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We started this
section with the caption "A Dirty Little Secret" and
we did indeed reveal a seldom acknowledged fact -- large
computerized switches in offices were vulnerable to hostile
control! Now, for the rest of the story!! |
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Large
computerized switches at telephone companies employ the same
general type of technology and are vulnerable to the same type
of attack! Obviously, this is the last thing that the telephone
companies want to admit. The liability is devastating. So, if
you made inquiry of the phone companies they would deny that it
is possible. It would be nice if we could believe them, I can't. |
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In Las Vegas
there are a number of legal businesses called "Out-Call
Services". They send "Dancing Girls" (or Boys)
to the hotel rooms of guests willing to pay the $125-$250 per
hour for a nude dancer. There can be little question that
these services are merely fronts for prostitution, which is
illegal in Las Vegas. Nevertheless, the owners of these
services stay clear of the law by delivering only dancing and
not prostitution. The owner of the Out-Call Service gets the
lions share of the $125-$250 dancing fee. If there is to be
any prostitution, it comes about after direct
negotiation between the hotel guest and the dancer. I am given
to understand that if she does engage in prostitution,
she keeps all of that money. |
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What has all
this got to do with the vulnerability of telephone company
switches to outside control? Just this - the Out-Call Services
have been victims -- and we believe perpetrators, of illegal
penetrations and control of telephone company central office
switches! |
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The Out-Call
Services are very profitable and very competitive. We have
received numerous complaints from various Out-Call Service
operators stating that calls from hotel guests are being
diverted to a competitor who has been able to hack into a
telephone company central office switch. Do we believe these
stories? You bet!! |
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One Out-Call
services operator admitted to us that he had hired a
hacker, who after penetrating the telephone company
central office computer, shut down a competitor on a four
day holiday weekend. During that four day period, when a
customer called the competing business, he either got a busy
signal or had his call diverted to the phone of the Out-Call
Service operator who had hired the hacker. |
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One telephone company
security official bragged that not only did he know that
telephone company central office switches had been hacked
into, he had been instrumental in the arrest and conviction
of the perpetrator of such a scam. |
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A federal law enforcement
official told us that there was no doubt in his mind that
such penetrations had taken place. |
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A countermeasures expert
in the UK told us that he had been approached by the
government of another NATO country interested in acquiring
the technology and techniques used to facilitate such
attacks. |
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I was
tempted to publish the URL of a web site, that, as of this
writing, contains a "How To..." article about
hacking into a computerized telephone switch and controlling
it. Since our purpose is not to aid those who would break
the law, I decided against it. |
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So there you
have the rest of the story... the second half of the Dirty
Little Secret... Some say that Telephone company central
office switches have been hacked into and controlled by
unauthorized persons!! On the other side we have the telephone
companies saying that their security measures are so effective
that such a penetration is not possible. Who do you believe? |
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Today is July 2,
1999. It has been about 2 months since the "Dirty Little
Secret" first appeared on our web site. This
morning's Las Vegas Review Journal, page 1B, contains additional
evidence in support of our contention that phone systems
are being hacked into. The following are pertinent excerpts from
that Review Journal article. It makes me wonder how long the
phone companies will be able to live in denial. |
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Out-Call case nets guilty plea |
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A reputed torture expert admits a role in a
mob-backed conspiracy to seize command of a valley industry. |
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A reputed torture expert from Florida
entered a guilty plea Thursday and became the first of six
defendants to admit playing a role...
Vincent Congiusti, 49... pleaded guilty to a single charge...
Congiusti...told the judge he came to Las Vegas from Tampa Florida
at the request of Mario Stephano, whom authorities have described as
an associate of the Gambino crime family. The defendant
said that Stephano told him he knew someone in the outcall service
industry who was having a problem with some of his competitors. The competitors were using a computer
expert to divert telephone calls from that person's business to
their own. (emphasis added)
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