Telecom-Request%usc-eclc@brl-bmd.UUCP (Telecom-Request@usc-eclc) (12/23/83)
TELECOM Digest Wednesday, 21 Dec 1983 Volume 3 : Issue 122
Today's Topics:
"Blue Boxes"
Bell 212s and CCITT V.22
Cellular mobile phone
direct digital service
Wiretap loophole concerns.
Re: TELECOM Digest V3 #121
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Date: Tue 20 Dec 83 00:32:09-MST
From: Spencer W. Thomas <THOMAS@UTAH-20.ARPA>
Subject: "Blue Boxes"
My understanding of "blue boxes" is that the LD switching tones are
different from the standard Touch-Tone(R) frequencies. Thus, having
one of these Radio Shack Touch-Tone generators won't let you do
illegal LD dialing, anyway. Besides, on almost all circuits now, the
switching tones are on a different path from the voice (I never hear
them beep in the background anymore), so a "blue box" isn't supposed
to work. Maybe someone who works in this area can comment further.
=Spencer
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Date: 20 Dec 1983 0832-EST
From: John R. Covert <RSX-DEV at DEC-MARLBORO>
Subject: Bell 212s and CCITT V.22
Though the modulation technique of the Bell 212 is essentially
equivalent to the CCITT Recommendation V.22, there are unfortunately
enough differences that 212s and V.22s are not fully compatible.
Recommendation V.22 specifies different handshaking practices and the
presence of a pilot tone. The result is that many (but not all) 212
modems can originate calls to V.22 modems, but V.22 modems can not
originate calls to 212s. The major differences in the handshaking are
a different answer tone (the 2225 Hz answer tone of Bell 212s is close
enough to the 2280 Hz AC9 signalling frequency that telephone
connections in the U.K. will be disconnected upon answer) and the fact
that V.22 provides a different procedure for dealing with a lower
speed (neither the 103 technique which is not used at all in Europe
nor the similar V.21).
Since most European countries require that all telecommunications
equipment adhere strictly to CCITT recommendations (even in those very
few countries which permit privately owned modems) this severely
limits the use of 212s.
On a product I have been working on it will be interesting to see
which countries are willing to permit it to be used in originate-only
mode or between two cooperating versions of the product. Holland is
the only one so far. In most other countries we expect to have to
remove the 212 chips from the device, leaving only V.23 mode 2, which
is 1200 in one direction and 75 in the other.
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Date: 20 Dec 1983 0708-PST
Subject: Cellular mobile phone
From: WMartin at Office-3 (Will Martin)
Question: What will happen with the current mobile phone system and
equipment when the new cellular systems are installed? I would think
that they would both operate in parallel for at least some time, but
is that planned to continue indefinitely? Or are there industries
clamoring for the current mobile phone frequency assignments already?
Will the current system continue in less-dense areas, with the
cellular systems for highly-developed urban areas only? In that case,
will the operating companies have to maintain operators and equipment
to service the non-local old-style mobile phone usesrs who come into
the urban areas from time to time? (Can you use your existing mobile
phone in many different operating company areas if you drive across
the country? How does billing work in that case?)
Will Martin
PS: Apologies for my poor geography; I forgot Washington National was
in VA, not in DC. A slip of the cerebrum... WM
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Date: 20 December 1983 12:07 EST
From: Jeffrey R. Del Papa <DP @ MIT-ML>
Subject: direct digital service
Actualy the quantizing rate is 56kbs. they steal a low order bit
from the 8 bit data, for syncronizatation purposes. It is supposed to
happen to only one line per t1 bank (1.4mhz carries 24 calls), so
there is no gaurantee that you get all 8 bits. In fact to save money
in some of the older local trunk equip., they just sent 7 bits on all
lines.
to add to the screw, many of the digital trunking schemes have a set
of duty cycle requirements. min of ~3% so you cna tell the line is
alive, and syncronize, and a max of ~65% (depending) to keep from
frying your microwave transmitter, or diode laser (I am not sure of
the upper limit, but I know there is one)
Jeff
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Date: 20 Dec 1983 11:01-PST
Subject: Wiretap loophole concerns.
From: the tty of Geoffrey S. Goodfellow <Geoff @ SRI-CSL>
n089 1907 18 Dec 83 BC-TAP 2takes (EXCLUSIVE: 10 p.m. EST Embargo) A
Loophole Raises Concern About Privacy in Computer Age By DAVID BURNHAM
c.1983 N.Y. Times News Service
WASHINGTON - Telecommunications experts are expressing concern
that the federal wiretap law does not make it a crime for anyone,
whether private citizen, law enforcement officer or foreign spy, to
intercept the millions of messages transmitted around the United
States each day by computer.
The experts, who are in Congress, the American Telephone and
Telegraph Co., and the American Civil Liberties Union, say the
importance of the loophole in the 1968 law has been greatly magnified
in recent years with the increasing use of computers for storing and
transmitting personal, business, and government information.
Three congressional panels are considering whether the law should
be rewritten to reflect the computer age. A major concern, both in
Congress and among the experts, is whether the loophole gives local,
state, and federal law enforcement officers an opportunity to conduct
computerized electronic surveillance without the court approval
required for wiretaps.
There is no evidence of widespread exploitation of the law by
officers. But John Shattock, director of the national office of the
civil liberties union, said: ''The issue here is the privacy of
communications against secret government surveillance. The threat here
truly is Big Brother, not a group of little kids.''
Some fear that any change in the current law, unless it is done
carefully, could inadvertently increase or decrease the power of law
enforcement officers.
The wiretap law forbids the monitoring of conversations except for
law enforcement officers who have obtained a warrant from a judge. In
the age of the computer, however, more and more messages, including
those expressed by the human voice, are broken down into ''digital
bits'' in their transmission.
But because of the way the 1968 law is written, the interception
of these bits is not a crime and the police are free to intercept them
without warrants.
Most electronic surveillance is passive, making it impossible to
measure how much the loophole is being exploited, whether by the
authorities, by industrial spies, by organized crime figures trying to
make a killing in the stock market, by international spies seeking
government data, or by curious individuals with a personal computer.
But in recent months a number of computerized data banks in
government and industry have become the targets of long-distance
telephone attacks by amateur computer experts working from their home
computers. In addition, indictments have charged foreign computer
concerns with attempting to purchase sensitive details about the
products of American companies.
More seriously, perhaps, several years ago the Carter
administration announced that it believed the Soviet Union was using
antennas believed to have been set up on its grounds in Washington,
New York, and San Francisco to intercept digital information being
transmitted in microwaves by businesses and government agencies.
The Carter administration took limited technical steps to prevent
the Russians from obtaining sensitive government data and ordered the
National Security Agency to help private corporations improve their
security. But it never took any formal legal action against the
Russians or formally asked Congress to amend the law.
H.W. William Caming oversees privacy and corporate security
matters at AT&T. ''As we enter the year made famous by George Orwell's
book, 'Nineteen-Eighty-four,' computer crime is on the rise and may
well constitute a major crime threat of the 1980s,'' he said in a
recent interview. ''We therefore are encouraged by and vigorously
support current efforts in Congress and the states to enact suitable
legislation concerning computer crime. We believe that such
legislation should include provisions making it a crime to secretly
intercept non-voice communications.''
AT&T is not the only company concerned about the wiretap law. In
response to an inquiry, Satellite Business Systems, a major new data
communications company jointly owned by International Business
Machines, the Aetna Life and Casualty Co., and Comsat, agreed that
some experts believed there was a ''potential loophole'' in current
law and that, to the extent this was so, ''legislation to make clear
that such unauthorized interception is prohibited would be useful.''
The 1968 wiretap law makes it a federal felony for a third party
to intercept the conversations of others by placing an electronic
listening device, or a ''bug,'' in a telephone or other place such as
an office.
The only exception is that federal, state, and local law
enforcement officers may use wiretaps in the investigation of certain
crimes but only with the approval of the senior prosecutor of a
particular jurisdiction and a special warrant from a judge.
The law does not apply to computer tapping because Congress
defined the word ''intercept'' as the ''aural acquisition'' of
information. In the opinion of a federal appeals court, the General
Accounting Office, and privacy experts such as Alan F. Westin of
Columbia University, this wording means that the wiretap law does not
prohibit the interception of computer transmissions because no sounds
are involved.
''Advancing telecommunications technologies which involve
non-aural interception techniques are being used more and more,'' the
GAO said in a report to the Senate in 1980. ''Therefore, modern
telecommunications are becoming less likely to be protected against
unauthorized interception by current statutory provisions.''
In an age when more than a third of the nation's households are
hooked into cable television systems, when millions of people are
doing their banking by computerized tellers and their mailing
electronically as well, the limitations of the current law have become
increasingly obvious.
David Watters, a telecommunications engineer who has served as a
consultant in both government and private industry, said the changing
technology may mean it is also not a crime to record certain telephone
calls secretly. ''There hasn't been a test case brought to court on
this question yet,'' he said, ''but increasing numbers of telephone
calls are being transmitted from point to point in the digital
language of computers, and the logic of the 1968 law would suggest
that such calls could be intercepted without penalty.''
Two House Judiciary subcommittees, one headed by Rep. Don Edwards,
D-Calif., the other by Rep. Robert W. Kastenmeier, D-Wis., and a
Senate Judiciary Committee headed by Sen. Charles McC. Mathias Jr.,
R-Md., are considering the possibility of rewriting the wiretap law.
Kastenmeier, whose subcommittee on courts, civil liberties, and
the administration of justice is to hold hearings on the question next
month, said such matters as how much statutes should protect against
actions like the unauthorized interception of electronic mail take on
great importance in this modern technological age.
''The implications of the ability of the new technology to go
beyond such definitions in terms of invading personal privacy make
consideration of this important issue by the subcommittee most
urgent,'' he said.
Drafting a new law to close the gap in the old one, however,
presents complex legal and philosophical problems.
In the past, when Congress has sought to limit the access of law
enforcement to banking and medical records, the Justice Department has
fought for the widest possible access.
A congressional change in the law to require a warrant from a
judge for interception of computerized information, would represent a
diminution of officers' independent authority.
In 1979 the Supreme Court ruled that local authorities in Maryland
did not violate the Fourth Amendment rights of Michael Lee Smith, a
Maryland resident, when they did not obtain a search warrant before
placing a device on his telephone to record the numbers he dialed.
A majority of the Supreme Court held that such information could
be collected by the police without a warrant because Smith could not
have a reasonable expectation that the numbers he dialed were private.
But three justices dissented, arguing that the numbers were just as
deserving of legal protection as the substance of what Smith said.
Electronic mail systems offer similar opportunity to gain
information about a person's dealings with others, according to
testimony before a House subcommittee in October by Willis H. Ware, a
member of the Rand Corp. and a leading privacy expert.
As opposed to traditional mail, electronic mail systems, ''in
addition to the message content,'' he said, contain ''information
relating the addressee to the sender.
In principle, such information could be used to establish
relationships among people, such as organized groups or circles of
acquaintance. Obviously, such information could be of high interest to
the law enforcement community, but the legal umbrella of protection
over such information is confused and probably incomplete.''
Experts agree that, depending on how Congress revised the wiretap
law, it could lead to significant broadening in the mandate of federal
law enforcement agencies and possible changes in the expectation of
confidentiality in such broad areas of concern as medical records.
''The privacy questions raised by the new telecommunication age
represent the single most important issue facing Congress today,''
said Shattuck. ''Because computers are now essential to the operations
of hospitals, of law firms, and even of newspapers, a sloppily drafted
law could give the federal government greater search powers that it
ever has had in our history.''
John Keeney, the deputy attorney general in the Justice
Department's Criminal Division, said Justice Department officials
believed changing the wiretap law was not the way to attack computer
crime.
''Our current feeling is that the 1968 wiretap law should not be
changed, that there would be simpler ways to take on computer crime,''
he said. He added that study groups in the Justice Department, the
Commerce Department, and the Department of Health and Human Services
currently were working on drafting a law to control computer crime.
nyt-12-18-83 2245est ***************
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Date: Tue, 20 Dec 83 13:26:15 EST
From: Ron Natalie <ron@brl-vgr>
Subject: Re: TELECOM Digest V3 #121
Sorry Carl, but Washington National Airport is defined to be in
Washington D.C. even though it is on the Virginia side of the Potomac
River. Think of it like West Berlin being in the middle of East
Germany.
-Ron
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End of TELECOM Digest
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