69 lines
3.9 KiB
Plaintext
69 lines
3.9 KiB
Plaintext
|
WASHINGTON (AP)-Telephone companies are declaring war on thousands of college
|
|||
|
|
students,professionals, and even prisoners who get into the telephone network
|
|||
|
|
illegally and ring up a half billon dollars in unpaid calls a year.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Companies are changing the software as well as the hardware in their netwoeks
|
|||
|
|
to try to block calls, and they are offering amnesty programs on college
|
|||
|
|
campuses for students to fess up and pay up.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
They also are working with federal authorities to prosecute call-sell
|
|||
|
|
operators who are using stolen authorization codes and electronic devices to
|
|||
|
|
break into the network and sell calls to all parts of the world at drastically
|
|||
|
|
dicounted prices.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
"We look at it as a major problem, and it's definately well worth going after
|
|||
|
|
this half billion dollars," said Rami Abuhamdeh, executive director of the
|
|||
|
|
industry-sponsored Communucations Fraud Control Association. (CFCA)
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
"In any industry, if you don't do anything about it, it's only going to fet
|
|||
|
|
worse."
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Computer-literate college stuents are among the biggest offenders and their
|
|||
|
|
campuses are breeding grounds for large-scale theft.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Authorization codes get passed around quickly, allowing students to phone
|
|||
|
|
home for free, telephone company security officials say.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
"That's something we're going to have to deal with because college students
|
|||
|
|
have inquisitive minds and they like to do things like challenge the network,"
|
|||
|
|
said Neal Norman, security manager for AT&T.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
MCI officials say they recently pursuaded 1,000 students at North Texas State
|
|||
|
|
University in Denton, Texas, to turn themselves in and pay about $100,000 for
|
|||
|
|
the illegal calls they made.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
At American University in Washington, D.C., 400 students turned themselves in
|
|||
|
|
and are being billed for about $25,000 so far, MCI spokesman John Houser said.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Computer hackers -- including doctors, lawyers, and some housewives -- who
|
|||
|
|
search computer files for authorization codes are another problem.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Abuhamdeh says their heaviest damage is in selling the codes or posting them
|
|||
|
|
on BBSs.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
The Hackers themselves usually don't make as many calls as ither groups,
|
|||
|
|
including prisoners, he said.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
"Prisoners have a lot of time on their hands and they're very innovative. And
|
|||
|
|
unfortunately in a lot of places, they have access to phones continually,"
|
|||
|
|
AT&T's Norman said.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
In on case, Norman said, a prisoner called a hospital, identified himself as
|
|||
|
|
a doctor and asked to be connect to another number in the hospital. When that
|
|||
|
|
number answered, he asked to be switched to the hospital operator, whom he
|
|||
|
|
asked to connect him to an outside line to for a long-distance call.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Companies are using sophisticated computer technology to identify patterns of
|
|||
|
|
illegal calling, which are often traced to operations run by "call selllers."
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
"They make $2,000 a week selling calls, and that's tax free," said Martin
|
|||
|
|
Preede, a special agent for corporate security at NY Telephone Co. But He
|
|||
|
|
warned that phone companies are actively tracking down such operations and
|
|||
|
|
prosecuting.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Typed in from a local newspaper. Article was written in late April.
|
|||
|
|
|
|||
|
|
Courtesy of The Wiz Kid.
|