214 DEAR HACKER

214 DEAR HACKER

month to clear off a couple of bad billings. But many businesses are in exactly this sort of situation, and needless to say they can get a bit tired of it pretty quickly.

Anonymous

We’d like to compile a list of long distance companies that charge for unanswered calls and busy signals. It could prove invaluable to consumers who are shopping around. If you want to help us on this, call or write us. We’d also like to know how much of a hassle each company creates for removing wrong numbers from the bill.

Dear 2600: Why are there different subscription rates for “corporations”?

Corporation

Ideally, we are trying to make 2600 available to anyone who wants it. This means that the subscription price must be low. The individual subscription price barely covers the cost of printing, mailing, layout, and other costs that are involved in pro- ducing a monthly publication. One solution is to charge more for those who either have a lot of money, will make lots of copies for their employees, place copies in their library on public display, or stand to gain financially from reading 2600 (those who earn a living beefing up security).

Although we do not copyright our issues, we would prefer that companies refrain from making copies and regularly distributing them. We are told that many do— especially certain telephone companies.

The amount we currently charge for people who represent businesses is rather small compared to many other newsletters and security publications which can actually be in the hundreds of dollars—and many of these are quarterly or bimonthly.

Finally, for those who have not asked, the corporate subscribers receive the exact same edition of 2600 as do all other subscribers.

T H E M A G I C O F T H E C O R P O R AT E W O R L D

Having different subscription rates is a solution that should not hurt anyone. The higher priced subscriptions help us maintain the same service for those who have less money—who are largely the same people who write the articles that appear in 2600.

Dear 2600: Thanks much for providing lots of useful information. Here is an

ironic little announcement about the new president of the Coalition for Open Systems.

From Courier published by Xerox, Palo Alto, California: “The Corporation for Open Systems has named Lincoln Faurer, former director of the National Security Agency, as the group’s first president. Faurer was chosen on the basis of his extensive experience in the stan- dardization process and in negotiations with vendors. Membership in COS currently stands at nearly 40 companies.”

kI Those are not just 40 little companies either. They include Bell Labs, Boeing, DEC,

Kodak, NCR, Northern Telecom, Xerox, and others on the executive committee alone!

We are sure that Mr. Faurer will enjoy running future discussions of data encryption and other standards with the rest of the coalition.

Dear 2600: Congratulations on the apparent success of your newsletter. I learn

something from each issue. Your points on the power of computers and the information that is processed on them are correct. And you provide a valuable service by attempting to educate your readers and (sometimes) chide those who would use the information improperly.