wb8foz@mthvax.cs.miami.edu (David Lesher) (09/15/90)
Bob Halloran wrote: |I used to be in software development for a company in Rochester NY who |made SMDR units for the Bell System, pre-breakup. I found soon after |I started that there was a known bug in the unit's software that would |reject any records that were not 7, 10 or 11 digits (1+ dialing was |not so entrenched in '81). If the people reading the reports weren't |checking the exception log, calls with extra digits slipped through. |Punching the last digit of your number a few extra times was a common |practice in-house :-). I've heard of an even better one.... When Ma offered TWX to compete with WU's TELEX she did so with a dataset (modem to us folks) run by a telephone that resembed a 565. You called up the far end with a special reserved area code and number {example: (710) 987-0000}, listened in the handset for the tone, hit the DATA button, and hung up the handset. Since there was no one to talk to, the handset had a blank cap and no T-1 transmitter. But as the years went by, Ma started having a hard time with people complaining about being billed for TWX calls that they had never made, or that had ended up in Fiji, instead of Fargo. Rumor was this was due to a vastly reduced maintenance budget for the switches, as she was not making the returns she wanted. So some 'brain' decided that rather than adjust a zillion wrong numbers/month, it was easier to put exception code in the billing software to bit bucket all TWX--->POTS calls. (This was an easy thing to impliment, as the TWX lines had those xx0 area codes.) This greatly reduced the numbers of calls to be manually voided. But, as you can all guess, some smart user noted this, and installed a T-1 on his TWX. Presto-free LD! I understand that despite the fact that word of this spread like wildfire, it was YEARS before Ma figured out she was getting had. I suspect she then tried to back-bill some people, but that's locking the barn door after the cow is gone. wb8foz@mthvax.cs.miami.edu (305) 255-RTFM pob 570-335 33257-0335
0004133373@mcimail.com (Donald E. Kimberlin) (09/20/90)
David writes <inDigest V10,Iss649>: >When Ma offered TWX ... she did so with a dataset (modem to us folks) >run by a telephone that resembed a 565. You called up ... with a >special reserved area code...{example: (710)...},listened ... hit >the DATA button, and hung up the handset. >But as the years went by, Ma started having ... people complaining >about being billed for TWX calls that they had never made ... >So some 'brain' decided that rather than adjust a zillion wrong >numbers/month, it was easier to put exception code in the billing >software to bit bucket all TWX--->POTS {areacode} calls. (This was >easy ... as the TWX lines had those xx0 area codes.) In fact they were only 510, 610, 710, 810 and 910, David ...trash anything else. >But ... some smart user noted this, and installed a {transmitter >element in the phone associated with} ... his TWX. Presto-free LD! > I understand ... this spread like wildfire, it was YEARS before >Ma figured out she was getting had. I suspect she then tried to >back-bill some people, but that's locking the barn door after the >cow is gone. In fact, your tale is largely true. Ma had a plan to get every TWX over onto a "special exchange" in each major city called a WADS exchange (Wide Area Data Service -- Rule Number 14 is NEVER make the name something people can figure out; don't simply say it is the TWX exchange. In fact, WADS was a compartmented piece of a crossbar office. Yes, Virginia, they could compartment an "old" crossbar! It was all just good old "class-marking" the lines for a different rate treatment.) But herein lies some understanding of the slothfulness of the old monolith. The local exchange people were just slaveys of AT&T, and TWX was an AT&T product, not a local Telco product. The whole grand plan was organized and run from AT&T. The local slaveys only did as instructed, or a reasonable facsimile thereof. Billing problems were AT&T's problems. So, it was a clever patch to avoid all the hassle by just scrapping obviously wrong numbers. The reasoning ran like: "Well, the locals probably have a lot of digit errors in what they are handling; we'll be getting a better handle on this mess when we get all the subscribers in WADS offices; there's NO way they could defraud the company from a TWX machine, because I don't know how to or our trusty installers out there will bust them in the field anyway; and the overhead for losing all those calls is less than the overhead we incur to try to take all those complaints. Just charge it off to operating expense. We'll get it back in the next rate case when we show how our expense is increasing." THAT, Dear Readers is another example of what can best be called the "Bell-Shaped Head." It is one of thousands of things that got Ma Bell lynched; the result of a 1913 "cost-plus contract with the public" that went so very wrong. It exemplifies why we are going through the throes of today. Many of those attitudes STILL pervade the minds of local Telco people, like to hear it or not. <Now crouching in foxhole with flameproof gear on, 'cause I KNOW the bees buzz when they get flushed out!> [Moderator's Note: Didn't they also have 410 as an area code, serving the New England area? PAT]