mis@uunet.uu.net (Mark Seiden) (11/10/89)
I am incredibly angry at a tour operator and a travel agent -- I placed a $500 deposit for a Hawaii trip over xmas based on the agent's substantial misrepresentation of the price ($3200 lower than actual price), and the tour operator tells me the entire deposit is nonrefundable even in that case. I am attempting to reason with them. I'd rather get EVEN than get mad...though I AM mad...how does this look? Set up a dialout modem to call their 800 numbers during prime time. Wait for an answer (in one case, from their robot operator, in which case dial a randomly chosen digit), and hang up 3 seconds later. repeat ad infinitum. (The telephonic equivalent of mailing in a truckload of empty business reply envelopes.) The effects: they pay for a minimum charge of 1 minute per call, (I think) and I can get a lot of these done in a few hours. Also, I imagine, partial denial of service since some people may get busy signals or be ignored in the noise. Questions: Are these nuisance calls? Could this possibly be legal? Can they find me? (and how easily?) What can they/They do to me? (they = the bastards, They = the govt or TPC)... (I know this is nasty/sophomoric -- I'm not a Christian and please don't suggest I become one... I don't have the time to sue the bastards who are half way across the country.) Flame me directly, I'll summarize to the net. I almost feel better already... mis@seiden.com [Moderator's Note: I *strongly* recommend against the action you have described to get even. You can get caught, and 'they' can do a few things including sue you to recover the phone costs and whatever business they claim they lost while the lines were tied up. What 'They' can do is another matter: 'They' can take you before a federal grand jury and indict you on charges of mis-use of the wires. Telephonic harassment is illegal in all states, and on the federal level. If 'they/They' put their mind to it, you will be caught. You should remember that many/most 800 subscribers do get a print out of the calls received. It would be a simple matter to look for patterns in the calls matching the time the harassment occurred. About four years ago, a man in Georgia used his computer and modem to dial repeatedly for days on end to the toll free lines of Jerry Falwell. The result was a phone bill of about *one million dollars* which Falwell settled with AT&T for considerably less. Falwell's total phone bill ordinarily runs about $275,000.00 per month. Falwell sued the guy in Georgia and got a judgment; I doubt he has collected it. AT&T stunk up things with the feds, and the guy wound up in court getting a year of federal probation. And by the way, the mis-use of Business Reply Envelopes (mailing them back blank, etc) is also against the law. You've been counseled. PT]
phil@uunet.uu.net (J. Philip Miller) (11/13/89)
>[Moderator's Note: >...... You >should remember that many/most 800 subscribers do get a print out of >the calls received. Is this new? It has been a couple of years since I had 800 service (from AT&T) for inward dialing of a modem connection. I repeatedly asked about this because of my vulnerbility to the hacker and was told all they offered was a 24 hour sampling of the area codes of the calling party (I think in the last year or so they said they could identify the LATA of the caller). I know MCI and some of the others offer this service, but if AT&T offers it, it is new. J. Philip Miller, Professor, Division of Biostatistics, Box 8067 Washington University Medical School, St. Louis MO 63110 phil@wubios.WUstl.edu - Internet (314) 362-3617 phil@wubios.wustl - bitnet uunet!wucs1!wubios!phil - UUCP C90562JM@WUVMD - alternate bitnet [Moderator's Note: Well, I don't think it is that new for AT&T. Actually I think they were doing it before MCI, et al were able to. PT]
johnl@esegue.segue.boston.ma.us (John R. Levine) (11/13/89)
In article <telecom-v09i0502m11@vector.dallas.tx.us> you write: >And by the way, the mis-use of Business Reply Envelopes (mailing them >back blank, etc) is also against the law. You've been counseled. PT] Huh? I understand why the Post Office is allowed to throw it away if you glue one to a brick, but in what way is sending back an empty envelope illegal? Pretty stupid law if it even exists, it'd be near impossible to prove intent. Regards, John Levine, johnl@esegue.segue.boston.ma.us, {spdcc|ima|lotus}!esegue!johnl [Moderator's Note: Didn't the original note refer to sending back *lots* of empty envelopes? If so, the intent would be easier to demonstrate. And although an empty envelope in the mail could easily be the fault of an absent-minded person who forgot to include whatever it was he was mailing, stuffing the envelope with (ahem!) un-business-like correspondence just to cause the receiver to pay lots of postage (something far less obvious than a brick, for example) is a mis-use of the envelope. PT]