Path: utzoo!telecom-request Date: Wed, 8 May 91 16:59:30 GMT From: "S. H. Schwartz" Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: 50k Counts of Wire Fraud Message-ID: Organization: Expert Systems Lab., NYNEX Sci. and Tech., White Plains NY Sender: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 11, Issue 350, Message 1 of 10 Lines: 38 > I see no lies and no coercion. The people who were charged got what > they paid for, a $55 audiotex message. Is there anybody in Manhattan > who can afford a pager who doesn't know that 540 numbers are toll > calls? If there are two thousand yuppie scum who are stupid enough to > return a page to a toll number, and they do this for no reason other > than that they were asked to, how can it possibly be illegal or even > unethical? Slow down, hotshot. I didn't know that 540 = toll until an operator told me. In fact, up to a few years ago, 540 was the exchange for automated ringback. And I am most certainly -not- a yuppie, not to mention a "yuppie scum," as any of my colleagues can tell you. :-))) I don't live in Manhattan, and I don't have a pager, but if someone left an apparently local number on my ans machine, I wouldn't think twice about calling back. I won't speculate about the legality of this event, as my employer has a particular interest in telephony, :-) but I hope this guy gets what he deserves. S. H. Schwartz schwartz@nynexst.com Expert Systems Laboratory 914-683-2960 NYNEX Science and Technology Center White Plains, NY 10604 [Moderator's Note: What the guy did was certainly not very nice, but I cannot really see the difference between what he did and someone who calls a large number of people at random with a recorded announcement saying to call a 900 number, then quickly glossing over the cost of the call (to the 900 line). Surely with the recorded voice calls urging one to call a 900 number there will be children who call without permission and people who still are not aware of the cost. If the folks who urge you to call a 900 number don't get prosecuted, then neither should the joker who paged a bunch of people to call his 540 number. PAT]