Pager Major (Spring, 1995)
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By Danny Burstein

This article has been put together to answer some of the more common questions
about pager systems. It is primarily focused on the U.S. and Canadian
arrangements, but other countries are not forgotten.

The replacement machines have any number of configurations, most with no doors
at all or a totally different door approach. I'm pretty sure the laws
concerning tampering with ATMs have also been replaced as well.

Number 2

This one I just saw the other day is pretty much the impetus for writing this
whole article. It's not so much of a hack other than observing the plain
stupidity of a company providing customers with an ATM-like service. This
nameless company provides a card reader/keypad/terminal/printer inside their
establishment. At the terminal you swipe your card (no card capture here!),
enter your PIN, and then the amount you want. The printer promptly shells out a
receipt and informs you to take it to the counter for the bucks. After you sign
it, the salesperson then takes the receipt and gives you the amount indicated.
Simple, with the single point cash idea, and life is just way easier with this
low maintenance machine. My transaction had one slight hang-up, which was pure
coincidence. The printer became somewhat jammed and my receipt had no place for
me to sign. The receipts are quite similar to those of any credit cards where
there is a white copy on top and a yellow one for the customer underneath. At
seeing the problem, the salesperson comes over and first opens the bottom up
and fixes the jammed printer. A key is needed here. Next, enter the shaky world
of high tech computer terminal security: a five-digit code is entered into the
terminal. No magic key card swipe then code combination, just a plain old five
digit shoulder surfable code. Five digits, press Enter, and the terminal
displays "Authorized Reprint - Press Enter for Reprint." Here comes my new
receipt and the machine is back in swipe-a-card mode. Looking over my new
authorized reprint I do find one small clue to indicate this is not the
original. Easily missed, it says "Reprinted" midway down amongst a slew of
other bank babble. Sign it, get the cash, and go. Now [nameless] is a large
nationwide chain with many locations even within the city; what are the odds
that the same code will work at another location? Sure enough. Walk in, five
digits, press Enter then enter again, tear off the print out, sign it with some
mess, take it to the counter and do the ole "Boy, that Brad Pitt sure is a
cutey, huh!" distracter, and ta-da! You just got handed the same amount of
money the last person got. Since it was a non-network function, [nameless] is
the loser, the reprinted account never knows the difference. As for how do you
get the chance to shoulder surf the code? Refeed the copy on to itself? Spill
coffee on it? You see it over and over how rules that apply to the user do not
for the administrator. The user is required to have a card and code while the
administrator needs just a code. The administrator usually means many
(salespeople, managers, etc.) and the policy to direct many appears to weigh
much heavier than any fear we install.

Special thanx to FlyCac Technologies and iBruiseEasily for some thoughts and
memories.