking at things be perhaps spread to other
countries so that they'll live a little bit more openly
as well
I doubt it, I doubt it, I hope so but I doubt it
alright let me
ask FiberOptic the same question
if you have any
thoughts on what lies ahead
then we'll go to the phones
I should start off with
a somewhat interesting story in brief
and that's that on
December 6th 1991
I was awoken
at about 11 o'clock in the morning
by two men
pointing automatic pistols at my head
claiming to be FBI
agents and
they were rather jumpy at that
and once they had
secured the fact that I didn't have any weapons
on me, I don't know how many people sleep with weapons
but they threw me
a pair of jeans and escorted me
downstairs
and basically I was confined
to my couch for a period
of about three hours while they
proceeded to clear me out of all my valuable
possessions and no reason
was ever given of why they were
there and what I was accused of doing
they left a copy of the search
warrant that they had gotten
and they left a copy of all the things
that they had taken from me which are valued at
many hundreds of dollars
actually a couple of thousands of dollars
and there was no reason ever given
it's as if
all the people that have been complaining
about the authorities
overstepping their bounds
it's as if these organizations weren't even
paying attention ever
because the exact same things
seem to have happened all over again. I know on this program
numerous times we've
asked the question why is it
necessary for authorities to
point the gun at somebody who's
accused of being a computer hacker
when there has never been a case of
computer hackers ever
having a firearm in the first place
or any kind of weapon or even resisting
anything in any way
so the response to this was to use two guns
on the latest series of raids
Well you'd probably be surprised
if you saw some of the propaganda
which was just a small sample of what
Ropp was saying that was fabricated
about him. There's
some horrible propaganda that's
circulated and recirculated concerning
hackers and
if what all these people
all these organizations are saying is true
then they are justified
to point guns at people
but what they're forgetting is the fact
that they're making up the propaganda
and they're using it to their advantage
This is
indeed scary stories
to be telling and we actually
mentioned that a couple of weeks
ago what happened on
December 6th having happened
to a bunch of people around the country
we had one system operator who had his entire
next computer system
taken because he allegedly
committed the crime of having a hacker
have an account on
his system. In other words, he wasn't accused of anything
he was simply accused of
allowing somebody to be on his system
and for that he lost everything to the
federal government and we have
all kinds of other instances of
abuses, people
being ordered not to speak Spanish
in their home when that's the language
that they speak in their home because it made the FBI agents
nervous, other people having
personal property intentionally
destroyed in front of them just to
aggravate them some more and taunt them
I suppose. All kinds of other
things as well. This was the first
coordinated raid between the
Secret Service and the FBI
and it does not portend
well for the future
A lot of people out there might wonder
why should they care
about what happens to a bunch of computer
nerds. What is
in it for them?
There's always a first step to something
and if the first step is against those people
that have figured out how
the system works and aren't afraid
to ask questions and persist
in finding those answers
you have to wonder
where that is going to lead us
and that's why we need your support
we need people's support that are not
hackers themselves but understand
the danger of such
actions against people that
really are just in for
free speech, freedom of information
no hacker has ever
been found to have
sold secrets and
profited and done
evil things that you would expect people to do
I'm sure there's people out there that would do that
but for the most part hackers are simply interested
in learning. Yes, one more comment
here. Yes, I'd like to make one quick comment
and that was going along with what Rob had
said earlier about
his document relating to the fact that
they had gotten information
propaganda type information from
their hacker sources
I'd just like to make a quick comment about that
and that's the fact that
unlike Europe, America is plagued
with many people who
I wouldn't call them hackers, the only thing
even coming close is that they own
a computer and a modem which doesn't say very much
but these people
or youngsters
whichever term you want to choose
think that if they can get in good with
the other side that they'll be free
to do what they wish
well they're going to be surprised to find out that this is
not the case and I'd like some of these
individuals to keep in mind
that I know who they are
and they should remember that and consider
what they do in the future
because sooner or later things will come to light
Yes, it's interesting
one of the first, in fact the very first
issue of 2600 that came out back in
January 1984
almost 10 years old by the way
was to
reveal somebody that was doing
just that and I refer to
John Maxfield who was known as
Cable Pair operating out of Detroit
he was an FBI informant and he
had been a very trusted hacker for so
long but
he, as Fiber has told us
was one of those people
that thought they were going
to gain something
by doing
this horrendous thing
of entrapping
kids that were curious about learning
something, getting them onto computer systems
and getting them to talk
freely and openly and all the time
recording what they were saying, writing down
everything and using it all against them and
hauling them into federal court
it didn't do them any good
it didn't do them any good at all because
the federal government never trusted him
and he was never
he never profited in any way
by
being a double agent so to say
it's not that there's
we're talking about spies
here, we're simply talking about
curious people that
are not being trusted or encouraged
in any way, that's something that we see
a lot different in Holland
the
atmosphere is just a lot healthier
and I think
we can learn something from that
hopefully 92 will be the year that we learn something
okay let's go to some phone calls now
because we do have a full switchboard
and I don't want to hog the whole hour here
and let our listeners get in a little bit
279-3400 is our telephone number
we've got FiberOptic in the studio
Rob from Amsterdam over there
in Holland and let's see who's out there
good evening
I'd like to make a point about the fact
that just because the numericalness
changes from 1991
to 1992
doesn't mean that there's any kind of
abruptness of change of life
there could be
in a way
they could have waited for the Russian thing to happen exactly
December 31st
into January 1st of the new year
but the thing about it is that
it seems that
the human
creature, there's like
one of those bell shaped curves
and most of them think that
this is some sort of a great phenomenon
you know what I mean?
It's just 365 continued again
another 365 or so
and it doesn't really
have that significance
to rally and get
excited if the people would put their energies
to teaching others to read
and how to fish or whatever
to make life better
than to show a kind of feigned
enthusiasm for
something that
may just be a numerical
jumping up of one digit
well that's really true
the new year is a complete human thing
since we're talking to people
overseas in Holland
I always have the best feeling about
the Netherlands but of course I'm sure
that there's a negative side to it
but we have to be one world now
we have to think in terms that
we have to in a sense plan because we don't want
pollution coming on our heads
we have to plan for working together
in harmony that everyone
is shall we say a happy
flower you know what I mean?
a happy organism
a happy human being
well I couldn't have said it better myself
and I don't think I would have wanted to
good evening
hey how you doing?
yeah I am
yes I am
hey you guys I was going to call up
tonight and bug about the
local service competition but I guess you got off on
something about hacker raids and I got a couple of interesting data points
you're not in Berkeley now are you?
no I'm in New York visiting friends
oh I didn't know that okay go ahead
anyway let's see well first of all
my mom listens to right wing radio WABC
and some commentator was on there
talking about the idea that there's a study
that's been conducted based on some things that happened in Europe
where they're planning to start going to
the use of fines instead of jail sentences
as a means of punishing certain types of offenders
particularly non-violent ones like white collar
criminals and I presume that they would say that
kids who are too curious about computers fall into that category
well what do you do with
those poor kids that are too curious
you know we see a lot of computer
hackers these days that fall under
the high income
a lot of computer hackers in the early days
were high income kids but now you see a lot
of lower income kids that are finally getting
into it and I see sort of
a coinciding
with the really heavy sentencing
now that these kids are getting involved
you know people haven't started to go to jail
Robert Morris never went to jail
he came from an upper class family and all that
but now that you have some of the
Main Street America kids getting involved
all of a sudden huge fines
long jail sentences, do you see a connection?
Well sure but see what they're talking about
is an escalating structure but then an escalating
fine structure but the other thing is
all this business about confiscating computers
where those computers ultimately end up is in the police department
headquarters being used. It's a revenue measure
and the thing that we've really got to watch out for here
is that the government is going to start taking advantage
of civil forfeits and other things as a revenue
enhancement measure to get themselves
things that they need or money that they need
because they can't get it from the
taxpayers
so I guess that's thing number one
which was kind of interesting to bring up tonight. Thing number two
I seem to have forgotten so on to thing number three
local service competition
they're talking about having competing phone
companies here for local dial tone and
what I start to see happening here is before the end
of 1992 we're going to see the beginning
of redlining of poor neighborhoods
to the point where neighborhoods that
you've got a lot of residence customers, a lot of people on
welfare, lifeline subscribers
hey why bother taking over those switches
just hand them off to 9x or whoever it might be
and let the rates go through the ceiling
Sort of like what we have with co-cots right now
Right exactly like what we've got with co-cots
because the co-cots in the poor neighborhoods will say
no incoming calls. Well
a lot of these people don't have phones in their houses
so they'll call someone and leave a message on the answering machine
and say call me back and wait around the phone
and then they can't get the call coming in
and I think we're going to start seeing that
you know it's like I was hoping to see if we can
it sounded as if, whoops
I've got a bad phone here
I didn't have any other debates going on tonight
to get you guys on the subject of
on the subject of local competition because I know it's a
it tends to be a consensus
in the community that people are in favor of that
but lately I've been coming more and more
to think that maybe the bell system
you know there were some aspects of the bell system
here you go with the big heresy that the bell system wasn't as bad
as some of us were afraid it was in some ways
well of course it worked a whole lot better
than it does now because people weren't all that
confused but what would you call
something along the lines of mandatory
competition in other words
every company has to serve every area
and allow service to be installed
wherever it's requested
well I wouldn't mind that as a matter of fact because what I'm trying to do
is retain the structure under which
you can still have long distance rates
paying for local service
in other words once you unbundle the cost which is a big thing
they're pressing for these days
what suddenly happens is the cost of local service
is the highest component of the telephone service
altogether because you don't have things like
multiplex carriers and stuff that your lay people
out there won't understand but anyway
and so if local service rises
that red lines
a lot of poor people out of the pool
entirely in fact
in Connecticut Southern New England Telephone did a survey
and found out that poor black families use the telephone
black families
below the poverty line use the telephone
with ten times as much local service usage
as white families in the same category
and poor families generally use the telephone
a whole lot more than rich families do
or middle class families do
and what I'm afraid of here is sort of an
information age class structure
which basically excludes
a lot of these people totally disenfranchises them
so if there's some way under a regulatory
structure to sort of force
these carriers to
provide the same grade of service
now I've talked to people in the Bell system about this
and they say oh sure there will always be some kind of lifeline plan
but maybe they won't get full featured
service well what does that mean does that mean commercials
between the rings which is another thing that someone's proposing
now does that mean someone just got a patent
for a device that puts commercial messages between the rings
while you're waiting for the phone to answer
I knew that would happen sooner or later
yeah I was predicting that stuff back in the early part of the last decade
but you know is it going to mean that
is it going to mean they can't have call blocking
is it going to mean that they are subject to additional
you know what kind of
how are we going to cripple the service
are we going to not allow them to use modems
I really see the makings of a monster out there
yeah very good points there
very good points listen George we're going to have to move on because we have a whole
lot of calls here
but it's good hearing from you
yeah you too I'm going to be in town until Saturday
I wonder if there's a way we can get together or something like that
oh call me at the office I'm sure we can work something out
oh in fact there's a very good way there's a 2600 meeting this Friday
you should come to it
I definitely will give me the number over there
okay well I don't have a phone number for 2600 meetings
I have a phone number for 2600 if that's what you mean
which is 516-751-2600
but for those interested in going to the 2600 meeting
which is basically a gathering of hackers
and people that are you know
considered strange in mainstream society
it happens at the city core center
in the lobby area by the pay phones
where else
between the hours of 5 and 8pm
that's this Friday
at city core center 53rd street
and Lexington Avenue
so hopefully we'll see people there
before I sign off Rob call me next week in Berkeley sometime
I'll be back in Berkeley then
I will thanks a lot I'll see you guys around
okay take care
bye
well we have a lot more calls
so we're going to try to race through them as quickly as possible
good evening
yeah hi
how you doing
I'm on the ER right
you certainly are go ahead
I am just barely getting into what's known as
a multi-level marketing setup
of a competitor of AT&T on long distance rates
and I had
contact with a person from Miami
who does a tremendous amount of phone calls
to a South American country
couple of things he says
first of all between the high usage time period
12 to 2
he has tried other competitors
of AT&T he finds AT&T to be
unsurpassed in quality and service
they still 10 years after deregulation
have a lion's share about 75%
of the market
and he claims that when he used Sprint
or MCI that he would get
the markets are busy during the peak period
that's one thing the other thing was when I suggested
he try just one phone line
as to set it up
and see what kind of quality my company could give
him he says well AT&T could
make it difficult for him and
he was implying some kind of retribution
that he really didn't get into
really
if you know of anything like that
well I don't know of AT&T really doing
any kind of you know
retribution for switching your lines
just that they might
make somebody feel uncomfortable
about shifting saying that there will be
charges for coming back that their service
might not be as good but
certainly if they came back afterwards
I don't think there would be any
hard feelings I don't know
does anybody here have any different stories
apparently not
and as far as the circuits being busy during peak periods
does AT&T have larger
volume abilities to go into foreign countries
well I'm sure they have the lion's share
both of the marketplace and the
technological capability but that's
something that's not going to remain that way forever
there's you see there's a lot of
hesitation towards going into South
American countries and also Middle Eastern
countries reason being that it
tends to be and you know it's just the
way that the phone companies perceive it there tends
to be a lot of fraudulent calls made to those places
in fact you cannot
use your AT&T calling card
to call lots of those countries as well
for instance say the Dominican Republic
hundreds of thousands of dollars
in you know illegal calls
made on people's credit cards so
they block all calling cards to that
kind of biting off your nose to
spite your face kind of thing
so that might be a reason why those
countries aren't moving in there
the perception apparently if they do have
75% of the market how do you break
the business man's perception that AT&T
can deliver
the service and the quality whereas MCI
or Sprint or even the smaller carriers cannot
well the real way to do
it is to get a good relationship
with the company so that
when something goes wrong
you can speak to somebody and not get the
royal run around like we do with so many
companies that
have sprung up
you might actually be better off with a
smaller company than Sprint
or MCI as well because
they'll adjust themselves rather than
having you adjust yourself to meet their
needs so
basically experiment because
this is a prime time for experimentation
there's all kinds of different services out there
you might be the first person to find something that
really works and then obviously you'll tell
more people and you'll be
very valuable to them just as they'll be valuable
to you and then I'll become rich and I'll no longer
have to listen to WBAI well you can always listen
but we'll just hit
on you a little harder at pledge time
alright thanks for calling
it is a good time though that line didn't sound
very good I wonder if he was using AT&T
well unless it was a local call
then it's all New York Telephone's fault
but you know it's a good time for experimentation
for trying something different
you know I've found lots of things that way just by
you know if you stick with the
mainstream all the time I think that's what we always say
here on this radio station if you stick with the mainstream
you're never going to learn anything right and yeah
you'll have bad experiences too but at least
you'll learn something does that make sense
Rob? yeah it makes sense
but it's kind of funny to
think of the phone system
as something that has to be commercial
something that has to be
they're doing it here too the
PTT Telecom
is now a company it used to be
just another ministry
just another telecommunications ministry
sort of it used to resort under
traffic and waterways
and it was another
just another part of the bureaucracy
that happened to be into phones
and now this world trend seems
to be to make everything
profitable and to get rid of everything that is not
profitable
for example I live in a house somewhere
and there's a road next to my house and they decide
to take it away
because it's not profitable
people should look at the
telephone system as something more like a
road than like a
luxury of sorts it's essential
and an infrastructure but the funny
thing is that
the way roads are built and where they run
and how they run and how white
they are and how much you pay to
drive on them everything
of that sort is determined
by parts of our democracy if things
are running well I mean
parts of our democracy decide where those
roads will be there's democratic control
on how and when and why
and yet there's very little if any democratic
control on where new phone lines are going
to be who gets what services
that's all done on a
on a what is
profitable basis that doesn't
work you can't build infrastructure
as in what is profitable
I think a lot of people see the way that it is
and think that it can never be changed that they
don't really have a say but that's really not true
because once something changes in one part of
the country and it works
it tends to catch on in other parts
so if we can change the rules somehow
who knows it might catch on
but we'll never know if we don't try
I want to race through a couple more calls so let's see if we can do it
good evening
hi am I on the air? yes go ahead please
well first of all don't think that I have any
sympathy for large corporations
that you break into or military establishments
or any of that stuff
but you do seem to not
accept the fact that breaking into
and looking around information
in somebody else's property
is a crime I don't know whether it is a crime
in America or not but
do you understand the rationale
of FBI agents
when they break in I mean why they're
sent to do that
maybe fiber optic would like to take that one
perhaps you can explain why they need heavy
firearms in order to break into
someone's house sure that's
unnecessary but
the point is
you understand why they're pissed
that you're doing that I think
they're pissed because they don't understand
and what the federal government does not
understand makes them afraid
and I have
another question
sure maybe none of you guys
have any contact with anybody
who wants to buy information
but don't you think it's
likely that anybody or any
country that would want to
get this information
would approach somebody like
yourselves who
has the skill to break in
I certainly believe that's possible what is the solution
to that to lock all of us up or to
improve the safeguards and learn
something from those people that have
got nothing to hide and are not
the country or the establishment in any way
right now they're making a lot of
enemies
I'm not saying that laws are made
for public good but they're made for
order I'm not saying that's good
but it's an order that's imposed
and if it's a crime
to break into a computer system
and get that knowledge
then you're saying
what do you expect them to do to lock us up
if you commit a crime in society
then there's a punishment
Rob it sounds like you want to say something over there
yeah well the thing
the thing is that
it's all a matter of how you conceive it
if you conceive it as a crime
and parts of the American authorities do
then you must lock people up
for sure
but it's not seen as much as a crime here
but the thing that all the laws
against computer crime have in common
is that they all go out of the idea
that you have already done the worst thing
to your information that you could have
which again goes out of the idea
that they don't know what you could have done
read any
read any
government piece about any computer
break in and they all say
this hacker could have done so and so
if somebody
breaks into a building and just looks around
and goes out again sure he may get a slap
on the wrist he may even get
arrested or anything but they will
never in his
in the papers for the
god how do you call that
um
where he gets arrested
they will never say this person could have
thrown a bomb in there
this person could have set the place on fire
they just say well this person was in there
but you don't accept that hacking is a crime of any sort
well in this
country it is not
and in the USA do you guys
well there's a big division
here obviously law enforcement people believe it
is a crime and obviously a lot of us believe
that it should not be considered a crime at least
not a serious crime if it
is in fact a crime at all I'm sorry we're going to have
to end it there because we've run over
I want to thank Rob over there in Amsterdam
and FiberOptic for coming into here
in New York all the callers that called in
and everybody else who was listening
that's going to just about do it
for us here tonight
for Off The Hook
stay tuned for the personal computer show
I'm Emanuel Goldstein we'll be back again next Wednesday night
at 9 o'clock