Telecom-Request%usc-eclc@brl-bmd.UUCP (Telecom-Request@usc-eclc) (12/23/83)
TELECOM Digest Thursday, 22 Dec 1983 Volume 3 : Issue 124
Today's Topics:
Expanded local calling area
Portable tone generators vs. "blue boxes"
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Date: 22 Dec 1983 1201-PST
Subject: Expanded local calling area
From: WMartin at Office-3 (Will Martin)
In many small towns relatively close to major metropolitan areas,
telephone customers have the option of paying a higher rate and having
their local calling area expanded to include the metropolitan area, so
they can call there without paying LD charges. I believe that this
can be of two forms -- one-way, where the small-town phone can call
the metropolitan exchanges as if they were local, but a call from that
area TO that phone is still Long Distance, and two-way, where the
small-town phone is treated just like a metropolitan area telephone,
and can call and is callable as if local.
What are the correct terms to describe this situation in telco jargon?
Are either of these configurations the same as a "tie-line" or "FX"
service? (If not, how are those terms defined?)
Can this situation be reversed for a phone in the metropolitan area?
That is, can a link to a specific small town be bought for a surcharge
to the regular local-service billing of a metropolitan-area telephone,
if that small town is within the LATA of the local operating telco?
Or is this sort of thing only obtainable by leasing a private line to
that small town (and therefore be uneconomic for ordinary people using
the phone for non-business purposes)?
I ask this because 90% of my LD billing is calls from my wife to her
relatives in a small town only 60 miles away. Actually it is all to
only one number. I would think that I could either buy some
enhancement to my own phone service to make calls to that exchange or
that number "local" in effect, or give her relative a present of a
service enhancement that I would pay for, which would make that phone
the equivalent of "local" to us. I'd like to have the right
terminology in mind before I start talking to the telco business
office about this, especially now, when everybody there is confused
about what will happen with the divestiture.
Will Martin
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Date: 22 Dec 1983 1254-PST
Subject: Portable tone generators vs. "blue boxes"
From: WMartin at Office-3 (Will Martin)
Right -- the "blue box" uses different tones than the standard
TouchTone dialpad generates. The point with the Radio Shack (and
other) portable tone generators I was making is that it's now
relatively common and legitimate to be seen using a device to send
tones into the mouthpiece of a payphone. If the "blue-boxer" types
rip a Radio Shack tone generator apart and build in the innards of a
"blue box", there isn't any distinguishing feature to keep the "blue
boxer" from using his device freely.
Of course, as at least one contributor mentioned, the telcos may now
have their systems so set up so as to make "blue box" use by phone
phreaks and students unrewarding, as they get caught right away.
However, I thought that such use was NOT the main problem, nor the
main abuse or theft of service that the telcos were concerned about.
Have not many mobsters, drug traffickers, Mafia types, etc., acquired
"blue boxes" and use them for their calls, which are mostly
payphone-to-payphone? Such calls, if noted after the fact, still
cannot be charged to anyone.
So what I contend is that the common legitimate use of portable tone
generators will mask the continued criminal use of "blue box"
techniques and actually make it easier for the crooks.
What I have read about the way "blue boxes" work is that the user
calls an 800 number, sends a special tone before it answers, and then
can use other tones to make connections and do things to the phone
network. If the system now can detect this call, and record the
calling and called numbers, it still has a payphone on one end and an
800 number on the other. Does the system reord the whole transaction,
and all the stages of tone commands entered, so the actual numbers
reached can be determined?
Will Martin
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End of TELECOM Digest
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