telecom@ucbvax.UUCP (02/12/86)
In article <8602110631.AA14409@ucbvax.berkeley.edu> Ralph.Hyre@IUS2.CS.CMU.EDU writes: > >What the government do (if anything) about possible abuses. Will it be legal >for a person to sell his own CNA database? (If so, why hasn't anyone done >this before? Here in the Minneapolis/Saint Paul area, there are four alternatives: 1) There is a publication known as Cole's (I think) directory, available to businesses and without restriction to the public at libraries, which is a compilation of name, address, and phone number data organized by name, by address, and by phone number. The information is collected by periodic door-to-door survey. It is possible to keep your name out of this directory without a monthly charge. 2) Polk's directory is very similar to Cole's above in every respect, including availablilty, except that I found it a little more current and complete. 3) To quote from page 2 of the 1986 Minneapolis Consumer Directory (Yellow Pages): "STREET ADDRESS DIRECTORIES AVAILABLE "Street Address directories are available for several Northwestern Bell communities. Listings are arranged in street address order with the corresponding name and phone number following each listing. In a separate section, listings are arranged in telephone number sequence. Northwestern Bell publishes Street Address directories semi-annually for Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, Omaha, Nebraska, and Des Moines and Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Call your Service Representative for pricing and ordering information." I was able to peruse copies of these directories at my leisure at the larger county libraries in the area, but they want some form of ID so that you do not walk off with them, as they contain a notice inside the covers stating that they are leased and old editions must be returned in order to get new ones. For the three cases above, the unconventional sortings are known variously as pink pages and blue pages. 4) To quote from page 11 of ibid. : "CURRENT NAME & ADDRESS SERVICE" "1 + 402-580-2255" "With this service you can obtain the name and address for any listed telephone number. This service is updated daily and is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week and serves Northwestern Bell's five states (Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota). For 50 cents, plus the long distance charge, you can obtain 2 listings per call. Non-published numbers are not available. "For more information on current name and address service in Minnesota call 535-5316." This is essentially a very current version of the published directories above, except that evidently "non-directory" listings are also available. >As I understand it, CNA stands for Called Number Authority. The phone company >keeps a list of number-person correspondences, which are available in many >cities by simply calling (presumably) secret phone number. (The CNA operator >answers and says 'Number, please?', you give number, they give name.) The >general public does not/is not supposed to have access to this information. The number is obviously not secret here. It is from the quoted text that I had assumed that CNA meant Current Name & Address. Some public libraries have a collection of recent telephone directories for most major cities around the world. It may be possible to glean this information for other cities by consulting such a collection. -- Honk honk! Why, it's Wobbles, the goose! Jeff Woolsey ...ihnp4{!stolaf}!umn-cs!woolsey woolsey@umn-cs.csnet
telecom@ucbvax.UUCP (02/12/86)
In article <8602110631.AA14409@ucbvax.berkeley.edu> Ralph.Hyre@IUS2.CS.CMU.EDU writes: >As I understand it, CNA stands for Called Number Authority. The phone company >keeps a list of number-person correspondences, which are available in many >cities by simply calling (presumably) secret phone number. (The CNA operator >answers and says 'Number, please?', you give number, they give name.) The >general public does not/is not supposed to have access to this information. Most cities of any size have a "city directory." This is distinct from the usual phone book and is produced by one of a number of city directory publishers for banks, real estate agents, and other commercial users. It contains business and government listings, demographic information, and lists of individuals. I believe at least a few of these directories have multiple listings by different sequences, including by street address and by telephone number. I recall a movie in which the villain's henchmen were after a witness to a crime. They locate her former employer and tried to get her address by claiming they had found something that belonged to her. The employer refused to reveal the address but did call her. The evildoers wrote down the number dialed and looked it up in the city directory. So, in this far-fetched instance at least, there is potential for abuse of such a listing. At times there may be a potential benefit. I trust you will keep the following story to yourself. One place I worked allowed employees to make personal long distance calls for which we later made reimbursement, after the bill came. On one occasion I called Source EDP (an employment agency) in Atlanta to get their free salary survey, just for the heck of it. I forgot to write down the number on my long distance log. The bill came. No one claimed the call. So the bookkeeper called the phone company to find out what name went with the number. "Who called Source EDP?" we were asked. I confessed and paid up, and assumed that was the end of the matter. Not so, however. Evidently suspecting I was hunting for a new job (I really wasn't) my employer soon gave me a *very* substantial raise and a promotion. It's an ill wind that blows nobody good! -- D Gary Grady Duke U Comp Center, Durham, NC 27706 (919) 684-3695 USENET: {seismo,decvax,ihnp4,akgua,etc.}!mcnc!ecsvax!dgary