Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!gatech!purdue!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!brutus.cs.uiuc.edu!wuarchive!texbell!vector!telecom-gateway From: GABEL@qcvax.bitnet Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Caller ID Linked to Decline in Harrassing Calls Message-ID:Date: 14 Aug 89 04:38:00 GMT Sender: news@vector.Dallas.TX.US Lines: 173 Approved: telecom-request@vector.dallas.tx.us The following article appeared on page 1 of the New York Times, Saturday, 8/5/89. (copyright 1989 New York Times) Harrassing Calls Show Decline When Phones Identify Callers by Calvin Sims The number of obscene or harassing telephone calls has fallen sharply in the first test of a system that allows people to see the number of the phone the call was dialed on before they answer. The test in Hudson County, N.J., showed a 49 percent drop in requests to track such calls after the system was in place. Telephone companies welcome the results, hoping that they will increase demand for the caller- identification service. Such systems are seen as a significant potential source of telephone revenue but they have been slow to win acceptance from regulators because of criticism that they invade the privacy of callers. The caller-identification system offered in New Jersey displays the number of the calling party on a small digital screen attached to the tel- ephone. The telephone subscriber can also notify the NJ Bell Telephone Co. to make a computer record of where and when a harassing call originated by dialing a code when the call is received. And, by pressing a code, the phone owner can block calls coming in from a designated number, making it impossible for a harasser to make repeated calls from one phone. The Hudson County test was started in late 1987 and has been widely available since the beginning of this year. The number of requests the phone company received to trace calls has declined sharply there. The 236 requests received in the six months that ended April 30, for example, amounted to a 49% decline from the similar six-month period two years earlier, when no one in the area had caller identification, NJ Bell said. "This technology, by its mere presence, is having a chilling effect on the number of crank phone calls that people are reporting," said James W. Carrigan, a spokesman for NJ Bell. "The word is out: people now have the ability to see the phone number of the caller, and many would-be obscene callers are afraid to mess around on the telephone." The service may spread rapidly. Phone companies in New York, Pennsylvania, California and the several Southern states served by the Southern Bell Telephone and Telegraph Company plan to introduce the service. The phone companies are enthusiastic about the revenue potential. New Jersey Bell, which charges $6.50 a month for the service, said its surveys showed that about 42% of its customers, or 1.2 million people, received annoyance calls last year and that 72,000 complaints were filed. Many phone companies, however, are moving more slowly than they expected because of the privacy issues the technology raises. Critics contend that the systems violate the rights of phone users who wish simply to keep their numbers private. The critics also say that caller identification will make the public less likely to use confidential social services like AIDS hotlines or shelters for battered women. And consumers phoning businesses might find their numbers being passed on to telephone marketing concerns without permission. The phone companies respond that the caller identification system increases privacy because it gives the called party an "electronic peephole," allowing them to answer only those calls from recognized numbers. Although there was strong opposition to the caller-identification system from the American Civil Liberties Union, the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities allowed New Jersey Bell to introduce the service because of the initial success of the phone company's trial run. For billing, telephone companies keep a monthly computer log of all local and long-distance phone calls. Such records take about a month to process. The call-trace system allows the subscriber to create an immediate record of harassing calls. Several New Jersey residents have used the system to rid themselves of harassing calls. Some have recognized the phone number of the harassing caller as that of a relative of friend and asked the known harasser to stop. Other subscribers who were unfamiliar with the number of the harassing call that appeared on the display screen informed callers that their phone numbers could be seen, and the harassers quickly hung up. A family in Middlesex County used the computerized call tracing feature of the system to press charges against a man who called their home about 20 times a night for three months. The family made it possible for the phone company to record the number, date and time of the calls. "The guy had seen my daughter at a party, and he would call our number and say the most profane sexual things about her," said the father, who asked that the family not be identified. "It got to the place where we just took the phone off the hook in the evenings." When the case went to trial, New Jersey Bell provided the judge with its computer records. The defendant pleaded guilty and was sentenced to a year on probation. Experts said the case is typical in that the caller knew the victim. "Over all, we have dealt with very few perverts because most obscene phone callers are old boyfriends who have been dumped," said Martin Harrington, a detective at the Buffalo Police Department who specialized in telephone harassment cases. "The caller-identification device would probably cut my caseload by about 80% because the greatest fear of any obscene caller is having their identity revealed." Making an obscene or threatening phone call is a misdemeanor in most states. In New York State, conviction carries a maximum sentence of a year in jail and a $500 fine. More than 19,000 customers in New Jersey have signed up for the caller identification service. By the end of the year, the service will be available to about 66% of New Jersey Bell's 2.8 million customers. Among the localities that will have the service are Asbury Park, Atlantic City, Camden, Elizabeth, Hackensack, Lakewook, Montclair, Morristown, New Brunswick, Newark, Paterson, Plainfield, Red Bank, Toms River and Trenton. Phone users in other states may have to wait longer than expected because of the growing privacy debate. Pacific Bell, the big local phone company in California, was scheduled to offer caller identification later this year but recently said it would await until 1991 to consider the privacy issues. "We have the obligation to our customers to thoroughly explore the issues surrounding this new technology before we install it in our network," said Ethan Thorman, Pacific Bell's product manager. "At first the system looked like it was free of controversy so we rushed ahead to deploy it. But then we stepped back." The California Legislature is considering a bill that would require phone companies that offer the caller identification system to include a blocking feature that would allow the person making the call to block his or her phone numbers by dialing a special code. The party being called would receive a message on the digital screen indicating that the call is a private one. The bill, which has already passed the California Assembly and goes before the Senate later this year, would require the phone companies to provide the blocking service at no cost. "A caller-identification system that does not have a blocking function endangers the lives of battered women," said Gail Jones, director of Women Escaping a Violent Environment, a counseling center based in Sacramento, Calif. "The woman or her counselor will often contact the batterer to let him know that she is all right." A similar battle is developing in Pennsylvania, where the Bell Telephone Company of Pennsylvania hopes to introduce caller identification by the end of the year. As in California, critics are arguing that the service should come with a feature that allows a caller to prevent the recipient from seeing where the call originated. "The introduction of this service poses a variety of privacy intrusions that the phone companies have been well aware of for some time," said Dan Clearfield, spokesman for the Pennsylvania Consumer Advocate Office. "That's why they designed the blocking mechanism into the original caller-identification software." New York Telephone plans to offer the service first in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., and parts of Vermont later this year. A New York Telephone spokesman said that the company hopes to offer the service in other New York cities in 1990 but that the introductions would be based on how well the service does in the initial offerings. A spokeswoman for Southern New England Telephone Company siad that plans to start offering call-trace and call-block services in Connecticut later this year but that it has delayed offering caller identification because of the privacy issue. The phone companies say the inclusion of a blocking mechanism may make caller identification far less appealing to consumers. ============================= Dan Blumenthal Gabel%QCVAX.BITNET@CUNYVM.CUNY.EDU