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The Telecom Digest for December 3, 2011
Volume 30 : Issue 308 : "text" Format
====== 30 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ======
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Telecom and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) Digest for the
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Date: 2 Dec 2011 04:56:08 -0000
From: "John Levine" <johnl@iecc.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Re.: Cell phones: more texting, less talking?
Message-ID: <20111202045608.27409.qmail@joyce.lan>
>Isn't it amazing how human beings (is it at a certain age level - or
>should I ask is it "up to" a certain age level) have become so
>non-verbal in their inter-personal communications?
Yeah. Now there's no words and it's all interpretive dance.
R's,
John
PS: Perhaps "verbal" isn't quite what you meant.
Date: Fri, 2 Dec 2011 08:31:03 -0800 (PST)
From: HAncock4 <withheld@invalid.telecom-digest.org>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Update on at&t/T-mobile merger
Message-ID: <18c245f4-3ea5-4162-8e73-4d943449208c@p16g2000yqd.googlegroups.com>
On Nov 28, 5:41 pm, John David Galt <j...@diogenes.sacramento.ca.us>
wrote:
> It was the other way around. Long distance subsidized local
> service. It was set up that way deliberately, partly because the FCC
> wanted universal service. Pre-divestiture, some long distance calls
> within California were over $3/min, while measured service
> (non-Lifeline) could be had for under $4/month.
$3/minute for an instate call? Sounds awfully high. Admittedly,
California is a big state, but back then (1970s) AT&T charged $2.00
for 3 minutes for a coast-to-coast call, and less for shorter
distances (down to 5c a minute).
But yes, universal service--where almost everyone could afford a
telephone--was a major goal of regulators (and the phone company,
too). Bare bones phone service (party line, measured service, plus
one telephone set and all maintenance) was available for as low as $3
a month in some places, and there was no qualification. Indeed,
single-line flat rate service for residences wasn't too much more.
But service and equipment above the bare bones cost more--a $1/month
for each extension, most business services and equipment, and another
$1/month for Trimline or Princess phoens. This rate structure was all
be design to provide universal service.
Ironically, we still cross-subsidize it today, only now it's a line
item on our local service, and individuals must qualify to get low-
income "lifeline" phone service.
> As soon as MCI won the right to compete, that subsidy became
> untenable -- it just made Ma Bell's own long distance rates
> uncompetitive. This is why we now have much higher monthly service
> rates, but much cheaper long distance rates.
Correct.
Regarding the issue of "questionable accounting", going way back many
people felt Western Electric should've been an independent separate
company and that they charged too much for equipment--costs which were
passed to subscribers. Repeated audits showed those claims were not
true, but suspicions still lingered. Over the decades govt anti-trust
officials sought for AT&T to sell off Western Electric, which AT&T did
not want to do.
Returning to the original question, at Divesture, the "Baby Bells'
were split up into multiple companies (Bell Atlantic, NYNEX, Bell
South, etc.) Later, many were allowed to merge back together, such as
Bell Atlantic and NYNEX merging and then acquiring GTE.
I understand separating out local service from long distance, thus the
creation of the Baby Bells. But why didn't they merely make a "Local
service" company instead of several of them? Why did they later allow
them to merge back together?
Date: Fri, 2 Dec 2011 08:21:39 -0800 (PST)
From: Daryl Gibson <daryl.gibson@gmail.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: MSNBC/NYT: Caller ID Forging
Message-ID: <8bbb3b86-5e87-41cc-8f1e-5731859956e8@h42g2000yqd.googlegroups.com>
Personally, I think Caller-ID should reflect the nature of the caller,
which is why I was amused to see this call on my Caller-ID box some
time back:
http://goo.gl/LPmFf
(For those who don't want to click through to the photo, it reads
"Phone Scam").
I was left to wonder who fixed up the database, and how we can
encourage more of it. Think of the labels: "Crooked Politician," "Soul-
sucking Relative," "Crazy Ex," "Scummy Co-Worker," and "Ruin your
dinner hour charity call."
Date: Fri, 2 Dec 2011 08:21:28 -0800 (PST)
From: Wes Leatherock <wleathus@yahoo.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: MSNBC/NYT: Caller ID Forging
Message-ID: <1322842888.5059.YahooMailClassic@web111721.mail.gq1.yahoo.com>
--- On Mon, 11/28/11, Gordon Burditt <gordonb.j8kg1@burditt.org> wrote:
> A modern PBX with hundreds of lines is able to pass off the
> caller-id info to make it useful - it's a feature - sending out the
> one public "operator" number for the whole company is not really
> useful, and some companies actually want you to be able to call back
> the particular person who called you.
There is a great push in the Central Oklahoma area to have the number
presented to the emergency service agencies from PBXs be the actual
extension number, which they can enter in their records with an actual
location.
They are complaining that when only the main number is given from a
PBX, that location may be miles away from where the actual caller is
(and where the need is for fire, ambulance or police).
Wes Leatherock
wleathus@yahoo.com
wesrock@aol.com
Date: Fri, 02 Dec 2011 02:59:34 -0600
From: bonomi@host122.r-bonomi.com (Robert Bonomi)
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: MSNBC/NYT: Caller ID Forging
Message-ID: <mZqdnV68z8zrDkXTnZ2dnUVZ_rGdnZ2d@posted.nuvoxcommunications>
In article <5c6d1b25-0d41-4647-ac61-e75f4d6406bd@v8g2000yqk.googlegroups.com>,
HAncock4 <withheld@invalid.telecom-digest.org> wrote:
>On Nov 30, 12:27 am, bon...@host122.r-bonomi.com (Robert Bonomi)
>wrote:
>
>> Which leaves the question hanging: "WHY -should- the phone company
>> spend all that money for 'no return'?" If they have the legal option
>> of not doing it, why reduce profitability by doing it? Viewed in
>> -that- light, doing the filtering is a 'breach of fiduciary
>> responsibility' to their stockholders.
>
>I don't agree with the last sentence. Indeed, doing nothing could
>be seen as a breach of fiduciary responsibility
Bluntly, you either;
1) don't have any idea what 'fiduciary responsibility' means.
or
2) don't have any idea how the modern PSTN works.
Facts:
Given that the 'telephone company' of the party originating the call and
the 'telephone company' of the party receiving the call are two different
entities -- as is almost invariably the case for marketing calls. Then:
1) The telephone company of the party receiving the call CANNOT do
anything to prevent or even detect spoofed/forged CallerID info.
No amount of money spent will make one bit of difference in customer
attitude/opinion about the 'value' of Caller-ID.
2) The telephone company for the party making the calls =has= a
financial incentive NOT to filter 'customer-supplied" CID data.
If they do, and -any- competitor does not then every potential
customer wanting it will flock to the competition instead.
This means that they spend extra money -- to do the filtering -- an
the result is to drive potential customers away. This is -not-
consistent with the duty to operate the business in a way to maximize
shareholder values.
As long as any telephone company offers service that does NOT include
filtering of customer-supplied CallerID data
A) -recipients- of phone calls will be 'unhappy' because they are receiving
'mislabeled' calls. And, in actual fact, the rarer the mislabeled call,
the -ANGRIER- customers will be about those 'errors'.
B) It is against the financial self-interest of every_other telephone
company to do such filtering. Customers receiving such calls have
no way of knowing 'who' the caller's phone company is, so they have
no way to 'assign blame' where it belongs.
Thus, the 'quality' of CallerID information is only as good as what the -worst-
originating telephone company enforces.
For ALL these reasons, the -only- way that the public will get 'reliable'
Caller-ID info is via government regulation that requires originating
telco enforcement.
Date: Fri, 2 Dec 2011 08:04:14 -0800 (PST)
From: Wes Leatherock <wleathus@yahoo.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Update on at&t/T-mobile merger
Message-ID: <1322841854.9401.YahooMailClassic@web111717.mail.gq1.yahoo.com>
--- On Mon, 11/28/11, John David Galt <jdg@diogenes.sacramento.ca.us> wrote:
> On 2011-11-27 12:04, r.e.d. wrote:
> > I'm not sure your characterization of the point of the breakup is
> > completely correct. My understanding is that the issue was not
> > size, but that fact that AT&T owned not only long distance and
> > equipment manuracturing. but local service. Creative accounting
> > could cause the regulated local services to subsidize the other
> > parts of the business, particularly long distance, at the expense
> > of local rate-payers, so fair competition for long distance
> > services would not be possible as long as it remained one company.
> It was the other way around. Long distance subsidized local
> service. It was set up that way deliberately, partly because the FCC
> wanted universal service. Pre-divestiture, some long distance calls
> within California were over $3/min, while measured service
> (non-Lifeline) could be had for under $4/month.
It wasn't just the FCC that wanted local service as cheap as possible,
it w= as also the state commissions, which didn't want rates for local
service an= y higher than they could possibly be, Neither did the
telcos, who were als= o interested in universal service.
> Long distance was considered a premium service, so intrastate rates
> were set by the commission to provide the subsidy to keep local
> rates low. The FCC, with no intrastate or local traffic to deal
> with, set interstate rates as low as possible. From Dallas it was
> cheaper to call Phoenix (interstate) than El Paso (intrastate). As
> soon as MCI won the right to compete, that subsidy became untenable
> -- it just made Ma Bell's own long distance rates
> uncompetitive. This is why we now have much higher monthly service
> rates, but much cheaper long distance rates.
And the charge for the Universal Service Fund, to subsidize high cost
areas= (mostly smaller towns, which were formerly subsidized by the
higher intras= tate long distance rates).
Wes Leatherock
wleathus@yahoo.com
wesrock@aol.com
Date: Fri, 2 Dec 2011 08:13:50 -0800 (PST)
From: Wes Leatherock <wleathus@yahoo.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: MSNBC/NYT: Caller ID Forging
Message-ID: <1322842430.85847.YahooMailClassic@web111708.mail.gq1.yahoo.com>
--- On Mon, 11/28/11, Gordon Burditt <gordonb.j8kg1@burditt.org> wrote:
> A modern PBX with hundreds of lines is able to pass off the
> caller-id info to make it useful - it's a feature - sending out the
> one public "operator" number for the whole company is not really
> useful, and some companies actually want you to be able to call back
> the particular person who called you.
There is a great push in the Central Oklahoma area to have the number
presented to the emergency service agencies from PBXs be the acutal
extnesion number, which they can enter in their records with an actual
location.
They are complaining that when only the main number is given from a
PBX, that location may be miles away from where the actual caller is
(and where the need is for fire, ambulance or police).
Wes Leatherock
wleathus@yahoo.com
wesrock@aol.com
Date: Fri, 02 Dec 2011 22:25:22 -0800
From: John David Galt <jdg@diogenes.sacramento.ca.us>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: Update on at&t/T-mobile merger
Message-ID: <jbcfcl$ffp$1@blue-new.rahul.net>
r.e.d. wrote:
> We're both right. Long distance DID subsidize local service. But if
> AT&T were to be allowed to compete in the new environment, it would
> mean that the cross-subsidy would need to be stopped, therefore local
> rates would rise. But if you were an AT&T competitor, you would
> always be suspicious that the rates that AT&T would ask the PUCs for
> would be higher than necessary, and that the excess would subsidize
> the other way. That is, local service would subsidize AT&T's long
> distance and therefore AT&T would compete unfairly in the
> long-distance market.
AT&T wouldn't have needed to do any such thing. Around the time of the
breakup, my employer's AT&T rep told me why: "All the new long distance
companies are still paying off their switches. Ours have been in place
for 40+ years and the mortgages are paid for. So if we were allowed to
set our own rates, we'd cut them by half for six months and every one of
our competitors would be bankrupt."
30 years later, this may no longer be true. But I suspect that the same
situation -- this time working against AT&T -- may be why its Uverse TV
service costs twice as much as older cable TV services in places that
have them.
Date: 2 Dec 2011 09:55:56 -0500
From: kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey)
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Re: MSNBC/NYT: Caller ID Forging
Message-ID: <jbaots$5oq$1@panix2.panix.com>
HAncock4 <withheld@invalid.telecom-digest.org> wrote:
>
>> Aggressively enforced regulation specifying two things, with stiff
>> penalties for any violations: [snip]
>
>I hope [those] suggestions are implemented. More than stiff
>penalties, I want to see swift and sure enforcement so the violators
>know there's an excellent chance they will be caught and punished
>before they can leave town.
How do you propose to find them when they are sending out invalid caller ID
to prevent you from finding them?
What if they are in India? The DNC list has driven a lot of telemarketers
offshore.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
Date: Fri, 2 Dec 2011 10:30:30 -0500
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
To: telecomdigestmoderator.remove-this@and-this-too.telecom-digest.org.
Subject: Skype flaw reveals users' location, file-downloading habits
Message-ID: <UgiOSD.A.dqH.msi2OB@telecom>
Skype flaw reveals users' location, file-downloading habits
A team of researchers has uncovered an issue that imperils Skype
users' privacy by putting their location and identity up for grabs
By Joan Goodchild, Senior Editor
December 1, 2011
Researchers have found a flaw in Skype, the popular
Voice-over-Internet-Protocol service which allows users to make video
phone calls and internet chat with their computers. The vulnerability
can expose your location, identity and the content you're
downloading. Microsoft, which owns Skype, says they are working on
the problem.
The issue was uncovered earlier this year by a team of researchers
from Polytechnic Institute of New York University (NYU-Poly), MPI-SWS
in Germany and INRIA in France and included Keith Ross, Stevens Le
Blond, Chao Zhang, Arnaud Legout, and Walid Dabbous. The team
presented the research in Berlin recently at the Internet Measurement
Conference 2011 in a paper titled "I know where you are and what you
are sharing."
The researchers found several properties of Skype that can track not
only users' locations over time, but also their peer-to-peer (P2P)
file-sharing activity, according to a summary of the findings on the
NYU-Poly web site. Earlier this year, a German researcher found a
cross-site scripting flaw in Skype that could allow someone to change
an account password without the users' consent.
...
http://www.csoonline.com/article/695631/skype-flaw-reveals-users-location-file-downloading-habits
Skype Can Expose Your Location, Researchers Say
By SOMINI SENGUPTA
November 29, 2011
Remember when a prankster could make himself a general nuisance by
calling your home phone and quickly hanging up?
The equivalent of a prank call on Skype, the popular
voice-over-Internet-Protocol service, can be much more than a
nuisance. If you are logged in to Skype, a prankster - or thief or
spy - can effectively track where you are and in some circumstances,
what you do and even what you download, according to an experiment
led by Keith Ross, a computer science professor at the Polytechnic
Institute of New York University in Brooklyn.
Mr. Ross, along with his collaborators at the French computer
research institute, Inria, followed 10,000 randomly selected Skype
users over 16 days.
...
http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/11/29/skype-can-expose-your-location-researchers-say/
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