Will Martin <wmartin@stl-06sima.army.mil> (06/26/91)
[I wish these people would put all the telecom stuff in one issue per week
instead of dribbling it out some each day... :-)]
On the front page of the "B" section of the 26 June '91 {Wall Street
Journal} are two related articles on cellular fraud, countermeasures
against it, and the encryption issue. I doubt if most Telecomers would
be surprised by any of the info in the first, except maybe about the
phreaked cell-phones with the plastic explosive inside to thwart
investigators. .. (Might make you a bit wary when you get out the
screwdriver to look inside that cell-phone you picked up at the flea
market ... :-) More common was a spring-loaded magnet which was set to
automatically erase the hacked chip when the case was opened. [I
thought EPROMS needed UV to be erased; are some magnetism-wipable?]
The cell-phone-security article on eavesdropping and encryption to
counteract it was refreshing in that it dwelt on the technical issues,
and did not make the common and false assumption that legislation was
a valid anti-eavesdropping approach.
Regards,
Will wmartin@stl-06sima.army.mil OR wmartin@st-louis-emh2.army.mil