TELECOM Digest     Wed, 13 Apr 2005 23:00:00 EDT    Volume 24 : Issue 162

Inside This Issue:                             Editor: Patrick A. Townson

    MCI Keeps Ownership Cap (Marcus Didius Falco)
    Lennon Telephone Chooses Joint net.com/Pannaway (Jack Decker)
    Re: Cellular Phone Harassment from '555-555-1212' (Lisa Hancock)
    Re: Cellular Phone Harassment from '555-555-1212' (T. Sean Weintz)
    Re: Cellular Phone Harassment from '555-555-1212' (No Spam)
    Re: Google Searching - Advanced (LB@notmine.com)
    Re: Concerns Over ID Theft Mount / LexisNexis Breach Widens (Wesrock)
    Re: Book Review: Goodbye to Privacy (Marcus Didius Falco)
    Last Laugh! When Marketing Surveys Get Off-Track (Linc Madison)

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               ===========================

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

Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 19:02:33 -0400
From: Marcus Didius Falco <falco_marcus_didius@yahoo.co.uk>
Subject: MCI Keeps Ownership Cap


http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A45476-2005Apr11.html

washingtonpost.com
Tuesday, April 12, 2005; Page E02

MCI's board of directors said it would not remove the "poison pill"
provision that blocks a shareholder from owning more than 15 percent
of the company's stock. The announcement came after New York-based
Verizon Communications agreed to purchase 13.4 percent of MCI's shares
from Mexican telecom magnate Carlos Slim Helu for $1.1 billion in
cash. The provision prevents Verizon from being able to buy all of MCI
by negotiating deals with other major shareholders. Verizon is trying
to block Denver-based Qwest Communications International from getting
enough shareholder support for a rival deal. Qwest released a
statement saying that MCI's rejection of its latest offer is not
consistent with shareholders' best interests.

<<snip stories on other industries>>

Compiled from reports by the Associated Press, Bloomberg News, Dow Jones
News Service and Washington Post staff writers.

Copyright 2005 The Washington Post Company

NOTE: For more telecom/internet/networking/computer news from the
daily media, check out our feature 'Telecom Digest Extra' each day at
http://telecom-digest.org/td-extra/more-news.html . Hundreds of new
articles daily.

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

From: Jack Decker <jack-yahoogroups@withheld_on_request>
Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 19:41:16 -0400
Subject: Press Release: Lennon Telephone Chooses Joint net.com/Pannaway


http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=104&STORY=/www/story/04-13-2005/0003389813&EDATE=

Lennon Telephone Chooses Joint net.com/Pannaway Solution for Delivery
of Feature-Rich VoIP Services http://www.net.com

SHOUT2500 Helps Deliver Complete Business and Residential Voice Over
      IP Over Hybrid Fiber-Coaxial Cable in Central Michigan

FREMONT, Calif. and PORTSMOUTH, N.H., April 13 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/
 -- net.com (NYSE: NWK), a global supplier of adaptive broadband
technology, and Pannaway Technologies, Inc., designers and developers
of converged broadband voice, video and data platforms, jointly
announced today that Lennon Telephone Company, established in 1918 and
under its current ownership since 1946, has selected net.com's
SHOUT2500, a highly integrated IP telephony provisioning platform
delivering unprecedented cost-performance metrics, for delivery of
Voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) services to business and
residential customers within their local exchange.

Lennon Telephone and its subsidiaries will use the SHOUT2500 as a VoIP
delivery platform to deliver low cost SIP (Session Initiation
Protocol) based telephone features and services to its business and
residential customers. SIP is the Internet signaling standard that
enables carriers to deliver a wide variety of services through the
Internet, such as telephone service, instant messaging, IP
conferencing, and presence management. Additionally, Lennon Telephone
will be able to use SHOUT to convert Internet-based calls to the
public telephone network (VoIP to PSTN) and vice versa, as well as
interconnect with legacy H.323 IP networks.

Pannaway's Service Convergence Network (SCN(TM)) is a highly
manageable end-to-end all IP solution that enables telcos to deliver
high quality voice, video and data services over a single broadband
connection. At the heart of the SCN, is Pannaway's Call Control
Manager (CCM(TM)) which is a SIP registration server, proxy server,
feature server and billing mediation platform that routes all calls,
provides advanced CLASS features and delivers billing information for
the SCN.

"The Pannaway-net.com solution enables significant and immediate cost
savings through the use of IP technology, as well as rapid development
of new features and services. For example, with this solution in
place, we are in a position to deliver traditional voice services via
our hybrid fiber-coax system," said Tom Bowden, Vice President of
Lennon Telephone.  "Additionally, the integration of SIP and legacy
signaling protocols like H.323 and SS7 in a single platform, along
with the SHOUT platform's enhanced GUI based network configuration and
management tools, will allow us to quickly deliver these services to
our customers."

About Pannaway

Pannaway Technologies designs the industry's first carrier-class
end-to-end IP solution for converged voice, video and data service
delivery.  Pannaway's innovative technology enables telecommunications
companies worldwide to deliver unified services to homes and
businesses at a fraction of their historical costs. The privately held
company was founded in April 2002 and is headquartered in Portsmouth,
New Hampshire. Its founding management team, with over 90 years of
collective experience in the industry, has played a pioneering role in
the telecommunications equipment sector. For more information, visit
http://www.pannaway.com.

About net.com

Network Equipment Technologies, doing business as net.com, is a
leading provider of networking equipment that enables enterprises,
governments and carriers to adapt to a broadband future. An architect
of the networking industry, net.com has been supplying service
providers, governments and enterprises around the world with
bulletproof networking technology for more than 20 years. net
performance. net results. net.com.  Visit http://www.net.com for more
information.

NOTE:  net.com and SHOUT are trademarks of Network Equipment Technologies,
Inc.

SOURCE Network Equipment Technologies, Inc.
Web Site: http://www.net.com 

How to Distribute VoIP Throughout a Home:
http://michigantelephone.mi.org/distribute.html

If you live in Michigan, subscribe to the MI-Telecom group:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/MI-Telecom/

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

From: hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com (Lisa Hancock)
Subject: Re: Cellular Phone Harassment from '555-555-1212'
Date: 13 Apr 2005 14:08:21 -0700


T. Sean Weintz wrote:

> This is almost definitely a scofflaw telemarketer calling from a PRI
> line. By using a PRI line, can set the caller ID to be whatever he wants.

Could you explain what is a "PRI" line, and characteristicss give it the
power to change caller ID?

Why would any subscriber have access to such a line?

> You answer and get no-one on the other end because he is using a
> predictive dialer -- a computer dials the numbers, and connects the calls
> to people in the telemarketing call center only when the call is
> answered on your end. If no one is available in the call center to take
> the call, when you answer you get the classic "no one there when I
> answer" effect -- you just hear dead air.

I don't understand that when the fellow answers the call, why someone
doesn't come on on the other end and make their sales pitch.  There is
usually a brief 1-2 second, but someone does come on.  Obviously they
don't want live people to miss their sales pitches.


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: The hassle is the 'predictive dialer' 
(which is what they call the device which 'dials ahead' and gets
suckers on the line works too fast for the human beings doing the
talking/selling. It thinks, based on formulas built in, that by the
time it gets a sucker on the phone, an agent will be ready to talk to
them. That's when the predictive dialer plays a pre-recorded message
saying 'please hold, we have an important message for you' or
something similar. That's when I usually hang up, and you should also.
PAT]

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

From: T. Sean Weintz <strap@hanh-ct.org>
Subject: Re: Cellular Phone Harassment from '555-555-1212'
Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 17:25:02 -0400
Organization: Posted via Supernews, http://www.supernews.com


hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com wrote:

> Earlier in this newsgroup it was reported that mass market calls were
> originating out of VOIP lines and giving nonsensical caller id numbers
> like 111-111-1111.  (I got such marketing calls during the political
> campaign -- the Dems were so desperate they called repeatedly all day
> long with recorded pitches.  It was a nightmare.)  Anyway, maybe
> hackers on VOIP are able to slur callerID.  It's strange that a number
> 555-1212 would be used since that's directory assistance, and I can't
> help but wonder the originator purposely set that number up to be
> seen.  That is troubling.

Don't need VOIP to spoof caller ID at all. a standard ISDN PRI line, 
which most outbound call centers have, can do it easily.


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: But Lisa just asked a question; she
wants an explanation of an ISDN PRI line.  PAT]

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

Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 17:47:30 -0400
From: No Spam <nospam@resi.com>
Subject: Cellular Phone Harassment from '555-555-1212'


Lisa Hancock <hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com> wrote to say:

(stuff snipped)

> Earlier in this newsgroup it was reported that mass market calls were
> originating out of VOIP lines and giving nonsensical caller id numbers
> like 111-111-1111.  (I got such marketing calls during the political
> campaign -- the Dems were so desperate they called repeatedly all day
> long with recorded pitches.  It was a nightmare.)  Anyway, maybe
> hackers on VOIP are able to slur callerID.  It's strange that a number
> 555-1212 would be used since that's directory assistance, and I can't
> help but wonder the originator purposely set that number up to be
> seen.  That is troubling.

Funny; all of the (pre recorded) calls I got (except for one) were
from George W Bush, Laura Bush, or the local Republican candidates.
(I did get one call from the Dems, but they identified themselves as
the state office of the party.).  The calls I got from the Dems gave
their valid phone number in Washington DC, but the calls from the
Republicans showed callerID of either 000-000-0000, or restricted.
Too bad that the politicians exempted themselves from the do not call
list.

I had opportunity to visit local offices of both parties during the
2004 campaign, and both of them were using VoIP services provided via
a Lynksys wireless router (I could see phone cords running from the
Linksys box to the cheap phones on the conference tables), but I don't
know provider they were using.

Joshua

(my opinions are my own and not necessarily those of my employer, but 
sometimes we agree.) 


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: My experiences were rather similar to 
yours. In addition to a call from George and Laura, a call came from 
a Kansas Republican. And recall please, the two documented examples of
telephone mischief we heard about (and reported here in the Digest)
were Republicans playing tricks on Democrats. PAT]

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

From: LB@notmine.com
Subject: Re: Google Searching - Advanced
Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 17:24:37 -0400
Organization: Optimum Online


jwillis@drlogick.com wrote:

> Pat

> Here is the link to the advanced search features of Google. Hope this
> helps a bit ...

> http://www.google.ca/help/refinesearch.html

> Regards,

> Jim Willis

> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Thanks for passing that along; it
> should be helpful. PAT]

" You can reach this page by clicking (no surprise) the "Advanced Search"
link on the Google home page."

LB

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

From: Wesrock@aol.com
Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 20:31:22 EDT
Subject: Concerns Over ID Theft Mount / LexisNexis Breach Widens


In a message dated Wed, 13 Apr 2005 13:05:46 -0400, Monty Solomon
<monty@roscom.com> writes:

> Concerns over ID theft mount LexisNexis breach widens; GM credit
> accounts at risk

> By Bruce Mohl, Globe Staff  |  April 13, 2005

> Identity theft concerns mounted yesterday as LexisNexis said a
> security breach at one of its subsidiaries may have been 10 times more
> severe than an earlier estimate, and GM MasterCard rushed to replace
> the credit cards of customers affected by a breach at an unidentified
> national retailer.

> GM MasterCard sent letters to customers late last week telling them
> that "a national retailer's computer system has had a security breach
> and your credit card account number may be among those that were
> compromised." A copy of the letter was provided to the Globe by one
> local GM MasterCard customer.

> Officials at General Motors had no immediate comment and referred
> questions to Household Bank, which issues the GM card. Household Bank
> could not be reached for comment.

> The GM MasterCard letter said the company had not been informed of the
> merchant involved and probably would not be informed. "Due to the
> serious nature of this situation," the letter said, GM MasterCard was
> advising customers to have their credit cards replaced as soon as
> possible.

I have a GM MasterCard and I have received no such letter.  Nor
have I received any e-mail them on the subject, although they have my
e-mail address and sent me a notice a couple of days ago that my
monthly bill was avilable for viewing on their web site.

The web site has no warnings or advices on the subject.  No unusual
transactions appear on my account.

As to Household Bank, notices in the last month or so have noted that
the GM MasterCard is now issued by HSBC (formerly Hong Kong and
Shanghai Banking Corporation).  While the notice is not explicit, it
appears HSBC has purchased some or all of Household Bank or its
operations.


Wes Leatherock
wesrock@aol.com
wleathus@yahoo.com

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

Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 20:33:29 -0400
From: Marcus Didius Falco <falco_marcus_didius@yahoo.co.uk>
Subject: Re: Book Review: Goodbye to Privacy 


Lisa Hancock <hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com> responded to Re: Book Review: 
Goodbye to Privacy on 13 Apr 2005 09:45:35 -0700:

> Marcus Didius Falco wrote quoting the book review:

>> Goodbye to Privacy
>> By WILLIAM SAFIRE
>> NO PLACE TO HIDE
>> By Robert O'Harrow Jr.
>> CHATTER
>> Dispatches From the Secret World of Global Eavesdropping.
>> By Patrick Radden Keefe.

>> In the past five years, what most of us only recently thought of as
>> 'nobody's business' has become the big business of everybody's
>> business.

> This has been going on much longer than merely "five years" -- more
> like at least 30 years.  The big three credit bureaus have been around
> a long time.

The credit bureaus have been around a long time. The data brokers are
new.

All or almost all the recent breaches have been with these data
brokers.

There is some thought to regulating them as credit bureaus, subject to
increased safeguards. I think it's in Pennsylvania.


[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Actually, the brokers are not
absolutely 'new'; they have been around a few years also, but no
where near as long as the credit bureaus. The brokers got their start
by selling the unprotected data on credit bureau reports. The stuff
above the perforated line (the address history, the social security
number and certain other information has never been protected; only
the 'trades' -- the creditors' experience -- has ever been protected
information. PAT]

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

Subject: Last Laugh! When Marketing Surveys Get Off-Track
Date: Wed, 13 Apr 2005 18:04:11 -0700
From: Linc Madison <lincmad@suespammers.org>
Reply-To: lincmad@suespammers.org
Organization: California resident; nospam; no unsolicited e-mail allowed


My cellular phone carrier called me (on my landline) the other day to
do a marketing survey. They asked me if I had any plans to add another
line to my account. I told them no, I live alone, I hardly use the one
cellphone, so I can't imagine adding a line at any point in the
foreseeable future.

The survey person persisted, though, wanting to ask me to rate on a
1-to-10 scale various offers relating to adding a line (e.g., 3 months
free, or various other perks). I begged off, but it occurred to me
that, had I been bored enough to sit through the whole list, my data
would have been meaningless at best.

I therefore came up with my own revised questionnaire.

On a 1-to-10 scale, with 1 being "no way!" and 10 being "where do I
sign up?!," rate the following circumstances for the degree to which
they would make you more likely to add a second line to your cellular
service.

A. Martians invade Earth.

B. You suddenly discover 27 previously unknown offspring.

C. You are diagnosed as paranoid schizophrenic. You need a second line
to talk to the voices in your head. "Can you hear me now?"

D. Both of your arms fall off.

E. Both of your legs fall off.

F. Both arms AND both legs fall off.

G. Costa Rica declares war on Vanuatu.

H. You simultaneously win every state lotto jackpot in the U.S.

I. The widow of an African dictator gives you $27,500,000.00
(twenty-seven million, five hundred thousand United States dollars) to
launch a new charity to PROTECT THE CHILDREN from accidental
Tupperware-related injuries.

J. Breakthrough scientific research reveals that telephone area code
maps are the most powerful aphrodisiac ever discovered. ("Oh, baby,
wrap your arms around me like 801 around 385!!")

I think, in my circumstances, those are equally realistic hypothetical
situations, compared to being offered 3 months free for a second line
for which I have neither need nor desire.


Linc Madison  *  San Francisco, California  *  lincmad@suespammers.org
<http://www.LincMad.com> * primary e-mail: Telecom at LincMad dot com
All U.S. and California anti-spam laws apply, incl. CA BPC 17538.45(c)
This text constitutes actual notice as required in BPC 17538.45(f)(3).
DO NOT SEND UNSOLICITED E-MAIL TO THIS ADDRESS.  You have been warned.

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


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End of TELECOM Digest V24 #162
******************************