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Tom Farley --- privateline@delphi.com
1. General Info on private line: ISSN No. 1077-3487
A. private line is a hardcopy magazine about the telephone
system. It's published six times a year by Tom Farley. It's
been reviewed well in Factsheet5 and Nuts and Volts.
Copyright (c) 1994 It runs 28 pages. It's done in black and white.
B. Subscriptions: $24 a year for subscriber's in the U.S. $31 to
Canada or Mexico. $44 overseas. Mailed first class or equivalent.
(1) Make checks or money orders payable in US funds to private line.
(2) Back issues are five dollars apiece.Specify Issue Number 4 if you
want this issue.
(3) A sample is four dollars.
(4) The mailing list is not available to anyone but me.
C. Mailing address: 5150 Fair Oaks Blvd. #101-348, Carmichael, CA
95608
D. e-mail address: privateline@delphi.com
E. Phone numbers: (916) 978-0810 FAX
F. Submissions: Go for it! Anything semi-technical is strongly
encouraged. I don't run any personality pieces. I pay with
subscriptions.
G. You may post this file to any site or BBS as long as the whole
file is kept intact.
H. This 'patent issue' is well illustrated. It may be hard to follow as
a text file but I intend to keep posting the text of each issue no matter
how they come out.
PRIVATE LINE NUMBER 4: JANUARY/FEBRUARY
I. About The Front Cover
II. Editorial Page
III. Updates and Corrections
IV. Hacking Patents -- A How To Guide
A. Introduction
B. Sidebar -- Quick Start Guide
C. Patent Numbering and Classification
D. Sidebar -- A Tale of Two Classes
E. The Patent Document
F. Patent Bibliography Example
G. Tools and Resources
H. Background and Summary Example
I. List of Patent and Trademark Deposit Libraries
J. Class 379 -- Telephonic Communications
V. Who's Bugging You?: An Interview With Chris Hall
VI. Federal Toll Fraud Law: Section 1029
-----------------------------
I. About The Front Cover
1. "3,142,522 COIN TELEPHONE HOUSING: Norris R. Hall and Richard K.
Thompson, Jr., Indianapolis, Ind., assignors to Bell Telephone
Laboratories, Incorporated, N.Y., a corporation of New York
Filed Dec. 18, 1962, Ser. No. 245,567 10 Claims. (Cl. 312--199)"
The front cover depicts the housing of the 1A1, the first single slot
payphone used in the Bell System. Note the large circular hole for the
rotary dial. The patent for the housing itself was granted in May, 1964.
The 1A1 was introduced in 1965 after seven years of development by Bell
Labs and Western Electric. I found this patent by making a list of
developer's names from articles in the Bell Laboratories Record. I then
looked for those names in many year's worth of the Index of Patents. See
my article on patent searching for information on the different kinds of
indexes.
2. Want to know more about early payphones? Check out Stokes, R.R., "A
Single-Slot Coin Telephone" Bell Laboratories Record (January, 1966) 20
and W. Pfred "A New Coin Telephone" Bell Laboratories Record (December,
1959) 464. Please note that the Record is not the same publication as
the Bell System Technical Journal. The B.S.T.J. is widely available. It
is dense, intimidating and hard to read. It is also indispensable. The
Record, on the other hand, is user friendly. It is well illustrated and
easy to read. It was published until 1984. Look for it. You'll find
valuable background information on how the Bell System set up phone
service for about 75% of America's population.
-----------------------------------------------
II. An Introduction
3. Welcome to the fourth issue of private line. This is the first
national edition! private line is an open, questioning forum about all
things telephonic. It's written with the beginner in mind, but I hope
that everyone can find something interesting here. Readers are
encouraged to submit articles and to forward corrections. I pay with
subscriptions. private line focuses on the technology of the information
age, rather than on the personalities. How did all this get started? The
magazine 2600 rekindled an interest in telephones that had laid dormant
with me for over fifteen years. I read about blue boxing as a teenager
but I didn't know anyone who did it. Many San Francisco Bay Area people
were involved in hacking but there was no way to get in touch them.
Everyone quoted in The San Francisco Chronicle used a fake name. I
experimented a little with coin first phones but that was by myself. I
tried reading telephony books but they were very difficult to
understand. I didn't apply myself and I eventually gave up. That was a
mistake. I graduated from high school, went to work and got involved in
other hobbies and pursuits. And then last year I saw a copy of 2600 for
the first time.
4. What a revelation. I sent for back issues and got a look at what I
had been missing. People were still experimenting with the telephone
system and still having fun doing so. What's more, the technology of
communications was rushing ahead at an incredible speed, producing more
fascinating equipment that I could begin to understand. But I still
didn't know the basics. I hit several libraries and was discouraged to
find that most of the books were as difficult as before. I resolved,
however, to apply myself this time. I started taking notes since I learn
better when I write things out. The first two issues of private line
were a result of that loose collection of notes.
5. I could tell you more about the past but I want to write about the
future. I look forward to sharing what I learn about telephones and
telecommunications. I look forward to seeing anything you have to
contribute. Maybe we can learn together. Thank you!
Tom Farley (Sherman) KD6NSP
----------------------------
III. Updates and Corrections
6. I discussed California Penal Code Section 502.7 in the first issue.
502.7 covers toll fraud. I had a question about subsection (3). It says
that avoiding lawful charges "[b]y use of a code, prearranged scheme, or
other similar stratagem or device whereby the person, in effect, sends
or receives information" is illegal. I wasn't sure what this was about.
I asked if anyone could give me an example of what the legislature
meant.
7. Tom (8STRANO_T@spcvxa.spc.edu) clears this up nicely. He writes,
"Perhaps they mean trying to avoid collect call charges. For example,
let's say I'm in Jersey City, and I want my mom, who lives in Bayonne,
to pick me up to take me home. I don't want to put $.20 in the phone to
make a call, and I don't want her to get the collect call charge. So,
we prearrange this idea: I'll call her collect, and when the operator
asks who the call is from, I give a fake name that we have prearranged
to mean that she should pick me up to drive me home. Then my mom simply
refuses the call, saying 'I don't know who that person is,' she hangs
up, then goes to Jersey City to get me. Neither my mom or I have been
charged for the call, but the information was passed successfully. In
real life, though, I'm not THAT cheap... I CAN spare 20 cents... I guess
some people see small change in terms of cheap transistors and
resistors. But anyway, that what the law seems to mean."
8. I think Tom provided a good example. It takes on even more importance
with new services such as 1-800-COLLECT. You can leave code names that
stand for different things. Biff Barker, for example, to stand for
"Call me back." Interestingly, the technology is so good these days that
phrases like "Call me back" or "My number is . . ." may result in an
operator intercept if you try to record them. True, this process is a
hassle and it takes a long time to do. But it is possible. I suppose
they would charge you with that code section if you had, say, a thousand
'800' calls from your residence that were never completed. And your long
distance company does keep track of those calls . . .
9. In issue 3 I talked about a program that came from Thipdar's Custom
Software. I said it hunted for modem tones. Not so. It's actually a
normal scanning program. It notes modem tones but does not look for them
exclusively.
---------------------------------
IV. Hacking Patents: A How-To Guide (Patent Searching & Telephones)
by Tom Farley
A. Introduction
B. -- Sidebar -- Quick Start Guide
C. Patent Classification
D. -- Sidebar -- A Tale of Two Classes
E. The Patent Document Itself
F. The Search Process
G. Tools and Resources
H. Example of a Background and Summary of the Invention
H. Example of a Patent Bibliography
I. List of Patent and Deposit Libraries
J. Class 379 -- Telephonic Communications
A. Introduction
10. Patent searching is a great way to find out about telephones. It's
low cost and fascinating. Got a question about AT&T's True Voice? Tired
of the hype? Read the patent instead. Interested in pay phones? You'll
find more information in patents than from any other free, public
source. Need telecom clip art that's copyright free? Patents provide.
Too good to be true? Well, you must not expect too much. You will not
find, for example, operating procedures like those in a manual. But you
will find some detailed information that a manual may be based on. Using
patents with other information will get you closer to the goal. You may
find that patent searching becomes a compelling, hypnotic hobby.
11. A patent is a written document with illustrations. Hardcopy versions
of the entire patent are only available at the Patent and Trademark
Office in Washington, D.C. Patent and Trademark Depository Libraries or
PTDL's have microfilm copies of those originals. See page 18 for a list.
In addition, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office gopher has the texts
of 1994 patents online. See the Quick Start Guide if you want to start
looking at patents right now. For the rest of us, let's start the search
process by looking at patent classification. . . (go to paragraph
A. Sidebar -- Quick Start Guide
The Conventional Approach
12. Go to a Patent and Trademark Deposit Libary listed on page 18. Pull
out the microfilm roll for any of the following patents. Thread roll on
viewer. Read the patent.
a) 3,142,522 Payphone housing
b) 3,86,3036 Ground circuit
c) 4,310,726 Early 911 network
d) 4,924,496 COCOT info
e) 5,311,582 Current COCOT
The Internet
13. Do you have net access? Preferably an .edu account? Full text of all
1994 patents were on line as of 12/01/94. The Patent and Trademark
office has a gopher. It pulls files from a database at town.hall.org.
True keyword searches of more than 90,000 documents are possible. You
can enter phrases such as toll fraud, COCOT or paystation and get a
list of relevant patents. You can then select which patent you wish to
view. Check out paragraph
B. Patent Numbering and Classification
14. Each patent gets a permanent number once it's approved. These go in
chronological order. You can get an idea, then, of an invention's age
without looking up its patent. The payphone housing on the front cover,
for example, has patent number 3,142,522. That dates back to mid-1964.
The patent number for the 1994 COCOT we discuss later is 5,311,582.
Tables exist that match dates to numbers. Two thousand patents on
average get approved weekly. More than 5,000,000 patents have been
assigned already. Organizing these patents is a major task.
15. All patents are first put into one of several hundred broad
classes. Some examples are Class 119 for Animal Husbandry, Class 102 for
Ammunition and Explosives and Class 380 for Cryptography. Most telephony
related stuff is put into Class 379: Telephonic Communications. All
classes, including 379, are broken down into subclasses.
16. Take a look at class 379 at the end of this file. See how everything
is arranged? Every conceivable piece of telephone equipment gets a
subclass number along with its class number. Payphone patents start at
subclass 143. So, the COCOT we'll talk about later has the reference
number 379143. That patent deals with other subclasses as well. But 143
is the one that that patent impacts most.
17. The chief problem with subclasses is that the headings are non-
intuitive. That's because the descriptions use 'patenteese' and not
telecom lingo. The Patent and Trademark Office defines these subclasses
but you have to go to a PTDL to look up the vague descriptions. Who
would describe, for example, a toll fraud prevention device with
language like this: "189. Fraud or improper use mitigating or indication
(e.g., 'blue box', 'black box'). Huh? This category is actually quite
broad. It includes equipment that deals with fraudulent tones of all
kinds. It may be a payphone that's designed to deal with red boxing, or
it may involve central office equipment that's designed to detect blasts
of 2600 Hz. Don't rule out a subclass because the wording of a heading
doesn't match your search exactly.
18. Other classes contain other telephone related products. Not
everything is in 379. Telephone booths are in Class 52. Coin collectors
for pay stations go in Class 194. You can look up these related things
with The Index to the U.S. Patent Classification System. I list it under
resources at the end of this article. It is essential for anyone dealing
with patents. Let's now look at the patent document itself. . .
(go to paragraph 20)
C. Sidebar -- A Tale of Two Classes
19. Classifying telephone equipment used to be simpler. Telephony
inventions were in another class altogether: Class 179: Telephony. It
had nice, friendly headings like 'Systems', 'Telephones', 'Switches',
and 'Testing Devices.' It contained 190 subclasses. The breakup of the
Bell System opened telecom to an avalanche of new products, inventors
and companies. This diversity of inventions caused the old class to
collapse after only a year. In 1986, Class 379 was introduced to replace
old 179. The amount of subclasses doubled. Simple headings were replaced
by cryptic ones. Parenthetical statements were devised to explain the
headings. Most don't work. You may get a better understanding of the
new class by photocopying the last revision of 179. At the very least,
you will need a copy of it to do a telephony search before December,
1985.
D. The Patent Document
20. Many, many parts make up a patent. I'll cover the main ones. The
first part is the title. Something complex like, "An Integrated COCOT
and Regulated Paystation Telephone System." Or, "Automatic Telephone
Answering System Using a Single-Tone Signal For Various Operations."
Only rarely will you see a simple title like "Modem With Call Waiting."
The first title is about a payphone that can be a COCOT or a telco
payphone. Two in one. What's more, the phone can be dialed up and set
into either mode with just a few commands. It takes some reading to make
sense out of these titles. Your best bet may be to always look up a
patent that has the right class and subclass number, despite what the
title says.
21. The second interesting part of the patent is its bibliography. It
gives you clue after clue about the invention as well as the entire
field that it belongs in. You'll quickly learn the companies, people,
documents and patents that are important. Use any large libary with
business directories to get names, addresses and phone numbers.
22. The third important part of the patent is the abstract. It is a
legalistic summary of the invention. The abstract is the most widely
accessible part of the patent. That's because each new patent has its
abstract printed in the Official Gazette, a weekly publication of the
Patent and Trademark Office. Hundreds of libraries carry it as well as
some companies. You can look up the abstract in the Gazette, even if you
don't have access to a Patent and Trademark Deposit Libary. An entry in
the Gazette also gives you the patent's number, its title and an
illustration. Correctly interpreting abstracts saves you time. Certain
abstracts grab your attention. In those cases, you know immediately that
a patent is worth the time and effort to get to a Patent and Trademark
Deposit Libary to look it up. Many abstracts, though, leave you
wondering. Relating an abstract to its patent is a matter of practice
through more reading.
23. The background of the invention is the most engaging part of the
patent for general readers. It gives you a technological summary of the
subject involved. For example, a patent about telephone handsets will
contain a background that summarizes handset history and operation.
I've reprinted the background of the COCOT patent on page 10 to give you
a good idea of what they contain. This short summary is a great
introduction to pay phone operation
24. The summary of the invention tells you how the invention works in
fairly non-technical terms. It also provides good details about how the
invention relates to other things in its field. The COCOT we discuss,
for example, has a specific procedure to deal with credit cards. The
summary gives details of calling card principles in order to relate the
invention's claims to everyday practice. I reprint the COCOT summary on
page 10 as well.
25. The body of the text provides the nitty gritty details. It is the
longest part of the document. The text is always linked to
illustrations. It is next to impossible to figure out a patent without
seeing the whole thing. Here's one quotation that shows you the problem.
Each number represents a diagram or a part of diagram:
"Assuming the voice message system is collect/return, control
relay 93 is provided in co-pending application Ser. No.
07/740,576 incorporated by reference above. The coin refund
inhibit relay 73, coupled in series between the collect/return
relay 93 and the coin relay 100, includes a pair of control
windings 75, 76. One end of each of windings 75, 76 is coupled
in common to receive a coil energizing voltage. The other ends
of control windings 75, 76 are respectively coupled to receive
"relay off" and "relay on" signals from the microprocessor 45,
to delineate the position of switch 74 in series with the coin
relay 100. As shown in FIG. 5, switch 74 is closed so as to
complete the circuit between the collect/return control relay
93 and coin relay 100 allowing for a firing of the coin relay
100. If the microprocessor 45, however, issues a relay off
signal, then the switch 74 opens (as noted by the phantom line)
to turn off the coin relay 100. . ."
You can tell that the body provides enough information to do some
serious reverse engineering. I hope this article persuades you to visit
a Patent and Trademark Deposit Libary so that you can look at what is
available. Or at least to look up a few abstracts at your local libary.
Let's now turn to the search process itself.
F. The Search Process
26. Go to the nearest patent and trademark deposit libary if you are
impatient and you know what patent you want to look at. These are the
only places that have the complete, illustrated patent on microfilm.
Not sure what to look for? Then you have to choose a subclass to
investigate. Let's say you've picked subclass 189, the one about
detecting toll fraud. What then? Well, again, the easiest answer is to
tell you to get to a Patent and Trademark Deposit Libary. It has the
most tools and you'll waste the least time. But I can make a case for
not going to the PTDL first, even if you have one near you.
27. PTDL's can be intense, intimidating and somewhat crowded. Why not
start with a lower key setting first? I'd recommend a beginner go to a
state college or university that carries the Official Gazette. You'll
usually find it in the Government Documents section. Such a libary will
have some supporting materials as well. You can get familiar with patent
publications and the microfilm reader there, rather than at a PTDL.
Let's go through an example of using a libary that has just the Gazette.
28. Okay, you're now in the Patent section at your libary. Find the
Manual of Classification. It's in two loose leaf binders. This is your
key to the whole classification system. It's a compilation of all the
different patent classes. You'll find Class 379 in there along with
everything else. No pictures but very compelling. All of technology is
categorized in one work. A libary may keep only the current Manual in
the Government Document section; older ones may be kept out in the open
stacks.
29. Let's say you're sticking with subclass 189 in telephonic
communications. You need to make a list of the recent patents in that
field. How? Look for the Index of Patents Issued From The United States
Patent and Trademark Office. A long title for some small books. You'll
find them near the Manual. The Index of Patents is put out every year in
two parts. Stronger libraries have more back issues.
30. The first part of the Index of Patents lists patent holders by name.
Organizations such as Bell Laboratories, Protel and Motorola are listed
by name as well. Next to the patent holder's name is the class and
subclass number of their invention. But no description of the invention
is given. A more useful tool is the second part. It lists patents by
Class and subclass. What it calls subjects. A list of all patents
issued in the last ten years may take only a few minutes to look up if
you have a quiet subclass. Classes like 149, "Post pay coin
collection", however, may not have had a single patent issued as far
back as you can search. Don't be discouraged. Developers may be
producing equipment in your field but they may not have decided to go
through the patent process. Remember, too, that Class 379 changed in
1985.
31. Well, now you have a list of patent numbers in your subclass. The
next step is to look up their abstracts in the Official Gazette. You'll
want to see if it's worth it to look up the entire patent at a PTDL.
Smaller libraries take the Gazette on microfiche or microfilm.
Microfiche is easier to use since you don't have to thread a machine.
The disadvantage is that the image produced on the reader is smaller
than that with microfilm. A small paper envelope holds each issue of the
Gazette on fiche. A single issue may consist of 10 or 15 individual
pieces of film. The issues themselves are arranged by date and patent
numbers in a file cabinet with shallow, wide trays. Class 379 is usually
2/3d's of the way back in the packet. It's a laborious process to look
up several abstracts but it's okay to look up a few. And you'll get
motivated to get to the PTDL where the hardcopy volumes are.
32. Microfilm is a different story. Looking up several abstracts is very
time consuming. Threading the film onto the microfilm reader takes
time, patience and practice. Don't be afraid to ask for help. I've had
librarians admit that they have problems threading the machines. I do
most of my film reading on the microfilm readers that double as copiers.
These machines tend to be in good repair since they make money. It is
really silly to thread up a conventional reader, only to have to thread
another machine to make a copy when you see what you want. Looking up
abstracts this way gives you an insight into the patent process and
gives you practice for the PTDL. Patents are on 16mm film but it threads
the same as the larger film of the Gazette. Let's now look at what the
Patent and Trademark Deposit Libary has to offer.
33. A few PTDL's have every patent ever issued on microfilm. Most don't.
Much of what we are interested in, though, goes back no more than 30
years. Every PTDL should have at least that many patents on file. Start
viewing the patents on your list in case you want to get going. You'll
see shelf after shelf with thousands of small boxes of microfilm. Most
PTDL's allow you to grab the roll yourself and start threading. You'll
also see the Gazette in hardcopy. You'll appreciate immediately how
much faster it is to search those instead of looking at film versions of
the Gazette. Speaking of speed, every PTDL has a CD ROM machine that's
great for doing recent patent research. It's called CASSIS.
34. CASSIS stands for Cla