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TELECOM Digest Tue, 6 Feb 2007 21:04:00 EST Volume 26 : Issue 38
Inside This Issue: Editor: Patrick A. Townson
Book Review: "Designing and Building Enterprise DMZs" (Rob Slade)
Verizon to Step up Efforts in India (USTelecom dailyLead)
CommunicationsDirect News Daily Update (communicationsdirect_daily)
Re: Historical Rules About Private Line Services? (Wesrock@aol.com)
Re: Historical Rules About Private Line Services? (Carl Navarro)
Re: Chinese and Koreans Buying Up All Old WE Test Gear (L d'Bonnie)
Re: Chinese and Koreans Buying Up All Old WE Test Gear (Scott Dorsey)
Re: Beware of the Dot (harris13@gmail.com)
Re: Criminals Are Overwhelming the Web (Lisa Hancock)
Re: TiVo Sees if You Skip Those Ads (ranck@vt.edu)
Re: 712 858 8094? (Wesrock@aol.com)
====== 25 years of TELECOM Digest -- Founded August 21, 1981 ======
Telecom and VOIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) Digest for the
Internet. All contents here are copyrighted by Patrick Townson and
the individual writers/correspondents. Articles may be used in other
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included in the fair use quote. By using -any name or email address-
included herein for -any- reason other than responding to an article
herein, you agree to pay a hundred dollars to the recipients of the
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===========================
Addresses herein are not to be added to any mailing list, nor to be
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we do not want the kind of world that results when no one stands
against crime. Geoffrey Welsh
===========================
See the bottom of this issue for subscription and archive details
and the name of our lawyer; other stuff of interest, and why not
support Net Freedom Now http://www.freepress.net/netfreedom .
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Mon, 05 Feb 2007 16:03:07 -0800
From: Rob Slade <rMslade@shaw.ca>
Subject: Book Review: "Designing and Building Enterprise DMZs", Ido Dubrawsky
Reply-To: rMslade@shaw.ca
Organization: Vancouver Institute for Research into User
BKDBEDMZ.RVW 20061223
"Designing and Building Enterprise DMZs", Ido Dubrawsky et al, 2006,
1-59749-100-4, U$59.95/C$77.95
%E Ido Dubrawsky
%C 800 Hingham Street, Rockland, MA 02370
%D 2006
%G 1-59749-100-4
%I Syngress Media, Inc.
%O U$59.95/C$77.95 781-681-5151 fax: 781-681-3585 www.syngress.com
%O http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1597491004/robsladesinterne
http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/1597491004/robsladesinte-21
%O http://www.amazon.ca/exec/obidos/ASIN/1597491004/robsladesin03-20
%O Audience i- Tech 1 Writing 1 (see revfaq.htm for explanation)
%P 714 p.
%T "Designing and Building Enterprise DMZs"
Chapter one does outline some basic DMZ (DeMilitarized Zone) concepts
and design, but is vague and verbose, with many large (in page size)
and simplistic (in terms of information content) illustrations with
little detail and minimal differences between them. (Figures 1.5 and
1.6 are, in fact, identical, even though they purport to show
different topologies.) Windows DMZ design, in chapter two, is both
too broad (it discusses very general aspects of planning for a DMZ
setup) and too detailed (the text almost immediately jumps into the
specifics of particular outside hardware to be purchased for an
isolated example) to be of practical use. Much the same is true of
chapter three, which is based on Sun's Solaris operating system.
Chapter four lists wireless network attacks and some security
technologies, but doesn't really deal with DMZ aspects, and chapter
five, purportedly about implementing wireless DMZs, just has lots of
screenshots for installing various products.
Chapter six starts a section of the book cataloguing various firewall
products. In this case it is Cisco's PIX and ASA systems, and
discusses unit specifications, licensing, and some Cisco commands.
Chapters seven through ten, respectively about Checkpoint,
SecurePlatform and Nokia, NetScreen, and ISA Server 2005, basically
contain screenshots for installation and configuration.
Chapter eleven, entitled "DMZ Router and Switch Security," would have
been a good place to deliberate on security considerations of the
different routing protocols, but only suggests hardening routers and
switches. VPN (Virtual Private Network) topologies and products are
noted in chapter twelve, with almost no mention of DMZs at all. The
standard advice for building MS Windows bastion hosts is in chapter
thirteen. We are told to remove unnecessary services (without being
told which are necessary), to rename the administrator account
(although nobody mentions that the renamed account can still be
determined), and the text recommends using Terminal Services (even
though this service is widely considered to be a security risk). Most
of the material is about how to use the configuration utilities,
rather than suggestions on the settings themselves. Much the same
type and level of advice is given in chapter fourteen, in regard to
Linux.
Ultimately, while there is content in the work that can be helpful in
terms of security, there is relatively little that actually relates to
DMZ concepts, design, use, or protection.
copyright Robert M. Slade, 2006 BKDBEDMZ.RVW 20061223
====================== (quote inserted randomly by Pegasus Mailer)
rslade@vcn.bc.ca slade@victoria.tc.ca rslade@computercrime.org
Be very glad that your PC is insecure--it means that after you
buy it, you can break into it and install whatever software you
want. What YOU want, not what [content providers] want.
- John Gilmore
Dictionary of Information Security www.syngress.com/catalog/?pid=4150
http://victoria.tc.ca/techrev/rms.htm
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2007 12:09:11 CST
From: USTelecom dailyLead <ustelecom@dailylead.com>
Subject: Verizon to Step Up Efforts in India
USTelecom dailyLead
February 6, 2007
http://r.smartbrief.com/resp/gerYfDtusXlHahCibuddLJQL
TODAY'S HEADLINES
NEWS OF THE DAY
* Verizon to step up efforts in India
BUSINESS & INDUSTRY WATCH
* EarthLink posts loss, broadband revenue up
* Motorola takes aim at IPTV migration costs
* AT&T, Hearst-Argyle reach retransmission deal
* Alcatel-Lucent lands China Unicom contract
* WOW to carry Universal's IMF
USTELECOM SPOTLIGHT
* USTelecom lauds president's budget proposal for FET repeal
TECHNOLOGY TRENDS
* BT taps NewStep for convergence
* Tiscali launches Internet pay-TV
* Akamai buys Netli
* Neotel calls on Motorola
* Mobile marketing's on the move
* Super Bowl scores viewer touchdown
Follow the link below to read quick summaries of these stories and others.
http://r.smartbrief.com/resp/gerYfDtusXlHahCibuddLJQL
------------------------------
Subject: CommunicationsDirect News Daily Update - February 06, 2007
From: communicationsdirect <communicationsdirect_daily@communicationsdirect>
Reply-To: communicationsdirect_daily-owner@communicationsdirectnews.com
Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2007 11:21:31 EST
********************************
PricewaterhouseCoopers Presents
The CommunicationsDirect Daily Update
For February 06, 2007
********************************
Today's World of Wireless Terms
http://www.communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/150/22539?11228
The telecommunications industry's lexicon is ever-changing and
its acronyms and words sometimes have different meanings for
different people. In no sector of communications is the
vocabulary more dynamic than in the wireless space. So xchange is
taking this, our first issue of 2007, as an opportunity to
revisit the definitions of ...
Elion Selects Alcatel-Lucent Triple-Play Solution, Launches HDTV
http://www.communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/140/22536?11228
Estonia's leading fixed-line operator has selected Alcatel-Lucent
for the delivery of enhancements to its triple-play services. M2
Presswire reports that Elion now has a total of 141,000 broadband
subscribers, including 26,000 to its DigiTV package, which offers
up to 70 digital TV channels, fixed-line telephony, and internet
...
BT Says It Agreed to Buy India's i2i for Undisclosed Sum
http://www.communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/120/22526?11228
LONDON -- BT Group PLC, Britain's former phone monopoly, said
today it agreed to buy i2i Enterprise Pvt Ltd., an India-based
Internet protocol communications services business, for an
undisclosed sum. BT will become the biggest foreign global
carrier operating in India today as the result of this ...
Phonemaker Sony Ericsson Unveils New Models in Bid to Increase Market Share
http://www.communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/150/22524?11228
STOCKHOLM, Sweden -- Sony Ericsson unveiled eight new phones
Tuesday aimed at helping the world's fourth-biggest mobile phone
maker make inroads into emerging markets in India, China and
Latin America. The company, a joint venture between
Stockholm-based LM Ericsson and Japan's Sony Corp., is already
well known for its ...
Cable Giants Taking VOIP to SMBs
http://www.communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/140/22521?11228
The nation's two largest cable operators are launching
comprehensive voice services for the small-to-medium-sized
business (SMB) market this year. Both Comcast Corp. and Time
Warner Cable Inc. plan to introduce customized VOIP offerings for
SMBs over the coming months, following in the recent footsteps of
Cox Communications ...
Spansion Shows Off First Flash Security for Handsets
http://www.communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/150/22519?11228
Calling it the first Flash memory subsystem that provides
security protection from viruses, attacks and service thefts,
Spansion has unveiled a product that uses MirrorBit and Spansion
Secure technology to provide commercially available handsets with
hardware-based encryption at the highest level of protection.
Traditionally, ...
Congress Ponders FY08 FCC Budget
http://www.communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/130/22517?11228
In the huge FY08 budget Congress just received from President
Bush is proposed funding for the Federal Communications
Commission of $313 million. At this funding level, covered
programs include mandatory increases in salaries and benefits,
and inflationary increases for contractual services. The request
also provides funding to ...
Tech Roundup: Broadcom & VLSI
http://www.communicationsdirectnews.com/do.php/150/22514?11228
This week's tech roundup sees chipmakers working on even smaller
combo chipsets -- want Bluetooth and FM radio with that order of
WiFi. While Verizon Wireless finally unveils its CDMA Rev. A
game; along with other tasty wireless news nuggets. Radio WiFi:
Chipmaker Broadcom Corp. is claiming a first with a chipset that
...
Your feedback on our e-letter is always welcome. Send email to:
CommunicationsDirect Editor <telecom_direct_editor@us.pwc.com>
Copyright (C) 2007 PricewaterhouseCoopers.
------------------------------
From: Wesrock@aol.com
Date: Mon, 5 Feb 2007 22:07:26 EST
Subject: Re: Historical Rules About Private Line Services?
There were many types of private line circuits, from dry loops (no
battery on them) used for burglar alarm and other signaling services
up to the highest bandwith of all, the broadcast television channels
used to send programs to affiliated stations across the country.
Telegraph and teletypewriter circuits were very common and vast
networks served wire services, newspapers, stock brokers and others.
They came in 50-, 80-, 75- and 100-wpms speeds. Some ran with
customer-owned teletypewrtiers, some ran with Bell Teletypes.
One particular circuit I was familiar with caused a great deal of
annoyance to the New York control bureau when Edinburg, Texas, broke
to send. Such channels ran on all kinds of physical, carrier,
microwave and coax circuits, and by the time the various relays and
other hardware along the way did its thing New York would be several
lines into the next message before the "break" signal from Edinburg
reached New York.
Another circuit from New York to the West Coast and south to Mexico
City often had trouble south of Laredo on the Mexican side. The
regulations in Mexico required the channels in Mexico be provided by
the government telegraph administion, not the telephone come, and it
was not unusual for the telco board in Laredo to have to "blind"
Mexico City (make the circuit one-way southbound because so many
transients interfering with the U.S.A. part of the circuit).
Higher-bandwidth channels came in various bandwiths, some of the most
common being voice (telephone)-grade and broadcast-grade, and others. As
other have reported, many, many companies had both local and wide-ranging
networks, some of them national or even international.
In general, connecting private line circuits with switched service was
prohibited, with exceptions for the military services and
"right-of-way companies," firms that had their own right-of-way such
as railroads and pipeline companies.
At the peak were the television broadcast channels, which had very
high quality and reliability standards and were continually monitored
in TOCs (Television Operating Centers) all along the way. Another
interesting provision of the TV broadcast channel tariff was that
there always had to be a hot spare channel available along the entire
route to switch almost instantly in case of failure. This was also
the only class of service that provided rebates for loss of service
more than either 15 minutes or 30 minutes, I forget which..
It should also be noted that there were differences in intrastate and
interstate rates for all private line servicess, interstate being
cheaper than intrastate as was customary in those days, so it was
advantageous to customers to seek to make intrastate circuits segments
of interstate circuits rather than stand-alone intrastate circuits.
Along the lines of some of the other reminisences, I remember the
downtown Montgomery Ward store in Oklahoma City had the Automatic
Electric sets on an isolated (customer-owned) PBX with only Bell
phones in a few locations.
One very large industrial customer on the Texas Gulf Coast (it had to
be located there becaust seawater was part of the process or
feedstock) told the telco how many thousand of dollars they could save
(monthly or yearly) with an isolated customer-owned PBX but went with
Bell because of the Bell System's ability to restore service along
that hurricane-frequented coast. (This concern also prompted them, in
the days of much more rudimentary National Weather Service coverage)
to maintain their own network of coastal radars from the Louisiana
line to the Mexican border.
Wes Leatherock
wesrock@aol.com
wleathus@yahoo.com
------------------------------
From: Carl Navarro <cnavarro@wcnet.org>
Subject: Re: Historical Rules About Private Line Services?
Date: Mon, 05 Feb 2007 22:07:02 -0500
Organization: Road Runner High Speed Online http://www.rr.com
On 5 Feb 2007 07:34:17 -0800, hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com wrote:
>> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Although what you say is correct, telco
>> had very strict rules on things. For example, a pair of wires from
>> point A to point B which did not go near an 'actual phone line' but
>> was still used for communication purposes was regulated according to
>> Bell rules and defined as a 'private line' according to their
>> rules.
> Many large organizations, such as a transit system, city government,
> or large manufacturing plant, had their own private telephone
> networks. As I understand it, these networks were not
> interconnected with Bell and operated and maintained by the owner.
> In the 1960s and even 1970s you would see two phones on a desk, a
> typical Bell 500 set, and then an obviously old AE (Automatic
> Electric) phone, with a fabric cord, the metalic stripe accents on
> the handset, etc. I doubt that the owners of such systems paid Bell
> anything for them, otherwise, they would've interconnected and been
> more up to date.
> The Phila public schools had a modest PAX (private automatic exchange)
> in most schools for internal use within the school. Each classroom
> had a non-dial phone. When the handset lifted it rang in the school
> office. The school office phone had a dial. No interconnection to
> Bell. I suspect such a system required only one SxS switch and a few
> relays. I understand that system is now gone and now classroom phones
> have dials, and parents can call a teacher directly, instead of making
> the teacher come to the school office where the outside line was.
> (I'd love to know what happened to that gear when replaced.)
Sure, in a common battery office, you didn't need any moving parts :-)
A cord board had some number of cord pairs, an attendant headset, and
a rotary dial mounted on the attendant's desk. You brought the
exchange line(s) to a bank of jacks, and the box of relays to sense
the current of the phones and bring in the signal to the board. IIRC
we called them 557 cord boards and they still existed in answering
services to the mid '80's. A new-fangled company called Amtelco made
an add-in that read DID numbers to make it continue to work toward
1990.
ALL of our phones were AE's, after GTE bought us out. Before that
there were some North electric gear, like Ericofon's. I don't
remember if we had any Stromberg keys, I only remember the AE 187
mechanical stuff and early 1A1's. Toward the later days, we still had
a TON of Leich crossbar in service.
I remeber that the early PBX's had some sort of out dial restriction,
whether by tarriff or by preference. Only the attendant console could
dial outside, and all the other phones could dial internally, but had
to dial 0 to make an outside call. In fact, a Leich console had both
a dial and a keypad. The keypad dialed internal numbers and the dial
outside.
PAX Steppers only had to have a line finder, first selector, and a
connector, since the 3 digit numbering plans were easy. A first
selector only used levels 1,2,3 and maybe 9 and 0. The first levels
went to a connector, the 9 to a trunk, and the 0 to an attendant.
The last stepper I worked on in 1980 went to some third world
country. Why, I haven't a clue. More of it probably went to a guy in
New Philadelphia, OH for precious metals reclamation and landfill.
> If anyone can offer more about such large private networks used in
> industry, I would appreciate if you'd post it.
Of course the most successful private network was some railroad named
Southern Pacific. I think they went public about 1980 or so as
Sprint.
Carl Navarro
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: One of the larger private systems was
'Unitel' which was the United Airlines private network. I recall
when we discovered a seven digit local number in Elk Grove, IL termin-
ated on tne Unitel network and the type of things which could be done
on that network. Elk Grove was like the main hub of United Airlines,
and it was also the central switching center for Unitel. Imagine, an
open-ended airline private phone network without a single bit of
security on it. Quite literally, when you dialed that seven digit
number, you were answered by fresh dial tone from Unitel to do
whatever you wanted or call as you liked. Dialing '9' off of that
network was nothing much; you were limited to _very_ local calling in
Elk Grove only. The three digit codes one dialed were the main thing.
Dialing SEA (732) got you the Seattle airport centrex; dialing 673
(ORD) got you the Chicago/Ohare centrex and there were three digit
codes for almost every airport (where United traveled) in the USA
and Canada. After you dialed the appropriate three digit code, then
the mystery started all over again. From the remote dial tone in those
airport centrex systems, more three digit coded were possible to still
other places.
For example, from SEA (732), continued dialing of 263 (BOE) got you to
the centrex of Boeing Aircraft at their offices in Seattle. All of
these places allowed one to dial '9' for local calls in their
communities, or (typically) a three digit code for a WATS line,
peculiar to the community it (the network termination) was located
in. Of course, there was a 'local' WATS line (out of Elk Grove) that
one was expected to use -- not the WATS line out of LaGuardia Aiport
or Seattle, or off of Boeing Aircraft. And it just went on and on like
that; there were sort of odd loop arounds; you dialed 732 to reach the
Seattle centrex, but the people in Seattle used some other code to
reach headquarters in Elk Grove, so if you went in on 732 and (then
new dial tone) dialed the other code you would wind up back where you
started. One of the three digit codes reached the Reno, Nevada City
Hall switchboard which was weird. On that one after dialing the code
from Elk Grove, instead of a fresh dial tone, it started ringing and
after a few rings, a woman answered as 'operator'; when asked who she
was, she replied 'Reno City Hall'.
Another very strange network was/is 'Stanotel', the Standard Oil
Company network. Based out of the Chicago office, there was also a
'hub' for it in Tulsa, Oklahoma. That is to say, there were places on
the network you could not reach out of Chicago directly, but if you
used the 'tie-line' to Tulsa, then you could continue dialing out to
other places. Both Unitel and Stanotel were very unusual hybrid
systems, and I expect, quite expensive to maintain, but apparently
_less expensive_ than toll charges had the Bell System been used. PAT]
------------------------------
From: L d'Bonnie <nobody@mts.net>
Subject: Re: Chinese and Koreans Buying Up Old WE Test Gear For Transformers
Date: Tue, 06 Feb 2007 12:19:25 -0600
Bret Ludwig wrote:
> I'm not saying don't sell it to them, but, make them pay a good
> price. They are buying up any old WE or NE box with audio
> transformers. Don't sell it cheap.
When whites do this they're entrepreneurs.
Must be time for another Inquisition. Where's McCarthy when you need
him?
------------------------------
From: kludge@panix.com (Scott Dorsey)
Subject: Re: Chinese and Koreans Buying Up Old WE Test Gear For Transformers
Date: 6 Feb 2007 13:52:17 -0500
Organization: Former users of Netcom shell (1989-2000)
Bret Ludwig <bretldwig@yahoo.com> wrote:
> I'm not saying don't sell it to them, but, make them pay a good
> price. They are buying up any old WE or NE box with audio
> transformers. Don't sell it cheap.
This has been going on for many years.
A local theatre got a system "upgrade" in 1983. They pulled out all
the Altec 600B surround speakers from the original Cinescope mag
system, and put crappy drivers in the boxes. Pulled the Altec tube
amps out, put crappy paging amplifiers in. Turned around and sold all
the Altec stuff in Japan at a huge markup. Telecom content? Some.
--scott
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."
------------------------------
From: harris13@gmail.com
Subject: Re: Beware of the Dot
Date: 6 Feb 2007 11:39:09 -0800
Organization: http://groups.google.com
On Feb 2, 5:18 pm, e...@no.spam wrote:
> In article <telecom26.2...@telecom-digest.org>, Monty Solomon
> <m...@roscom.com> wrote:
>> Wireless companies and phone makers say water damage is a common
>> problem with cellphones
> So why haven't the cellphone makers done something to fix the problem?
> It's not that hard to make a phone that'd take some water without
> breaking.
> http://yosemitecampsites.com/
Just want to add this ongoing anecdote. My 15 year old son's Samsung
phone has now been through our Maytag washer's full cycle 3 times and
through the dryer at least once. We put it in the sun or toaster oven
for an hour and it starts working again 100%. Just ordered a new
battery for it as the family tries to wait out our commitment to our
wireless carrier for another 6 months.
------------------------------
From: hancock4@bbs.cpcn.com
Subject: Re: Criminals Are Overwhelming the Web
Date: 6 Feb 2007 11:40:50 -0800
Organization: http://groups.google.com
On Feb 5, 5:46 pm, Tim Weber, BBC News <b...@telecom-digest.org>
wrote:
> Criminals controlling millions of personal computers are threatening
> the internet's future, experts have warned. Up to a quarter of
> computers on the net may be used by cyber criminals in so-called
> botnets, said Vint Cerf, one of the fathers of the internet.
What is frustrating to me, as an end user, is that none of the many
articles on this subject say anything about stopping the "botnets".
How does a computer become that way? Who owns such computers? What
is being done to notify or discipline the owners of such unprotected
computers? Why are there so many of them?
What is being done to prosecute the criminals who exploit these
things? For example, it appears money fraud uses credit cards, not
cash. Such items are trackable, even to foreign countries. If some
foreign bank isn't cooperating, simply cut them off from the rest of
the banking world. That'll bring them into compliance real fast.
U.S. credit card companies and banks could be doing more control
checks as well, but perhaps they don't want to discourage business.
> Despite all that, the net is still working, which is pretty amazing.
> "It's pretty resilient," noted Vint Cerf
Perhaps because people have been brainwashed to spend far more money
than necessary for high horsepower equipment to handle all the crap.
The computer industry is just like the auto industry with its planned
obsolescence model years: this year's model has so many new hot
exciting features your last year's computer is old and shabby!
> But its members were unsure about feasible solutions, even though they
> identified operating systems and authentication as key issues.
Bull----! If they can develop fancy protocols that cross connect
everything from giant mainframes to handheld music boxes, they can
come with security solutions.
> It was still too easy for net criminals to hide their tracks, several
> panel members said, although they acknowledged that it was probably
> not desirable that every individual was definitively identifiable.
> "Anonymity has its value, and it has its risk," said Jonathan
> Zittrain, professor for internet governance at the University of
> Oxford.
This is hypocritical nonsense. Grow up. The 1960s are long gone.
Yes, personal privacy is a big problem. But requiring true
authetification on computer networks will ease identity theft and
fraud, which are big problems.
> But already pirated copies of Vista were circulating in China, even
> though the consumer launch of Vista has only been a few days ago.
> Experience showed that about 50% of all pirated Windows programs came
> with Trojans pre-installed on them, Mr Markoff said.
Nothing about what lay consumers can do and should do to protect
themselves. The techies live in a world unto their own and don't want
to share it (nothing new there, the techies 30 years ago were just as
obnoxious). When a lay person asks a techie a question, the reply is
a stream of acronyms and buzzwords that mean nothing.
When I was in college I had a comp sci prof who deducted points for
every buzzword used in a paper. Standard English was required. Hard
specifics, not vague promises, were required. Too bad more teachers
weren't like that.
> Mr. Toure said that whatever the solution, the fight against botnets was
> a "war" that could only be won if all parties -- regulators, governments,
> telecoms firms, computer users and hardware and software makers -- worked
> together.
But all of those people have their own selfish agendas, sadly. The
computer makers want to sell more and powerful computers to make more
profit. The telecoms don't want any restrictions or tracking to
disrupt their profits or make their job harder. The governments want
to track things outside of computer security (i.e. drug runners, tax
cheats). The tech users want to safeguard their priviledged world
where people must pay dearly for their services. The end users are
too lazy to learn and use even basic computer concepts and technology;
they want everything fully automated.
[public replies, please]
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Its everyone with their own agenda
which has created most of the problems we see these days with the
tons of spam and truckloads of bots ruining things. And most system
admins are far too busy to examine every piece of outgoing mail to
try and detirmine any (spam) patterns prevalant in them. That is, if
the system admins even care. Many of them do not. In the 1980's and
early 1990's, system admins were always known as generally good guys.
We could _trust_ them ... not so any longer, regretably. PAT]
------------------------------
From: ranck@vt.edu
Subject: Re: TiVo Sees if You Skip Those Ads
Date: Tue, 6 Feb 2007 22:07:21 UTC
Organization: Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Virginia, USA
Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com> wrote:
> by David Lazarus
> This raises a pair of troubling questions: Is TiVo, which
> revolutionized TV viewing with its digital video recording technology,
> now watching what people watch? And is it selling that sensitive info
> to advertisers and others?
I believe this was always in thier business plan, and publicly
admitted by TiVo from day one. They have said they are gathering
aggragate data, not personally identifiable. They have certainly
always *claimed* to not be gathering subscriber specific info.
In other words, they can say 60% of their users skip the latest Ford
commercial (or whatever) but not if Joe Blow of 123 Street Rd. was
one of those skippers. I believe last year TiVo revealed that some
percentage of their users were replaying the commercials during the
Superbowl, and which commercials were most replayed.
Bill Ranck
Blacksburg, Va.
------------------------------
From: Wesrock@aol.com
Date: Mon, 5 Feb 2007 20:19:58 EST
Subject: Re: 712 858 8094?
In a message dated 3 Feb 2007 03:17:00 -0000, John Levine
<johnl@iecc.com> writes:
> The always informative Local Calling Guide reveals that 712-858 is the
> tiny Superior Telephone Co-op, which strongly suggests that this is a
> USF arbitrage gambit. That is, the co-op gets a very high per minute
> settlement rate on inbound calls which is more than enough to pay the
> penny or so that most int'l calls cost and still have something to
> split.
> A little poking around reveals that this isn't the only USF arbitrage
> in this exchange:
In the 1950s I used to go to coffee and lunch often with the assistant
connecting company agent in Austin (title later changed to independent
company relations manager) and he said there were numerous small
exchanges -- often manual -- that could profitably make calls to the
town which served as their toill center and receive a latger sum under
the settlements with indepedent companies then in effect than the
amount they would be billed by the Bell Company.
Wes Leatherock
wesrock@aol.com
wleathus@yahoo.com
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