Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!agate!apple!sun-barr!newstop!texsun!texbell!vector!telecom-gateway From: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu (TELECOM Moderator) Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: US Sprint Code-abuse Policies Message-ID: Date: 18 Jul 89 04:02:49 GMT Sender: news@vector.Dallas.TX.US Lines: 65 Approved: telecom-request@vector.dallas.tx.us X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@vector.dallas.tx.us X-TELECOM-Digest: volume 9, issue 242, message 7 of 10 In the message before this one, Steve Elias describes a problem which has plagued telephone companies for years; namely fraudulent billing information passed to the operator, which ultimatly is written off uncollectible and later passed on to legitimate users in the form of rate increases. The most famous, or would you say infamous case on record was several years ago when New York Telephone went before the state commissioners to seek an increase in rates. The question arose, 'How much did NY Tel write off in uncollectibles due to calling card fraud last year?' .....the answer: $7 million! So it a problem which requires action. But I will suggest that if for no other reason than their size, anything US Sprint gets, the Mother Company gets four times as much of. And how does AT&T handle fraud? Certainly not by red-lining certain parts of cities where fraud is prevalent, as Sprint has done with NY Port Authority or Grand Central. Suppose I was a Sprint customer, and innocently took the bus to New York and got off at the terminal. Ah yes, I am supposed to call home right away and let the folks know I arrived okay....but at the last minute, in quite an inappropriate way, I find out *my* calling card won't work there either. Sprint may choose to say, 'so what'....but that is simply indicative of their attitude in general toward their customers. If AT&T pulled something like that, they would be immediatly censured by the FCC. And of course I am sure there are no signs on the payphones saying "phones won't work with Fon Cards", so it is left to the confused telephone user to wonder why the calling card issued just last week which worked fine at home won't work here now that he has no change, and needs to make an urgent call. I operated a BBS here in Chicago for several years called . It was open without pre-registration to all callers except that to post messages, one had to have a validated password. It was NOT a phreak board, yet there were phreaks from all over the country calling it at one time or another. One day at my office -- a place totally unrelated to any and all of my computer hobby activities over the years -- a miserable little man called me, identified himself as "Sprint Security" and demanded a full print out of all the users on my system. He kept calling, threatening and harassing me for several days because I would not give him the information. I told him *I* would investigate; *I* would purge the board if I found anything; but that *he* had no right to make such demands. Sprint is not the only offender. US Telecom in Cedar Rapids, IA is another bunch that makes up the rules as they go along. Their thing is, if they do not like what you say on the phone, they refuse to extend *paid* calls! I kid you not. They block all calls on their network terminating at the phone number in Chicago of a BBS which they suspect of being a phreak hive. So as a BBS user, I sign up with US Telecom for long distance, only to find after the fact that I cannot call certain BBS' if the Cedar Rapids gang has not approved. You can't do it this way! AT&T takes the good with the bad. They do prosecute for theft of service, as they rightly should; as as Sprint and others should do. But AT&T takes the concept of universal service and the importance of service availability quite seriously. They won't ever chop off innocent customers just to spite someone else. And I might add that if your AT&T card is ever compromised for any reason, if you call them immediatly -- 24 hours per day -- they will kill the card on the spot AND issue you a new pin within three or four hours. That is how serious they are about keeping service available to their customers at all times. AT&T is running some ads in Chicago right now which say it all: "You've tried all the rest -- now come back home to the best." Patrick Townson