Okay, very humble beginnings. However, I think most professional astronomers would think
that there is a definite decoupling between events and the motion of planets, though in
fact the President of the United States apparently believed in astrology for most of his presidency.
Well unfortunately, that's all we have time left in exploration. This is Dr. Michio Kaku,
Professor of Theoretical Physics here at the Graduate Center of the City University of
New York, advising you to tune in every Wednesday evening from 8 o'clock to 9 o'clock when we
discuss the world of science, as well as issues concerning war, peace, and the environment.
This is Dr. Michio Kaku for Radio WBAI 99.5 FM, broadcasting from the Empire State Building.
Good evening.
Trying to buy your attention with big dollar contest promotions? No, sir! You'll never hear me stooping so low as to give away loads of cash.
But what you will hear is nothing you'd ever expect. We play fabulous rock and roll. Other stations are afraid might get their listeners to start freethinking again.
Whoa! That would be a real tune-out factor for those flaming media pigs like K-Rock and WNEW where rock lives on respirators.
But on the Bernie Fleschken Show, you'll meet the likes of show waitress Dixie Lilly, chanteuse Vanessa Tease, The Missing Link, Aries Guy, and America's latent superhero, Captain Fabulous, in his yellow ribbon cape.
And even celebrities like Elvis and Johnny Cash. So tune into the Bernie Fleschken Show on WBAI on the first Monday morning of every month at 9.30.
It's a rock and roll comedy adventure you won't soon forget. Just ask the FCC. That's the first Monday morning of every month at 9.30 on free speech, listener-sponsored, hey buddy, gotta dime radio, WBAI.
Who loves you, sweetheart? Ciao, muchachos!
Let's celebrate the end of the membership drive and the beginning of fall together at the next WBAI Sunday Brunch.
Yet again, on October 4th, for just $12, you can dine and chat with some of New York's most interesting people, including Andrew Phillips, Anthony Sloan, Lauren Comiteau, and more.
And who more, you ask? Well, you'll have to join us at Bernard's at 145 Avenue C at 11.30 a.m. or 1 p.m. That's Sunday, October 4th, for the WBAI Sunday Brunch.
For reservations, call Bernard's at 212-614-9395. That's 212-614-9395. We'll see you on Sunday for the next WBAI Sunday Brunch.
And this is radio station WBAI in New York. The time is 9.01, and that means we're one minute late for Off The Hook.
The telephone keeps ringing, so I ripped it off the wall. I cut myself while shaving, now I can't make a call.
It couldn't get much worse, but if they could, they would. Bundy Lee Ball, for the best, expect the worst. I hope that's understood. Bundy Lee Ball!
And a good evening to one and all. This is Off The Hook, and this is Emmanuel Goldstein. We'll be together for the next hour.
And tonight we'll be, among other things, taking listener phone calls for the first time in about two months, I think.
It's been quite some time, and I'm sorry about that, but all kinds of interesting things have been going on.
We've had the marathon, we've had other pre-recorded programs, but tonight we are here live and ready for questions, comments, observations, experiences, things like that.
And we've got some of our own here to share with you, so stay tuned. The number is 279-3400. It's area code 212.
And when you die, they never seem to hear even your cry. So as sure as the sun will shine, I'm gonna get my share now, what's mine.
And then the harder they come, the harder they'll fall, one and all. Ooh, the harder they come, the harder they'll fall, one and all.
Well, the oppressors are trying to keep me down, trying to drag me underground, and they think that they have got the battle won.
I say forgive them, Lord, they know not what they've done, cause as sure as the sun will shine, I'm gonna get my share now, what's mine.
And then the harder they come, the harder they'll fall, one and all. Ooh, the harder they come, the harder they'll fall, one and all.
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And I keep on fighting for the things I want, though I know that when you're dead you can't.
But I'd rather be a free man in my grave than living as a puppet or a slave. So as sure as the sun will shine, I'm gonna get my share now, what's mine.
And then the harder they come, the harder they'll fall, one and all. Ooh, the harder they come, the harder they'll fall, one and all.
Hey, the harder they come, the harder they'll fall, one and all.
What I say now, what I say now.
The people have to have free time. The people have to have free time.
What I say now, what I say one time.
The harder they come, the harder they'll fall, one and all. Ooh, the harder they come, the harder they'll fall, one and all.
Receiver off the hook, please hang up.
Receiver off the hook, please hang up.
You just don't get any worse sound quality than that, do you?
Well, anyway, that's what happens if you leave your phone off the hook here at BAI. You get all kinds of static.
Ooh.
Among other things.
Let's fade that one gracefully down.
Well, we've had some rather interesting reports floating into this program as far as various odd occurrences that have been going on,
and other strange things involving the world of technology and telephones and you name it.
I'm sure there's plenty of stories out there. We're going to be getting to those. 212-279-3400 is our phone number.
And we've got a couple of things to share right away.
Let's take a look at this story. It comes out of Germany.
Actually, I brought this one back with me from Germany because I happen to know the people involved.
But computer hackers have dealt telephone banking a ringing setback.
Don't you love the way they write these things?
In Germany, after tapping into a Barclays Bank credit card hotline and sifting through confidential customer details,
Barclays had to shut down its free answering service when hackers gave details of their actions to the news magazine Der Spiegel.
They said they had easily cracked the passcode. The passcode was 888.
And they figured that out. They cracked it, and they got in, and they were able to access the information that had been stored
through a voicemail system linked to an answering machine.
They claimed they had collected all the information necessary for a major fraud.
But these hackers did not commit a major fraud. They went to the media and told them.
It would be nice to see more of that around here.
Even though the media does tend to ignore it unless there's money in it for them of some sort.
The bank was accused of being negligent in not first testing the security of the system thoroughly,
relying instead on the fact that the northern telecom equipment was widely used.
But data protection officials said no action was being taken against the bank.
Postal authorities were checking to see if any frauds had been committed against Barclays customers
or those of other banks using the same system.
Hans Gutschmidt, chairman of the association representing the country's major banks,
said that the concept of telephone banking itself would emerge as the principal victim of the hacking scandal.
After this, I can't see telephone banking having a great future in Germany in the next few years, he said.
It may well be a trend in America, but German banks are traditionally very conservative.
This will put off anyone who may have been thinking of changing over.
Germans were already known to be very wary of credit cards because of the danger of fraud.
Rainer Wendland, marketing manager for Barclays,
confirmed that the bank was still taking legal advice over the scandal
and said other banks were at risk because of the hackers.
How do you like that?
They reveal the security hole and they're still the ones that are causing the risk,
not the insecure system in the first place.
He continued, we just had bad luck that they got into our system and sold details to the press.
Oh, sold now. How about that?
Most hackers fall into one of two categories.
The criminals and those that make money by selling their information to the press.
Oh, I can't believe this guy.
Where's his phone number?
Well, we'll get to that later.
Other firms and credit businesses in Germany have Northern Telecom products.
This is not just a problem specific to Barclays.
We were told when we bought the system that it was the latest technology on the market,
but we didn't know this meant it wasn't hacker-proof.
Well, they could learn a thing or two listening to this program, couldn't they?
The free telephone line was in use out of normal banking hours.
It's a European way of saying when the bank was closed.
It mainly took calls from customers applying for increases in their credit limit,
confirming card receipts or reporting details of stolen cards.
Most of our credit card customers used another phone number during office hours.
There were fewer than 100 calls with information of use to the hackers.
Customers gave their names, card numbers, and expiration dates
when calling into the Meridian mail system.
Meridian mail systems are rather easy to use.
I'll just say that and nothing more.
And it had been in use for several months.
And computer experts were said to be working on the Canadian equipment
to set up a foolproof replacement for the vulnerable line.
Ralph Wardman of the Hamburg Chaos Computer Club said he was not surprised.
He said voicemail is as easy to crack as a bike lock.
I'll tell you, Ralph, it's even easier than that
because you don't have to break anything to get in.
Well, how about this for an interesting telephone number,
the Ross Perot 800 number.
Let's give that a try now, actually,
see if we can actually manage to get a phone line of the non-static connection.
How does that sound?
Well, it sounds good now, but the static usually comes in when you don't want it to.
Let's give it a try.
Okay, we're calling Ross Perot now.
See, there's the static now.
Thank you for calling United We Stand America.
Your call is very important to us
and will be included in our total count of callers supporting Ross Perot.
Thank you again for your valued support.
And that's it. You call that, they got 1.5 million calls the other day.
Now, it's caused some controversy because, well, people were told by Ross Perot
and the Larry King show to call this number
and people thought, well, it was going to be some way of leaving feedback,
not necessarily voting.
Bonnie Smith of San Diego says,
I don't think that's playing fair. I think it's misleading.
55-year-old unemployed marketing manager who called the number to advise Perot
to keep out of the presidential race
and to stay away from her while he was at it.
To her, what, static now? There's no phone.
How can I have static now?
Oh, boy, this place.
To her surprise, the automatic message at the other end said her call
would be counted as a vote in favor of his joining the race.
That isn't democratic.
I got the impression it was to voice your opinion, she said.
What Perot actually said when he announced the number on Larry King Live
was that Americans could call in to express their support,
not opinions either way.
And they said they got 1.5 million calls just after it was announced
until 1 a.m., which is a span of three and a half hours.
And it probably makes AT&T very happy
or whatever company is handling that particular exchange.
And if people are interested in calling that number,
we might as well give it out here too, 1-800-925-1300.
And there's nothing hackable on it.
We already tried hitting every touchtone
and it doesn't have any effect whatsoever.
Well, as I mentioned a couple of weeks ago,
I was away in Eastern Europe for about three weeks
and I came back about two weeks ago.
But I forgot to mention something on the radio
about the experience I had coming back into this country.
Now, if you recall, several months ago,
I had quite a time getting back into the country from Canada.
I was harassed mercilessly with a friend at the American border.
They didn't like the hacker material that we had.
They didn't like various bits of hardware they couldn't understand.
And they just didn't like the way we looked, I guess.
I'm not quite sure. They never really told us.
But they did keep us for a couple of hours
and searched us relentlessly and tore the car apart
and didn't find a blessed thing.
So I was expecting all kinds of problems coming into the country
after having been to Eastern Europe.
And I was ready, as ready as I could be.
Ready mentally, anyway.
I mean, you know, you don't arm yourself or anything.
You just get ready for whatever it is that's about to happen to you
and you have to take it in stride.
That's really the best you can do.
And since, you know, you come from this country in the first place,
there's really not all that much they can do.
They can't send you away.
They have to take you sooner or later,
so it's just a question of how long you can hold out.
So I was thinking all of this, getting off the plane,
coming into the customs area.
And there's a couple of different places you have to go.
You have to go to the passport control people
and then you have to go to the actual customs people.
So you get off the plane.
At first you walk into this passport control area
and the person there is friendly.
And he asked me where I was and what I had been doing.
And I said, well, I was in Eastern Europe.
And he said, oh, really? What countries did you go to?
And I told him.
And I said, I was in Czechoslovakia and Hungary and Romania
and Bulgaria and Yugoslavia and places like that.
And it was very interesting.
And he asked me what was most memorable about it.
You know, regular conversation with a human being.
I haven't had one of those in quite some time
with a U.S. government official.
And I said, well, Romania was pretty memorable.
It's probably the scariest place I've ever been in my life.
So for that reason it was a memorable place.
And he said, yeah, well, that's probably why I'm never going to go there.
And we had a good laugh.
He put my passport into...
You see, most countries, they stamp your passport.
But in the United States,
they put your passport under a barcode reader.
And so he put the thing under the barcode reader
and it said, beep.
And he gave it back to me and said, have a nice day,
welcome back, all that kind of thing.
And I said, thank you, and walked my merry way down the hall.
And I realized as I was walking down this hall,
this is the hall that goes to customs,
and it was kind of curious
why there was such a long hallway between the two places.
I mean, why not have them both at the same table?
And then I thought about the barcode
and how by putting that thing under the barcode,
they now know who's walking down that hallway
and who's going to be rounding the corner
and meeting up with the passport people,
with the customs people, rather.
I thought that's a rather interesting way of doing it.
Let's say I was Abul Nadal or something
and I checked in with the passport control guy
and said my various pleasantries and walked my merry way.
They would probably be waiting for me
when I rounded that corner
because their computer would tell them
that someone of that nature was here
and to welcome them accordingly.
And I was thinking about this
and then I came across this poster.
And you've got to check this out.
This was in Newark Airport.
Go out of the country and come back.
It's worth it just to do this.
Look at the poster. The poster says,
Think twice about smuggling drugs into this country
because if you do smuggle drugs into this country,
there's all kinds of penalties that we're going to throw at you
and you'll be very, very sorry
and you really shouldn't do that.
It's not nice and all that kind of thing.
And I thought to myself, well, that's just great.
What if somebody does think twice?
What if they decide, okay, I'm not going to do it.
I'm not going to go through with it.
What are they supposed to do?
Go back onto the airplane?
Drop their drugs there on the floor?
No, there's no wastebasket anywhere.
I mean, it was kind of a cruel joke
to play on someone that is going through that.
It's this moral dilemma.
But fortunately, that wasn't my moral dilemma,
so I just took a look at that sign and kept walking.
And there was this long line.
Actually, there were three long lines for customs.
And, you know, it wasn't too cheery a notion
to have to wait in line after an eight-hour plane flight.
But I resolved myself to doing that
and I waited in line.
And after about five minutes, this guy walks up to me.
Keep in mind, I'm in the middle of the line,
not at the end, not at the beginning.
I'm in the middle of the line.
This guy walks up to me and he says...
he flashes a badge.
And he says,
United States Customs, can I see your passport, please?
And I said, oh, boy, here we go.
Here we go.
This guy was not, you know, some low-down person.
You could tell this guy was, you know, polished.
He was up there.
He was ranking, whatever.
However they rank people in the Customs Bureau.
So I said, okay, here we go.
And I got my passport and gave it to him.
And he looked it over.
And the first question he asked me,
and I thought this was rather odd, was,
what countries were you in?
And it's kind of odd that he would ask that question
because that's exactly what I was talking about
with the passport control person.
And I said, well, you know,
I listed all the countries all over again.
And while I was doing this,
I was writing something down on the little form
that you bring into the country.
You have to bring in a form to declare things
if you're bringing in various bits of things
that you're supposed to declare,
which I never bring in,
so I don't ever have to declare anything.
You just write down your name and address
and hand in the form as you enter the country.
So he took that form and he wrote something in red.
It was a completely illegible scrawl,
as far as I could see.
And then he took it from me.
And he said, okay, you can go.
And I was amazed.
I said, what, that's it?
I don't have to wait on line?
I don't have to go through the whole customs process?
He said, nope, go ahead.
And it was the exact opposite
of what happened on the way back from Montreal,
the exact opposite.
Because there,
they kept me waiting for a couple of hours
and gave me the once over, twice over,
however many times they felt like
and treated me like dirt.
In the end, of course,
I wound up back in the country anyway.
Now this time, they did the exact opposite.
They allowed me to bypass the entire system.
And they selected me.
They walked up to me.
Now, I don't mind saying
that this one scares me a whole lot more
than being searched and held for two hours.
And I realize I'll never know
what was in that red scrawl that he wrote on the card.
And I'll also never know
what kind of beeps and buzzes sound
when that passport barcode comes across.
But it was yet another experience at the border,
of which I seem to have quite a few.
All right, speaking of computers,
and I'd also be very interested
in hearing anyone else's experiences
going back and forth into this land.
Computer, I don't know if anybody heard this story.
It was in the New York Times today.
It's been banning about the media a bit.
It's hilarious.
The headline says,
Court Computer Says All of Hartford is Dead.
Yeah, court officials have figured out
why Hartford residents were excluded
from federal grand jury polls over the past three years.
The computer that selected names
thought everyone in the city was dead.
Well, those of us who have been up there,
at least recently, can attest otherwise.
Federal district court workers
discovered the computer error
while investigating why no Hartford residents
had been on lists of prospective grand jurors.
Here's what happened.
The city's name had been listed
in the wrong place on computer records,
forcing the D at the end of Hartford
into the next column,
and that next column, if there is a D there,
it means dead.
So apparently they thought
they were all from the city of Hartford,
and the extra D,
or the D that wasn't used in Hartford,
wound up in another column.
Incredible what you can do with computers these days.
And imagine if that investigation
had never been launched,
if they had never wondered why
people from Hartford were never on grand juries.
Three years that went on.
So, every time the names of Hartford residents
popped up for jury duty,
the computer noted the deaths
and declined to send them juror questionnaires.
And they may very well have declared them
dead someplace else, too,
because a computer making up its mind
about something like that,
it's a pretty serious thing,
and pretty irrefutable.
For instance,
a computer somewhere at the hospital
that I get occasional checkups,
you know, you go into a hospital every few years
just to see somebody in a clinic or something.
At some point,
they decided to change the date of birth.
They moved it up one day.
And so, every time I have to register somewhere,
I have to correct them.
And say, no, it's not this date, it's that date.
And the computer somehow took it upon itself
to change the date of my birth,
and now I've got to spend the rest of my life
correcting other people.
Because I know it's never going to be changed.
It's never actually going to be changed.
So, when a computer decides something,
it's pretty much forever.
Okay, one final thing,
then we'll get some phone calls.
And that final thing is a phone number.
Yeah, another phone number.
Now, let me see if I can
actually dial this successfully.
Let's see if we can get a non-static-y dial tone.
Oh, it's about as good as we can get, I guess.
Let's give that number a call.
And what this is, is a call to something
known as the CNA Bureau.
But there's something different about this one.
Something very different.
Okay, here we go.
Take a listen.
Thank you for calling
Michigan Bell's Automated CNA Bureau.
The system is restricted to authorized personnel only.
By using your touch-tone telephone,
please enter your ID number.
Now, if I was an authorized member,
I would enter my ID number,
which, of course, is not going to be valid,
at least I hope not.
If it is, I'll hang up right away.
I'm sorry.
The number you have entered, 279, is not valid.
Please enter your identification number again.
Let's enter the phone number,
the full phone number of this radio station.
Goodbye.
Well, I guess he didn't like that number at all.
Anyway, the CNA Bureau stands for
Customer Name and Address,
and that allows you to take a phone number
or take an address and find out
the name of the person attached to it.
It's something that's existed for years and years,
maybe even decades.
But what's interesting about this one,
and this one has existed for some time, too,
I remember playing with it some years ago,
this one is automated,
in case you couldn't tell by the guy's voice.
Believe me, when you talk to some of the humans,
it's hard to tell.
But you can key in any phone number,
and even if it's unlisted,
it will tell you who it belongs to.
It's a most incredible system,
and I'm told,
although this is by no means
something that's necessarily reliable,
I'm told that the code is only three digits long.
So that's not a very secure system, if that is so.
And of course, no system is secure
as long as there are human beings involved someplace.
And I think if you see sneakers,
you can appreciate that fact.
Let's talk about sneakers tonight, too.
If anybody has seen that film,
if anybody has any comments on it,
questions about it, or criticisms,
then this certainly is one of the places to air them, anyway.
It's just about 9.28,
and we might as well move to our first listener phone call,
212-279-3400.
The program is off the hook.
Good evening, you're on.
Hi.
I'm glad to talk to you again.
I haven't spoken to you in a long time.
I have some questions and comments.
Oh, that's exactly what we're here for.
All right.
Now, the first comment is,
I remember talking last time about
if you find a broken payphone,
like, or a stuffed payphone,
meaning, you know, if the coin return is stuffed.
Right.
Instead of dialing 611,
they want you to dial another number,
because I talked to a telephone repairman,
and he said when you dial 611,
it registers as a customer complaint,
and it's not good for the repairman,
because they sort of get, like, put down by that.
And he gave me an 800 number to dial in case,
and it's fully automated,
so that when you dial it, you can follow the instructions.
And the number is 1-800...
It's N-Y-T COIN.
Oh, I hate those numbers.
Spell it.
N-New York Telephone COIN.
Okay, so that's 6-9-8,
and 2-6, I feel like a moron,
4-6.
That's right.
Okay.
If you don't remember, just dial,
N-Y-T COIN, 1-800-N-Y-T COIN.
It's a fully automated system, eh?
It's a fully automated system,
just follow the instructions.
And speaking of 800 numbers...
Well, tell us, what are the instructions?
What does it ask you to do?
They ask you, it says,
thank you for, oh, by the way,
it's called a VIP report,
so you have to press 1,
and it's a VIP thing.
No, it just means VIP,
and it just registers as a VIP report.
Well, you can only call if you're a VIP,
is that it?
Oh, no, anyone can call this number,
it's just, you know,
you can call it,
and just follow the instructions.
You have to say it as VIP.
I don't understand what that means,
but I'll just accept it.
I don't either, but, you know,
it's just something that they asked me,
that's what they told me to do,
and I'm just saying it for everyone,
if they find a broken payphone,
instead of calling 611,
call this 800 number.
Okay.
Now, the other thing I wanted to ask you was,
are there,
one of the 1-800 numbers
not going to be depending on the exchange
for long-distance companies?
That's scheduled to happen,
I believe, next spring.
I heard April of 1993.
What that means is,
right now, the exchanges,
like, for instance,
800-279
belongs to a particular company.
2-2-2 belongs to a particular company.
Various exchanges have different companies
that actually process the call,
and what's going to happen is,
any number can be processed
by any individual company.
For instance,
279-3400,
800, that is,
not our phone number,
could be an AT&T number,
whereas 800-279-3401
can be a Sprint number,
and 3402 could be an MCI number,
so it'll be dependent on the number itself,
not the whole exchange,
and what that means is,
customers can move to a different company.
They can keep the 800 number they have now
and move to a company with better rates,
so the number would belong to the customer,
not the company.
Do you know what they're going to do
when they run out of 1-800 numbers?
That's a good question.
It seems like they should.
It seems like they should
run out of 800 numbers fairly soon,
because...
People are using them.
Yeah, people are using them.
You have personal 800 numbers,
you have all kinds of useful...
I thought maybe, like,
I know you can dial an 800 number,
and that will be only used in the state,
like 1-800-New York-Tel-Coin,
like I said.
That's starting to go away, though.
You're starting to see less and less
of in-state-only use.
Really?
Because there's no...
It doesn't really cost much more
to have an out-of-state number
than an in-state number.
Well, I was thinking of, like,
maybe like a...
Well, not 700,
but like a 600 number
for, like, local toll free...
You know, it's funny.
I was thinking 600, too.
That seemed the next logical thing,
because 700 is taken
and 900 is taken.
600 does seem like
something they should use for...
Maybe they'll divide up the country,
like the West Coast will be 800
and the East Coast will be 600
or something like that.
Or how about residential toll free
and business toll free?
That's true.
Yeah, they could do that.
That's true.
And also, what...
Let's see.
I told you about the 2-1-1
that gives you the operator.
2-1-1 does give you an operator.
Is that...
Right.
That's how you could bypass
some restrictions on PBXs.
I see. Okay.
Okay.
And speaking of PBXs,
your PBX probably doesn't have
a good sound quality sometimes.
That's why you get that static.
Well, actually,
our phone system
is wired into the board here,
and I don't think
anybody's looked at it
in about 25 years.
So hopefully,
if people send telegrams
saying,
please fix the phones here,
maybe they'll get fixed.
I don't know.
It sure would be nice.
And...
One thing I can't stand
is the fact that people
can't hear back and forth
and I keep talking over you
and you keep talking over me
and we can't have
a two-way conversation because...
By the way,
you have a tape that thing.
I hear you have the old system
where you have a tape delay.
Uh-huh.
Is there a newer system?
Yeah, it's digital delay now.
Yeah.
Some radios use digital now.
No, you're actually
becoming ones and zeros
right now when you speak.
Before, yeah,
the old system,
you would be
an endless loop tape
and that tape
got pretty worn out.
Right.
Which is what you have now?
We have digital delay.
Oh, you do now?
Yeah, sure we do.
When I went to the station,
I saw the old tape delay.
Well, maybe you saw it,
but we're not using it.
Oh, really?
Yeah.
I'm looking at flashing lights
right now
that say digital delay,
so we're all digital now.
Nobody's showing me.
Yeah.
But anyway,
I know nobody could do it
because they don't have the codes,
but I wonder what would happen
if you dial a strange number
like 950 or whatever.
What do you mean
by a strange number?
You mean just enter that as number?
Danger.
It would probably say
it couldn't figure out.
230 or whatever.
It probably wouldn't be able
to figure it out
because they don't
bill that number.
There's no reason for them to.
What do you mean bill it?
Well, I imagine
they're looking at
phone bill-type things
to indicate
who is attached to it.
So it would have to be
a number that has a customer.
Let's put it that way.
Right.
So any other questions?
Do you know if
they're going to have
like a 311?
Oh, by the way,
311 gives you touch tones
instead of 711 now.
All right.
Wait.
You have to tell me what...
Remember when I said
that 711 in Queens,
both the Queens
gave you these touch tones?
I wish that I could...
You know what?
I'm going to play you
the touch tones.
Let me get my cordless phone.
Could you hold?
Well, if you play as touch tones,
you might be playing
your phone number,
and I'm not sure
you want to do that.
No, I'm not.
It's the same one.
Okay.
All right.
Well, make it fast
because we have other calls
we want to get to.
Hold on while I get my phone.
All right.
As he's walking
across the room,
let me repeat.
Our phone number is
212-279-3400,
and hopefully he has
that all queued up
on tape there
because...
Hold on here.
And then it hangs up.
Hold on.
Oh, that's going into
like a disco kind of a thing.
Well, that's what I get.
That's nice.
I like it.
It's catchy.
I know.
I call it the 3-1-1 song.
Uh-huh.
Well, that's what I get
when I dial 3-1-1.
Really?
Let's try something here.
All right.
You want me to hang up?
Well, I want you to...
I want you to cue that up again.
You want me to play it again?
Yeah.
And...
All right.
Hang on.
Hang on.
Hang on.
Hang on.
Hang on.
Hang on.
You want me to say it again?
Yeah, and what I want you
to do this time is,
let's see,
this time try to play it
as loudly as you can
into the phone.
What I'm going to do is...
I've been calling again.
If you need to...
Whoops.
I have two phone numbers here
and I'm like holding one,
so play it again.
Okay.
I've got a dial tone here, okay?
You hear my dial tone?
Yeah.
What I'm going to do is
allow you to feed those tones
into my dial tone
and maybe it'll dial something
and we'll figure out
what those numbers are.
Okay.
I doubt it will,
but hold on.
Okay.
Actually, you know what? You're going to have to dial a 9 first. Do you have a touchdown phone?
Hold on, let me get the cordless.
Boy, this is exciting. This is experimentation at its best here at WBAI.
All right, here's the cordless.
Okay, now, can you dial a 9 first?
All right, yeah. Do you want me to do that now?
Uh, yeah. Hang on. Wait until you hear the dial tone.
All right.
And just trying to get a free line here. It's impossible to get a free line.
Everyone's calling every single line that we have.
Okay.
We're trying to get a line. We're trying to fight off the listeners.
Okay, we've got a dial tone now. Feed a 9 down the line.
Hello?
Let's hold on just one more minute.
No, that's not loud enough.
Not loud enough.
No, it's definitely not loud enough.
Definitely not loud enough. It has to be a certain one.
Listen, what you have to do is call a voicemail system or something and find out what those numbers are.
I've asked, and nobody seems to know.
All right, play them one more time over the radio.
Hopefully somebody out there will record it and then decode it and send it in to us or tell us.
Okay? Go ahead.
All right.
And then when I flash, it does that.
Okay, that certainly is something.
That's the mystery of the week here, and we'll see if our listeners are able to solve that.
Listen, thanks so much for calling in.
All right.
I'll speak to you some other time.
All right. Bye.
Okay, what we're going to do at this particular juncture is give a call to that very number.
Not the number he was playing now, but the coin number.
Let's see what they ask you to do.
All right, we'll see what this automated system is all about.
Thank you for calling the public communications trouble reporting system.
To report a VIP, press 1.
To report a coin collector trouble, press 2.
To report a technician pickup, press 3.
If you are calling from a rotary phone, please wait.
All right, we'll do the VIP thing.
Welcome to the public communication VIP hotline.
If the telephone number you are reporting is unknown, press 0 for an agent.
Should you require an agent at any time during this call, press 0.
To repeat these instructions, press the pound sign.
Press 1 to begin the trouble report.
Okay, we want to begin the trouble report, so we'll press 1.
Please enter the area code and telephone number that you are reporting.
If you make a mistake, press the star key.
Enter the area code and telephone number now.
Now this is where it could be interesting.
We're going to enter the WBAI phone number, which is not a pay phone.
And let's see if it picks that up.
You have entered area code 2122793400.
If this number is correct, press 1.
If incorrect, press 2.
All right, let's say it's correct for now.
Please hold on momentarily while we retrieve your repair records.
Press 1 for no dial tone.
Press 2 for coins fall through.
Press 3 for block slot.
Press 4 for no coin return.
Press 5 for vandalized equipment.
Press 6 for can't call out.
Press 7 for noise, can't hear, or can't be heard.
Press 8 for instruction card missing, incorrect, or vandalized.
Press 9 to repeat the trouble description.
Press pound to cancel this trouble report.
My word.
Coins fall right through, so let's do that one.
Trouble will be fixed on October 1, 1992.
If you would like to report another trouble number, press 1.
So am I supposed to expect that somebody's going to come over here and fix our phones so that the coins don't fall through, even though we don't have payphones?
Obviously, there's no checking being done on this particular system, so it might just be something to placate the masses and make them seem as if something's being done, but I don't know.
I don't know. If somebody comes by here to fix the payphones, I'm sure I'll hear about it, but I don't think that's ever going to happen.
Okay, good evening. You're on the air.
Hi, good evening. You know, I listen to your show a lot, and you give up some numbers to get the telephone number that you're using.
All these kind of numbers, 700 numbers, can you just tell me those numbers again? Because every time you say it, I...
Well, tell me what kind of number you're looking for. There's a lot of numbers.
Something like star 69, and if I do that, I'll get my number back?
No, no. Actually, what area are you in?
I'm in 212 area code.
Okay, in 212, if you want to hear your phone number, you can dial 958, and that will tell you what your phone number is.
Uh-huh. How about, is there... I remember one time you gave out a 700 number.
That was, you know, like some kind of test on the phone, or to ring back or something.
I don't recall which number you're talking about, but ring back is something that generally goes through an exchange known as 660.
In some areas, 660 plus the last four digits, and you toggle the switch and hang up, and it will ring you back.
That's in some places. Other places, it's a different number.
There's all kinds of other weird things, and the best thing to do is just write down these numbers as they come across, because they are changing a lot.
Uh-huh. And you mentioned some number, like if I got a prank phone call, and I wanted to call that person back, all I had to do was dial a number, and it would immediately...
Well, it doesn't work yet in New York City. I'm told that people in New York are starting to get handouts saying the caller ID will be here in November.
And at that time, what you'll be able to do is dial star 69. I mean, it's possible it might work already. You just have to try it.
But star 69 will get you the last number. It will call back the last number that called you.
And there's no way to block somebody from doing that to you.
If you call somebody directly, there's no way that they cannot star 69 you back if they have that service.
Whereas caller ID, you can prevent your number from being shown on the screen, but to many people, there isn't much of a difference between the two.
Okay. Well, this one called 958, would that work, say, like in a company where they have their own phone system?
It depends if they've blocked it out or not.
Some places, for no good reason, really, they block out the 958 exchange so you can't call it, which makes it a lot more difficult.
So you have to somehow figure out how to get an unrestricted dial tone so you can do that.
Also, alternate pay phones, that's a favorite tactic of theirs, is to block out 958 so you can't find out the number of the pay phone.
So you have to do other things, you know, like collect calls from it to find out what the number is.
Okay. Well, what is the 700 area code used for?
The 700 area code is carrier-specific.
That means that a 700 number on AT&T is different from a 700 number on MCI.
So, for instance, AT&T has a new EasyReach service, which allows you to have a number that you can forward virtually any place in the country.
And it's advertised as your number for life.
It'll follow you around wherever you go.
And that's something that's used with AT&T.
If you have MCI, you'd have to dial the AT&T carrier access code of 10288 before you dial the 0700 number.
And similarly, MCI has numbers and other companies have numbers, and you have to make sure you use their service to access them.
Okay. You've already, you know, proved that cellular phones, you know, are not private and everything.
So, I mean, do you think it's a bad idea to use cellular phones?
I mean, was that the point of your show?
It's a bad idea if you want to maintain privacy.
But then again, you have to keep in mind that privacy is something that's becoming increasingly difficult to maintain.
We use satellites.
We use cordless phones.
People are able to tap into your line all kinds of different ways.
The government wants there to be even more ways.
So it's something that people should be aware of, the fact that it's so easy to listen in, so easy to, you know, to have your life out there on the public airwaves.
Okay. So how much do you think it would cost, you know, to buy a scanner like in Radio Shack so that I could, you know, eavesdrop on cellular calls?
Well, okay. I've got to tell you something.
It's not illegal to own a scanner like that.
It's not illegal to buy a scanner like that.
It's not illegal to sell a scanner like that.
But it is illegal to listen, as long as you understand that.
That's how the law works.
A scanner itself of that nature would cost you a couple hundred bucks.
What do you mean? Like 300, more than 300?
If you want. If you want something that's, you know, continuous, receives just about everything on the spectrum, yeah, you'd pay more than 300.
But you can get a scanner that will cover the 800 MHz, which is where these calls are.
You cover that particular area for a couple hundred, I think.
So it ranges from 800 MHz, and how high does it have to go?
Just below 800 MHz, I believe. I don't have the exact numbers in front of me.
Just below 800 MHz?
No, above 800 MHz, but the low part of it, I believe.
Oh, so it's like...
I'm not 100% sure of that. I could be completely wrong about that.
So you want an 800 MHz scanner. Everybody knows what that means.
Okay, thank you. Have a good night.
Okay, you too.
And I hope we're all safe from that person, as he no doubt listens in on everybody's phone calls from now on.
Good evening.
Hi, am I on?
Hold on, let me check. Yes, you're on.
Okay, marvelous. I just dialed it down. I've been waiting here for a dog's age.
Anyway, I have a couple of questions, if you don't mind.
Yep.
I'd like to ask, first of all, I received a sample issue of 2600.
Is that identical in format, font size, and page number as the regular issues?
Well, I'm not sure what you're asking. How could it be otherwise?
Well, I don't know. Some companies or some people, when they make a sample, it is literally a smaller...
Oh, no. Oh, no. We send out the original.
Okay.
Yeah, you're getting the same thing as everybody else. No changes or modifications.
Okay, because it looked like it was only like about 40 pages versus, you know, like 90 pages or 75 pages in the listings.
No, it's 48 pages. It's been that way since 1988. If you see something bigger, it's because we messed up and stuck two of them together.
Okay. If you could do me a favor and tell me basically what the boxes do, like a red box does this, a silver box does that, because I've never been able to get a clear understanding of that.
Okay, well, pick a color first, and we'll start that way.
Okay, red.
Red box is used for sending the tones that sound like quarters, nickels, and dimes. It's a very simple method of doing that. You hold it up to the phone.
Right.
And when it asks, it has to be the kind of a phone call that asks for money where it says, 25 cents, please, or, you know, in that particular tone.
It can't be a local call because they use a different system. And also, New York Telephone uses a different system than AT&T, so the tolerance levels might be a little bit varied.
And basically, and, you know, I'm not advocating this at all. I'm just explaining how it works. You would hit a button, and you'd hear five beeps. That's a quarter.
They ask for $1.25. You hit that button five times. Five times 25 is $1.25. And that's as simple as you can possibly get as far as, you know, faking out the phone company.
Of course, they are working on fixing that, on installing other kinds of ways of collecting coins. But for now, it's open season in many places.
Okay. Silver.
Silver box is nothing more than an extra row of keys on a touch-tone phone. Every touch-tone phone is capable of creating four additional tones. Or actually, every tone is actually two tones.
Yeah, the fourth column on the right.
And that's known as A, B, C, and D. And I should point out that it's worth it to get those four extra tones because they do things in some places.
Some places, they actually can trigger other reactions. And I'm speaking of the phone company and also voicemail systems and anything that requires touch-tones certainly has the option of using those extra four keys.
Those of you with modems, most cases, Hayes Modem will dial A, B, C, D just the same as any other number. Try it out. The command would be A, T, D, T, and then you dial your number.
But instead of putting a number there, put the letter A, B, C, or D, and you'll hear those extra tones.
Okay. Very good. Pink.
Pink box?
Yeah, I came across that once or twice. You know, I thought I came across it in an old tap publication.
Well, you know, people come up with all different colors of boxes and sometimes they mean different things. I'm sure there is a pink box meaning someplace. I just don't know what it is and I don't want to say the wrong thing.
No problem. How about black?
A black box? Well, I don't think those will work virtually anywhere anymore. Basically, what that allowed you to do was fake out the phone company when somebody was calling you.
Make the phone company think that your phone had never picked up.
Okay.
The phone company would say, oh, the phone is still ringing or the phone is busy or whatever. We can't charge for that.
In actuality, you would be preventing supervision from kicking in and you'd be able to carry on the conversation with the person that called you.
It only worked on mechanical switches such as crossbars, steps, that kind of thing.
You know, you find a mechanical switch around these days and it would be a pretty rare thing.
There are a couple left, even in New York and Brooklyn and places like that. There are a couple, but not very many.
Okay. Is there one called orange?
Orange box. I'm sure there is. I'm sure there is, but again, I don't know what that one is.
Okay. Have I omitted any colors?
Let's see.
Covered red, silver, black, orange, pink.
Well, I'm sure there is. I have to think about this. Well, green box. Okay, there's a green box and that sends...
It actually uses a few... Oh, you've left out a very major one, actually. You've left out a blue box.
Okay.
Blue box is a device that allows you or did allow you to make free phone calls by actually fooling the phone company
into thinking that you were an operator and were able to process certain operator commands,
such as calling inward operators, overseas, international, direct, various things like that.
It allowed you basically to run around all over the place, internal and external,
and it really... It's a thing that gives a phone freak the most power, the most sense of being a part of the network,
and a green box uses a couple of the blue box tones, and basically what a green box does is send signals down the line
to say, return this guy's quarter.
You ever notice how an operator is able to at will return a quarter to you?
Well, they send green box tones down the line to do that, and also there's a tone to collect coins, too.
So, you know, it's a good prank to pull on someone.
If they call you from a pay phone, you send the collect coin thing and their quarter goes away.
Yeah, only to people you don't like.
Yeah, and only to people that call you from pay phones using coins.
Okay. Now, in the 2600 that I got, you guys were talking about your little wireless mic in there.
Now, is that something that, you know, you were on like a different frequency than something that I would go out and get in Ratshack or whatever, or what?
I think... I don't know what the exact frequency is.
Well, actually, on that particular one, I think you're talking about the FM one.
Yeah, I would imagine.
In which case, it's a variable frequency. It can go anywhere in the FM dial.
Yeah, generally 88 to 108, right?
Right, and actually I think it goes a little further than that, too.
So, as far as, you know, it's very non-powerful, so I don't think it's interfering with anything that should be interfered with.
It's in milliwatts, right? Like about 500 mils or maybe...
Yeah, it's not very powerful at all. If you're lucky, you'll get a couple hundred feet on it.
And I don't think that's any different from something that would be, you know, that would be sold, except it's better.
You know, it's more dependable and less consumer-oriented.
Okay, two other things. One, as far as sneakers went, great movie.
If you buy the premise, it works. I think there's a couple of things in there that weren't quite technically accurate.
Personally, I don't think Dan Aykroyd should have had a part in the movie. I really think it destroyed it.
Yeah, he's kind of a strange person, but then there's, like, strange people in the hacker world, and I don't know.
I've mixed feelings about that myself.
Yeah, I mean, you know...
He played a good paranoid, I thought.
Yeah, I mean, I just could think of other people who would be...
If he was supposed to be there because he, quote, had the best hands in the business, close quote,
I could think of other people who could portray that as actors without having to get into that, you know, silliness that he likes to do.
Yeah.
Now, the other thing is, is it possible that you could give out that 800 number for CNA, you know, that automated voice?
Well, I'll tell you, I don't want to give that number out over the airwaves,
but I will tell you it's going to be printed in a particular hacker magazine in the next issue,
which just went out to press today, and I'm sure you can figure out the rest.
Okay.
It will be printed in the upcoming issue, though.
Okay, I hear what you're saying.
Okay, thanks so much for calling.
Thank you very much for taking my call.
Okay, let's see if we can take some more calls before we run out of time.
Good evening.
Hey, Manuel.
How are you doing?
Fine.
I wanted to ask you, you said once that one can get around to call waiting by doing something different or whatever,
instead of paying for it to...
Get around?
Oh, you can have an extra line put in, an auxiliary line, is that what you mean?
Yeah.
And have a free service, New York Telephone offers this for free, called Call Hunting.
It'll take you about 20 minutes to convince them that they offer it, but they do.
And Call Hunting basically says if line 1 is busy, jump to line 2.
It only works in one direction.
The advantage of that is it's free, of course.
The second line, if you get what's known as an auxiliary line, it shows up on one phone bill,
and the extra cost is about $10 a month, which, you know, if you get a couple of custom calling features,
$10 a month is what you would pay for those.
But in this particular case, you get an extra phone line, you can use it at the same time,
you can conference calls together, you can do all kinds of things, depending on what kind of equipment you have.
Right.
It's just you have a lot more power over it, you know, a lot more flexibility.
Tell me, do you know where one can get some kind of a catalog or something like that of telephones,
numbers of bulletin boards, they can call up different kinds or whatever?
Ah, jeez, there's bulletin board lists all over the place, some on the Internet.
I don't have the exact address where to get listings of those things.
But if you connect to something, invariably that will lead you to a list of some sort.
I see.
And lists just keep generating more lists, you know.
Yeah.
One more thing, do you know if there's a way of checking your line for noise?
Let's say if you want to do high-speed data transfer, you want it as quiet as a line as possible.
Is there a way of checking it besides listening?
Yeah, the best thing I can tell you is to call a number that's disconnected, okay?
You know, those things that give you the recordings?
Mm-hmm.
And wait until after the recording is finished and you'll hear silence.
Ah.
It doesn't hang up.
Mm.
That's the best way I can think of.
I see.
Okay?
Okay, thanks a lot.
Thanks for calling.
Bye.
Good evening.
Yeah, I've got a couple of quick things that I'd like to tell you about.
Okay, make it quick.
We're running out of time.
Okay, yeah.
Number one, phone banking.
has got a phone banking service.
And if you want this service, all you have to do is call up yourself.
It's not an in-person verification type of thing.
Uh-huh.
So anybody, presumably anybody, could call up, claiming to be you.
Don't you have to give a bank account number or something?
No, all you need is the bank card number and the last four digits of a person's social security number.
So if you find a bank card in the street
and you're somehow able to get the last four digits of the person's social security number,
you can start.
You don't have to prowl around ATMs anymore.
You can do it from the comfort of your own home.
And every Citibank customer is on that system,
but you have to call up to actually activate it.
Okay.
And the only way that you can get off that system is to close out your bank account with Citibank.
Well, that might be something that a lot of people are considering now that you've told us this.
Another thing is you mentioned that there's going to be caller ID in November.
Uh-huh.
New York Telephone is offering this call restrict services, Star 67.
Right.
And they say that there's two options that they claim is possible.
One is all-call block, and the other is per-call block.
Right.
That's a pretty standard feature.
Unfortunately, we're out of time, so we're going to get into that in weeks to come
as caller ID becomes a much more pressing issue in New York.
I want to thank everybody who called in.
Sorry to those we didn't get to.
We'll try it again next week.
Stay tuned for the Personal Computer Show.
This is Emanuel Goldstein.
It's been a thrill and a pleasure as always.
Remember to keep asking questions.
Keep experimenting.
Don't let anybody scare you.
See you next week.
Now, I can't make a call.
It couldn't get much worse.
But if they could, they would.
Bum-diddly-bum for the best, expect the worst.
I hope that's understood.
Bum-diddly-bum!