Telecom/1996-04-telecom-walnutcreek.iso/back.issues/recent.single.issues/V16_#13

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Subject: TELECOM Digest V16 #13

TELECOM Digest     Thu, 11 Jan 96 22:44:00 EST    Volume 16 : Issue 13

Inside This Issue:                          Editor: Patrick A. Townson

    BC Tel U.S. 800 Bypass Approved (Dave Leibold)
    Cellular Phone Called Simon (Andre Groenwald)
    Illegal Cloning Alleged (Wes Leatherock)
    Re: Fridays are Free With Sprint (Leonid A. Broukhis)
    Is ISDN Dying Already? (Jim Hornbeck)
    Re: Doppler Shift, was Re: "PCS Faces Rough Road" (William Hawkins)
    Re: Is Cellular Cloning Legal? (Matt Simpson)
    Re: Warning: SLC96 Cannot do 28.8 kbps (grendal)
    Re: Warning: SLC96 Cannot do 28.8 kbps (Dave Van Allen)
    My ANI is: (Thanks AT&T!) (Les Reeves)
    Re: Federal Crackdown on Cellular Cloning (Michael D. Sullivan)
    Re: Cellular Fraud Suspects Arrested in Santa Fe (David Norman)
    Reserving 888 Numbers (Bob Schwartz)
    Enhanced Full Rate Vocoder (Milind Paranjpe)
    Re: D3 Channel Bank Question (Bill Benzel)
    Unusual Radio Promotion (Mike Harpe)
    Re: Last Laugh! Suspected Wrong Domain Name For "Heaven" (Ed Ellers)

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----------------------------------------------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Dave Leibold)
Date: 10 Jan 96 07:25:54 -0500
Subject: BC Tel U.S. 800 Bypass Approved


The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission
approved BC Tel's September application to provide a bypass service
for U.S. 800 numbers. Telephone subscribers in British Columbia would
soon be able to reach American 800 (and probably forthcoming 888)
numbers that were previously inaccessible to them.

BC Tel's service would allow customers to reach the U.S. 800 numbers
for CAD$0.18/minute. The CRTC's approval of the service requires BC
Tel to have customers dial a special access code first, then play an
announcement warning of the charges to use this service. The customer
can then complete the bypass call, or hang up before charges are
assessed.

During the CRTC application process, Unitel was concerned about the
confusion that could be caused when customers are charged for a
service that is normally perceived as toll-free.

This is the first to my knowledge that a major Canadian telco (i.e.
part of the Canadian Stentor group) has started such a service for
general use.  The now-defunct STN carrier provided an 800 bypass for
$0.10/minute. ACC and Sprint Canada have had such services in the
past, generally for their business customers.

This news was from CRTC's Telecom Order 96-6, as found on the web at
http://www.crtc.gc.ca/


Fidonet : Dave Leibold 1:259/730 |
Internet: [e-mail]

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (S A Holstein Friesland Society)
Subject: Cellular Phone Called Simon
Date: Thu, 11 Jan 1996 11:22:04
Organization: Internet Africa


Can anybody please help me in locating the manufacturer of a product
named Simon. It is a cellular phone that can handle electronic mail as
well as being a personal organizer.

Any information about this product will greatly be appreciated since
the name and features of the product is all I have.


Andre Groenewald
S A Holstein Friesland Society
[e-mail]

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Wes Leatherock)
Subject: Illegal Cloning Alleged
Date: Wed, 10 Jan 1996 13:37:00 GMT


      A story in {The Daily Oklahoman} (Oklahoma City, Oklahoma) for
Jan. 9, 1996, reports that AT&T Wireless Services has asked for an
injunction against an Oklahoma City firm for allegedly cloning a
cellular telephone to create an extension.

      The story, by Oklahoman staff writer Charles T. Jones, says AT&T
Wireless Services asked in federal court for a temporary restraining
order and permanent injunction against Johnny Meyers, doing business
as Safari Communications and Safari Holdings, Inc.

      According to the story, "The lawsuit alleges Meyers' company
'advertised and solicited' AT&T Wireless customers to have the secret
electronic serial numbers of their activated cell phones 'cloned' onto
other phones, thus giving them an 'extension' phone."

      The story says the suit alleges that such unauthorized phones are
illegal and deprive AT&T Wireless Services of income.

      Besides the injunction, the story says, AT&T Wireless Services
is asking for attorney fees and any other losses it can prove at
trial.

      The story says The Oklahoman was unable to reach Meyers for
comment.


Wes Leatherock
[e-mail]
[e-mail]
[e-mail]

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Leonid A. Broukhis)
Subject: Re: Fridays are Free With Sprint
Date: 11 Jan 1996 17:35:35 -0800
Organization: Best Internet Communications


TELECOM Digest Editor noted in response to [e-mail] (Les Reeves):

> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Les and I discussed this at length on
> the phone a couple days ago. According to Sprint's literature, they
> will give you a year of free calls on Friday up to a thousand dollars
> per month. That works out to $12,000 in calls for $600 (50*12) in
> charges. The best part is, the $50 minimum per month can be taken
> out of the free calls on Friday. I am not sure if you have to default
> one of your lines to them or not. I don't think you do, and as Les
> points out, both business and residence phones are eligible. So if

    Go to http://www.sprint.com/ then to the Business Sense
International (which will bring you to
http://www.sprintbiz.com/cgi-bin/qfridays.cgi ) and tell us _where_
does it say anything about residence phones. If it sounds too good
to be true, it isn't.


Leo


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: According to Les, it says nothing about
residence phones, but does not specifically exclude them. He says that
when he talked to their representative, he was told that 'any phone
was eligible if it was used to make business calls'. I presume you
have to refer to yourself as a business; is that so hard to do?  Are
they going to demand that you produce evidence of business telephone
service as per local telco records? Here in this area, lots of people
work from home as a routine thing and do so with residence service from
Ameritech.

The bottom line is if you call Sprint at that number and agree to be
billed a minimum of fifty per month for long distance calls for one
year, you can have up to a thousand dollars per month in free calls as
long as you make the calls on Friday. That is 50*12=600 versus 1000*
12= 12,000, a difference of $11,400.

Now you can just barely do it on purely domestic traffic at 16 cents
per minute. The math adds up like this: That is $230.40 per day
if your phone is off hook the entire 24 hours. Based on 4 1/3 Fridays
per month that is $997.40 per month. Based on 52 Fridays in the year
it is $11,981 for the year, but you have to pay $500 of that, remember.
They did say in their advertisment the rates were 16 cents per minute.
But instead of all that time spent on domestic calls, why not instead
a half dozen or so international calls every Friday of several minutes
duration each? Or, a single international call several hours in length
one a week ... they are allowing international calls under this plan.

I don't think you have to default any lines to them; you can do it by
keeping your lines with whatever carrier they are on now (AT&T, smile)
and just remembering to prepend 10333 to your dialing string all day
on Friday. Seems to me it would be worth remembering to do that if
Sprint was willing to give me over eleven thousand worth of service
in a year's time. And, there is no where mentioned in their adver-
tising that I am aware of any catch about how they will only give
Friday Free credit up to the same extent you otherwise use them; i.e.
no reference to 'if your bill is $50 for the month we will give you
up to $50 in free calls on Friday ....'   nothing like that. It says
'we will give you up to $1000 in free calls monthly for calls placed
on Friday if you spend a minimum of $50 per month.'

It sounds to me like another 'sign up and get a free fax and data
modem' promotion -- grin -- the one they lost their shirts on a
couple of years ago compliments of Digest readers who signed up in
droves, demanding their free fax modems, then stayed on Sprint for
a month or so and switched back to wherever they were before. Let's
give it a whirl and watch them squirm; a couple thousand Digest
readers legally pulling eleven thousand dollars each in traffic
through Sprint for a year at no charge. That should give them a
swift kick in their bottom line!  Readers: if you try to sign up
and they say no, or if you do sign up and then they lie about it
and claim you don't get all those free calls, let us know.  PAT]

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Jim Hornbeck)
Subject: Is ISDN Dying Already?
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)
Date: Wed, 10 Jan 1996 02:49:39 GMT


Recently I called Pac Tel to inquire about ISDN service and received
a rather cool reception.

Since I had understood that they were pushing ISDN prety heavily, I
started asking some knowledgable folks at work what was up.  They told
me that ATT was about to introduce a new compression scheme for data
transmission for twisted pairs that would make most current needs for
ISDN obsolete.  The Telco *expert* was, of course, not there today to
answer with any authority.  However, others have noticed the chill
reception given to inquiries also.

What have I missed? Is Ma Bell on the verge of introducing something
worth while or is this just smoke?

Curious mind(s) want to know.


Regards,

Jim Hornbeck WA6GHF
[e-mail]
GEnie L.Hornbeck

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (William Hawkins)
Subject: Re: Doppler Shift, was Re: "PCS Faces Rough Road"
Organization: Rosemount, Inc.
Date: Thu, 11 Jan 1996 00:25:25 GMT


There may be lots of reasons why PCS will grind its face on a rough
road, but I'm delighted to hear that it doesn't work in a fast moving
vehicle.  Ever been behind someone on the highway who gets bad news
(or is otherwise distracted from the task of driving)?


Bill Hawkins

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Matt Simpson)
Subject: Re: Is Cellular Cloning Legal?
Date: Thu, 11 Jan 1996 09:42:29 -0500
Organization: University of Kentucky Computing Center


A cloner here (Lexington, KY) was recently arrested and tried. He was
cloning phones for people who had legitimate cellular service and
wanted a second phone; he was not cloning stolen numbers. According to
the news, this was the first time in the country that someone had been
charged for that. I saw a headline in the newspaper a couple of days
ago saying he had been acquitted. I didn't get a chance to read the
article.

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (grendal)
Subject: Re: Warning: SLC96 Cannot do 28.8 kbps
Date: 11 Jan 1996 23:35:43 GMT
Organization: Systems Research and Applications Corp.


In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail]
says ...

> I have now heard of two ISPs in Bell Atlantic territory who got burned
> when getting a SLC96 installed to handle their large numbers of phone
> numbers.  Apparently the SLC96's are incapable of handling 28.8 kbps,
> and regularly result in 21 kbps and worse for users.

> This sets up the perverse situation where larger regional ISPs have
> worse dialup speeds that little Mom-n-pop ones who dialtone over
> copper.

> Has anyone else heard of this?  I imagine there are probably many
> large office buildings that might also have SLC96 service which are
> similarly "speed impaired."

> Of course, we all know 28.8 kbps is a "best case" scenario, but this
> is sad for the future of analog dialup net connectivity (hmm - could
> it be the RBOCs would use this "feature" to leverage ISDN?)

Yo, Thomas,

I seem to remember several conversations here regarding modem problems
that I thought were caused by SLC services.  Yes, indeed, SLC will
limit your bandpass sufficiently (4:1) so that only 4800 will be
usable.  With lousy modems, 2400 is more likely.

This (SLC) is most often found in newer suburban develpment areas and
older and sparsely populated rural areas.  The philosophy is called
"pair gain", meaning that digital compression multiplexing (via a
lower digital sample rate) allows less copper to be used -- a signifi-
cant economic factor in telephone cost.

The RBOCs are now reducing ISDN prices to build a market base. Once
the RBOCS have converted the entire analog plant to SLC, they will
increase ISDN rates and ISDN will be the only way we'll get ANY decent
bandwidth.  Remarkably clever, eh?  By then, the cable companies may
be a good alternative and the Telco's will be left with voice.


grendal

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Dave Van Allen)
Subject: Re: Warning: SLC96 Cannot do 28.8 kbps
Date: 11 Jan 1996 19:40:11 GMT
Organization: FASTNET(tm) PA/NJ/DE Internet


[e-mail] wrote:

>>> I have now heard of two ISPs in Bell Atlantic territory who got burned
>>> when getting a SLC96 installed to handle their large numbers of phone
>>> numbers.  Apparently the SLC96's are incapable of handling 28.8 kbps,
>>> and regularly result in 21 kbps and worse for users.

>> I have heard telecom device providers speaking of this being due to
>> robbed-bit signaling occuring over the T-1 feeding the SLCs.  This
>> doesn't make sense to me, as it would infer that B8ZS coding is also

It doesn't make sense to you, because that's not the problem.

The line coding is not what is messing up the payload, it the A/D
conversion at the switch (prior to feeding the digital hicap to the
SLC) and then further, the type of card used at the SLC to convert
back to copper to feed your demarc.

We reported this problem to Bell Atlantic 18 months ago, and were told
we were crazy, that it was "our equipment".  The question was then
asked why, "I can take "our" equipment, off-site, to my house no less,
and get nearly perfect 28.8K connects?  What I got was dead-air, and
excuses.  Today, the same guy at the TAG group humbly tells me this is
a "national problem".

If your site is fed by a SLC, and there is just ONE A/D conversion at
the CO switch, then count on poor 28.8K connects.

Most switches are still 90% analog out to copper. When the RBOC's
need to extend facilities past copper length, or for other
reasons, they normally take the analog side of the switch out-
put, pump this to D-4 channel banks, MUX's ec t, and point it all
toward a T-3 or Sonet ring.  At the far end they "decode" the
channels back to analog and deliver them to you on copper.  That
initial MUX'ing is what causes the problem.  High order eliptical
filters (9th order according to Bellcore) cut the top-end off
sharply at 3050Hz (or thereabouts), phase shift, q-Noise and
other by-products are the result.  This doesn't affect voice,
but it plays hell on data.

We tried a test, where we asked Bell for a Digital handoff T-1 with 24
voice, B8ZS ESF channels and we plugged it into a Channel bank to
convert back to analog. Result, poor connects.  Bell "swore" that this
was a complete digital path, NO A/D except at OUR end. Hmmm, weeks
later we found out that there WAS an A/D conversion at the switch.
Bell said, "well that's the way we ALWAYS do it.  We asked for a
digital port from the DMS-100 to feed our circuit.  Not in the tariff
 -- you need an HSA (house special assembly) for that.  They did it --
guess what?  Perfect connects!

Nynex is the only (that we could two months ago) RBOC that had a
tariffed service that was truly digital -- it goes under the trade
name of Flexpath.

If you want more reliable 28.8K connects, get an ascend MAX and feed
it ISDN PRI, load it up with ascends 28.8K modems and you'll be much
happier.

BTW, they CAN fix the problem at the SLC -- they just don't see a need
to do it.

Not fun when you have 500 modems that all get at BEST 26K connects and
the puny Internet service provider down the street has a two dozen
'cheeze' modem, built to the CO on copper and they get 28.8K all of
time.  Try explaining THAT to your (potential) customer.


Best regards,

*Dave Van Allen - You Tools/FASTNET - [e-mail] - [phone]
    -=-=-=- www.youtools.com - FASTNET(tm) PA/NJ/DE Internet -=-=-=-

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Les Reeves)
Subject: My ANI is: (Thanks AT&T!)
Date: 11 Jan 1996 13:38:01 -0800
Organization: CR Labs


For those TD subscribers who lament the loss of 1-800-YOUR ANI,
AT&T has a couple of numbers for you:

800.532.7486  (Billing info, but ANI readback even if the
               billing info system is down and you don't
               have AT&T as your PIC).

OR

800.858.9857  (True Rewards, True Reach, or True Lies balance info).
              ANI works regardless of your LD company.

Note: These are ANI readbacks.  *67 and other CID issues do not apply.

Try it from your Cell Phone!


Les     [e-mail]       Atlanta,GA      404.874.7806  --
404.875.1273  ISDN Voice      404.875.1274    ISDN data/fax --

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Michael D. Sullivan)
Subject: Re: Federal Crackdown on Cellular Cloning
Date: 11 Jan 1996 05:17:10 GMT
Organization: Wilkinson, Barker, Knauer & Quinn
Reply-To: [e-mail] (Michael D. Sullivan)


In <[e-mail]>, Kevin B. Kenny <[e-mail].
COM> writes:

> I'm curious.  Would it be possible to set up a value-added service to
> support `extension cellphones?'  The idea would be to have THREE phone
> numbers: the numbers of the two cellphones and the number of the
> group.  When someone calls the number of the group, a machine picks up
> and places calls, simultaneously, to the two cellphones.  The first
> call to complete wins, and the other call gets dropped.  A smart PABX
> could probably arrange to see that the inbound call doesn't supervise
> until the outbound call does.  Feasible?

In fact, some cellular carriers with appropriate software offer the
ability to have two cellphones (e.g., portable and vehicular, or
husband and wife) that can be reached with a single number.  The
phones actually have different MIN and ESN assignments, but the switch
is programmed to hand traffic to the first of the two to answer, more
or less.


Michael D. Sullivan                      Email to:  [e-mail]
Bethesda, MD, USA     Also:  [e-mail] [e-mail]

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] ("David Norman")
Subject: Re: Cellular Fraud Suspects Arrested in Santa Fe
Organization: Brother International Europe
Date: Thu, 11 Jan 1996 11:48:46 GMT


I'm perplexed! Surely the mobile telco knows the overseas number
dialed.  If the recipient of the call were to be visited by the local
fraud squad and asked who originated the call, I'm sure a few arrests
back in the originating country might lessen people's enthusiasm for
"really cheap" inetrnational calls!

I may be missing something here, of course (perhaps I'm too honest?) I
realise the call may be to a call box (or otherwise untraceable),
there may be political/cost implications in following up the recipient
(presumably they are innocent themselves?), but surely the call
originator is guilty of theft, or receiving stolen goods? I've never
seen any comment from mobile telco's about this aspect of fraud. Is it
just too difficult, or is being done on the quiet?

I guess I must look honest too, 'cause no-one has ever offered me cheap
calls on a cloned handset!! (This isn't a request either!)

A final observation: here in the UK it isn't illegal to clone a phone
(although I think this is being looked at), but it is illegal to
misuse the telco's electricity to make a fraudulent call, but this
makes it much harder to gain convictions.


Dave Norman: [e-mail]

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Bob Schwartz)
Subject: Reserving 888 Numbers
Date: Wed, 10 Jan 1996 22:43:45 -0800
Organization: BCI


Has anyone got advise on how to reserve an 888 number and How to get
the best chance at securing the *right* number?? Through an RBOC a
Long Distance company or ...

Is there a deadline? When will numbers be assigned and any other
pertinant information? Please reply to [e-mail]

Thanks in advance.

------------------------------

From: Milind Paranjpe <[e-mail]>
Subject: Enhanced Full Rate Vocoder
Date: 11 Jan 1996 19:26:39 GMT
Organization: interWave Corp.


Hello all,

Does anyone have information on the Enhanced Full Rate vocoder used in
PCS-1900 in Washington DC?


Milind   [e-mail]
[phone] x170

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Bill Benzel)
Subject: Re: D3 Channel Bank Question
Date: 11 Jan 1996 19:41:18 GMT
Organization: OpNet -- Greater Philadelphia Internet Service


Raymon A. Bobbitt ([e-mail]) wrote:

> Does anyone know the difference between D3 and D4 framing in a channel
> bank??

D3 is 24 channels (one DS-1) and D$ is 48 channels (two DS-1s).

Some D4 channel banks are designed to permit "drop and insert" so that
you can switch traffic through them.  Not all models, however, support
this feature.


Bill Benzel
Fiserv, Inc. Philadelphia
[e-mail]

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Mike Harpe)
Subject: Unusual Radio Promotion
Date: 11 Jan 1996 16:10:14 -0500
Organization: University of Louisville, Louisville KY USA


WHAS-AM 840 here in Louisville is starting a rather unusual radio
promotion that I thought the Digest readers would have some thoughts
on ...

It's simple ... they are calling pay telephones around town and giving
money to people who answer them.

Is this a proper use of payphones?  How would a COCOT operator feel
about this?  I would like to hear some opinions.


Michael Harpe, Communications Analyst III          Information Technology
Internet: [e-mail]               University of Louisville
[phone] (Voice) [phone] (FAX)        Louisville, Ky. 40292
WWW: http://www.louisville.edu/~meharp01

------------------------------

From: [e-mail] (Ed Ellers)
Subject: Re: Last Laugh! Suspected Wrong Domain Name For "Heaven"
Date: 11 Jan 1996 14:48:28 GMT
Organization: Pennsylvania Online [Usenet News Server for Hire]


In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] says:

> A domain name ending in .com represents a "commercial" site and I suspect
> that's incorrect in the context used.

> A company calling itself "heaven", or even a nightclub or some other such
> operation, if it had a domain name on the internet, would use such a
> domain name.  But I doubt that if there was a real site such as the
> purported one in the fictional example, it would use such a domain name.

> Seriously I doubt {THAT} "Heaven" (the one allegedly upstairs) is a
> commercial site.  International, probably.  Or perhaps an organization.

That's what I would think too.  Actually I've seen some Usenet
messages from a user identified as "[e-mail]" a while back.

------------------------------

End of TELECOM Digest V16 #13
*****************************