well its late tonight (or early tomorow) and ive decided to post my daily text
now instead of later, so here ya go!

*************************DISCLAIMER&INTRO***********************************
This file is for educational purposes  only. I take no responsibility for how
you use this information.  And also, Please excuse the mistakes in these
files, sometimes you just make mistakes when your typing up texts.
****************************************************************************

Origianlly writen by Robin Hood 
---------------------------[ start ]--------------------
***CALL THE PHONE BOOTH: (714)497-5999**

                Cable Descrambling
              (uploaded by Robin Hood)

If you have cable TV but are not fortunate enough to have the Premium
services, here is a simple way to steal Cinemax, The Movie Channel, Showtime,
The Disney Channel, and any other service that appears as a bussing fuzzy
picture (that you can ALMOST get clearly by fine tuning).  This method also
works on channels that appear as a lined flashing screen that produce a
beeping sound.  These channels are not scrambled, but instead a garbage
transmission that is sent at the same frequency.  Therefore, in order to
recieve the movie services clearly, you must filter out the garbage. 

Here is a simple way to do this:

Examine the back of your TV set.  Find the Vhf antenna terminals (these are
the antenna teerminals that the cable service is hooked to).  Get a piece of
antenna wire (bout 3 feet long).  Strip one end of the wire and attach it to
the VHF terminals along the with the cable.  Tune into one of the movie
services and adjust the fine uner until you get the cleansest picture.  Cut
off about 1/4 inch of the antenna wire and adjust the fine tuner.  Continue
to do this untill you get a good picture (you should not have to cut off more
then 6 inches of the antenna wire).  Get a piece of aluminum foil and wrap
it around the antenna wire.  Slide it up and down untill you have a perfect
picture.  This is a simple yet effective way to get movies for free.

More in depth info on descramblers and converters ma be obtained by writing
CABLE FACTS, box 711-R, Pataskala, Oh 43062.  They have an excellent
publication available for $8.95.

Also write to RANDOM ACCESS, box 41770-r Pheanix, Az 85080.  Ask for their
Subscription TV Manual that deals with video scrambling techniques.  THE
TELEPHONE BOOTH [714 497 5999 PHREAK BOARD & OVER 40 G-FILES
-----------------------[ END ] ---------------------------------

                                GENiUS

64 responses total.

Remember, im not the original writer of these files, i just like to share my
information =)

Again please post in the cyberpunk conf.  Thanks.

Analog filtering?  This sounds very retro-80s.

Genius, another thing you might want to do is put all of the articles in the
same item (problably in the "A new phreaking article every day" thing) as new
responses. If you need an example of how this would work, you can look at
summer conf's #106 and 119, where I posted the story of my life. #119 is just
an item with continuous updates.

Re #2: There's really no point in trying to get certain types of content to
appear in only certain places on Grex.  You can't make people do it, and you 
can link it.  So discuss it here and there too.

Thanx for the idea don (#4) i think ill update # 124 everyday instead of
posting a new article every day. And in RE to #5, i totally agree. Since
people automaticaly come to this conf. when they log in, i feel that more
people will be able to make use of at least be able to read it then just
posting in "cyberpunks"  And yer, this is very retro80's (i believe it was
typeed up in '83)  Seeya later, and dont 4get to read #124 everyday!!!!!!

About that retro stuff, I don't think there'd be much of a point in posting
that if your intent was to distribute phreaking techniques. On the other hand,
if you're posting it to document "a peek into a clandestine world," then it's
a great idea to use the retro stuff, because it would be much harder to get
into any sort of ethical/legal trouble. Overall, I've been enjoying the
articles, and as soon as I get offline I'm going to try that 800 number from
124#0.

Yah don, im not posting many up-to-date articles for the legal reasons and
because there harder to find =)   Plus, the old texts are fun to read...

Cprompt, don't take this too personally, but...
 
Advice for people new to Usenet News has long been "Read a group
for a while to get a feel for it, BEFORE you post."  It's obvious
that you did not read much of Agora before deciding that it was
"hacker heaven", which it is not.  You call yourself "genius",
and you don't know that?
 
The stuff you're posting is awfully stale to boot.  This one is
a history lesson at best.  Current boxes won't even give you an
output signal for a scrambled channel you're not allowed to
decode.  At the end of your pay-per-view, the screen goes blank.
 
This fact has been used to nab pirates.  At the end of one fight,
the screens of all the legitimate subscribers went blank.  However,
the transmission continued, and all the hacked-to-be-always-on
boxes displayed an ad with a voice track for a "FREE T-shirt!  Just
call 1-800-WE-SCREW!"  After giving their names and addresses to
the operators, the dopes who called got nice letters in the mail
allowing them to either pay for the service they'd been stealing
or be prosecuted for cable piracy.

First off Russ im purposely posting old info because of legal issues.  The
stuff im postiing is just history of old BBS's that i feel are interesting.
Now maybe you dont think they are, but in that case, DONT READ IT!  and
another thing, hacking is not a bad thing.  I'm sick of all you people who
instantly think of some sort of bad person when you here the word "hacker"
of "phreaker"  yet, youve never even met the person! And anywayz a true hacker
follows ethics.  Maybe you should read the "hackers manifesto" you should be
able to find it anywhere on the web.  And by the way, I am  a GENiUS =)

To me at least, this sort of thing is more interesting as a history lesson
than as a how-to.  I've always been fascinated with the early days of
computers, not having been there myself, and this sort of ties in with that
interest.  So I guess I'm casting another vote for "if you don't like it,
don't read it."

(Cprompt -- there's another reason to post these all in one item, actually.
That way, people who aren't interested can ignore one item rather than having
to ignore each new one as it comes up)

Like i said, after today, i shall post my daily text in #124. 

I concur with #11 -- these are great primary sources for history lessons.
Given that they are outdated and thus no longer useful, I think they would
make great additions to any History of Computers course.

Actually, Michigan Tech still uses this scrambling system for the Disney
Channel.  (I bet they bought the whole schpiel from another cable system
that upgraded to Starbase or some such.)  I know people who descramble it
with $13 Jameco _Interference Filter Kits_ ("FOR EXPERIMENTAL USE ONLY".)
HBO and Showtime appear to be trapped out entirely, though.

This looks suspiciously like spam to me.  I'm not at all convinced
information on how to steal from the cable company belongs on grex (it
is illegal, you know).  The text also invites you to send money to some
address -- this is a comercial solicitation, and I don't think we really
want to see agora swamped by hordes of commercial solicitations (even
legal ones) -- do we really want every item in agora to start off with
"Hi", "GRAND OPENING!", "It pays to read this message!!!", "Never pay a
long distance bill again!", and of course, "MONICA   BARES IT ALL!" ?

re 15  I pretty much agree it doen't belong in Agora. I think the text as
long as it's old school cracking is an interesting addition to the cyberpunk
conf.  I also agree that the posts shouldn't try to engage in comercial
activities except in the classifieds conf.  Would the author of these posts
be willing to freeze them in Agora, and restart the item in cyberpunk?

        I'm curious - if someone sends a signal to you, but charges you for
modifying it, but you modify it yourself, is it still illegal?

        in re #15:

        how about if the poster edits out addresses or other commercial
        sounding elements which are not essential to the posting?

        just because an action is illegal does not mean that a description
        of it, even a highly detailed one, is also.

Re #17: I believe it's theft of services; you're getting a pay channel you
didn't pay for.  So yes, I'm certain it's illegal.  Whether it's immoral is
probably more open to debate.

I think you also agree to some stuff when you contract to have the signal sent
to you.  In most places I've lived, the signal comes down a wire that they
disconnect if you don't pay for it (or at least if you don't pay for it but
the previous tenants did).

But if you've never asked for the signal to be sent in the first place?

        The Disney channel now offers itself as a 'basic' cable channel
, instead of being a 'premimum' channel.

Not here, it doesn't.

        Right, I'm aware that the signal comes down a wire, and that signal
can be shut off at any moment if you don't pay for the service - it's clear
that that's a service the cable company is providing.  Now, if you provide
the same service yourself - put up your own dishes and feed it in via coax
to your television, it's not illegal in the slightest.  How is the decrypting
service thea they're providing different?

re 15, 

1) Even if it may be illegal to the letter, it's not to the spirit -- and
definately not unethical. Only in the most backwater of towns (those which
probably don't have premium channels anyway) would you find a reciever like
that which could have its signal be descrambled; all of the new systems have
loads of safeguards, so nobody's going to use this article for any sort of
malicious purpose.

2) Posting this stuff into cyberpunk is a waste of time. Cyberpunk (along with
most of the other conferences, like I've mentioned before at many occasions)
is pretty much dead, so nobody's going to read it there. As an emperical
support of this idea, I wouldn't have come upon these articles had they been
in cyberpunk, and had they been placed only there I would have missed a very
interesting lesson in the history of modern technology.

3) The commercial fluff around it is entirely inconsequential -- I don't even
remember seeing any, so it wasn't something glaring. If it's really a problem,
then I'm sure genius could strip that stuff off before he posts. Besides, this
article is years and years old; nobody's still making money off of it, and
it would be ridiculous to exclusively post this in classified just because
it has a dollar sign or two in it.

It's dead as long as you say it's said.  If you want people to post
there, then you have to put stuff there.

Number 25 pretty tells how i feel (oh and add "if you dont like it, dont read
it")

  If the cyberpunk conference is really dead, what does that tell you
  about whether people want to read about or discuss this stuff on Grex?

  I'm not saying don't post it, I'm just saying that if it's *really* the
  case that nobody will read it if you put it in the right place for it,
  then it's probably the case that nobody's all that interested in it anyway..

A conference doesn't necessarily die because nobody is interested in the
topic; it can just as easily die when one key user who was generating a lot
of volume leaves, or when a few users are away for a while and don't post,
or simply when all the running conversations end and nobody enters a new one
quickly enough.  In addition to a whole bunch of willing participants, a
conference needs _momentum_, especially since most of us (yeah, I'll include
myself in this one) would rather talk in an active item than start a new one
or revive an old one.

I went and poked around a bit in the cyberpunk conference yesterday, and it
certainly looks like a conference that's lost its momentum rather than one
with nobody who cares about the topic.  You don't get over 100 items, many
of them with responses well into this year, on a topic that nobody cares
about.  

Part of a fw's job, if I understand correctly, is to link related items 
into their conference, for precisely the reasons at work here.  When new 
users come in and start posting on a topic, they're not likely to go and 
find the "right" conference first, they're likely to post in agora.  
There's nothing wrong with this.  If the item falls into a topic for 
which there is another conference, great!  Link the item, and encourage 
people who read the item to check out that other conference if they like 
this topic.  This is how old conferences get new activity:  when new 
people find out about them.  
  There's no such thing as an item that "shouldn't" be in agora.  
Collections of specific, related items (like classifieds) should 
probably be redirected to the appropriate conference, but even those 
sometimes can't find a home outside agora:  witness the continuing 
adventures of bdhN in wacky chicagoland.  What we have here is one or 
two agora items which, it just so happens, might also be of interest to 
the readers of cyberpunk.  Readers of cyberpunk can take this as an 
opportunity to interest new people in cyberpunk, but there's nothing 
wrong with it having been posted here.  

Ooh.  Metadiscussion.  Forget.

re 28, I agree with 29. Note that the only active conferences are agora, coop,
and cflirt. Then come some semiactive ones, garage, jelly, and the helper cfs.
Most of the rest are dead, D-E-D dead. I don't even bother to look at the
other conferences to check for anything interesting anymore, and I doubt
others do either. Case in point: during the summer, I posted The Story of My
Life in the writing conference. To this day there are no responses. I then
posted it to the summer agora conference, where it got discussion via
responses and lots of talk in party. TSoML "belongs" in writing just like
these articles with cyberpunk, but it's useless to put them there. People tend
to crowd around the main areas and stay out of the back alleys.

Yes but have you actually *looked* at the cyberpunk conf Mr. Joffe?  Please
come and browse our many active items before you dismiss us out of hand.
You might even learn something, and not just about blue boxes. :-)

There are lots of conferences that would *appear* to be dead to the casual
observer that are in my .cflist.  And they're in a lot of other people's
.cflists.  When something new gets entered, all those people see it, and
discussion picks up again for a while.

re 33, yes, I've seen the cyberpunk conf. The newest items have been the
phreaker texts which you put in, and nothing of much consequence (or
warranting much discussion, for that matter) has been put in for quite some
time. Re 34, that's the whole point -- articles are so seldom that only
hardcore diehards are going to pick them up -- the rest of the world will
never notice them.

Thanx to all ya ppl who are reading my posts +) (and thanks for the
compliments)well, heres todays text:

               "Loops I've Known and Loved"

   No self-respecting Phone Phreak can go through life without knowing what
a
loop is, how to use one, and the types that are available.  The loop is a
great
alternate communication medium that has many potential uses that haven't even
been tapped yet.  In order to explain what a loop is, it would be helpful if
you
would visualize two phone numbers (lines) just floating around in the Telco
central office.  Now, if you (and a friend perhaps) were to call these two
numbers at the same time, POOOOFFFF!!!, you are now connected together.  I
hear
what you're saying out there ..., "Big deal" or "Why should mother bell
collect
two MSU's (message units) for one lousy phone call!?" Well ...  think again.
Haven't you ever wanted someone to call you back, but were reluctant to give
out
your home phone number (like the last time you tried to get your friends'
unlisted number from the business office)?  Or how about a collect call to
your
friend waiting on a loop, who will gladly accept the charges?  Or better yet,
stumbling a loop that you discover has multi-user capability (for those
late-night conference).  Best of all is finding a non- supervised loop that
doesn't charge any MSU's or tolls to one or both parties.  Example:  many
moons
ago, a loop affectionately known as 'The 332 Loop' was non-sup on one 'side'.
I
had my friend in California dial the free (non-sup) side, (212) 332 - 9906
and I
dialed the side that charged, 332-9900.  As you can see, I was charged one
MSU,
and my friend was charged zilch, for as long as we wished to talk!!!


   Ahhhh ....  have I perked your intrest yet?  If so, here is how to find a
loop of your very own.  First, do all of your loop searching at NIGHT!  This
is
because the loops serve a genuine test function which Telco uses during the
day.
(We don't want to run into an irate lineman now, do we?) To find a loop,
having
two phone numbers is a definite plus.  If not, get a friend to dial numbers
at
his location.  Last resort, try dialing from two adjacent pay phones.  Now,
get
your trusty white pages, and turn to the page where it lists Metro NY
exchanges
and the number of MSU's from your exchange.  The idea is to get a loop that
is
only one MSU from your calling area so you don't go bankrupt trying to find
a
working one.  So write down in a list all of these exchanges.  The following
are
common loop endings (EXC stands for the exchange):

Manhatten and The Bronx ---------- EXC - 9977 & EXC - 9979
Brooklyn and Queens -------------- EXC - 9900 & EXC - 9906

Armed with the preceding info, dial the tone side of a loop.  This would be
the 9906 or 9979 side.  The best thing that could happen now is that you will
be
able to hear yourself, or friend through the loop connection.  Eureka, you've
found a loop!!!  Unfortunately, this doesn't happen too often.  Here are the
more common possibilites:

   1.  You can hear through the loop (not muted) but there is a 1/2 second
click
every 10 seconds that interrupts the audio.  Good for backup use, but the
click is super annoying.

2.  One side of the loop is busy; try it again later.

   3.  The tone disappears, but you cannot hear through it (the loop is muted,
try again in a month or so).

   4.  You get "The number you have reached" recording.  No more loop in that
exchange, go on to next.

   Most loops fall into catagory #3, but they do become unmuted from time to
time.  Let's say you're dialing 941-0226.  You
won't hear it rotary dial those numbers, but you will hear another number or
series of numbers in rotary step pulses.  That's the selector we mentioned
earlier.  Let's say that after you dialed 941-0226, you heard a 5 being pulsed
out.  What does that mean?  The selector is the decision-making part of the
phone call.  Different prefixes are stored in different levels in each central
office.  In this particular case, 941 happens to be stored in level 5 in
whatever office you're calling from.  There's no rhyme or reason to it; the
selector level could be anything up to three digits in length.  (If it was
three digits, you'd hear each individual digit get pulsed out.)  The toll
center is usually level 1 and the operator is usually level 0.  So what can
be
done with this information?  If, after dialing 941-0226, you enter your own
rotary five, you'll once again hear the click-click which is your cue for MF
tones.

While step offices have no special phone phreak trapping capabilities, they
a just as dangerous as any other office as far as being traced.  They have
what's known as trap and trace.  If a certain person (or computer) is begin
harrassed, they'll put a trap plug on a particular line.  If you happen to
call
into that number, you won't be able to hang up until the other party does.

                               Some More Tricks

   In some step areas, local calls are limited to certain exchanges that have
th same first digits as yours.  For example, the 222 exchange can dial 235 and
263 as local calls.  But in order to call the 637 exchange, you must first
dial
a 1 which makes the call non-local.  If you dial a 6, you'll get an immediate
reorder.  But somewhere between you and the 637 exchange, is the 231, 233,
235,
and 239 exchanges.  There's no 237.  So you dial 2.  Clunk-clunk.  You dial
3.
Click. And then you dial 7. Ching-clunk. It goes to the 637 exchange!
Similarly, a 281 from he 287 exchange could wind up in 471.  Why?  Because
these numbers are all coming from the same switching center.  That just
happens
to be the way step works (and in some cases crossbar).  If you could seize the
222 trunk, you'd enter KP+25500+ST to reach 222-5500.  To reach 637-5500,
you'd
enter KP+755000+ST.


   Then there's "step crashing"--if the number you're calling is 675-2888,
and
it's busy, you can dial 675-2887, and in between the last pulse of your rotary
dial and the time it would start to ring, you can flash you switchhook
extremely fast.  If you time it right, you'll hear an enormous loud click at
your end.  Then, all of the sudden, you'll cut into your party's conversation.
(This works bacause of step's realy system.  One relay has determined that
the
line you dialed is open.  Then, before a second relay sends along the ring
pulse, you throw in a 1, which jumps the number you dialed up by one, and
fools
the system into conn FOR DARK PRIEST.  THANKING YOU IN
ADVANCE, AND ENJOY YOUR LOOPS.

   *******DARK PRIEST********
   *******DARK FOREST*********
   ********DARK DAY***********
   ******END*********

Are there any step exchanges left in the world?

I was wondering that, too.  I'm finding this a really interesting history
lesson, though.  Sorta like the old 40hex files I have.

It's like _The Anarchist's Cookbook_.  Somewhat outdated, and almost 
certainly not useful information for most people, but somehow just 
fascinating to read.  :)

- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss