Patrick_A_Townson@cup.portal.com (09/16/88)
We have a new Big Brother out there, folks.... the name is TELECONNECT, and its purpose is to provide interstate long distance service *to those phone numbers it deems appropriate*. TELECONNECT, based out of Cedar Rapids, Iowa is just another in the growing number of OCC's out to make a buck. Maybe you have heard of them, and maybe not. They came to my attention through a message left by Bruce Wilson, active BBS'er and sysop in Des Moines, IA. His board number is 515-280-9107. Unlike MCI or Sprint, who will not connect to 976 unless/until they work out their chronic disputes with the local telcos on billing for these calls, TELECONNECT will not connect to *any BBS line if it thinks the BBS is a board for phreaks or hackers*. Bruce found this out when repeated efforts to call a couple BBS lines in Iowa consistently failed to go though when the modem (with speaker turned off; i.e no way to hear the intercept) dialed via TELECONNECT. When the same calls were attempted via AT&T or Sprint, they always completed just fine. Curious, the call was dialed manually via TELECONNECT and an intercept recording stated that 'we will not connect to the number you have dialed at this time'. Management at TELECONNECT refused to discuss the matter except to say that 'it was their business who they were willing to connect with or not...', this despite a reading of applicable federal laws to the executives of the firm. Only when an informal complaint was filed with the authorities in Iowa did TELECONNECT bother to respond at all, and then to say that they 'suspected' the BBS lines in particular were being used to pass illegal information regards telephone access codes on the TELECONNECT network. Even though they had no proof of this, they said they simply would not admit calls to those numbers. When asked for specifics and particulars about the 'illegal information being passed around', TELECONNECT requested the right to provide this information to the Commission in secret, and the Commission granted this request, meaning the exact nature of TELECONNECT's complaints against the BBS' in particular will not be revealed to the public -- or even the victim of the complaints -- any BBS line this carrier chooses not to admit to its network. According to Bruce Wilson, formal complaints have been or will be soon filed with the Federal Communications Commission, citing appropriate federal law and asking that the firm be ordered to comply with the law and pay a fine for its previous non-compliance. This is the first time I have ever heard of an OCC refusing to terminate a call on its network on the phone number(s) of persons or businesses it perceives to be engaged in fraud. I'll repeat the phone number for Bruce Wilson's BBS: 515-280-9107. Read the text files there for yourself. You may wish to download them for distribution elsewhere. Patrick Townson