Date: Tue, 01 Aug 95 13:54:00 EST Errors-To: Comp-privacy Error Handler From: Computer Privacy Digest Moderator To: Comp-privacy@uwm.edu Subject: Computer Privacy Digest V7#009 Computer Privacy Digest Tue, 01 Aug 95 Volume 7 : Issue: 009 Today's Topics: Moderator: Leonard P. Levine Re: Phone Sales Re: Phone Sales Re: Phone Sales RE: Phone sales Re: Phone Sales. Re: Tracking a User on the Net E-porn at Eastern Washington University P. O. Box Re: More SSN Abuse Re: Texas Driver's License Wisconsin Operator's License Caller ID Blockers Survey: Money on the Internet Ralph Nader on Windows 95 Problems Info on CPD [unchanged since 12/29/94] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: Robert Bulmash <75754.2763@CompuServe.COM> Date: 29 Jul 1995 17:35:56 GMT Subject: Re: Phone Sales Organization: Private Citizen, Inc. Private Citizen, Inc. will notify over 1400 firms nationwide that: 1) you are unwilling to freely receive telephone solictations of any type (sales - charity - survey ) 2) that you ask to be put on their do-not-call list 3) that you offer to accept such calls (from a notified firm) on a for-hire basis of $500 per call If you know of firms that you want to be sure are notified, you may send PCI the name, full address & phone for inclusion. PCI will send you a list of the firms so notified. The cost is $20 to join call 1-800/CUT-JUNK ------------------------------ From: bo774@freenet.carleton.ca (Kelly Bert Manning) Date: 29 Jul 1995 23:05:58 GMT Subject: Re: Phone Sales Organization: The National Capital FreeNet, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada Maryjo Bruce (sunshine@netcom.com) writes: Is there any reliable way to stop phone sales calls. Have you tried the Readers Digest method? It goes something like (big sigh of relief) "Oh, you want to sell me something, thank goodness, I thought it was another bill collector, gee, sounds like a really great bargain, but they cancelled all my credit cards and I never have anything in my bank account since the garnishees started getting deducted from my pay." Of course, my cynical streak tells me that the real product in direct marketing is solicitations, not sales, and that an inhouse or service bureau direct marketing operation would rather have a 1% success rate on a scattershot solicitation than a higher rate on a solicitation that excludes people who never buy from direct marketing soliciations. If they send less junk there is less justification for inflated charges if it is a service bureau operation, or for staff and management salary if it is done in house. ------------------------------ From: steigelmann@picard.capd.abbott.com (Jim Steigelmann) Date: 31 Jul 1995 23:34:06 GMT Subject: Re: Phone Sales Organization: Abbott Labs. Maryjo Bruce says: I then sent a written request to an address given me by the phone co asking that all sales calls to my number be stopped. It had no effect at all. My number is unpublished and unlisted. Just a suggestion - when and if they call, tell them that you are a telephone marketing analyst and charge $250/hr - if they want to talk to you, you will start billing immedeatly, and if they call back, you will assume that they are entering into a billable contract with you. If they ever anoy you again, time the call and send them a bill. Alternate suggestion - if it is the same company calling you, tell them that their calls are unwelcome, and that if they continue to call you, you will contact the police because of their harassment. -- Jim Steigelmann ---------------------------------------------------------- The opinions expressed are my own and do not represent the opinions of my employer, my boss, the state of Illinois, the government of the United States of America, or of the world in general... ----------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ From: ecm@matufia.sp.TRW.COM (ecm) Date: 31 Jul 1995 18:11:01 -0700 Subject: RE: Phone sales Maryjo Bruce (sunshine@netcom.com) writes: Is there any reliable way to stop phone sales calls. I don't know if there is a reliable way to stop phone sales calls, but I have been handling them for some time with a very simple technique that puts me under no stress and gives me a little satisfaction since I make them waste some time. As soon as I determine a call is sales related (wrong first name, "calling from ", or "How are YOU today?", etc), I ask "Please, hold?" and press the hold button. I have found only very few operators dense enough to call twice in a row; but they seem to eventually wise up: nobody has called three times in row. The longest somebody stayed in line was 12 minutes. The MCI people normally wait religiously for 5 to 6 minutes. Of course if you need the phone, you can always cut them off. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ | Enrique A. Caponi Ocean Technology Department | | TRW S&TG, Mail Stop R1-1008, One Space Park, Redondo Beach, CA 90278 | | ecm@matufia.sp.TRW.com Phone: 310.812.0451 FAX: 310.814.2359 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------ From: Dean Ridgway Date: 31 Jul 1995 00:05:57 -0700 Subject: Re: Phone Sales. Maryjo Bruce (sunshine@netcom.com) writes: Is there any reliable way to stop phone sales calls. One firm calls me 3x daily, 4 days/week sometimes. When I call their number on the caller id box, I get a message saying it is a non-working number. Through the phone co I located the business. I phoned personally and asked to be put on the no-call list. A phone co rep did the same in my behalf. They told us both to buzz off. They continued calling. I don't remember the specific law off hand (communications privacy act?), but telemarketers are REQUIRED BY FEDERAL LAW to take you off their call list if you ask them. Tell the phone company that you want to file a complaint and if they continue to call, the phone company is REQUIRED to disconnect their phone service. Another tactic I have heard about (but never tried) is file papers with the state and set yourself up as a small business. Then start charging them $100 a phone call as "consultation fees". If you set it up right I have heard that they are required to pay. I would personally follow #1, get the feds to do your dirty work for you, otherwise you have to hire an attorney and get a court injunction against them. Good luck on your problem. -- /\-/\ Dean Ridgway | Two roads diverged in a wood, and I- ( - - ) InterNet ridgwad@peak.org | I took the one less traveled by, =\_v_/= FidoNet 1:357/1.103 | And that has made all the difference. CIS 73225,512 | "The Road Not Taken" - Robert Frost. http://www.peak.org/~ridgwad/ PGP mail encouraged, finger for key: 28C577F3 2A5655AFD792B0FB 9BA31E6AB4683126 ------------------------------ From: Barry Kopulos Date: 29 Jul 1995 15:21:18 -0500 (CDT) Subject: Re: Tracking a User on the Net I am just wowndering and so have a few intrenet users I have talked to is it possible for the provdier os iste one is linking into to identify the exact location you originated fromand then pinpoint your name,etc. This could aply to logging into web sites,ftp sites or even postingt o news group. Are there any programs that can track that kind of information and how could one become anonymous invisible when linking to a site and no source showed up. ------------------------------ From: "Mich Kabay [NCSA Sys_Op]" <75300.3232@compuserve.com> Date: 31 Jul 95 23:09:38 EDT Subject: E-porn at Eastern Washington University >From the Associated Press news wire via CompuServe's Executive News Service: APn 95.07.27 10:52 Professor-Porn CHENEY, Wash. (AP) -- Eastern Washington University has suspended a geology professor who kept thousands of child pornography photos stored on his campus computer. Russell Boggs, 42, had collected the photographs -- some showing children as young as 3 -- since April. The article explains that Boggs' wife, Peggy-Lynn Boggs, has been doing a research project on erotic literature and that she asked her husband to collect such photographs for her. On Wednesday 95.07.26 a judge in Spokane made the details of search warrants public; at that point the University suspended Professor Boggs. -- M.E.Kabay,Ph.D. / Dir. Education, Natl Computer Security Assn (Carlisle, PA) ------------------------------ From: tye@metronet.com (Tye McQueen) Date: 29 Jul 1995 23:54:03 -0500 Subject: P. O. Box Organization: Texas Metronet, Inc (login info (214/705-2901 - 817/571-0400)) coleman@alexia.lis.uiuc.edu (Scott Coleman) writes: As for myself, my checks have my name and PO Box number. This is enough to satisfy those merchants which use check guarantee services which require a preprinted name and address. It is quite common for grocery stores here to demand a "physical address". At three different stores I have been told that the local District Attorney (or some such) won't pursue cases of bad checks unless an address other than a PO box was obtained. I get the impression that the ubiquitous mistrust of PO boxes is waning, however. The last several times I've filled out forms listing only my PO box address (and sometimes omiting much other information) I've gotten much less resistance than I've become accustomed to. -- Tye McQueen tye@metronet.com || tye@doober.usu.edu Nothing is obvious unless you are overlooking something ------------------------------ From: sean@sdg.dra.com (Sean Donelan) Date: 30 Jul 95 04:28:16 CDT Subject: Re: More SSN Abuse Organization: Data Research Associates, St. Louis MO PHILS@RELAY.RELAY.COM (Philip H. Smith) writes: A local Washington, DC TV station was recently doing a story on Jack Kent Cooke, owner of the Washington Redskins (among other things). As part of the story, they were discussing his refusal to discuss his income publicly, and mentioned that they had a copy of his tax return. They then SHOWED the front page of a tax return filled out with his name and address, including an SSN! One can only hope that it was NOT his real SSN... A bigger question migh be where did they get a copy of his tax return? But once the press had it, and judged it newsworthy, I have severe problems with restricting the press. A few weeks ago a national news magazine (Newsweek, or US News, I can't remember which) had a story on gun licenses. One of the photographs was a woman getting her picture taken for the license. Her name and license number on the board she was holding. The license number looked like XXX-XX-XXXX, which I guess was her SSN. Now available for anyone who wants to know in a national magazine. I would question why the state was using the her SSN as the license number. Unlike driver's licenses, I don't think Congress has authorized the use of SSN's for gun licenses. On a related note, I noticed when the White House released copies of Bill Clinton's 1994 tax returns this year, someone had blacked out Bill's, Hillary's and Chelsea's SSNs. I never saw a politician do that before. In 1993, the White House released the Clintons' tax returns including SSN's. Apparently the Vice-president's office didn't feel the same, since Al Gore's 1994 tax returns didn't have his family's SSNs blacked out. It'll be interesting to see what happens next year. -- Sean Donelan, Data Research Associates, Inc, St. Louis, MO Affiliation given for identification not representation ------------------------------ From: Athena Consulting Date: 30 Jul 1995 12:10:16 GMT Subject: Re: Texas Driver's License Organization: Communique Inc., New Orleans Maryjo Bruce wrote: I just went to have my driver's license renewed in Texas. I had to provide both right and left thumbprints. Does every state do that? No. California started requiring right hand thumbprints in I believe 1990. And it is really cute, they're digitized so if you try to give them the corner of your thumb they can see if immediately and get really pissed. Hey I didn't know at the time! I just changed my CA d/l to a LA one. Lousisana now actually has MAG strip licenses. But they didn't take fingerprints. ------------------------------ From: Professor L. Levine Date: 01 Aug 1995 13:10:16 GMT Subject: Wisconsin Operator's License Organization: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee For about a year now the State of Wisconsin had demanded your Social Security Number when renewing your Operator's License (Driver's License) or License Plates but has not listed that number in any space you can find. This week the dropped the other shoe. From now on, if you get a parking ticket or do not pay civil fines they will extract the money from your Income Tax Refund. The SSN will be the link. This will mean megabucks for the State and for the Cities involved. ------------------------------ From: Athena Consulting Date: 30 Jul 1995 12:14:37 GMT Subject: Caller ID Blockers Organization: Communique Inc., New Orleans I am very new to this CALLER ID concept. I just moved to LA from California where they do not allow the masses to have CID. I have seen a device you can purchase from specialty catalogs for like $40 that claims to stop your name and number from being read. Does anyone know if these work or not? Thanks! ------------------------------ From: r.m.weiler@ic.ac.uk (Mr R.M. Weiler) Date: 31 Jul 1995 11:10:43 GMT Subject: Survey: Money on the Internet Organization: Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, London Hi there! I am doing an MBA research on the use of money on the Internet. I would appreciate it if you could answer a short survey on this subject, found at the following Web site: http://graph.ms.ic.ac.uk/money I would also appreciate any remark on this survey. Please tell your friend about it, too. -- Roy Weiler The MAnagement School Imperial College e-mail: r.m.weiler@ic.ac.uk ------------------------------ From: James Love Date: 31 Jul 1995 08:57:24 -0400 Subject: Ralph Nader on Windows 95 Problems ----------------------------------------------------------------- TAP-INFO - An Internet newsletter available from listproc@tap.org ----------------------------------------------------------------- TAXPAYER ASSETS PROJECT - INFORMATION POLICY NOTE July 31, 1995 MICROSOFT WINDOWS 95 - Ralph Nader and James Love send letter to Clinton Administration outlining criticism of two features of Microsoft WINDOWS 95. - Letter objects to Microsoft decision to "bundle" its new Microsoft Network (MSN) with WINDOWS 95, and the Microsoft "Registration Wizard," which provides Microsoft with information on files located on customer hard disk. - Nader and Love express support for Department of Justice (DOJ) antitrust action to address both problems, and ask Clinton to prevent federal agencies from buying WINDOWS 95 until the information gathering features of the "Registration Wizard" are disabled or modified. jamie (love@tap.org; 202/387-8030) The letter follows. Ralph Nader P.O. Box 19312, Washington, DC 20036 James Love Consumer Project on Technology P.O. Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036 love@tap.org; voice 202/387-8030 July 26, 1995 President William Clinton the White House Washington, DC Dear President Clinton, We are writing to ask you and your administration to take actions which address problems arising from Microsoft's near monopoly position in the market for personal computer operating systems. As you know, two features of Microsoft's WINDOWS 95 software have been widely criticized -- the "bundling of Microsoft Network (MSN) and Microsoft's online "Registration Wizard." These issues are discussed below. 1. Microsoft Network. The "bundling" of Microsoft Network (MSN) with WINDOWS 95 has raised alarm among Microsoft's competitors that Microsoft will use its dominate market position for operating system software to give MSN an enormous advantage over its rivals in the market for online service providers. In brief, Microsoft has written its new version of Windows with a built-in way to register for its new online service. According to reports by beta users of the product, Microsoft has given the MSN a very high priority, including a special icon which cannot be deleted by the user, and periodic queries by the operating system to the user, encouraging registration. Apparently no other rival online services vendor will have the opportunity to receive similar status within Windows 95. In our view, Microsoft's actions are a predictable attempt to exploit its dominance in the operating system market to benefit its penetration into other fields that are potentially more competitive. One analogy to this practice is in the area of airplane reservations. American Airlines operated the dominant online service for airline reservations, and arranged the available flights in alphabetical order, giving American Airlines what turned out to be a large advantage over its rivals. The government subsequently regulated this practice, so that the online reservations systems would not be used in an anti- competitive manner. We believe it is appropriate and justified for the Department of Justice to take actions that would prevent Microsoft from bundling MSN with WINDOWS 95 as has been done in their beta releases of the product. 2. Registration Wizard. Another objectionable feature of WINDOWS 95 is the Microsoft online "Registration Wizard." This part of the program is designed to scan automatically a user's hard disk, dial-up Microsoft, and download information to Microsoft about the files on the user's hard disk, including the titles and versions of software applications. Critics of this practice, including the Department of Defense, have questioned the impact of this practice on data security and privacy. Microsoft's rivals also believe that it will give Microsoft an enormous advantage in marketing by virtue of the fact that it gives Microsoft excellent intelligence on its competitors, including the names and addresses of their customers. Microsoft has defended the Wizard by saying that the information is gathered to help its product support personnel debug its software, and that consumers can choose not to send the information to Microsoft. We believe that both arguments are disingenuous. First of all, the registration process is separate from customer service, and if Microsoft really wanted to use the information for customer service it could devise far less intrusive methods of doing so, such as a program to printout relevant information for use during a consumer service call, rather than at the point of registration. Secondly, consumers are likely to be confused and intimidated by the registration process, because of concerns that this complex software might not function correctly if they refuse to give Microsoft the information it wants to collects. In our view, the Registration Wizard is an intrusive measure that uses technology to erode customer privacy, and we urge you to take steps to discourage its use. Specifically, we urge you to ask OMB officials Sally Katzen, Administer of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA), and Stephen Kelman, Administrator for Federal Procurement Policy, to issue a directive to all federal agencies, advising them not to purchase WINDOWS 95 with the Registration Wizard. This would be similar to the very successful actions taken by federal agencies in the 1980's to refuse to purchase spreadsheet and database software that placed "hidden" files on hard disks as part of copyright protection schemes, a proactive measure which moved the entire market away from such ill-conceived practices. We also believe it is appropriate and justified for the Department of Justice to take actions that would prevent Microsoft from sharing the information gathered from the Registration Wizard with its marketing personnel. Please let us know what you will do about these important matters. Sincerely Ralph Nader James Love Consumer Project on Technology ps: Of course, we were pleased to read press reports that Microsoft recently said it would make the MSN abide by the European Union's Directive on Data Protection, and we urge Microsoft's competitors in online services, such as American Online, Prodigy or Compuserve, to embrace these rules which protect customer privacy. --------------------------------------------------------------------- TAP-INFO is an Internet Distribution List provided by the Taxpayer Assets Project (TAP). TAP was founded by Ralph Nader to monitor the management of government property, including information systems and data, government funded R&D, spectrum allocation and other government assets. TAP-INFO reports on TAP activities relating to federal information policy. TAP-INFO is archived at gopher.essential.org in the Taxpayer Assets Project directory, and at http://www.essential.org/tap/tap.html Subscription requests to tap-info to listproc@tap.org with the message: subscribe tap-info your name --------------------------------------------------------------------- Taxpayer Assets Project; P.O. Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036 v. 202/387-8030; f. 202/234-5176; internet: tap@tap.org --------------------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------ From: "Prof. L. P. Levine" Date: 29 Dec 1994 10:50:22 -0600 (CST) Subject: Info on CPD [unchanged since 12/29/94] Organization: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee The Computer Privacy Digest is a forum for discussion on the effect of technology on privacy or vice versa. The digest is moderated and gatewayed into the USENET newsgroup comp.society.privacy (Moderated). Submissions should be sent to comp-privacy@uwm.edu and administrative requests to comp-privacy-request@uwm.edu. This digest is a forum with information contributed via Internet eMail. Those who understand the technology also understand the ease of forgery in this very free medium. Statements, therefore, should be taken with a grain of salt and it should be clear that the actual contributor might not be the person whose email address is posted at the top. Any user who openly wishes to post anonymously should inform the moderator at the beginning of the posting. He will comply. If you read this from the comp.society.privacy newsgroup and wish to contribute a message, you should simply post your contribution. As a moderated newsgroup, attempts to post to the group are normally turned into eMail to the submission address below. On the other hand, if you read the digest eMailed to you, you generally need only use the Reply feature of your mailer to contribute. 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The moderator reserves the right to delete extraneous quoted material. He may change the SUBJECT: line of an article in order to make it easier for the reader to follow a discussion. He will not, however, alter or edit or append to the text except for purely technical reasons. A library of back issues is available on ftp.cs.uwm.edu [129.89.9.18]. Login as "ftp" with password identifying yourid@yoursite. The archives are in the directory "pub/comp-privacy". People with gopher capability can most easily access the library at gopher.cs.uwm.edu. Mosaic users will find it at gopher://gopher.cs.uwm.edu. Older archives are also held at ftp.pica.army.mil [129.139.160.133]. ---------------------------------+----------------------------------------- Leonard P. Levine | Moderator of: Computer Privacy Digest Professor of Computer Science | and comp.society.privacy University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee | Post: comp-privacy@uwm.edu Box 784, Milwaukee WI 53201 | Information: comp-privacy-request@uwm.edu | Gopher: gopher.cs.uwm.edu levine@cs.uwm.edu | Mosaic: gopher://gopher.cs.uwm.edu ---------------------------------+----------------------------------------- ------------------------------ End of Computer Privacy Digest V7 #009 ****************************** .