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Faxing is growing in popularity

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Re: Faxing is growing in popularity

#61

Post by reaperducer »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #54
newhotelowner wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of small business owner has one company credit card. They send the credit card information to us through fax for the employees that are checking in without the company credit card. Employees are still using their personal card for incidentals. Big companies use travel agencies. They fax a virtual credit card. Depending upon the company, the credit card in the reservation won't authorize. We can only charge the…

Yes, my point is all of that can be obviated if the hotel offered an online payment system where you can just pay online, same as you can with Expedia.com or Hotel Tonight or Priceline or Amazon.com However, the major brands would rather have all of their hotel guests be inconvenienced and have people's personal information and ID scans flying around insecure systems operated by minimum wage hotel personnel with high…

all of that can be obviated if the hotel offered an online payment system

I spent the weekend making reservations at nine hotels for a two-week trip. Of the nine, three could be paid online. Two could be reserved online, but will have to be paid with plastic at check-in. Two had web sites, but I had to call to make a reservation. Three didn't have web sites at all.

The vast majority of lodging options in the United States are not chains, or hooked up to an app.

Re: Faxing is growing in popularity

#62

Post by reaperducer »

mobilemidget wrote: post #28
newhotelowner wrote: post #21

Every single hotel that caters corporate clients in the USA still uses fax. We don't get reservations through fax, but that is the best way to get credit card authorization. A lot of corporate booking systems are automated to send out Fax for credit card authorization after they book the room online. Also, it's much better for our Front desk staff, as they don't have to constantly check the email. There is only 1 fax…

There is an alternative, called internet. Faxing for CC authorizations certainly is not the best. Or I’m way confused and don’t understand your conditions of “best”

There is an alternative, called internet.

I routinely stay in places that don't have internet service, either deliberately (ranches and luxury off-grid getaway places), or because there is no infrastructure.

Internet isn't the solution to everything. In fact, some very high-end restaurants are now only taking reservations by telephone. And there was an article (NYT?) a few months ago about exclusive restaurants now only taking reservations by letter.

If internet was the answer to all of this, then Google wouldn't have spent billions of dollars on a system to call businesses to place orders and make reservations for you.

Re: Faxing is growing in popularity

#63

Post by reaperducer »

Animats wrote: post #25

The intelligence community has been intercepting faxes for decades.[1] It's not very secure. Even worse, VoIP systems recognize fax modem signals, decode them, transmit them as data, and re-encode them as fax modem signals.[2] They have to; VoIP has such awful jitter and bandwidth that you can't send modem signals over it. So it's easy to peel off the fax data and log it. This is done routinely using fax servers. [1]…

How secure do I need my restaurant take-out order to be?

Re: Faxing is growing in popularity

#64

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

devoply wrote: post #22
newhotelowner wrote: post #21

Every single hotel that caters corporate clients in the USA still uses fax. We don't get reservations through fax, but that is the best way to get credit card authorization. A lot of corporate booking systems are automated to send out Fax for credit card authorization after they book the room online. Also, it's much better for our Front desk staff, as they don't have to constantly check the email. There is only 1 fax…

Imagine a future where faxes are a private alternative form of communication. Image machines specifically designed to send encrypted data using phone lines. Maybe there is room innovation there, fax 2.0 is encrypted private alternative form of communication when all others have been exhausted. Maybe we can attach a typewriter to them as well so you can get all your private communication needs in one package. I know h…

You may joke about SW, but there are not a few applications for a secure encrypted channel that is difficult to MITM and doesn't go through nation-state infrastructure.

Re: Faxing is growing in popularity

#65

Post by reaperducer »

jedimastert wrote: post #15
giarc wrote: post #10

I work in healthcare and in my office we likely receive 100-200 pages of faxes everyday. Every single microbiology report in my large urban hospital prints out (including preliminary results. This includes a cover page for every single fax. It's a huge waste of paper. Luckily we are moving to Epic and all results will come through that system instead.

I'm mildly concerned with how many people that aren't directly involved with my medical care could read those reports. It's not like they have to break open an envelope or a filing cabinet or something either. Just another piece of paper to be casually picked up and scanned for filing.

I'm not the OP, but I do work pushing buttons in healthcare. In our company incoming faxes are OCR'ed and routed to the proper person by e-mail.

I can't say how well it works because nobody's faxed me (nor should anyone), but since every employee gets HIPAA training, I don't think there's much cause for worry about misdirected faxes.

Re: Faxing is growing in popularity

#66

Post by jaclaz »

newhotelowner wrote: post #21

Every single hotel that caters corporate clients in the USA still uses fax. We don't get reservations through fax, but that is the best way to get credit card authorization. A lot of corporate booking systems are automated to send out Fax for credit card authorization after they book the room online. Also, it's much better for our Front desk staff, as they don't have to constantly check the email. There is only 1 fax…

If I may, I would add that it is (obviously) unheard of computer viruses sent by FAX, whilst - besides the "benign" (if we can call it so) spam - a generic hotel e-mail is bombarded by phishing attempts and more generally "check this attachment (enclosed invoice)" or "booking confirmation check the attached image for credit card number" kind of letters, so, besides the time needed to open the e-mail, the e-mails are anyway a "risk".

The worst that can happen with a FAX is that the "attacker" can make you consume some paper and printer ink.

Re: Faxing is growing in popularity

#67

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

jedimastert wrote: post #15
giarc wrote: post #10

I work in healthcare and in my office we likely receive 100-200 pages of faxes everyday. Every single microbiology report in my large urban hospital prints out (including preliminary results. This includes a cover page for every single fax. It's a huge waste of paper. Luckily we are moving to Epic and all results will come through that system instead.

I'm mildly concerned with how many people that aren't directly involved with my medical care could read those reports. It's not like they have to break open an envelope or a filing cabinet or something either. Just another piece of paper to be casually picked up and scanned for filing.

I know someone whose medical records - including full details of the removal of her brain tumour - were faxed to a hairdresser because the operator swapped a couple of digits in the number.

Re: Faxing is growing in popularity

#68

Post by cbhl »

reaperducer wrote: post #63
Animats wrote: post #25

The intelligence community has been intercepting faxes for decades.[1] It's not very secure. Even worse, VoIP systems recognize fax modem signals, decode them, transmit them as data, and re-encode them as fax modem signals.[2] They have to; VoIP has such awful jitter and bandwidth that you can't send modem signals over it. So it's easy to peel off the fax data and log it. This is done routinely using fax servers. [1]…

How secure do I need my restaurant take-out order to be?

There are jurisdictions outside of the US that transmit health records by fax to avoid them being subject to the USA PATRIOT Act when they transit routers in the United States.

Re: Faxing is growing in popularity

#70

Post by lotsofpulp »

reaperducer wrote: post #61
lotsofpulp wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, my point is all of that can be obviated if the hotel offered an online payment system where you can just pay online, same as you can with Expedia.com or Hotel Tonight or Priceline or Amazon.com However, the major brands would rather have all of their hotel guests be inconvenienced and have people's personal information and ID scans flying around insecure systems operated by minimum wage hotel personnel with high…

all of that can be obviated if the hotel offered an online payment system I spent the weekend making reservations at nine hotels for a two-week trip. Of the nine, three could be paid online. Two could be reserved online, but will have to be paid with plastic at check-in. Two had web sites, but I had to call to make a reservation. Three didn't have web sites at all. The vast majority of lodging options in the United S…

This Aug 2015 article says US hotel room supply broke 5 million rooms:

https://www.businesstravelnews.com/Strategic-Sourcing/U-S-Ho...

and this Mar 2015 infographic on HotelNewsNow.com shows over the 10 biggest brands having over 4 million rooms, worldwide.

http://www.hotelnewsnow.com/Articles/25511/10-largest-hotel-...

Some of those brands have hit 1 million rooms each, so I think it's safe to say that the vast majority of rooms in the US are able to be reserved online, and even the boutique hotels not affiliated with bigger brands have an online presence in my experience.

The only hotels I've seen not online are the low budget motels or smaller lifestyle businesses in a few niche locales here and there. Even then, I've seen them on booking.com where you enter your details, and booking.com emails or faxes the motel operator the details of your reservation.

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