251–260 of 279 posts
I did really enjoy this post, but is it just a tiny bit weird how casual he is about repeatedly committing fraud? Not asking for some grand apology (lord knows the crap I did as a kid), but the post is written like defrauding an ISP is just a normal and fine thing to do. Am I off base here?
I love it that he uses the payphone to talk to his daughter's phone in her room... or rather that she uses her phone to call him ;) I also just set up a private phone network in my house, and my daughter can also call my room, from her bedroom. But it spiraled very quickly into something more evolved & more fun. It all started when I discovered after buying our new house that most rooms were pre-wired with RJ11 outle…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
With the 1950s mic and speakers, it was substantially better than a smartphone. The Western Electric model 1500 [1], from 1963, is generally considered the best analog phone [1]. This was rented, not sold, so it is extremely reliable and rugged. Best audio quality was with ISDN phones. Digital end to end, synchronized at the bit level, no noise, no dropouts. [1] http://www.telephonearchive.com/phones/we/we1500.html
I'm not sure why you picked a 1500 as the best sounding, the 500, 1500 and 2500 all used the same network, receiver, and transmitter elements - I've used all three, they perform identically, the 1500 set is actually incredibly rare - touch tone was just not common until the 2500 was out. The best speakerphone ever made (even better than modern ones) is a 4A Speakerphone. Also in my opinion, an AE 80 with a non cohere…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I kinda agree with the low probability, but you also ignored the article (he’s faking mastercard), and I see 12 digits not 14. Also, not every valid number will be used (e.g. all 0s won’t be an option), and every number don’t need to be valid at the same time. If I renew 25 cards, their numbers are burned with no reuse. That’s a long way to say, I’m not a fan in general of throwing in naive probability calculations a…
Correction, there’s actually only 7 digits at most of randomness https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31605950
The BIN/IIN is traditionally the first 6 digits. Extended BINs can be 8-11 digits, which is like subnetting -- the BIN sponsor can delegate assignment control of an extended BIN range to another entity. So in some cases, there can be as few as 4 "random" digits in the full card number (PAN).
E.g.:
BIN "random" Check
411111 111111111 1
ExtendedBIN "random" Check
41111111111 1111 1
We can't know the likelihood of hitting a valid number without knowing the count of assigned PANs in that BIN, but clearly the capacity would be 1 billion (or 10 million) possibilities.
One day I noticed the tones produced by putting a quarter in a pay phone to tell the backend switch a quarter had been inserted. It was, like, beep beep beep beep beep, really fast. Dimes and nickels made the same tones, but they were shorter, less beeps.
Something sounded familiar about these tones, and through trial and error, I realized these tones were made from the DTMF tones of either the asterisk key or the octothorpe key (I can't now remember which, and btw, it is not a hash symbol, it is an octothorpe). By putting enough presses of the right key into the memory of the Radio Shack dialer, I could fool payphones into thinking I had deposited quarters. I had turned my off the shelf Radio Shack DTMF dialer into a Red Box, without actually doing anything to the hardware or electronics. And it was a lot more svelte than the original Woz Red Boxes, about the size of a flip phone when closed.
At first, this worked at every payphone, always, any kind of call, local or long distance. I spent a lot of time at the airport and hotel pay phone banks calling a gf long distance. But eventually, my DTMF dialer stopped fooling the switch, so I could no longer make free local calls. But with long distance calls, I'd usually get an operator once the spoofed coin inserts failed, but they would always still fool the operator, who I think assumed line interference prevented (what I assume were) the new digital switches from recognizing coin insert tones. Then that stopped working; somehow the operators knew what I was doing and would accurately describe my spoof to me.
So it no longer worked with ordinary common pay phones. But I found a pay phone installation that was not ordinary, I believe it was called a "Smart Payphone," but it was not smart in the way we think of smart phones today; it just had some extra electronics and a small 3 line LCD panel which told you how long your call lasted. I could continue to make local and long distance calls from only these types of pay phones for a few more years until every place I knew there had been one had been uninstalled.
It only occurred to me later that I was not stealing from AT&T or some local Bell affiliate. I had been stealing from whomever owned the pay phone, who still had to pay for those long distance calls I made. I have carried the guilt and shame of my juvenile crimes ever since. Not kidding. That was all very, very wrong.
That's a really awesome story with a great opening, middle, and especially the end, if one ignores the adolescent fraud. I think it really highlights the simple joy that technology that literally just works can bring. I'm around the same age as the author, a little younger in fact, but there's just something about today's Internet and a lot of the overwhelming amount of technology that just isn't fun or memorable. Fr…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> That's a really awesome story with a great opening, middle, and especially the end, if one ignores the adolescent fraud. That admission was the best part! Everyone here was not goody two shoes in their teens. Accepting this reality can release people from expectations of perfection. Perhaps ironically, kids' behavior can improve when they feel their imperfections are airable.
I am not sure credit card fraud is innocent pranks or misbehavior... I can tell you with certainty that most teenagers have never committed that sort of crimes tbh.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Late 1980 was when criminality was going up and right before its peak. It is quite lower now ... and people who were teenagers in late 1980 are almost 60 now.
Im 47. Started Highschool in 1989
Online since 1993.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> That's a really awesome story with a great opening, middle, and especially the end, if one ignores the adolescent fraud. That admission was the best part! Everyone here was not goody two shoes in their teens. Accepting this reality can release people from expectations of perfection. Perhaps ironically, kids' behavior can improve when they feel their imperfections are airable.
Going through the grueling immigration process, Homeland Security eventually sits across the table from you, looks you in the eye, and asks "have you ever committed a crime for which you have not been convicted?"
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> That's a really awesome story with a great opening, middle, and especially the end, if one ignores the adolescent fraud. That admission was the best part! Everyone here was not goody two shoes in their teens. Accepting this reality can release people from expectations of perfection. Perhaps ironically, kids' behavior can improve when they feel their imperfections are airable.
Going through the grueling immigration process, Homeland Security eventually sits across the table from you, looks you in the eye, and asks "have you ever committed a crime for which you have not been convicted?"
It's really not a valid question -> only a court can determine if you've commited a crime, that's why we call people suspects, not criminals, before they are convicted.
For example recently in UK, a group of 4 people have toppled a statue and threw it in the river. This sounds like a crime to any normal person, and they were charged with criminal damage.
The accused raised defences of lawful excuse, owner's consent, etc. They were found not guilty - with many people foaming at the mouth because they disagreed with the decision, media calling them criminals, you know the drill.
But the opinions of random people are just that - opinions. In fact even if you think you commited the crime, the court is not required to accept your guilty plea and could still find your innocent.
Only judge and jury can evaluate defences presented and decide if this is a crime. So what should these four people answer to such a question? Or suppose those 4 people where never charged- what should they have answered?
case in question: https://thesecretbarrister.com/2022/01/06/do-the-verdicts-in...