Including Sid Straw and Peter Halsapel will be featured in concert from Arts at St. Ann's
in Brooklyn next Saturday, May 8th at 1 p.m. on the Piper in the Meadows Straying.
So tune in Saturday, May 8th at 1 p.m. for Peter Blegvad in concert on WBAI in New York.
It's 10 o'clock, time 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.
Bum-diddly-bum for the best, expect the worst.
I hope that's understood. Bum-diddly-bum!
Bum-diddly-bum, bum-diddly-bum.
emergency response to 911 calls would work in handling 300 police, rescue and fire incidents in a single hour.
When two-thirds of the 86 needed computers, terminals for dispatches were put into operation,
county officials say the average response time for getting critical information displayed on computer screens was 6.8 seconds.
Imagine that, in an emergency, being asked, can you wait 6.8 seconds while we figure out where you are?
The 3.5 second standard is what is considered normal under this particular contract.
Officials say the computers were also slow to respond to dispatches on what patrol cars were available
or the appropriate fire department to which a call should be routed.
Efforts to correct the problem by adding computer memory and changing the computer program only made things worse in a follow-up test on Thursday.
A third phase involving use of 86 computer terminals, the full number of active users of the dispatching system,
was cancelled because of problems in the most recent tests.
Incredible. It just keeps getting worse.
Well, in case you think things can't get any worse, this story datelined April 27th out of Beijing.
The first person in China to be convicted of embezzling bank funds by computer has been executed.
A little sobering warning there to some of you who might be thinking of playing with technology in ways you shouldn't.
You could be in China.
Or China could come here.
Things change every day, you know.
What's illegal one day becomes legal the next.
What's technologically infeasible one day is normal the next.
You can't afford to sleep, you know.
Well, here's a story about a photocopier.
A sophisticated photocopier.
It's got an onboard computer, constantly monitors and controls all aspects of the photocopier's operation and maintenance.
The sorter trays on this machine are driven up and down by servo motors to collate the output.
Under normal operation, the tray would never be directed by the computer to raise beyond a certain height.
However, should there be a problem,
two sensors were placed at both limits of the tray's movement to detect a possible overrun.
In keeping with the integrated nature of this copier,
sensors were, of course, not wired directly into the servo motors,
but instead were monitored by the main computer.
Well, it's all fine and dandy. What does it mean?
According to Ian Staines, who posted this from Canada onto the Risks Digest on the Internet,
today I watched the copier attempt to recover from an interrupted print job.
In error, it failed to note the starting position of the sorter tray and directed the servo motors to move the tray upwards.
Unfortunately, there did not appear to be a software check in the recover routine to check the overrun sensors.
The tray crashed upwards off its rails, damaging several components in the process.
My, my.
We've been talking about this particular incident, or possible incident,
on this radio program over the past couple of months.
In the St. Louis Post-Dispatch of April 22nd,
there was an article about a local man who had been convicted of growing marijuana for resale.
His defense was primarily related to using it to treat his asthma,
but what was far more interesting was the way he was originally arrested.
According to the story, he first came to the attention of the authorities
because he was using substantially more electricity than his neighbors.
They then utilized an airborne infrared detector to infer that he had a substantial number of grow lamps in his attic.
Based on this, they were able to obtain a search warrant and discovered his crop of 150 plants.
It would be interesting to know if the utilities actually have routines that identify unusual customers
and routinely report this to the authorities,
or if there was some other reason that this man came to the attention of the authorities.
That comes from J. Philip Miller, professor, Division of Biostatistics in St. Louis, Missouri,
also from the Risks Digest.
And, you know, there's been talk of the clipper chip all over the place,
and that is something we're going to be talking about tonight.
We'll be talking about it in future weeks.
We'll be talking about it until it either dies or until it becomes law.
Clipper chip, supposedly the way of protecting all of us from listening ears,
by providing a way of encrypting data.
But, you know, there's a lot of people that feel maybe it's not just a good idea to have the government in charge of our privacy.
Well, this is a short essay from Bill Campbell,
The Real Risk of the Clipper Chip.
And he says,
Proponents slash apologists for the chip make, as I see it, one and only one valid point.
Use of the chip will protect me against the casual eavesdropper better than no encryption at all.
Now, keep in mind, we've demonstrated this in past programs,
that there is no encryption at all right now on cellular telephones.
One of the things that the clipper chip is supposed to address is that particular problem
and make our particular phone conversations more private by encrypting them.
Sounds like a great idea. What could possibly be wrong with that?
Well, let's listen to this particular opinion.
I fear, however, that unless something high-profile is done,
and done quickly,
the real risk associated with this technology policy will be born to fruition.
To wit, the American public is by and large profoundly ignorant of technical stuff,
with the exception of the BI audience, of course,
and often very indifferent about protecting their own constitutional rights.
This same gullible public may very easily be convinced by the government
that not only is their privacy protected from their nosy neighbor,
but also from unlawful invasion by law enforcement and or other more determined individuals and organizations.
This is what I see as the real risk of Clipper.
There are dozens, perhaps hundreds, of commercial, criminal and governmental entities
with access to government resources who would not hesitate for a moment
to violate my rights if they found it expedient to do so.
These individuals and organizations have demonstrated beyond question
that they are not constrained by legal or ethical considerations,
and, as has been suggested in a number of other postings,
the technology employed by Clipper
will probably not even pose so much as an inconvenience to a determined adversary.
To suggest otherwise is at best profoundly naive.
I believe that as a society we have at least two challenges
with respect to addressing this public gullibility.
One, we need to find some way to dispel the assumption held by many
that the government ultimately acts with the best interest of the public in mind.
This is unmitigated hogwash.
Government by its very nature is a consumer, not a producer.
Left to its own, government will progressively consume more and more of a nation's productivity
until the nation finally collapses under the weight of its inevitably oppressive and corrupt government,
as in the Soviet Union.
This can only be prevented by an informed and active citizenry.
And two, we need to find a way to effectively educate the public
about specific threats to our freedom and prosperity from government actions,
such as the cripple chip, as he calls it, as these things arise.
Here's an interesting flipside to all of this.
It comes out of Australia.
Something just occurred over there, actually on the 28th of April.
The federal government has overridden the objections of law enforcement agencies
and allowed Telecom and Optus to start new digital mobile phone networks
which are so secure that conversations can escape officially authorized telephone bugging.
While law enforcement agencies can still intercept calls from mobile phones to an ordinary phone,
calls from one digital mobile phone to another cannot be tapped.
The government agreed to waive the bugging requirement,
originally a condition of the mobile phone network license.
That was only a couple of weeks ago, after strong pressure from both carriers
to begin their services without providing technology
to allow law enforcement agencies to listen into conversations.
The changes to the system to allow official bugging will take up to two years to complete
and will cost more than $25 million, a cost which the government has agreed to bear.
The government's waiving of the bugging requirement was made despite strong opposition
from law enforcement agencies who wanted the start of the new digital mobile phone networks delayed
until there was technology available to allow conversations conducted on these networks to be intercepted.
The law enforcement agencies argued that once criminals and others
who had reason to avoid officially authorized interceptions of their telephone conversations
became aware of the loopholes in the new system, they would exploit it.
Referring to the fact that most mobile phone calls are to fixed phones
attached to the ordinary telephone network, Optus Chief Operating Officer Mr. Ian Boatman
said that most calls carried on the network would be interceptable by any security agency.
And you know, that's what it comes down to.
There's always a way.
You know, if you suspect somebody is a criminal, there's always a way of finding out.
There's always a way of spying.
And just because you can't listen to particular conversations,
particular airborne digital conversations that are encrypted,
doesn't mean you can never find out that the person is in fact up to something.
I mean, if you could monitor brainwaves, wouldn't that be wonderful?
Wouldn't it be great if you could read people's thoughts and realize that they were criminals of some sort?
And imagine, if you will, imagine that we had that capability.
Now, for some reason, law enforcement people had the capability to read our brainwaves for the past, say, 50 years.
And, you know, some bleeding heart organization like the ACLU suddenly managed to win a court case and say,
you know, that's not right.
And stop doing that. Stop reading our brains, okay?
And as of tomorrow, as of tomorrow, no more brainwave reading is allowed.
Now, imagine the uproar that law enforcement agencies would be conducting right now to say,
look, how can we possibly catch criminals if we can't read their brains?
They'll be able to think with impunity.
They'll be able to talk to other people and plan things without our knowing their every move.
Now, maybe we should look at cellular phone calls and other forms of communication as possibly something that should be private,
something that maybe shouldn't be eavesdropped into.
And if you really believe somebody is a criminal, well, is that the only way you can find out for sure?
I mean, criminals do criminal things.
Just seems that as we move into the 90s, there are more and more ways of listening in.
There's electronic mail.
I mean, you couldn't open up people's mail before, but now you can.
Now you can do it without being traced.
You can just tune in to a radio now.
Didn't used to be able to do that.
Used to have to lug heavy equipment into a basement somewhere and tap into a phone line.
It's just becoming easier and easier.
Maybe it should be coming harder, you know?
Not easier.
Or at least staying the same.
Well, that's one way of looking at it.
I'd be curious as to what those of you out there, if you agree with that particular way of looking at it.
I don't know. I think it's a realistic way.
You've got to look at things from a human point of view.
And I think what we're seeing with the advent of computers, advent of networks,
telephone communications, video communications,
we're seeing kind of an instinctive reaction where people want to remain private.
They want to be able to encrypt the messages they send to each other.
They want to not be watched at every step of the way.
And that's something that we as individuals demand.
So to go against that is unnatural, in my opinion.
In my opinion, anyway.
Well, here's a final note to end on for those of you that have not gotten your fill of cynicism today.
You know, if you get bombarded with junk mail and junk phone calls and things like that,
you can ask not to have that happen.
We live in such a wonderful society that there is a safe harbor for people like us
that don't like to be constantly barraged with wonderful vacation offers and fabulous prizes
and once-in-a-lifetime opportunities and investments and things like that, you know?
Sometimes we just want to live our solitary lives.
And so for people like us, for these misfits, we can send in our names and be put on a list.
That's right, a list of people that don't want to get phone calls and letters and things like that.
Now, that in itself should tell you that something is fundamentally wrong.
But if that's not enough, listen to this.
The Direct Marketing Association maintains a database listing of people that prefer not to receive unsolicited marketing material.
This contributor, Rich Rosenbaum, says,
I've had my name and address added to this list, hoping it would reduce my mail.
It seems to have had just the opposite effect recently.
I just received a mailing from Sears that begins,
Because you have requested through the Direct Marketing Association not to receive various solicitations through the mail.
Dot, dot, dot.
Yeah, that's where we stand today, folks.
Well, this is off the hook.
Glad you could join us.
We have an important announcement, and we might as well get to that important announcement right now.
So, without any further ado, let's listen to this important announcement.
And we'll be back with some important news about New York Telephone.
And, of course, we'll be taking your phone calls, which New York Telephone will play a part in.
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.
Von Diddley-Bohm, for the best, expect the worst.
I hope that's understood. Von Diddley-Bohm!
This is Emanuel Goldstein from Off the Hook, inviting you to join us for a special program this Wednesday, May 12th, from 9 a.m. until 12 noon,
where we ask if things can get much worse as the marriage of high technology and low intelligence continues.
We'll be talking about computers, telephones, consumer ripoffs, and, of course, Big Brother.
Tune in this Wednesday from 9 a.m. until 12 noon, only on WBAI 99.5 FM.
Ah, yes, there's our dial tone, and that means we're going to be exploring the phone network in just a couple of seconds.
This has been... I don't know how we're going to get up at 9 in the morning, just to be honest.
I don't understand how we're going to do that, but we're going to do it because we care about this place and we want to reach all kinds of people.
So it's three hours next week. Incredible.
And we won't be here at this time next week because we're only human, you know.
But this has been an incredible week for New York Telephone.
New York Telephone has outdone themselves this week, and I feel it's fair to point out when somebody has gone to that extra effort, you know,
they really excel in whatever it is that they do.
And this week, New York Telephone has gone above and beyond the call, and I just simply cannot say that enough.
Now, a lot of it revolves around the phone bill that I just got.
Now, we've been talking about the new features here at this radio station, new features that have been introduced in many parts of the area,
caller ID, phone smart, call return, you know, all that kind of thing.
And one thing that we said on this radio station was that for the next two months until June 15th,
for those areas that are known as sell-out areas, according to New York Telephone, that features such as caller ID were free, no charge.
Well, guess what? There is a charge.
New York Telephone, on two separate occasions, and I've got this on tape, by the way,
said to me that there is no charge for the next two months because this is a sell-out location,
and you're encouraged to test out the system and play with it all you want.
Well, I got a phone bill, and all these caller ID charges for every single line that we've got coming into the office shows up on the bill.
It's the most incredible thing, and, of course, I got that wiped away immediately,
but I just can't believe how they can resort to that kind of tactic.
And if it's not a tactic, how they can have such ignorance running around where they're saying things that are so obviously not true.
When you ask them, are you sure? Are you sure there is no charge? No, there's no charge.
And you ask a second person, and they say there's no charge, and then there turns out to be a charge.
You know, it's just, what are these people doing? You have to wonder.
That's only one thing.
Every single person in the area has been asked a question.
They've been asked, do you want to have your phone number blocked, or do you want to have your phone number sent when you make a telephone call?
For those people that have caller ID boxes, do you want them to be able to see your telephone number?
Now, in something that I consider to be wrong, the default is yes.
The default is yes, send my telephone number, even though for all the past decades of phone service,
we have not been sending our phone number to people that we call.
It's just assumed that we all want to do that now.
So if you don't answer the question, your phone number will be sent.
If you do answer the question, your phone number may or may not be sent.
And it doesn't really have all that much to do with what you say.
I found that out because I was very explicit with what I wanted,
what lines I wanted to have the phone number sent and what lines I did not want to have the phone number sent.
And I have to say, just about every single one of these got flip-flopped somehow,
so that a number was sent on one, a number wasn't sent on the other.
It was all completely botched.
And the only way you can find out if it's completely botched is to have a caller ID box so you can see for yourself.
Now imagine if you're out there now and you've asked for your number to be blocked.
You don't want to send your phone number every time you make a phone call.
Well, how do you know?
How do you know that your phone number is not being sent?
You don't.
New York Telephone offers no such way of checking.
And you know what's funny?
When I called up to complain about this, they were looking at their computer screen.
They looked at their computer screen and they said,
Well, you know, on the computer it says that you have all call blocking and your number should not be sent.
But it's not working.
It's not working.
The computer says it's working, but in real life it's not.
It's really not.
So if you just call up and ask them, they're going to tell you one thing,
but in reality, something else will be happening.
So maybe the solution is for everybody to go out and get caller ID and pay the phone company $6.50 a month plus installation
so that you can check to make sure they're doing their job.
I'm sure they'd like that.
There was only one of many things.
There were all kinds of collect third number charges.
And, you know, you might say, OK, there's people making all these weird phone calls
and charging them to 2600 Magazine because, well, they just think they can get away with that
and because everybody keeps making these crazy phone calls from chemical banks
and charging them to third numbers and things like that.
But, you know, for six months now, we've been telling the phone company,
don't allow any third number calls to go through.
And you'd think it would be a simple matter for them to not allow it to happen, but no.
The computer says that the phone line is not supposed to accept third number billing,
but, you know, it just keeps happening.
We don't understand it.
They don't understand it.
It's their system, and they don't understand it.
Well, maybe we can have some people infiltrate the computer system and fix it,
you know, make it work the way it's supposed to work.
Because obviously they have more of an understanding as to how the system works than you fellas do.
Suggestion was not well taken, but I maintain that, you know,
good God-fearing Americans have to do something.
I don't know. And that's not all. That's not all. It never ends.
It never ends. I could go on for another hour.
Do you know they installed an 800 number for me?
They just felt I guess I needed an 800 number, and they just put it on my phone bill.
I open up my phone bill, and there's an 800 number that I never heard of going to my phone number.
I'll tell you, the things that the phone company does for you just boggles the imagination.
Well, fiber optic is here, and I'm sure nothing the phone company does boggles your imagination, does it?
No, certainly not.
I've got something here, though, that I think you might like and I think listeners might like.
We do have some new features that have been installed.
We have different recordings that you will get when you access these things,
when you make certain mistakes or do all kinds of assorted actions.
Now, to go over these rather quickly,
star 70 is something that you would dial to turn off call waiting, and you get that little stutter dial tone.
Now, star 67, you also get a stutter dial tone, but that's to turn off sending your phone number down to caller ID
or to turn it on if you've already turned it off, if that's not getting too complicated.
Now, what's interesting about these two stutter dial tones is that the second one,
the one to block your number or unblock your number, whichever, has a technical problem with it.
Maybe you could describe that a little better for the listeners.
Well, it's a bit specific, I guess.
Well, it's something that people would notice, but they wouldn't know why it was happening.
Okay, but you and I both are on AT&T 5ESS switches.
This is pretty much specific to those, I guess.
But you'll notice that, well, you modem users out there who like dialing quickly,
if you notice, if you dial star 70 before your telephone number that you're calling,
most people, maybe just out of force of habit, would stick a couple of commas in there to pause.
But you really don't need them in there on us digital switch users, at least people on 5ESSs.
Yeah, you can just dial.
You just dial straight through, straight through the stutter dial tone, yep, it'll all go through.
However, it's worth noting that people on DMS100s don't get a stutter dial tone, they get two beeps and a dial tone.
I think that's worth noting.
That is worth noting, I didn't know that.
Yeah, so that's a sure sign if you're curious as to what type of switching equipment you have.
If you have call waiting.
If you have call waiting, yeah.
Because it won't work at all if you don't have call waiting.
No, you'll just get a recording or a reorder.
And the thing with star 67, the stutter dial tones, star 70 will give you three stutters and then a steady tone.
Star 67 gives you two stutters and a pause and then a dial tone.
During that pause, it does not recognize any digits that you dial.
And if you're speed dialing, like if you have a speed dial phone and you're dialing quickly,
or else if you're using a modem to dial, you'll notice that you're going to be making dialing errors
because it's not recognizing any digits during that short little break.
Now, I noticed this when I was, because I don't have touch tone service, you know.
I don't believe in paying for touch tone service.
But when I programmed my push button phone to dial 1167 in that particular case,
1167 followed by the number, it would constantly not go through
because it would dial while that little pause was going on and confuse the switch completely.
Or God forbid, connect me to a wrong number entirely.
So you've got to be careful with that. You've got to wait for that little pause.
And we're going to actually demonstrate this.
And hopefully this will work.
We have set up a particular demonstration line that will show us this and a bunch of other things too.
So just hold on for a moment.
This is really exciting and another proof of how technology can make us all happier.
Puzzling, actually, is the way that the information is sent.
On the caller ID box, if you are calling somebody back, all right, if you're doing a star 69,
you will get on your caller ID box whatever information they allow to be sent.
In other words, if they have all call blocking, you will see private number show up.
If they don't have all call blocking, you will see their phone number.
And that's interesting. That's something I did not know before.
But you will see their phone number even though they're not technically calling you, you're calling them.
Now, if you're calling a busy signal, if you're doing a star 66,
you will always see their number regardless of what they have
because it's assumed that you know what number it is in the first place because you dialed it.
You dialed it and then you dialed star 66 or 1166 afterwards to camp on to it.
So it's not going to block the number even if they said to block it
because you already dialed it so you know what it is.
So a couple of interesting things about caller ID,
and I'm sure that we've confused a lot of people with that information, but it just had to be said, you know.
You understand, right?
I thought it was pretty interesting, yeah.
I don't know.
The whole telephone technology is changing in such quick and rapid ways
that it's leaving a lot of people behind in the dust.
It's good in some ways, it's not so good in other ways.
That's something that I think we need to talk about some more.
We're going to be taking phone calls now, 212-279-3400.
The phone company is a wild, mysterious animal.
But I'll tell you something.
If you actually believe what they tell you and believe they know what they're doing,
well, you know what you are?
Crazy.
I'm crazy for feeling so lonely.
Yeah, well, that gets the point across anyway.
No time for this.
Time for us to take phone calls, though.
212-279-3400.
Let's see who's out there.
Good evening.
I was just listening.
You were giving so many star numbers.
I was trying to figure out.
I've never heard your show before.
Did you have a star number you could press?
Let's say I just dialed a friend up in Massachusetts, and he was not home.
His phone wasn't busy.
He just wasn't home.
Is there a star number that would keep checking it?
No, I guess.
Well, no.
There are several things.
Yes, you can keep checking it, but not through a direct dial phone call that I know of.
I think AT&T actually has a service like that,
but you don't want to pay rates of a phone company to keep checking something
when you can buy a phone that will do the same thing.
There are plenty of telephones that will recognize a busy signal,
hang up, and try again in a minute or so, or whatever they program it to do.
Where would I go to find out what all the star numbers are
and all the extra little things like this are?
Do they publish a little something?
Yes, you don't have to go anywhere.
It should be in your phone book.
If it's not in your phone book, well, we can tell you what virtually all of them are.
Star 70 is to turn off call waiting for one call.
Star 67 is to block your number or to send your number if you've already blocked it for all calls.
Star 69 is to return a call.
Star 66 is to try a busy signal again,
but you have to already call the number in the first place.
And star 89 cancels a star 69.
Star 86 cancels a star 66.
Star 57 is to trace a call, which I'm very unclear as to what exactly that does,
except it does cost $1.50, and I think it's a tremendous ripoff.
Am I leaving out any?
Do the other stars cost extra fees?
Well, yes.
Actually, right now in my area it's not costing anything,
but in most areas it costs an outrageous amount, I think,
$0.75 every time you call somebody back,
on top of the cost of the phone call, which I don't think is right at all.
It should be changed, unless you get a monthly fee, which is something like $4 or $5.
Okay.
I didn't understand star 70.
How does that work?
All right.
Do you have call waiting?
Yes, I do.
Okay.
If you wanted to turn off call waiting, when you picked up your phone,
and you'd hear a stutter dial tone,
and people would get a busy signal if they tried to call you.
If you had three-way, you could flash off to another dial tone now and dial it,
and it would turn off your call waiting.
Could I do that while I was talking to somebody?
Like let's say you and I were talking right now, and I pushed star 70.
Would it turn it off?
No, you have to have three-way in order to be able to do that.
Do you have three-way?
No.
Okay.
You need three-way in order to get that second dial tone, to be able to flash.
You can't just dial star 70 now.
You have to get a dial tone to do it.
So the only way you could do it would be at the beginning of the phone call.
Because when you were mentioning these numbers before,
I tried pushing star 70 on my phone,
and I got not those code sounds that you were talking about on the radio,
but I got the phone like I was calling somebody.
It just started ringing.
It was probably an error message of some sort.
I didn't hang out to find out who was going to answer.
Well, no one's going to answer you.
Nobody has the number star 70, but I would check it out and see what. . .
I pushed star 70, and I got like I was trying to call somebody.
I wasn't trying to call anybody, so I hung up.
Now, you do have call waiting?
Yes, I do.
Okay.
Is that mine or something?
I don't know.
Do you know what kind of a switch you're served by?
Oh, I don't know.
What area of the country are you in?
I'm in 908 over here in Jersey.
You have to pay for it.
New Jersey, you have to pay for it.
Oh, boy.
Yeah, New Jersey has a real racket going.
New Jersey Bell charges you for star 70.
Oh, I'm glad I didn't wait until it picked up.
Well, no, I mean they won't let you do it, and you can't. . .
I don't know what they charge you for this,
but you have to pay for the service in order to be able to dial those three numbers.
Oh, well, maybe that's why it was only ringing or something.
Yeah, it was ringing.
It would have given a recording.
It would give you a recording saying,
We've got to pay the ransom before we can release the numbers.
When I did star 67, it started ringing also.
Uh-huh.
I haven't tried the other stars yet.
Well, yeah, star 67 will ring because New Jersey doesn't have blocking.
You know, New Jersey is a real fascist state.
Nothing against the people who live there,
but, I mean, I can't believe the things the phone company gets away with there.
Well, that's because they're here.
Yeah, I know.
That's because that's where it all started.
Right.
There's like about five different locations where AT&T is.
I don't know if you've ever been up to Mary Hill,
but it looks like that monastery up there.
Oh, yeah, I'm there quite a bit, in fact.
Yes, it's quite an incredible place.
I'd just like to get the numbers.
I went through there a few years ago when I was touring the art collection alone.
It must be worth billions of dollars.
Uh-huh.
They have it hanging on the walls up there.
Yeah.
Okay, well, thank you very much for those answers.
If I have any more, I'll call back.
Okay, thanks for calling.
Take care.
That's a good example of some of the things that, I mean, I was surprised.
Yeah, the phone company charges.
Some phone companies charge for things that other phone companies don't.
The phone should tell you that it's wrong, you know?
Shouldn't it cost the same everywhere?
Good evening.
You're on the air.
Hi, thanks.
I have two questions, if I can.
The first one is I just had to get my mobile phone,
my cellular phone reprogrammed to a different number
because someone, I guess, programmed theirs to my number and started using my account.
Yeah, it's a common way of defrauding cellular phone companies, yes.
Is there any way to protect yourself against that?
Not right now.
There's no way of not listening in,
and that includes the data that gets transmitted as well,
which has your special code numbers and all that.
So, no, there's no protection at all for cellular phone people.
And, you know, even if there was protection against that,
we'd still be able to listen to you on the scanner
and we'd be able to tell exactly what you were saying.
Right.
I was wondering if someone actually, when they did that,
what if there are two cellular phones on at one time programmed with the same number?
Does the network know that?
I don't think that's possible, is it?
Yeah, of course it is.
Is it possible for the same area?
Yeah, of course it is, and both phones would be in use at the same time.
I mean, the account would be in use by two separate phones.
I see.
It's called stealing service.
Right, both stealing service.
Okay.
I thought you were asking is there a legitimate way for that to happen?
No, I was asking actually when they did it if that would show up
or if they could just be driving right next to me using my account.
Yeah, they just get your ESN number.
Yeah.
When it gets transmitted, when you pick up the phone.
Okay.
What people do is they camp out on the highway
and they just capture all the ESN numbers as they go buying the cars.
Yeah.
It's very easy.
Yeah.
Okay, the second question was I heard a rumor tonight about Prodigy
that when Prodigy connects to you and updates your software,
it checks out your directories
and it uploads some information from your hard drive.
That's an old story, the stage.dat file,
and just to cut it short, it's unfounded.
It really is.
They're not up to something,
but it does show that a lot of people don't really know
how their computers are being accessed and what's being done to them.
Yeah.
It's something to know about,
but we've talked about that at great length
and just don't want to get into it anymore.
Okay.
Okay.
Thank you.
All right.
Let's go to another telephone call.
Good evening.
Yes.
Go ahead.
I have a report that may be old news,
but I was in New Orleans a couple months ago
and was told by a systems person down there
that the phone company has a systems for allocating charges
that are done by fraud to other numbers that make similar calls.
All right.
You're going to have to say that, I don't know,
something a little closer to what we understand.
The phone company has very serious amounts of money
that are charged by fraud to a business or to some other number they've gotten.
Okay?
All right.
Maybe thousands of dollars charged to some company by fraud.
And rather than just take the hit themselves,
they have a system for checking other phone accounts
that make calls to similar area codes and assigning the charges to them.
Just assigning them without notifying them that they're doing this.
I thought you probably had run into this.
Well, I know that if there's a case of fraud, for instance,
and a person down the block from a pay phone where all this fraud is taking place
happens to call the exact same telephone number,
the phone company will usually figure out that that person is probably behind it,
and they might surreptitiously add it to their phone bill without telling them.
But to do it to something that's similar, in other words,
if somebody is calling Columbia from a pay phone,
they'll simply add it to the person in the neighborhood
that happens to call Columbia from their homes.
I don't think they would do something like that.
I don't think they could get away with it.
Well, apparently they are in New Orleans.
Really? Well, I'd like to hear more about that if that is true.
Well, I don't have more details, but I thought it was worth reporting anyway,
on the chance that some other listener might have more details,
and perhaps I can track it down.
Okay.
Good luck.
Thanks for calling.
Bye-bye.
People do all kinds of things to get what they feel is theirs.
Good evening.
Go ahead.
Yes, you raised an intriguing metaphor earlier,
which I wanted to explore a little bit.
You said, what if the government –
you were talking about some kind of a search.
You said, what if the government could read somebody's brainwaves,
I guess to read their minds?
Right.
And you said that was as if, like, when they took a picture of someone's –
got a hold of someone's utility bill,
and then took a picture of their house using an infrared camera,
and found that they had all these lamps to grow marijuana.
Right.
And that was like reading brainwaves.
I think that's a very intriguing analogy.
I would even extend it further to say the way this system works
is not only as if the government could read people's brainwaves to search them,
but if they could also – let's suppose they could punish somebody
just automatically, like by reading someone's brainwaves, as it were,
or extract taxes, or what they call taxes,
or that they could use such methods of surveillance
or some kind of an illegal method of surveillance.
I don't know how you take a picture of lamps in people's homes.
You might explain a little bit about that.
For the purpose of politics and discrediting or blackmail,
in other words, where you can imagine a full range of extents
where if you could just extract a punishment, let alone just evidence for a court,
so you never even have to bring evidence or charges in a court.
You just go straight to the punishment.
It's kind of the way the system usually functions.
It's sort of like these new high-technology traffic tickets.
Have you heard about these?
Where the police officer doesn't even have to witness it.
It's done by machine.
The machine somehow is able to tell if the person was speeding,
and it takes a picture of their license plate,
and the officer simply signs the ticket to say that he did not actually witness it,
but to the best of his knowledge, it happened,
because the machine told him it happened.
It's all automatic.
There's no human intervention needed anymore.
In fact, to carry what you're saying a few steps further,
all they have to do is take the money out of your bank account.
They don't even have to notify you.
Right, right, or right, exactly.
Although somehow with parking tickets, that doesn't, I mean...
Well, these are traffic tickets, actually.
Traffic, whatever.
I mean, we don't worry, but I personally think marijuana should be legal,
but many of these kinds of things don't seem...
In the case of marijuana, a person is doing something illegal.
There's a statute that says you're not supposed to do that.
It's legitimately passed, even if it's not a good statute.
But the notion about the nature of the search aspect,
where they find the evidence...
Now, could you explain how that happens?
A plane flying overhead and they...
Well, according to the story, it was a question of power consumption.
A particular kind of a lamp that's used for growing marijuana,
or growing plants of any sort, really,
but, of course, if you have this kind of lamp, well, maybe you have marijuana.
That particular thing draws a certain amount of power,
and only somebody who would have something along those lines
in the thoughts of the power company would have that.
So the power company...
Well, according to the article, okay, they...
Let's think about a telephone company.
Can they report, just like,
gee, this person makes a lot of calls to Miami?
Well, you know, if you have an integrated network
where every computer talks to every other computer,
you could conceivably have a portrait drawn of you
that says, well, you're this particular type of person.
You know, even if you haven't already done it,
you're the kind of person that will do it someday,
so we might as well just prosecute you now and get it over with.
But right now, according to this,
it's because of the number of grow lamps in the guy's attic.
You know, it was the amount of...
What did they say here? An airborne infrared detector.
That's what they used.
The notion, though, that you could use a utility,
like I could subscribe to a newspaper
and someone could get hold of my mailing...
my subscription list
and find out all the publications that I read,
and they'd know that I read, let's say...
I mean, I don't, but let's suppose I read High Times,
and then they said, and this person makes calls
to, you know, areas of the world where...
You would fit a certain profile.
...fame is grown or produced and...
or, let's say, or heroin or something,
and they put together these kinds of things
by finding out things like what you subscribe to or utilities.
That information, it can be given out
without your consent and knowledge, I gather.
That's right, and it happens all the time.
And I think the best way to counter that...
The best way to counter that...
Well, it's done by organizations all the time.
It's not done by governmental authorities.
It's done by marketing firms.
But the best way to fight that, I think, is to confuse it,
confuse the system and subscribe to things
that, you know, you wouldn't be expected to subscribe to.
And, you know, get numbers wrong,
spell your name differently, things like that.
A little individualistic flair there.
Well, I don't know that that solves anything.
It doesn't solve anything, but it does make the system
work a little bit less conveniently, less perfectly.
And I think a system like that working perfectly is a scary thing.
Well, it doesn't really obstruct them.
But it is true, though, that if they...
The metaphor of the brainwaves is interesting.
Not only for the purposes of surveillance but punishment.
You could literally short-circuit the whole Constitution.
They can just extract punishment.
They never have to go to trial.
The best you could do is somehow take the system to trial
to try to prove that you're innocent by the preponderance of the evidence
instead of having to be proven guilty of a crime
beyond a reasonable doubt.
So that, in other words, that loophole you spoke of
and that metaphor, when expanded to its reductio ad absurdum,
more describes how the system functions.
That's all I want to say.
Okay. Well, thanks for saying it.
I had Franz Kafka around to offer some comments on that.
Good evening.
Yes, I'd like to speak to VAI on the air.
Well, you're talking to all the people in New York right now.
Okay.
You're talking about the various scams by the telephone company,
and I'm just curious as to whether there are other people
that might be sensing something about a scam
that I think I sensed the same month.
My daughter and myself at different locations,
different phone numbers,
had payments for our telephone bills that we mailed
that were not posted to our accounts
until after they were theoretically overdue.
And the delay was more than the usual postal delays for both of us.
And I'm just wondering if the telephone company
has decided to make a little bit of extra money by occasionally,
in some pattern of their own,
holding on to checks a little bit longer
so they can extract the interest percentage.
Well, you know, it's only recently.
Are you in New York?
Yes, I am.
Okay, it's only recently that New York Telephone
for not paying their bill on time.
You know, it's impossible to say
if they're doing things intentionally
or if it's the result of an accident
or if it's the result of just ineptitude on their part.
However, if you can prove that a certain piece of mail
was mailed on a particular day,
I really think that the onus is on them to prove that they got it later.
They'll come through, and they'll take it off.
But in my mind, I wonder how many people bother
that might not seem so significant say,
well, why do the bother?
It's a good point.
And also, you know, I think it ties into something else.
The speed with which a company takes off a charge
is directly proportional to the number of people
that don't bother to contest it.
In other words, you call one of these long-distance companies
that charges you $10 for a local call,
and you don't know that you're using them in the first place.
You call them up, and you say,
hey, you know, I just got this phone bill.
And they say, yeah, yeah, yeah, we'll take it off
without even getting your name.
They just know what you want right away.
Now, they do that so quickly because they know
that if people challenge them, they're going to lose.
But so many people don't bother to challenge them,
so that's why they survive.
My challenge to this on suspicion,
and again, it's just a suspicion,
but because of the coincidence or seeming coincidence,
my challenge has been instead of mailing it now
to put the costs on them for their agents out there
who take the bills and charge no extra for payment
because I'm conveniently located with my work
to a place where I can just take it in
and pay it directly and have a stamp on it
that says I paid it at that point in time.
Uh-huh.
Well, I've heard that if you do that,
if you go to a bank or something,
it doesn't always work.
I mean, yeah, you get that little stamp,
but sometimes it shows up late anyway.
That's interesting.
Yeah.
You're best off just paying it early.
You know, get into the flow of it and just pay early.
I believe in paying up the last minute.
Let the float be in my account, not theirs.
Yeah, that's true, except when they have a late charge,
then they somehow wind up with the advantage
even if you do it once.
Yeah.
Okay, well, thanks for calling.
You're welcome.
All right, let's see if we can fit in a couple more calls.
Good evening.
Anybody there?
Okay, well, that makes it easy.
Let's try this one.
Good evening.
Yes, okay, let me get this straight.
If I call from a pay phone in New York City,
somebody who has caller ID,
is there any way I can block them?
Is there any way you can block your number
is what you're saying?
No, you cannot block your number
from showing up on caller ID.
If I'm calling from my home phone,
I don't have any kind of caller ID service,
and I call somebody with caller ID,
is there any way I can block it?
Yes, there's two ways you can block it.
You can tell the phone company
you want it blocked all the time,
and that means every time you make a phone call,
it will show up as private number.
Or if you have not done this,
then you have to dial star 67 or 1167
before every number you call.
Well, then wouldn't you recommend
to 90% of the people out there
who don't plan on buying
to just call up the company
and tell them they never want it?
Yes, that's what I do recommend.
I recommend it to 100% of the people
because I see no use for it.
I can't picture any situation
where I would want the person to know.
If I want them to know, I'll tell them.
Right, and if you want them to know,
you can always dial star 67 then,
and it will send your number.
It would send them, right.
Or, you know, yes,
so I guess everybody should do that.
Okay, but you can't block it from a pay phone.
Okay, one last question.
Yes.
When your readout,
because I know you have it,
when does it read out the person's number?
During the ring or after you pick up?
It does it after the first ring,
whether you pick up or not.
Whether you pick up or not.
In fact, what I was hoping to have for the show tonight,
we'll have it in a couple of weeks,
is an actual sound, you know,
the sound of the data being sent,
and maybe people out there can record it,
decode it, and figure out ways
as to what exactly is being sent on there,
but it's a little burst of data
that comes directly after the first ring,
and, you know, it's interesting.
This is something I discovered, too.
If you get a call on call waiting,
and, you know, the call waiting call comes in,
and you hang up your first call,
your telephone will ring,
and you will get a caller ID signal
after the first audible ring of your telephone.
In other words, it won't be lost
when the first ring of the caller comes in
on your call waiting.
It's kind of hard to describe,
but I think you understand.
Right.
If a person set up their modem
to ring, like, three-quarters of a ring,
and then speed redial...
I don't think you can do that.
You can't.
Three-quarters of a ring?
You couldn't be done, right?
Well, I'm not sure,
but if you set it up for one ring,
it won't be sent.
That much I do know.
Oh, it won't be sent?
If it picks up after the first ring,
it probably won't be sent, no.
Oh, okay.
Well, it'll be sent, but it won't be received.
Oh, one quick last thing.
Yeah.
I have this idea.
For, like, picture two companies,
one in L.A., one in New York,
who constantly call each other.
Well, the average long-distance rate
might be, like, $2, $3 or something.
Why wouldn't those companies set up 800 numbers?
Not that they advertise for customers to call,
but just to call each other more inexpensively.
Yes, a lot of companies do that, in fact.
However, after a long period of time,
it doesn't pay off.
It doesn't.
The calls mount up.
But, yeah, there's all kinds of different services,
and, yeah, if you use calling cards
or things like that,
you're being ripped off, definitely.
Oh, okay, but you're saying
you can get special long-distance reduction rates
if you keep calling the person all the time
long-distance?
Yeah, there's all kinds of options.
That is lower than 800 service?
Yeah, there's all kinds of options.
Oh.
But we're out of time now,
so we can't get into it,
but keep thinking creatively,
because there are options out there.
I guess that's kind of the theme of our program here.
Well, that's all the time we have this week.
Remember, next week, we're not on the air at night,
but we're on the air in the morning.
Yes, from 9 in the morning until 12 noon.
And that should be interesting.
We're going to have all kinds of special things
going on then, so tune in.
Stay tuned for the news next here on WBAI New York.
This is Emanuel Goldstein for Off The Hook,
and for FiberOptic and all, good night.
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
Bum-diddly-bum
For the best, expect the worst
I hope that's understood
Bum-diddly-bum
For the best, expect the worst
Bum-diddly-bum
Bum-diddly-bum
Bum-diddly-bum
Bum-diddly-bum
Bum-diddly-bum
Bum-diddly-bum
Bum-diddly-bum
Bum-diddly-bum
Good evening. In the news tonight,
if US troops head to Bosnia,
will they have the blessings of the American public?
Can progressive movements survive in Latin America
in the aftermath of the Cold War?
The Lesbian and Gay March goes to video,
compliments of the Christian right.
And in New York, civil liberties groups call for peace
in the wake of bias incidents in Brooklyn.
With these and other stories,
I'm David Sears in New York
with Verna Avery Brown in Washington,
and this is the news for Wednesday, May 5, 1993.
First to Mark Beavis in Washington
with these news briefs.
The world is waiting for the outcome
of Bosnian-Serb parliament deliberations
on the Yugoslavian peace plan.
Bosnian-Serb leader Radovan Karadzic
warned his parliament today that it had no choice
but to sign the UN-sponsored pact to end the civil war.
If it's rejected,
Karadzic warned of catastrophic consequences.
The parliament's expected to remain in deliberations
behind closed doors until a vote is taken.
Meanwhile, Western nations are still deciding how to react,
and at the White House,
President Clinton told reporters
he's not yet made up his mind.
I hope they'll not only vote for it,
I hope they'll observe it.
They're two different issues, you know.
We have to start our meeting here in a minute,
but I think one of the things that we have to discuss
is that we want an agreement in words
and an agreement in fact,
and that's what we've got to watch.
The president spent much of the morning
in consultations with congressional leaders
who voiced support for the administration.
Senate Minority Leader Robert Dole of Kansas
says there's no disagreement among the leadership.
There will be bipartisan support.
There were a lot of questions asked.
There are a lot of very difficult things we need to do.
We need to prepare the American people.
We need to define very carefully the national interest.
But I think beyond that,
we had a good briefing on the Christopher mission,
and the president was good enough to consult with us again
and indicates he'll continue it.
We're thankful for that.
Secretary of State Warren Christopher is in Europe
for consultations with allies on possible military action.
So far, the allies have not agreed to use force
against the Bosnian Serbs.
But Russia told U.S. Today
it would send peacekeeping forces to Bosnia
if the rebel Serbs accepted the peace plan.
Meanwhile, at the United Nations,
Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali
has proposed a working plan for a war crimes tribunal
for human rights violations committed in the former Yugoslavia.
Linda Fasulo reports.
In February, the Security Council decided to set up
an international tribunal
and ask the Secretary General to propose a plan.
Now in his report, Boutros-Ghali is recommending
that such a tribunal be located at the Hague,
home of the world court.
The tribunal would be comprised of two trial chambers
and a court of appeals.
All persons accused of committing war crimes
since January 1st, 1991 could be tried.
The Secretary General would nominate a prosecutor
who would then be appointed by the Security Council.
The 11 judges would be elected for four-year terms
by the General Assembly and eligible for re-election.
But the maximum penalty the tribunal could impose
on criminals would be imprisonment.
There would be no death penalty.
For Pacifica, this is Linda Fasulo at the UN.
Israeli and Palestinian negotiators
announced today in Washington they have some hope
of reaching a declaration of principles
on Palestinian self-rule.
A working group on the idea of self-rule
has been meeting every day this week to work on the principles,
but both sides said there's no guarantee
they would finish the document during this round.
Meanwhile, Arab negotiators have decided
to extend the current round of peace talks with Israel.
The announcement was made late Tuesday night.
President Clinton today welcomed home U.S. troops
who'd been stationed in Somalia,
and he presented their commander,
Marine Lieutenant General Robert Johnston,
the Distinguished Service Medal.
On behalf of all the American people I say to you, General,
and all of whom you brought with you,
welcome home, and thank you for a job very, very well done.
Of the 25,800 troops sent to Somalia back in January,
about 5,000 remain.
Most of those will be part of a peacekeeping force
led by the United Nations.
At the White House ceremony this morning, however,
President Clinton noted that for the military,
quote, other missions lie ahead.
Khmer Rouge guerrillas have attacked a Chinese army unit
in central Cambodia.
In its first attack on its once-allied Chinese forces,
the Khmer Rouge shelled a base in Kampong Tom Province
Tuesday night.
No one was injured, although some 200 U.N. peacekeepers
were stationed at the facility at the time of the attack.
And finally, Irving Howe, writer, critic,
and leading member of the New York literary scene,
died today after a stroke suffered last night.
Howe's best-known book was World of Our Fathers,
a social and cultural history of East European Jews in America.
It won the National Book Award in 1977.
Howe was 72.
And those are the headlines.
I'm Mark Bevis.
♪♪♪
Once again, the nation is poised for military intervention abroad,
this time in the tiny Balkan state of Bosnia.
The Bosnian Serbs debated the proposed peace plan
as the U.S. geared up for military action.
The Russians say they'll commit troops to a peacekeeping mission.
U.S. forces are reported to be stockpiling supplies
just in case their troops are sent to the Balkans.
And back home, top congressional leaders met with the president
at the White House to discuss the latest plans.
Talk for the need to intercede militarily has not been reflected.