PRE-RELEASE ___________________________ _:_( )_:_ .______. | D I G I T A L | ______|_ _ |._____ ________ ______ ______.__________ ______. / _//_/ ||____// _ \\____// |_ _ \\ |________ \ \ / _/ \. |_ / \_________________.______ _____________|_____| ____________/ _________ | '-----' `------` ___\__ \ ___| __________ _______ _________ ______. / _/ / _|_______\_ // __// _ \\ _|_______ / ________/ \_ / / _/ \. / / /______|____________| ___\_____________________| ___\_________\ _________`-----` `------` ___\__ \ ______ _____ _____ ___________ ______ Dz/a! / _/ //_____// \/ \\ _ // /_______ / ________/ \/ / ___/ / /______|_____________________/_____________\________________/ . _|_ P H R E A K P 1 M P S _|_ : (___________________________) : ASCII by Dezibel\Arcade ooooooooooooooooooooo o d.i.g.i.t.a.l o o p.h.r.e.a.k o o p.i.m.p.s o o o o i.s.s.u.e.3 o o a.p.r.i.l.9.8 o ooooooooooooooooooooo table of contents _______________________________________|___ __. | | | p1mp telecom news...........hoal | | hacking winshield..neptuniumOverkill | | | wtf, where is everything....sphinx | | | | | | | | | | | | | | : | ; : . . . ; . P1mp Telecom News Compiled by Hatredonalog hatredonalog@hotmail.com --------------------------------------------------------- School can't suspend pupil for criticizing teacher on Web Thursday, March 19, 1998 By MARK ROLLENHAGEN PLAIN DEALER REPORTER --------------------------------------------------------- Westlake High School junior Sean O'Brien (Spanish Prince) says he didn't set out to be a pioneer in cyberspace. He says he was merely looking for material to put on a Web site he was building last month when it struck him that the Internet might be a good place to air his grievances against his high school band teacher, Raymond Walczuk. School officials took one look at the page - titled "raymondsucks.org" - and disagreed. They suspended Sean for 10 days and threatened to expel him. But yesterday a federal judge ordered the district to immediately reinstate Sean and barred school officials from restricting what he says on the Internet through his home computer. The temporary order issued by Senior U.S. District Judge John M. Manos will be in effect until at least April 3 when a full hearing will be held on Sean's claim that the school district violated his First Amendment rights. The case could be the first nationally to explore how much, if any, control a school can exert over what its students say on the Internet when they are using their home computers, according to the American Civil Liberties Union. The Web site featured a photograph of Walczuk and described him as "an overweight middle aged man who doesn't like to get haircuts." "He likes to involve himself in everything you do, demands that band be your No. 1 priority, and favors people," the text says. "He often thinks that problems are caused by a certain student and/or group of students and no one else." Other pages on the site describe various run-ins Sean had with Walczuk, including an incident in which Sean was accused of putting stickers on a clock in a school hallway. One page also lists Walczuk's home address and telephone number. Walczuk declined to comment yesterday. School officials contend they were entitled to discipline Sean under a school rule that says students shall not "demonstrate physical, written, or verbal disrespect/threat" against school employees. Westlake schools Superintendent Beverly Reep said that on Monday she upheld high school administrators' decision to suspend Sean for 10 days but decided not to expel him. "I didn't feel it was necessary for any further consequence [beyond the suspension-," she said. Sean took the Web site off the Internet after his March 6 suspension, but the judge's order allows him to put it back up. He said he didn't know yet if he would put the site back on the Internet. "I'm not sure my dad will let me," Sean said yesterday. He said he also would consult with his lawyers, Avery S. Friedman and Kenneth D. Myers. Dr. Vincent O'Brien, an oncologist, said he learned about his son's Web site from school officials who called him at work and said his son was being suspended. "There were one or two minor words that you wouldn't use in front of 5-year-olds," he said. "But it wasn't anything really bad." He said school officials suggested that Sean, who has a grade-point average above 3.0, drop his band class and receive an F. Chris Link, executive director of the ACLU of Ohio, said she was unaware of any previous court decisions regarding a student's free speech rights on the Internet. Generally, she said, courts have decided schools do not have authority over what their students do outside of school. "The school cannot control the communication off the school grounds," she said. Sean's lawsuit seeks a court order declaring that the school district violated Sean's First Amendment rights and asks for $550,000 in damages from various school administrators and the district. Sean said he would be back in school today and plans to return to band class. "I'm going to sit there and do what I'm expected to do," he said. ©1998 PLAIN DEALER PUBLISHING [Note: This is a story about spanish prince. He has written for the PLA, and System Failure. He goes on IRC as spee most of the time. you can take a look at the site at: www.raymondsucks.org if he did decide to put it back up. Note to spee: You are going to buy me a car right? ] --------------------------------------------------------- AT&T proposes bold new initiatives to eradicate slamming FOR RELEASE TUESDAY, MARCH 3, 1998 AT&T Press Release --------------------------------------------------------- Recommends tough, uniform anti-slamming measures be implemented nationwide NEW YORK -- AT&T today announced it has undertaken bold new initiatives to eradicate "slamming," the fraudulent practice of switching consumers from their preferred communications company without their consent. "We want to eliminate slamming from our industry and are taking the steps today to do so," said C. Michael Armstrong, AT&T's chairman and CEO. "We will work to preserve choice by doing what is right for consumers." "As the industry leader, we have zero tolerance for slamming," said Armstrong. "That is why we are also announcing today three tough new measures to ensure that our own house is in order." o AT&T will voluntarily and unilaterally suspend the use of outside sales agents for consumer marketing efforts at local community events. AT&T has discovered that these vendors generate an unacceptable level of complaints. The company will not resume use of these vendors until we are comfortable that they can meet AT&T's zero tolerance policy toward slamming. o AT&T has established a slamming resolution center 1-800-538-5345 to provide dedicated service representatives 24-hours a day, seven days a week to resolve any consumer slamming complaints involving AT&T. The center is committed to resolve most consumer slamming inquiries on the first call and any that require further investigation within three business days. The center's capabilities will be expanded to handle business customer slamming inquiries on April 1. o AT&T will charge companies that resell our network facilities for the cost of handling each valid customer slamming complaint they cause. AT&T will also step up its monitoring of those companies' marketing practices to ensure that they are not misrepresenting themselves as AT&T. "These extra steps, which go above and beyond current industry practices, will give consumers an added level of protection. We believe our entire industry should take this approach as well," Armstrong said. Public policy makers in Congress and in the states have been increasingly concerned about slamming. AT&T hopes its actions today will be constructive as Congress continues to address this issue. That's why AT&T is calling on the FCC to use the authority Congress gave it in the 1996 Telecommunications Act to put in place the following industry-wide safeguards: o The requirement that all changes in local, local toll, and long-distance service for residential customers be verified by an independent third party before they can be processed. This verification now occurs only when communications companies call customers to solicit their business. AT&T is proposing that verification also take place when customers themselves initiate the call, submit a signed form requesting a change in service, or agree to have their service switched while attending a local event in their community. AT&T will begin to develop the systems and training necessary to implement third-party verification on all residential carrier changes, following FCC adoption of nationwide rules. o The implementation of stricter anti-slamming rules for the communications industry, including rules involving compensation to companies whose customers have been slammed. We propose a stiff carrier-to-carrier penalty of $1,000 per valid slamming incident. o The tightening of FCC rules on third party verification to prevent unscrupulous carriers from using scripts that mislead customers as to the identity of the carrier actually soliciting their business. o The elimination of local telephone company control over the processing of changes to local, local toll, and long-distance communications services. This could be accomplished by setting up an independent company to handle such changes. This measure will take service change activities out of the hands of the local telephone companies, which have a vested interest in maintaining their monopoly position. Since the early 1990s, AT&T has been in the forefront in condemning slamming and finding ways to eliminate this industry problem. Based on the most recent FCC studies, the company's performance is the best in the industry. AT&T has also coordinated several consumer education campaigns on slamming over the last decade that has reached consumers in eight languages. -------------------------------------------- WORLDCOM AND MCI SHAREHOLDERS APPROVE MERGER MCI Press Release -------------------------------------------- Jackson, MS and South Sioux City, NE -- March 11, 1998 -- Both WorldCom and MCI shareholders overwhelmingly approved the pending merger between the companies during meetings held today respectively in Jackson, MS and South Sioux City, NE. Of the WorldCom shareholder votes cast, over 99 percent were in favor of the merger; representing over 78 percent of votes entitled to be cast. Of the MCI shareholder votes cast, over 99 percent were in favor of the merger; representing over 80 percent of the votes entitled to be cast. The positive vote represents an important milestone in completing the merger approval process. The merger, first announced on November 10, 1997, is still subject to approvals from the U.S. Department of Justice, the Federal Communications Commission, and the European Commission, among others. The companies expect to secure the remaining approvals for a mid-year closing. "Our shareholders recognize the significant value of this merger to our future growth and earnings," said Bernard J. Ebbers, WorldCom president and CEO. "This vote is an important step forward in the completion of the MCI WorldCom merger and we are confident that we will gain other necessary approvals to complete the merger in mid-1998." "As we move closer to the completion of the merger with WorldCom, the synergies and growth opportunities become increasingly clear," said Bert C. Roberts, Jr., MCI chairman. "We will have an unmatched local- to-global network as well as the marketing and service capabilities to meet our customers' growing data, voice and Internet service needs." On November 10, 1997, MCI and WorldCom announced a definitive merger agreement to form a new company called MCI WorldCom. MCI WorldCom will be a leading provider of facilities-based and fully integrated local, long distance, data and global communications services. On completion of the merger, the company will have revenue of more than $30 billion, approximately 22 million customers and operations in more than 65 countries. ------------------------------------------------------------------- MCI CHAIRMAN ROBERTS TESTIFIES BEFORE SENATE JUDICIARY SUBCOMMITTEE Washington, DC, March 4, 1998 MCI Press Release ------------------------------------------------------------------- "The Bell monopolies have reneged on their commitment to Congress" and have pushed hard to bring down the landmark Telecommunications Act, MCI Chairman Bert Roberts charged today in prepared comments before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Business Rights and Competition. The Subcommittee held a hearing examining the status of telephone competition and the Bell monopolies' efforts to enter the in-region long distance market. Currently the Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOCs) may not provide long distance service to local customers until they have met the requirements of section 271 of the Telecom Act. Increasingly, the RBOCs are trying to discredit section 271 as the FCC has rejected all their premature long distance applications to date. In his testimony, Roberts highlighted the need for strong governmental action to combat efforts by the phone companies to block local competition. Roberts drew on his experience as a pioneer in the telecommunications industry and stressed that section 271 can best work to open up local markets if three lessons are considered: o "Section 271 calls for rigorous oversight by both the Department of Justice and the Federal Communications Commission. Given the long track record of the Department in administering the Modified Final Judgment, this allocation of responsibility helps to maintain a tough, consistent and sustained approach. o "The focus needs to be on economic as well as legal incentives. Section 271's public interest provision will only be served when consumers really have choice and the correct economic incentives are in place. Today resale discounts are too low, one-time charges imposed solely on new entrants are too high, and new entrants face discrimination whenever they attempt to use the essential local facilities to which they are lawfully entitled. o "Section 271 rightly focuses on whether local markets are open in practice, not just in theory. The FCC has correctly applied the 271 "checklist" to reject each application that has come before it. That's because the details of competition were not in place in Michigan, South Carolina, Oklahoma or Louisiana." --------------------------------- Race is on to Provide Net Calling by Randolph Court 5:02am  12.Mar.98.PST Wired Online (www.wired.com) --------------------------------- You may not have heard it, but there was just a loud bang. It was the sound of a starter's gun, signaling the beginning of a mad dash for the Internet telephony market. ICG Communications announced a voice-over-net service Wednesday that it said will eventually allow customers in 166 US cities to make domestic long distance calls for as little as 5.9 cents per minute. That's about the same as the Sunday best of 5 cents offered by traditional telcos like MCI - and 2 cents per minute less than Internet protocol telephony services offered by Qwest Communications International. But, ICG's great deal is nearly a penny more than a service offered by IDT Corp. "Let the games begin," said Rebecca Wetzel, director of Internet consulting for the research firm Telechoice. Twelve months ago, the folks at ICG Communications thought their core business was simply competing with the Baby Bells, providing the dial tone to customers for local telephone service. But in October 1997, ICG acquired Netcom, and everything changed. Overnight, the company had to change its industry-identifying acronym. It had been a competitive local exchange carrier, or CLEC. Now it's an ICP - an integrated communications provider. "Now we see our core as telecommunications services - whatever customers want," said ICG president and CEO J. Shelby Bryan. Such thinking results in changes almost daily in the telco world. Earlier this week Qwest, which is building a 16,000-mile fiber network in the United States, agreed to acquire LCI Communications, which offers long distance in 40 US markets and commercial local access in 30. The $4.4 billion stock swap will create the fourth largest telco in the country. "LCI had what Qwest was looking to grow into, similarly Qwest had what LCI wanted, an enormous fiber network," said Qwest spokeswoman Diane Reberger. Qwest rolled out IP telephony service in nine cities in February and is expected to push ahead rapidly now. "Because of the enormous bandwidth of the Qwest ... fiber network, we are the only provider who is not forced to compress the voice, ensuring quality with each call placed," said Steve Jacobsen, senior vice president of consumer markets at Qwest. He also boasted of his firm's straightforward pricing. "Consumers are tired of confusing long-distance calling plans that offer a low price at one time or for one type of call, but offer a higher price if the call takes place during peak hours or terminates at a different location," he said. "Qwest's ... offer is 7.5 cents per minute, 24 hours a day, seven days a week for all interstate calls no matter where the call terminates." Also on the IP telephony playing field is AT&T, which offers voice-over- net service of its own. A host of Internet backbone providers, including UUNET and GTE, offer similar services for sending faxes via the Net protocols. And waiting to get into the game are a slew of others, including Level 3 Communications. Level 3 was started up by founders of another hot-shot telco, MFS Communications, after it was bought out by WorldCom. The competition is fierce, and telephony is only one piece of the IP services puzzle. ICG offers a service called NetWorks, which allows a small business to use a single T1 line for local and long distance calling and data transmission, allotting as much bandwidth to each packet stream as it needs. And next week the company will announce plans to roll out digital subscriber line services targeted toward businesses wanting high-speed Internet access. ICG said its telephony service would begin rolling out in the second quarter - April, May, and June - of this year. "What we're seeing with ICG's telephony service, and the competition with Qwest and the others, is only the first step toward a new generation of telecom services, some of which we haven't imagined yet," said Wetzel, of Telechoice. "It's almost like when they introduced new building materials in the Industrial Revolution," Wetzel said. "In the beginning, they used the new materials in the old ways, then they realized that with steel you could build buildings 100 stories tall. Similarly, with [IP networking tools], the first implementations we're seeing are the familiar services made cheaper. But down the road, we're going to be seeing new telecom services that are analogous to the 100-story building." Those services could be anything from universal messaging services, which would allow a single company to offer customers mailboxes for voice, fax, and email, to multimedia conferencing. Strictly speaking, the service ICG announced Wednesday should not be referred to as Internet telephony. "Under no circumstances do calls go over the Internet," said Bryan. The service is really Internet protocol telephony because data is sent using the same protocols as on the Internet, but it is sent over private networks owned or leased by Internet service providers and telcos, in this case ICG. But the important point, for now, is that it's cheap. Customers calling from one of ICG's 166 cities to another will pay the 5.9 cent-per-minute rate. If they call outside of that area, it will cost them 7.2 cents per minute. They'll see the difference on their bills, Bryan said. Qwest and IDT both offer a single rate for domestic long-distance calls, regardless of whether the point of termination for the call is on or off the network. The wonders of Internet protocol networking may soon bring us a host of data services other than voice, but it is the cheap long distance calls that promise to make it all take off, especially when the services become widely available for international calls. "That's where the real bang for the buck is," said Chris Mines, an industry analyst with Forrester Research. There is a huge pent-up demand for low-cost international calls, Mines said, and that's the next step - US providers will be making deals with gateway companies in other countries. Odds are, customers have only seen the very beginnings of the price competition. "My strong belief is that someone is going to come along this year and get rid of price-per-minute, and put in a flat monthly rate for unlimited calls" Mines said. "And that's going to blow the lid off the market. We're going to get there very rapidly." Forrester projects Internet protocol telephony will be a $2 billion market in 2004, with customers saving $1 billion they would have spent for regular service. ----------------------------------- Spam Jams Pac Bell's Email Services by Chris Oakes and James Glave 12:05pm  13.Mar.98.PST Wired Online (www.wired.com) --------------------------------- Pacific Bell Internet Services grappled with an unprecedented load of spam for four days this week, leading to sporadic disruptions of email service to thousands of customers across California. The attack cost the regional telephone company roughly $500,000, an executive said. When asked if the company had ever seen an attack of this magnitude before, Pacific Bell Internet Vice President Ruben Cota said "never to this degree." But even as the Internet service provider (ISP) sifts through its logs of the incident today, anti-spam activists saw in the brownout a silver lining, in that it may offer momentum to an anti-spam bill recently introduced in the state. The deluge began late Monday afternoon, when Pacific Bell received a large volume of incoming spam email from multiple sources, said Cota. The spam soon overwhelmed a system capacity that, as of Monday, could only handle 50,000 more users above and beyond the company's existing 170,000 customers. Some customers checking their email during the resulting brownout received "message refused" alerts from their mail software, Cota said. Meanwhile, other customers saw no interruption in service, and those that did were sometimes able to receive mail after successive attempts. He said he couldn't estimate the percentage of customers affected by the load. "What happens is the machine runs out of processing space because you're flooding it with sometimes huge volumes of incoming mail," Cota said, explaining the effects of spamming. "It runs out of processing space and can't keep up," Cota said. "Then you get another spam that slows it more and more - until at one point, it can collapse." In this case, the system never actually collapsed, Cota said, though he noted it has happened to ISPs in the past. The ISP responded by moving to double its capacity to 440,000 users, which it did by Thursday evening, Cota said, installing four more mail gateways. The move cost the service close to $500,000, Cota estimated. The spam messages were "varying messages [not all the same spam message] and did come from multiple sources externally," Cota said. Pacific Bell Internet has dedicated four full-time employees to stay on top of spam problems. That team is spending today analyzing this week's onslaught to see if any special conditions or points of origin can be determined for the email. Cota couldn't say whether it was simply a case of bad timing - converging multiple large spams arriving at once - or whether addresses at Pacific Bell Internet were specifically targeted by the spam. Cota said he knew of no other ISP experiencing a similarly massive mail overload at the same time. The company will try to determine where the spams originated and then contact the originating ISPs to ask that they take action against the offending spammers. Cota said legal action against such spammers would be a possibility. No email messages were actually lost in the incident, according to Cota, as gateways were able to deliver mail once normal capacity was resumed. The incident shows that even those companies vigilant about fighting spam can fall victim. Anti-spam activists said that Pac Bell is a vocal participant in the anti-spam movement. "They are one of the better [ISPs], generally speaking," said Scott Mueller, chairman of Coalition Against Unsolicited Commercial Email. "[Pac Bell] participates in the anti-spam community; they are not one of the companies that sticks their head in the sand," Mueller said. Mueller was suprised to hear of the email brownout, though, noting that Nick Nicholas, a Pac-Bell employee dedicated to dealing with bulk email, had been silent on the issue on a CAUCE mailing list. Mueller and another CAUCE member were disturbed to learn of the attack, but also saw a potential silver lining: It could add political momentum to an anti-spam bill recently introducted in the California Assembly. "I can't say I'm happy to hear that it happened, but then again, I can't complain about the timing," said John Mozena, vice-president of CAUCE. On Wednesday, CAUCE endorsed the Internet Consumer Protection Act, Assembly Bill 1629. The bill would allow California companies affected by spam, such as Pac Bell, to sue spammers for $50 per message, up to a maximum of $15,000 per day in which the spamming takes place. "I am sure that Pac Bell is going to lose customers to AOL or Compuserve because they are not able to provide their services," said John Cusey, a legislative aid to Assemblyman Gary Miller, the bill's author. If AB 1629 becomes law, Cusey said, Pac Bell will have the opportunity to recoup some of the damages and, more importantly, send a message to spammers that their business is no longer as profitable as it might have been. "Part of the reason [spammers] use such huge spam lists, and don't target them, is because if they can get a 2 percent return they are making money," said Cusey. "If they are going to get nailed with a $30,000 lawsuit, they will think twice," he said. The bill will be heard by the state's Consumer Protection Committee on 31 March. Mozena said that the bill was the best legislative effort to date to address the spam problem. "This is anti-spam legislation that could well bring on board some of the constituencies that have been vehemently opposed to anti-spam legislation in the past, and could negate the rabid anti-free speech activist [camp]." ------------------------------------------------------- EMS, INC. AND MCI SIGN AGREEMENT TO MARKET WATCH PATROL MCI Press Release ------------------------------------------------------- Unique Monitoring And Tracking Technology Introduced In Corrections Market Laguna Hills, CA, March 12, 1998 -- Electronic Monitoring Systems, Inc. (EMS) and MCI Telecommunications Corporation today announced that they have entered an exclusive agreement to market WATCH PATROL and WATCH PATROL RF to U.S. government corrections agencies, including federal, state and local municipalities. WATCH PATROL and WATCH PATROL RF are electronic monitoring and tracking technologies developed by EMS that allow random or programmed monitoring of participants. The agreement also names EMS as MCI's exclusive developer of future electronic monitoring and tracking technologies. WATCH PATROL is a patented, tamper-proof electronic monitoring device that is worn by a participant like a wristwatch. WATCH PATROL signals the participant, with an electronic alarm, to call a central monitoring station from any nearby telephone using a 1-800 number. Each call automatically identifies the participant and determines if the location of the participant matches one of the approved locations provided by the officer at enrollment. WATCH PATROL RFF is an enhanced version of WATCH PATROL that uses radio frequency to monitor the location of a participant within a designated location, such as the participant's home. "WATCH PATROL RF is the most flexible and comprehensive technology available for electronic monitoring of participants with continuous signaling while at home and random tracking and scheduled contacts while away," said Michael O'Donnell, EMS President and CEO. "We are confident that our agreement with MCI will provide immediate recognition for WATCH PATROL RF and set a new standard for monitoring technology in community corrections programs." The combination of WATCH PATROL and WATCH PATROL RF provide the ability to monitor and track a participant inside the home as well as outside. The officer can easily program the number of random alarms per day and an optional quiet period. Furthermore, WATCH PATROL can be used to automate scheduled contacts in addition to or as an alternate to random tracking. With WATCH PATROL, the officer can also require a participant to initiate additional check-in calls by activating the WATCH PATROL unit at specified times from specified locations. This combination of options enables program staff to establish standards for participant-initiated reporting based on agreed upon times, movements, and attendance at required locations. "WATCH PATROL RF's unique ability to monitor offenders at home and randomly track them while they are away from home is a key to MCI selecting EMS as a strategic partner, "said Richard McGuire Director, MCI Government Markets. "Moreover WATCH PATROL and WATCH PATROL RF compliment MCI's existing menu of technologies and services in community corrections." HOW IT WORKS WATCH PATROL An electronic alarm from the WATCH PATROL device signals the participant to call a central monitoring station from any nearby telephone using a 1-800 number. The participant's location is automatically established using Caller ID. The participant's identity is verified by pressing the WATCH PATROL face and holding it to the phone. When the face of the WATCH PATROL device is pressed, it generates an electronic code which is transmitted over the phone line to the central monitoring station. WATCH PATROL RF WATCH PATROL RF integrates a radio frequency transmitter into the WATCH PATROL wrist device and has an optional companion Home Monitoring Unit (HMU), which incorporates a radio frequency receiver. WATCH PATROL RF can be used in random tracking, scheduled contacts, or continuous signaling modes - or any combinations the officer may choose. The HMU actively listens for the transmitter's signal and reports information to the central monitoring station on movements of the transmitter and tampering with the system. The central monitoring station automatically compares these events against the participant's curfew schedule and initiates notifications as required by the officer. The HMU utilizes stored voice technology, providing verbal instructions to the office and participant during installation and monitoring. This simplifies installation so participants can self-install the HMU, reducing officer field time and increasing officer safety. MCI is the leading provider of telecommunications to the corrections market, including MCI Time Clerk™, an advanced telecommunications system for monitoring time and attendance. EMS develops and manufactures electronic monitoring and tracking equipment and provides monitoring services for the community corrections market. MCI Government Markets is the sales and marketing division of MCI that serves the U.S. government and its agencies, state governments, and universities. Offering managed network services, systems integration, and campusMCI products, MCI government markets is a leader in providing telecommunication solutions to the nation's government(s) and education markets. --------------------------------- Another Phone Merger: Alltel, 360 Reuters --------------------------------- NEW YORK - Alltel Corp. (AT) has agreed to acquire 360 Communications Co. 360 share will be exchanged for 0.74 Alltel share. Alltel will also assume about $1.8 billion in debt, the company said. The equity value of the deal was less than the $4.8 billion price tag cited in news reports on Friday. Shares of 360 surged about 18 percent to $35.375 on Friday and Alltel's stock dropped $2.125 to $45.81 after a news report said a deal was imminent. The deal will be accounted for as a pooling of interests. The companies did not immediately comment on how the deal will affect earnings going forward. Both companies primarily serve mid-size cities and smaller communities. The complementary strategies, geographic fit and administrative synergies will allow the combined company to reduce costs by more than $100 million by the year 2000, the companies said. "Alltel and 360 share a strategic objective to offer bundled communications services throughout tightly focused geographic markets," Dennis Foster, 360 president and chief executive officer, said. Foster will become vice chairman of the combined company, while Joe Ford, Alltel's current chairman and chief executive officer, will continue to hold those titles. The combined company will have $4.5 billion in annual revenues, $8.6 billion in assets and more than 20,000 employees. The deal, which is expected to close by midsummer, is subject to shareholder and regulatory approval. Following a transition period, the merged company will operate from Alltel's headquarters in Little Rock, Ark., and will market its products under the Alltel brand. Alltel provides wireless, wireline, long-distance and Internet services to 3 million customers in 14 states, and information services to financial and communications companies in 47 countries. 360 provides wireless communications to 2.6 million customers in more than 100 markets in 15 states. 360 also offers residential long-distance and paging services. --------------------------------------------------- Lucent Managed Firewall receives ICSA Certification FOR RELEASE: MONDAY MARCH 16, 1998 Lucent Press release --------------------------------------------------- MURRAY HILL, N.J. - Lucent Technologies announced today that its Lucent Managed Firewall has been certified by the International Computer Security Association (ICSA). "Although the Lucent Managed Firewall is already being recognized as an industry leader, ICSA certification represents a formal acknowledgment that our firewall meets the highest standards of this global industry," said Howie Gittleson, director, Lucent Internet Security Products Group. "This certification gives our customers the level of assurance they demand in firewalls." The growth in overseas firewall markets is reflected by the fact that the International Computer Security Association was known as the National Computer Security Association until December 1997. The name change was designed to reflect the organization's increased international presence. Nearly one-third of ICSA's consortia members, professional members and partners are in Europe and Asia. About 95 percent of all deployed firewalls are currently ICSA certified, according to the association. Providing a scalable approach to firewalls, the Lucent Managed Firewall is among the industry's most secure, expandable and easy-to-use hardware and software platforms for protecting data networks. The Lucent Managed Firewall can replace or complement any Internet firewall now in use, and it can support a variety of applications without requiring any network reconfiguration. For more information on the Lucent Managed Firewall, visit the company's "Security Zone" web site at http://www.lucent.com/security. Additional information on the ICSA can be found on the association's web site at http://www.icsa.net. ---------------------------------------------------- GTE launches TV advertising campaign, "People Moving Ideas," in prime time. March 11, 1998 GTE Press Release ---------------------------------------------------- STAMFORD, Conn. -- GTE Corp. today launches a major television advertising campaign that signals a new GTE, and positions the company, for the first time, as a national and international telecommunications provider. Called "People Moving Ideas," the corporate brand campaign is part of GTE's $100 million-plus annual advertising budget. It was created for GTE by Ogilvy & Mather, New York. The TV campaign kicks off March 11 with prime time ads on "The Drew C arey Show," and "Law & Order" and follows with spots on such shows as "Seinfeld," "3rd Rock from the Sun" and "Dateline." Ads also are slated for cable channels A&E, CNBC, CNN, Discovery, ESPN and Headline News. GTE also will have considerable involvement in high-profile professional tennis and golf broadcasts such as Wimbledon and the GTE Bryon Nelson Classic, as well as a meaningful presence on Sunday morning news shows. "With telecommunications providers competing fiercely on all fronts, consumers can't distinguish one telecom company from another," said Glen Gilbert, vice president - advertising and social responsibility. "People Moving Ideas carves out a distinctive and compelling positioning for our brand - a positioning that singles out GTE and lifts us above the rest of the pack. "At the same time, it dispels some old notions of GTE left over from the days when we were the local telephone company -- perceptions that are simply out of line with what we've become and where we're headed," Gilbert said. The ads open with shots of planes, trucks and trains -- representing companies that move cargo and freight -- followed by a close-up of a large, compelling eye that dissolves into a telephone handset. The ads then cut to fast-moving images of GTE employees, interspersed with telecommunications services, and end with the written tagline, "People Moving Ideas." "There's a company out there in the business of moving things. It's not a trucking company. It's not a shipping company. And it doesn't carry packages overnight," says the voiceover. "It's a company in the business of moving ideas. Via long distance, wireless, video, Internet, Airfone, directories and local telephone lines." ** GTE Employees Are the Ads' Stars Gilbert said GTE's decision to showcase employees rather than use a celebrity endorser reflects both the campaign's theme and employees' role in the company's overall success. "We could think of no more appropriate, more compelling, more believable ambassadors for the GTE brand than GTE employees themselves. After all, it is our employees who move ideas for the benefit of our customers, and no one can tell our story more genuinely than they can," Gilbert said. In addition to the television campaign, GTE will continue its print advertising, begun in January, in publications such as The Wall Street Journal, Barron's BusinessWeek, the Financial Times, Fortune and The Economist. With 1997 revenues of more than $23 billion, GTE is one of the world's largest telecommunications companies and a leading provider of integrated telecommunications services. In the United States, GTE provides local service in 28 states and wireless service in 17 states; nationwide long- distance and internetworking services ranging from dial-up Internet access for residential and small-business consumers to Web-based applications for Fortune 500 companies; as well as video service in selected markets. -------------------------------------------- Bell Atlantic, Nortel Sign $240 Million Deal Wednesday March 18 10:11 AM EST Routers -------------------------------------------- NEW YORK (Reuters) - Bell Atlantic said that it and Northern Telecom have signed a $240 million deal to modernize Bell Atlantic's advanced telecommunications network. Bell Atlantic will use Nortel's advanced DMS switching equipment and software to better meet customer needs for new products and advanced services, it said. The agreement also provides Bell Atlantic with the flexibility to license software features to its customers more rapidly and cost effectively, the statement said. "We're building a public telecommunications network that is dramatically more reliable and flexible, and offers more features than ever before," Bell Atlantic vice president of technology and engineering Paul Lacouture said. ---------------------------------------- FCC Wins Ruling on Long-Distance Service 5:47pm  20.Mar.98.PST Wired Online (www.wired.com) ---------------------------------------- WASHINGTON - A federal court today upheld the government's rejection of a plan by SBC Communications Inc. to offer long-distance service in Oklahoma, dealing a setback to regional Bell companies trying to expand into long distance. The Federal Communications Commission last June rejected SBC's Oklahoma application, finding that the company had not met its obligation under the 1996 Telecommunications Act to open its local network to competitors. The US District Court for the District of Columbia, which issued today's ruling, is also reviewing a broader appeal from BellSouth Corp. over the FCC's rejection of a long-distance application for South Carolina. So far, the FCC has rejected all four regional Bell company attempts to enter the long-distance business. In addition to the Oklahoma and South Carolina cases, the FCC rejected Ameritech Corp. in Michigan and BellSouth in Louisiana. In recent months, however, the FCC has initiated a more collaborative process to help the Bell companies understand its interpretation of the Telecom Act's requirements. Since the FCC rejections, SBC has continued applying for permission to offer long distance by working with regulators in Texas, Arkansas, and Kansas and renewing its Oklahoma application. Bell Atlantic Corp. is working with regulators in New York on a long-distance application in that state. SBC said in a statement its Oklahoma applications should have been approved under the FCC's prior system, but praised the new FCC approach. "The FCC has changed dramatically and demonstrated a more collaborative approach," the company said. "We remain hopeful that we will provide our customers with the full benefits of competition in local and long-distance service this year." FCC Chairman William Kennard said he was pleased with the decision. "When the Bell companies open their local markets to competitors and can in turn provide long-distance service, consumers will benefit from increased competition and choice in both the local and long-distance marketplace," he said in a statement. Long-distance companies that have criticized the Bells for not opening their local markets also praised the decision. "Now that the Bells know that the law cannot be evaded, it's time that they implement it as Congress intended," said Jonathan Sallet, chief policy counsel at MCI Communications Corp. -------------------------------------------------- IBM successfully hacks a client's computer network Copyright © 1998 Nando.net Copyright © 1998 Reuters News Service -------------------------------------------------- TUCSON, Ariz. (March 23, 1998 8:30 p.m. EST http://www.nando.net) - International Business Machines Corp.'s team of "ethical hackers" successfully broke into an unnamed company's computer network in a demonstration of a live attack at a computer industry conference. IBM's team of ethical hackers, who work at its research division in Yorktown Heights, N.Y., are paid security professionals called IBM's Global Security Analysis Lab, who are hired by corporate customers to detect security flaws. A "large transportation" company, who would not be identified for security reasons, agreed to let IBM try to penetrate its network in a demonstration and discussion of hacking at the PC Forum conference. The IBM researchers, who were working in New York, reported by telephone that they successfully penetrated one of the company's file transfer protocol (FTP) servers through the root directory and had access to employee telephone numbers, social security numbers, payroll data and other sensitive information. They broke into three different UNIX machines on the network. "Most people think hacks are random attacks," said Charles Palmer, head of IBM Research's Global Security Analysis Lab. "They are very organized probes." The IBM team started working on this company's network Sunday evening, he said. Palmer said IBM charges between $15,000 to $45,000 to perform a hack of a company's system, with its permission, to test its security. Palmer said because hacking is a felony, its clients sign a contract that he calls a "get out of jail free card" specifying what IBM is allowed to do. The IBM team, which has an 80 percent success rate in electronic break- ins, is not a team of reformed hackers and Palmer warned the audience that hiring former hackers can be very dangerous, and not worth the risk. He said IBM has also had a 90 percent success rate with a physical break- in, where IBM researchers have literally walked out of a company's offices carrying computers, while the security guard held the doors open for them. He said that there are currently about 100,000 hackers worldwide, but that about 9.99 percent of those hackers are potential professional hired hackers, who may be involved in corporate espionage, and .01 percent are world class cyber criminals. Ninety percent are amateurs who "cyber" joyride." "There are about 100 people in the world I would not want touching my computer," Palmer said, adding that hack attacks are on the rise, with the attack on the Pentagon computers by five teenagers being a very recent example. IBM then offers a series of services to help a company solve its security problems, through IBM's services business, or other companies. "The first thing that I hope to accomplish is to raise awareness (about security problems)," Palmer said.  ------------------------------------ FCC Asked to Resolve Wiretap Dispute Wired News Report 3:01pm  27.Mar.98.PST ------------------------------------ The US Justice Department and the FBI today sought the FCC's help in resolving a dispute with the telecom industry over preserving their ability to tap telephone lines in the digital age. A 1994 law requires telcos to make digital wiretapping technology available to law enforcement. But three years of negotiations later, the industry and the government are at a stand-off. One of the points of contention is the technical changes telcos must make to ensure that phones and other communications can be tapped legally as digital technology replaces analog lines. Another concern is money - how much will it cost, and how much would the government and industry pay? The Justice Department and the FBI argued in petitions to the FCC that the industry's offer "is not adequate to ensure that law enforcement will receive all of the communications content and call-identifying information" and asked that the regulatory agency find a solution by 28 September. The cellular phone industry welcomed the petition. "It will be helpful to the industry, which had been trapped," said Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association spokesman Jeff Nelson. ------------------------------------------ Hacking Posse (Mostly) Leaves Web in Peace by James Glave 7:00pm  ounted among their members two of the three teens implicated in recent attacks on US military Web servers have stated that their days of defacing Web sites are over - sort of. "We, the Enforcers, have decided that it would be in the best interests of the hacking community and the security community at large to cease and desist all Web site hacking of external businesses," an Enforcers statement read. But an Enforcers member who goes by the name "paralyse" told Wired News that the declaration came with a catch. The truce applies only to "external" sites, which paralyse defined as "sites external to the goals of the group." Their self-professed mission has been the elimination of online child pornography and racism, but critics have suggested that claim is a false front. Enforcers also stopped short of calling an end to denial of service attacks. Those attacks, which clog up servers, denying network access to legitimate users, are far more destructive than what otherwise has amounted to graffiti scrawled on random Web sites. When asked if the declaration also extended to denial-of-service attacks, paralyse said, "I can't comment on that." The Enforcers are a close-knit hacking group of about 25 to 30 people, of varying ages, from around the world. Group members have claimed that some of their ranks have defaced numerous Web sites, and also have allegedly launched denial-of-service attacks against Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and Internet Relay Chat (IRC) channels. "Most warez people [software pirates] tend to say they are against child porn also, but warez doesn't help or justify anything, nor does it prevent child porn," said an IRC operator who goes by the name "play." "Same goes for hacking, what relevance does it have?" asked play. IRC operators are the overlords of the global text-based chat network called the Undernet, the meeting place for Enforcers and many other hacking groups. Another IRC operator named "danie," agreed that the Enforcers declaration was meaningless. "I don't think they'll stop harassing the small powerless individuals," danie said. "Perhaps commercial sites will have some reprieve ... but it's their [enforcers'] drug. They have to do something, their threats are a dead end and they perhaps realize it but I don't think they will hold to it ... no," he said. Another IRC operator said that Analyzer, the youth arrested in Israel for allegedly breaking into more than 400 US government Web servers, had attacked ISPs with denial-of-service attacks. "The ISP I work for has been attacked by Analyzer at least once," said the operator, who goes by the name "OmniDynmc." On Friday, Infowar, an online resource dedicated to fighting threats to network infrastructure, put out a news release stating that Ian A. Murphy, CEO of IAM/Secure Data Systems, had been negotiating with the Enforcers and come to an agreement. But Enforcers recently had a falling out with Murphy, and paralyse said Murphy's press release, which went out over PR Newswire, is not an entirely accurate account of their position. "I want two things from [the Enforcers declaration]," paralyse told Wired News. "1) less government and corporation scrutiny and 2) less press hype - so that should hopefully have an effect," he said. Neither representatives for Infowar, nor Ian A. Murphy, could be reached for comment. ------------------------------ Shootout on the Phone Frontier by Randolph Court 1:13pm  30.Mar.98.PST wired online (www.wired.com) ------------------------------ Last week, two phone companies that are distinctly not household names announced a deal that they hope will allow them to compete with the likes of AT&T, Sprint, WorldCom-MCI, and a host of overseas telecoms that have wedged their way into public consciousness. Delta Three, a company that claims to operate the largest Internet telephony network in the world, with 18 points of presence, joined with ITXC Corp., an aspiring broker of Internet telephony services, to form what they heralded as a network of networks in their business. The deal, announced as the industry prepares to meet at this week's Voice on the Net '98 conference, highlights the rapid growth in Internet telephony. But it also suggests at least two pitfalls for small players seizing on the opportunity to grab part of the global voice-telephony market from the well-heeled companies that have come to own the sector: First, the giants are awakening. Exhibit A might be Deutsche Telekom's announcement earlier this month that it is committed to spending 10 billion marks (nearly US$5 billion) in establishing itself in the Internet protocol telephony business. Second: While small players still can steal a march on the big firms, they face a lack of standardization in the way IP telephony is deployed that makes it tough to build new voice empires. Internet telephony service providers already allow customers to call anywhere. Using a standard telephone or a computer with a microphone and speakers, you can dial into a gateway server, and ultimately have a call terminated anywhere on the public switched network. That arrangement falls short of the promise of IP telephony. To achieve the full cost savings of sending voice in packets, just like any Internet data, both the point of call origin and the point of termination should be on IP networks (though not necessarily on the Net). To further compound the problem, no standards exist in the emerging industry, so IP telephony gateways made by different manufacturers can't talk to each other. ITXC's mission is to help strengthen individual Internet telephony providers by offering a central clearinghouse, dubbed WWeXchange, for crucial services. The company aims to supply IP phone firms with network development and oversight services, call routing, customer authorization, bill settlement, and call record processing. IP phone firms are like islands, Mary Evslin, vice president of marketing at ITXC, says. And to build a viable industry, she adds, "there has to be someone who connects all of these islands together." ITXC's target for launching WWeXchange is to have banded together Delta Three's 18 points of presence with about another 25. Because competition in the US telecom market has already reduced prices, Evslin, her husband Tom (formerly AT&T vice president in charge of the firm's WorldNet service), and their colleagues at ITXC have been trotting the globe to sign up partners for WWeXchange. The company is looking for overseas entrepreneurs and existing Internet service providers willing to make the relatively modest investment - gateways can be had for around $30,000 - to set themselves up as an IP phone firm. "If you're an ITSP in Honduras," said Evslin, "chances are, you have customers wanting to make cheap long-distance calls ... to where there are a lot of Honduran expats. Say Taiwan," she hypothesized. In such a case, she said, ITXC would encourage someone to set up IP phone services in both places. Once that's accomplished, ITXC would target other potential markets for both Honduran and Taiwanese customers. Probe Research, a telecommunications and data networking market research firm, forecasts that demand for those savings will make IP services add up to a $6.3 billion market in 2002. At that point, according to Probe Research, IP telephone and fax traffic will account for something approaching 10 percent of total long-distance traffic. The competition to get a piece of that pie is heating up. The deal announced this week between ITXC and Delta Three is just one of many to hit the pressxpand the service rapidly. There are a slew of other upstart players offering a variety of services and gateway products in the IP space, including IDT (a newly minted partner of Yahoo), Biztranz, Inter-Tel, VIP Calling, and VocalTec (one of Deutsche Telekom's IP phone partners). One specter for ITXC's plan to be an IP services broker is the possibility that industry heavies will get serious about the sector sooner rather than later, said Chris Mines, an analyst with Forrester Research. Kim Malone, an executive vice president for Delta Three, acknowledges that AT&T, MCI-Worldcom, Sprint, and other established long-distance carriers will get into the game. But she said she believes the big players will resist cannibalizing their existing business with low IP phone prices. That reluctance ought to give smaller, foxier companies the chance to undersell big rivals and still make a healthy profit, she said. Said ITXC's Evslin: "I don't care how many competitors there are. There's going to be enough business for everyone." ------------------------------------------------------------- Lucent Technologies intelligent networking features to bring GSM network operators enhanced capabilities FOR RELEASE: MONDAY MARCH 30, 1998 ------------------------------------------------------------- MURRAY HILL, NJ -- Lucent Technologies today unveiled a new suite of intelligent networking (IN) software thomers simply buy PrePaid cards which contain a fixed number of call minutes/units. Customers receive real-time call setup, charging and administration, such as account replenishment and mid-call warning announcements. o Virtual Private Networks (VPN): This service incorporates phone, mobile or PBX into a closed 'private network.' Mobile network facilities are configured to maximize the use of the network operator's existing infrastructure investment. VPN saves customers money on calls, provides consolidated and itemized bills, and minimizes the potential for phone misuse. o Personal Number: Allows subscribers to be reached with just one number. Customers can receive calls wherever they are, or have calls routed to a single voicemail system for later retrieval. With this service, call completion rates rise, as does customer satisfaction. o Usage Limitation: Helps prevent misuse and fraud by setting call usage limitations based on daily, weekly, or monthly basis. Once an account reaches a pre-set limit, a report is generated, allowing network operators to take appropriate action, such as contacting the subscriber. o Advanced Routing Services: Allows customers to decide how their calls will be routed. Services include Advanced Freephone, which allows customers to call a service subscriber for free, Split Charging, which divides the cost of the call between the calling and called parties, among others. "Lucent has more than 25 years of experience in intelligent networks and over 250 systems with multiple services deployed worldwide," said Curtis Holmes, intelligent network vice president for Lucent's Communications Software Group. "Bringing this knowledge and experience to the GSM market enables us to help GSM network operators differentiate themselves from the competition and attract new customers." Lucent provides a full range of IN offerings with a platform that has all the tools needed to design, administer and deploy value-added services with speed and efficiency. IN software will play a key role in helping network operators evolve to third generation wireless systems. It also helps protect GSM network operators' investments through an architecture that is evolvable as new technologies are developed and market requirements change. The company's system has an open, programmable platform, with active third-party solution providers. The software introduced today is available immediately. In addition to its rich IN solutions, Lucent is also a major supplier of GSM infrastructure. For example, the company has won major contracts to supply GSM infrastructure equipment to network operators around the world. Its growing list of customers includes KG Telecom and Tuntex Telecom of Taiwan, T-Mobil of Germany, Pacific Link of Hong Kong, Escotel of India and Celcom of Malaysia. Lucent has also successfully completed the first GSM 1800 network trial in the Philippines. -------------\\the goddamned end of it all or something\\--------------- -anchorman ooooooooooooooooooooo o o o p.l.e.a.s.e o o s.u.b.m.i.t o o o ooooooooooooooooooooo :) +----------------------------+ | Hacking | | WinShield | +----------------------------+ by Neptunium Overkill INTRODUCTION: This is just a brief follow-up to my article last month on getting the school's internet password. This is only for people whos schools use a retarted little program called WinShield. Okay, the following is a bug i discovered in the WinShield. Here's how ya do it: Open Internet Explorer. If your school uses Netscape you can still access it from Start/Programs/Accessories/Internet Tools/Internet Explorer. In the box where you type web addresses type "C:\" and VIOLA! you have complete access to the C: drive! Now have phun! If you are thinking "What the hell does this have to do with last month's article?" Well, now you can type "A:\" in the web site box thingy and run the keystroke logger discussed last month! Not a great "Shield" is it? Where is everything? Why is this so short you might ask? Well, it's the pre-realease. Unfortunately, due to a hardware error, my linux box crashed and that's where most of the articles are. If you could please re-send them to me, I will continue trying to pry them off of my box at the same time. Look for the final release in the next week. --Sphinx