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From: samho@larry.cs.washington.edu (Sam Ho)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Policy Change in Unlisted Numbers?
Message-ID: 
Date: 15 Aug 89 21:14:38 GMT
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X-TELECOM-Digest: volume 9, issue 300, message 3 of 8

Last week, the Washington State Utilities and Transportation Commission
issued rules about releasing unlisted numbers to "voice mail" and
"pay-per-view" services, over the objections of the Attorney General's
office, which felt that the privacy implications were not yet clear.

The background is as follows:  Last year, the UTC rejected a proposal
to release unlisted numbers to information providers for billing
purposes.  It also shelved a proposal for "message forwarding" services
which would flash a caller's number on a screen.

The current action was prompted because the UTC said these "services
are already available", and that software exists to record the numbers
of incoming callers to a voice-mail system.  The ruling prohibits such
a linkage.  Violators would have their service disconnected.  The UTC
notes that this should be a sufficient deterrent, since voice-mail
installation is $1500, with a $355 monthly charge, and there are other
ways of gathering numbers for sales purposes.

I am not quite sure what the ruling means, since all numbers, listed or
otherwise, are already recorded for long-distance and 800 calls, and in
the case of 800 calls, may be itemized on the recipient's bill.  I know
that the earlier information providers ruling regarded the disclosure
of name-and-address information, for bills returned as uncollectible.
I would imagine that this has something to do with CLASS services,
which, to my knowledege, are not offered in Washington.

Sam Ho
samho@larry.cs.washington.edu

[Moderator's Note: At the time of divestiture, one ruling was that telcos
has to share all numbers -- including non-pub numbers -- with the alternate
long distance carriers, for billing purposes only. The carriers were then
and are now forbidden to make other use of the information than billing. PT]