Phreaking, The Nightmare For The

Phone System
Alpha Version - Computer and Society -
IKI40000

Abstract
Computers and the Internet can offer great benefits to society. However they can also present
opportunities for crime, much of it just traditional crime using new technology tools. Most people has
known or familiar to computer crime such as Hacking and Cracking. Just as hacking, phone phreaking
became a word meaning "Using computers for evil purposes" and eventually "any evil use of
technology". Phone phreak known as phreaker, a hacker of the telephone system. A phreak, (or a
phreaker) is someone who wants to learn about the telephone system. A phreaker explores the telephone
system. Some are just electronic voyagers who want to understand how telecom structure works. Others
exploit vulnerabilities in the system to get free long-distance service, re-route calls, change phone
numbers, or eavesdrop on conversations [7]. This digital product describes the phreaking activities which
attack vulnerabilities of phone system.At the beginning, explained about definition of phreaking and its
history. Through of this digital paper you can open your mind about phreaking, how to do it, who did it,
why its illegal, the impact of it and other information about it. This paper also explains how to avoid this
kind of attack to your phone system whether your home phone or celular phone. You will be aware about
this phreaking thing, before somebody or anybody that you know be attacked.

1. Introduction
Most people has known or familiar to computer crime such as Hacking and Cracking. Hacking is known
as an act of penetrating computer systems to gain knowledge about the system and how it works [4]. This
activity is illegal because it demands free access to all data, in order to get it. Cracking is a serious form
of hacking, the cracker has intention to damage the system or destroy data. This activity may cause
considerable or even irreparable damage for the victim. But Hacking and cracking are not only attacking
computer system, there is another crime that attack phone system that is known by phreaking. Phreaking
can be described as using a computer or other device to trick a phone system. Typically, phreaking is
used to make free calls or to have calls charged to a different account.
Just as hacking, phone phreaking became a word meaning "Using computers for evil purposes" and
eventually "any evil use of technology". Phone phreak known as phreak, a hacker of the telephone
system. A phreak, (or a phraker) is someone who wants to learn about the telephone system. Some
people who claim to be phreaks are thieves who do nothing but rip off long distance service. They use
mischievous and mostly illegal ways in order to not pay for some sort of telecommunications bill, order,
transfer, or other service. It often involves usage of highly illegal boxes and machines in order to defeat

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the security that is set pu to avoid this sort of happening. The cellular/ mobile phone system is one that is
perfectly set up to be exploited by phreaks with the proper knowledge and equipment. Phreaks can attack
cellular phone in three general areas; using that in an unlocked car (or an unattended walk-about model),
modifying the chip set to look like a different phone, or recording the phone number/ID number
combinations sent by other local cellular phones, and using it.

2. The Beginning Of The Phreak

In 1964, at MIT arrived a student by the name of Stewart Nelson, who was extremely interested in the
telephone. Before entering MIT, he had built autodialers, cheese boxes, and many more gadgets [3]. But
when he came to MIT he became even more interested in "fone-hacking". After a little while he naturally
started using the PDP-1, the schools computer at that time, and from there he decided that it would be
interesting to see whether the computer could generate the frequencies required for blue boxing.
Now there were more people phreaking than the ones at MIT. Most people have heard of Captain Crunch
(not the cereal), he also discovered how to take rides through the phone system, with the aid of a small
whistle found in a cereal box . By blowing this whistle, he generated the magical 2600hz and into the
mouthpiece it sailed, giving him complete control over the system. One time he made about 1/4 of the
calls coming out of San Francisco [1]. He finally got caught after a long adventurous career. After he was
caught he was put in jail and forced to make promised that he would not teach other inmates how to box
calls.
The first major breakthrough in manipulating the phone system was when Bell Laboratories published a
book that told all of the tones used by the phone company to operate phones [1]. When we would do
certain things the switching systems would know because a tone was sent down the line that told it what
to do. When we hung up the phone it would send a 2600 hertz sound (cycles per second) then the
switching system would know that we had hung up [1]. This book told all of the tones that the phone
system used, some people made what was called a Blue Box, this was a little box that simulated tones.
We call a free number and then send the tone down the line, the switching system would disconnect from
the number we where calling, but we were still on the line. we would get a little noise and we could call
anywhere for free and our bill would show that we had been talking to the free number the whole time.

3. Phone Service Vulnerabilities

Phone-phreaking as a social practice is still very much alive at this moment. Today, phone-phreaking is
thriving much more vigorously than the better-known and worse-feared practice of computer hacking.
New forms of phreaking are spreading rapidly, following new vulnerabilities in sophisticated phone
services.

3.1. Cellular Phones

Cellular phones are especially vulnerable. Their chips can be re-programmed to present a false caller ID
and avoid billing. Doing so also avoids police tapping, making cellular-phone abuse a favorite among
drug-dealers. Call-sell operations using pirate cellular phones can, and have, been run right out of the

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backs of cars, which move from cell to cell in the local phone system, retailing stolen long-distance
service, like some kind of demented electronic version of the neighborhood ice-cream truck.

3.2. Private Branch Exchange

Private branch-exchange phone systems in large corporations can be penetrated. Phreaks dial-up a local
company, enter its internal phone-system, hack it, then use the company’s own PBX system to dial back
out over the public network, causing the company to be stuck with the resulting long-distance bill. This
technique is known as diverting. Diverting can be very costly, especially because phreaks tend to travel in
packs and never stop talking. Perhaps the worst by-product of this PBX fraud is that victim companies
and TELECOM have sued one another over the financial responsibility for the stolen calls, thus
enriching not only shabby phreaks but well-paid lawyers.

3.3. Voice-mail systems

Voice-mail systems can also be abused. Phreaks can seize their own sections of these sophisticated
electronic answering machines, and use them for trading codes or knowledge of illegal techniques.
Voice-mail abuse does not hurt the company directly, but finding supposedly empty slots in our
company’s answering machine all crammed with phreaks eagerly chattering and hey-duding one another
in impenetrable jargon can cause sensations of almost mystical repulsion and dread.
Worse yet, phreaks have sometimes been known to react truculently to attempts to clean up the
voice-mail system. Rather than humbly acquiescing to being thrown out of their playground, they may
very well call up the company officials at work (or at home) and loudly demand free voice-mail
addresses of their very own. Such bullying is taken very seriously by spooked victims.
Acts of phreak revenge against straight people are rare, but voice-mail systems are especially tempting
and vulnerable, and an infestation of angry phreaks in one’s voice-mail system is no joke. They can erase
legitimate messages, spy on private messages, harass users with recorded taunts and obscenities. They’ve
even been known to seize control of voice-mail security, and lock out legitimate users, or even shut down
the system entirely.

3.4. Others
Cellular phone-calls, cordless phones, and ship-to- shore telephony can all be monitored by various
forms of radio. This kind of passive monitoring is spreading explosively today. Technically
eavesdropping on other people’s cordless and cellular phone-calls is the fastest- growing area in
phreaking today. This practice strongly appeals to the lust for power and conveys gratifying sensations of
technical superiority over the eavesdropping victim. Monitoring is rife with all manner of tempting evil
mischief. Simple prurient snooping is by far the most common activity. But credit-card numbers
unwarily spoken over the phone can be recorded, stolen and used. And tapping people’s phone-calls
(whether through active telephone taps or passive radio monitors) does lend itself conveniently to
activities like blackmail, industrial espionage, and political dirty tricks.
It should be repeated that telecommunications fraud, the theft of phone service, causes vastly greater
monetary losses than the practice of entering into computers by stealth.

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4. How It Works

4.1. Basic Knowledge

There are many ways to cheat the phone system. One way to do it is to call a business number [1]. These
usually have something set up for their traveling employees, so they can call in punch in their code and
their phone bills will be charged to the company. Phreakers spend a lot of time finding these codes and
sell it to ordinary people who want to make a lot of calls and don’t want to pay for them. Companies
have been hit by bills in the hundreds of thousands. Someone can go outside and connect onto people’s
lines. There are hundred’s of ways to get free calls.

4.2. Boxes
These are boxes that take advantage of holes in the phone system [1]:

• Black Box: Makes it seem to the phone company that the phone was never picked up.
• Blue Box: Emits a 2600hz tone that allows someone to do such thing as stack a trunk line, kick the
operator off line, and others.
• Red Box: Simulates the noise of a quarter, nickel, or dime being dropped into a payphone.
• Cheese Box: Turns home phone into a pay phone to throw off traces (a red box is usually needed in
order to call out.)
• Clear Box: Gives a dial tone on some of the old SxS payphones without putting in a coin. into phone
lines and extract by eavesdropping, or crossing wires, etc.
• Beige Box - Basically the way to connect in to someone else’s phone line from anywhere that you can
get to the wires. People used these to eavesdrop, or to run up other peoples bills. Others were done like
calling and harassing operators (from other peoples phones) to get their phones shut off.
• Purple Box: Makes all calls made out from our house seem to be local calls.
The most easy box and practical box is the beige box.

4.3. ANI
This stands for Automatic Number Identification. This is a number that ussually dialed and it tells what
line someone are on. It is very useful when messing around in a can. Because the phone lines are not
labeled.

4.4. How Do Phones Work

Some basics are that when phone hung up, the voltage running through the line is about 48 volts [1].
When phone is picked up it drains power. If there is more than one phone picked up in the house it drains
even more (that’s why we can tell when someone picks up on the line, the volume goes down because it
is also powering another phone). If someone calls a person, the phone company computers detect how

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much voltage is on the line, if it is below 48 volts then it knows that person are talking to someone else.
If it detects 48 volts then it sends a voltage charge down the line(this makes the bell ring)[1]. One box
called the Black Box was very useful. It was just a resistor connected to the phone. When someone
called, they would be connected to our line and the ringing they heard was actually ours. When we
picked up the phone the voltage dropped below the 48 volts and the ringing stopped. What the resistor
did was not let the voltage drop far enough. The phone would still ring (all we had to do was turn the
ringer off) because the phone company thought we hadn’t picked up the phone yet. But since the phone
company connected the person to our line before we even picked up, we could talk to the person and the
phone company still thought that the phone was ringing so nobody would get billed. This no longer
works because the phone company made it so that the caller is not connected until the voltage reaches the
correct point. So there is not known a way to get around this anymore. Today the ring we hear is just a
simulated sound that the phone company sends down our line. If we have our hands touching the green
and red wires when someone calls that line we will get a little shock.

5. Tehnique
Below is phreaking tricks that ussually done in America and UK :

5.1. Phreak On Cellular-Phone System

(taken from http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/mobile/column/bitmap/1999/12/16/cellular.jpg)

There are three general areas when phreaking cellular phones [11] :

1. Using one that found in an unlocked car or an unattended walk about model
2. Modifying the chip set to look like a different phone

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3. Recording the phone number or ID number combinations sent by other local cellular phones, and
using those as our own.
Most cellular phones include a crude "password" system to keep unauthorized users from using the
phone - however, dealers often set the password (usually a 3 to 5 digit code) to the last four digits of the
customer’s mobile phone number. Sometime someone can find that somewhere on the phone. If not, it
shouldn’t be too hard to hack, since most people aren’t smart enough to use something besides "1111",
"1234", or whatever. A cellular phone can be phreaked by modify the chip. There are two chips, this
depends on the model and manufacturer that will need to be changed - one installed at the manufacturer
(often epoxied in) with the phone’s ID number, and one installed by the dealer with the phone number,
and possible the security code. To do this, an EPROM burner is required as well as the same sort of chips
used in the phone . As to recording the numbers of other mobile phone customers and using them.

5.2. Phreak On Card-Phone System

(taken from http://www.ildtelecom.com/images/phonecard.jpg)

This is a simple way how the phreakears trick the phone card [11]:

1. Get a hold of the phonecard and some video tape, a pencil, sellotape and some sand paper. (and six
thousand tons of sticky back plastic).
2. Place a strip of video tape over the back of the card, at the top this is where the credit details are
stored.
3. Sand paper some pencil lead onto the video tape, and then sellotape the whole lot onto the phone
card.
4. Place the card into the card payphone, and hopefully the pencil graphite and video tape’s magnetic
field should confuse the phone and should be able to call for free.

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5.3. Phreak On Coin-Phone System

(taken from http://www.telephoneart.com/pay/payphone.jpg)

Phone coin also can be phreaked by the following way [11]:

1. For every 5 cents that put in a phone, a sound is made.

2. After putting the coins in the slot, it will pass through a totalizer which counts them. Then it’s
collected in a hopper.
3. Activate the coin relay to empty out the hopper. Payphones sometimes hold $100 or more. To
activate the relay, place 5 cents in the phone.
4. Stick a magnet up the coin slot about 5 inches.
5. Remove the front panel of the phone.
6. There will be a series of wires. Cut the red and green wires. In the front of the panel there are three
screws. Touch the green wire to the third screw. Better have a hat ready, because alot of change will
come flooding out.

6. The Nightmare
The victim caused by phreaking activities will be classified in 2 object :

1. We are as individual (customer)

2. We are as telecommunication system company (telecommunication service provider)
What kind of ’nightmare’ they will get, will be described.

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Take a peek about definition of phreak.Phreak is The action of using mischevious and mostly illegal
ways in order to not pay for some sort of tele- communications bill, order, transfer, or other service. It
often involves usage of highly illegal boxes and machines in order to defeat the security that is set up to
avoid this sort of happening. [fr’eaking].[5]
From definition above, we can look at a glance the deep impact of phreaking activities.it create many
disadvantage not only for customer but the telecommunication service provider itself. It will become
serious trouble with nonfinancial and financial loss. It is awfully nightmare.
Early phreaking techniques used 2600 hz tone generator to create the same tone that indicating if the user
has hung up the phone. It can can be implemented with small electronic circuits,called blue box. Blue
box will making the tones, so the user can stop the billing system while still connect and do the
conversation by phone,definitely it is free of charge.not only that he/she can get illegal access to exploit
all the services from telecommunication operator Another techique can be done on coin-phone
system.By pressing the return button, we can get back our coin that has been deposited into the
coin-phone.it can be implemented by another hardware called red box.
The device called black box can fool the telecommunication system company into thinking that we don’t
answer one call, so the people who call to us can get free of charge. Other technique to cut the phone bill
is done by using brown boxes as a relays so we can set up our calling into local call. We can only call to
our partner in local area as a middle medium to conduct long distance conversation with the others.
Not only those above, in the worst case, the user can got operator privileges and and do lots of other
damaging things that the phone company don’t approve. It’s a truly nighmare for the phone company as a
service provider.They will suffer a financial loss and will decrease customer satisfaction then slowly
create bad images in customer view. In the other side, on the customer perspective the phreaking
activities also bring negative impact to us. On the one time, perhaps we get big surprise with our bill
caused by the amount of our debt significantly increase and not proportional to our use. It’s the one of
many things that bad phreaker can do. He/she can get access to any services by run up other peoples
bills. Phreakers also can use the another ’boxes’ to eavesdrop our conversations,its really harmfull if the
topic of conversation is the information that must be privacy. With the scarlet box, phreakers can make
bad connections and dropout to somenone’s phone.With the busy box, phreakers can cause our lines
always on busy state so no one can call in and the victims him/her self can make call out.
One thing that enough annoying to us,if in our phone line we hear the notclear (noise) sound when we
online.Likewise, by using blast box, phreakers can make noise to blow our ear drum by amplifier of
noise tone
Those cases that describe above, will make nuisances in our activities that using telecommunicatin
services. We are as customers, definitely want to get the best services from our providers.If it is not
reached, perhaps it also become nighmare to us, and slowly but surely we can get uncomfortable feel in
our future life.

7. What Can We Do?

7.1. Self Defence

On this part we will discusss how most of the people that involved in telephone system should self
defence their selves. First prevention is though employee of phone system awarebess.

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Among telecommunication company (TELECOM) today, much attention is given to employee

awareness. Nearly all TELECOM employees are trained to recognize and prevent social engineering and
hacking. Unfortunately for the TELECOM employee laziness and complacence often leads employees to
replace caution with sloth. For example, much attention has been given to "trashing" or "dumpster
diving,"and employees are encouraged to shared sensitive documents.
The same holds true for social engineering, explicit instructions are given to TELECOM employees to
lessen the threat of information leaks through clever social engineering. Employees are encouraged to get
the caller’s phone number and call them back, but this does not often occur.
There is an article in "Enterprise", a magazine printed by Southwestern Bell that gave advice about how
to self defence your self from the phreaks. It was said that every person, espesially those who works at
phone system companya should [9]:

1. Get rid of trivial passwords.

2. Routinely change passwords.
3. Review password files.
4. Restrict access to "read only."
5. Know to whom you’re talking.
6. Shred as many documents as possible.
7. Post a warning which will be displayed whenever one logs into a computer.
8. Lock up terminals, personal computers, and floppy disks when they are not in use.
9. Eliminate unnecessary access lines.
10. Disconnect modems when they are not in use.
11. Avoid public domain software.
12. Report suspicious activity.
As the world goes on so the computer security personnel have gotten smart. They are well aware of most
hacker tricks, and are doing their best to explain them to all of the other employees. Hackers now rely on
the forgetfullness and laziness of normal employees for success, not the ignorance of system managers.
So does the phreaks.
TELECOM security personnel are much more apt to check audit trails than they once were. Suspicious
activities such as late-night logins, the use of test and demo accounts, and the like are carefully
monitored. One should use the TELECOM computers during peak hours so that strange activity will not
be noticed by already busy system managers.
One can also assume that if one TELECOM or corporation has a particularly effective strategy for
stopping phreakers, or a successful awareness campaign, it will spread like wildfire to all TELECOM.
Despite the fact that TELECOM are competitors, and are especially secretive since their business
depends on a technological edge, they are happy to share all security information, since the ruination of
the computer underground is one of their primary goals.
Second step that should take by phone system people is to respon to securtiy breaches. Unlike other
businesses, which may ignore the occasional security breach because they don’t feel like it’s a major
problem, the TELECOM live in fear of hackers, and do their utmost to prevent entry into their systems.

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TELECOM make it a point to document every security risk, whether it’s a break-in on their system, a
bug in an operating system, or some new information found on a BBS (Bulletin Board System). These
detections are often published in TELECOM literature in an attempt to educate all of the employees of
the telephone company.

7.2. From The Goverment

Phreaking as one of the the TELECOM-related crimes become more and more complex when we relate
it on the perspective of criminal law. As we know,Someone can communicate by using telecomunication
system, not only in national scope, it can happen regionally, even internationally. Therefore, Phreaking
activities with purposes to get illegally access or cause severe damage to telecomunication system that
across different countries, need judgement of law that prevails in each country. Because, those activities
can cause global problem that inflicts many countries..
In this case, there are complicated problems because the crime investigating authorities are only
authorised to investigate in its own state.so, it will be a good idea if our government conduct cooperation
between authorities in the other state.Therefore, with regard to TELECOM-related crimes, it become
more important to present this cases as a international issues in which there is consensus made by many
countries which respect about that.
Likewise,Our national government have to concern about it,they must be partner with the other states to
overcome this crimes.This issues better take more attention to minimalize negative effects that may
happen . We’ll see that TELECOM infrastructure will become strategic asset in the future. We must
always take care seriously from the efforts that try to use the TELECOM-services with illegal authority.
So, who are the parties must responsible for it?.
We need profesional expert with more knowledge about telecommunication system,and it seem common
thing that this requirement can fullfiled by TELECOM operator. The TELECOM operator as a certain
private subject that provides the telecommunication services,must be involved as early as possible in the
crime investigation. Without adequate knowledge on the technology, such as how the telecommunication
systems work, it will be almost impossible to realise and explain how a crime has been conducted, what
information can be used for evidence and how the actual information can be accessed.
How the TELECOM operator together with our government carry on the prevention acts for telecom
crimes ( especially phreaking) have became interesting discussion until now.Yet, it’s believed that this
will be ongoing discussion together with the condition in which phreaking techniques growing more and
more smart and undetected day to day. There always many loophole for the phreaker to try using the
technology or service with illegal manners.Although the new detectors to prevent this crime has been
established spreadly,there are still many opportunities to conduct this crime .
Government efforts and its obstacles regarding with enforcement of telecom legislation
The most important part of the government regulation is regulation about which kind of activities that
could be categorized as activities which breaking the law. These things become important to apply the
sanction according to criminal law in a certain country. The activities that’s called phreaking could be
categorized as the activities violating the law in the telecom area and it can be processed procedurally
according to legislation which prevails.
It’s not the simple things that we realize. In practice,the most likely events is there’s conflict between
telecom legislation and personal data legislation.We know, for the need of investigation, crime

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investigating authorities have to get the obvious evidence. These proofs, related with telecom crime
could be found in the form of digital information
In digital system, included telecommunication system, essential information is recorded digitally in the
hystory which representing list of activities that was done before and who the persons that have done
those activities. This information in different ways can become the key role to collect evidences related
with the crime which may be happen.
Those information will be the nightmares for the criminal, because of the information that is stored
within the telecom network and the information systems of the telecom can be very useful for tracing,
detecting and convicting the criminal..But, are these information can be accessed freely?
In fact, every customers(subscribers) have the sensitive data that’s prevented by the telecommunicatin
provider to forbide some ones have access to this data. Information that relates directly or indirectly to an
identity of person may be treated as sensitive data and all regulation concerning of those data reserved by
the personal data legislation. It asserts that these information cannot be accessed freely. The use of such
sensitive information for crime-investigating purposes may then be in conflict with the personal data
legislation and telecom-legilation , although the information has been permitted to process for such
purposes according to the other legislations. This conflict may be solved by refer to Telecom Secrecy and
its exception.
According to personal data legislation,telecom operator is obliged to keep information about subscribers
and telecommunications secret .Without given permission, the telecom operator may not uncover such
information. Its one of agreements to protect subcriber privacy in the telecomunication sector.Those
principles called The Telecom Secrecy.
The telecom secrecy relates to information about subscriber, such as telephone numbers, names and
addresses, and others information. The history of our activities when making the calls, such as the phone
numbers we have been dialed are also part of Telecom Secrecy. The telecom secrecy refers to authorized
legislation,i.e. personal data legislation and telecom legislation , so that illegal disclosure of the
information will constitute a crime.
Nevertheless,there are exceptions for this case. Such as [2]:
- Consent by the subscriber
If the subscribers that have been protected by the telecom secrecy ask to the operator for giving access to
someones that have been pointed, then the telecom operator is no longer obliged to keep those secrets. If
in the following time the subscriber may request back to forbid someones access him/her data, then the
telecom operator is obliged to keep the actual information secret anymore
-Obligation by law
In the certain situations, The telecom operators are forced by law to assist different authorities in getting
access to certain information. For Example, permmission given to expertise from telecom operator to
assist crime investigating authorities (Ex, policeman) to be able to access the right kind of information .
Usually, Only the crime-investing authorities are allowed to access information and only in cases
regarding severe crimes.
Ultimately, there’s a need to syncronize telecom legislation with other legislation to overcome telecom
crime.Otherwise, This could cause considerable difficulties in a situation where an authority has been
given rightfull authority to access the information by a certain legislation , but the telecom operator is
obliged to keep secretly the information according to the telecom secrecy and if they disclousure those
information, the operator may be supposed conducting a breach of secrecy.

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The conditions that describe above are only a little bit of many cases that occurred in telecommunication
area.The more detail about the regulation of telecommunication in Indonesia, arranged in
UNDANG-UNDANG NOMOR REPUBLIK INDONESIA NO 36 TAHUN 1999 TENTANG
TELEKOMUNIKASI that legitimized by president of Indonesia previously, B.J Habibie [10]. Detailed
explanation about some sections in that UU, describe again in peraturan pemerintah.For example there is
Peraturan Pemerintah that regulate about customs and manners to uncover the privacy data of customer
in the special cases, such as to conduct crime investagion (obligation by law)).[10]
Our government have settled hard sanction to all the people who have broken or tried breaking the rule in
the telecommunication area.Based on UU Telekomunikasi,law breaker will be charged with the amount
of money and placed in the jail. [10]
There are many argument about legality of phreaking, until now it still become vague. There are not
effective measures to assures that the phreakers absolutely always do phreaking to conduct crime. What’s
about the phreaker who phreaks only for enhance their knowledge without exploit vulnerabilities in the
system.Are they still regarded as A perpetrator. Do we still prosecute the phreaker that explores the
telephone system with the intention to become an electronic voyeurs who want to understand how
telecom structure works.Once again, if we use positive thinking, perhaps there is nothing efforts to
improve system telecommunication without the effect of phreaking activities. The phone companies will
become much wiser because phreaks have helped teaching them the flaws, so they must improve their
phone systems and added many more services as well.There are many issues concerning about legalities
of phreaking, and it still remains the questionable issues.

7.3. One case of phreaking in Sweden

One case of phreaking that happened in sweden has created awareness to the victims, if phreaking
activities could became a serious problem for the country, even could harmed more than one countries.
An teenager of 19-years old in Gothenburg (Sweden) that called himself as Demon Phreaker ,has waisted
his time in the jail, because he has conducted the activities that was viewed as a criminal.As a
perpetrator, he has used the service of telecommunication system with illegal manner, with the result that
he got access to several telephone numbers without paying. In the six month period, he has made 60000
telephone calls in nearly 1800 hours, and of course it made the telecommunication service provider has
suffered from financial loss.During done his activities, he used accessed code that registered in AT &T,
the telecom operator in USA. After carried investigation, the authorities have collected the evidence to
catch him and processed acording to prevailed law.But, like we have known,this activity has involved
two countries as victims.Although he conducted the crime in his origin country, sweden.He used the
accessed code in AT & T America.This occasion has generated the jurisdictional problems caused by the
difference of regulation in each country.The american prosecutor wanted extradition, but swedish did not
agree to do that.[2]
Therefore, it’s a good idea to view this crime as international issues to bridge that different
regulation.With the consensus that have been agreed,it will more probable to prevail the standar
procedures to handle these problems.Nevertheless, there is a better idea and more effective regarding
with these problems i.e idea about prevention methods to prevent early these phreaking activities. And it
need big favours from the telecom operator in each country, as the authority and the expert which carry
out services of telecommunication

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8. Confession from the phreakers

This chapter will roll out the confession, opinion, suggested about phreaking from the phreaks. There are
Revelation Loa, Jolly Mill, and John Drapper.
According to Revelation Loa, one of the phreak, he knows the phreaking makes the victim angry. He also
realized that the phreaks are outcasted from society [4]. So he advice among the phreaks, that they
should keep their status of being a hacker/phreaks as a secret. The phreaks should not discuss their
findings with anyone but other members of phreaking communit for fear of being punishing. He believes
that the phreaks is being punished for wanting to learn. He wonder why is the government spending huge
amounts of time and money to arrest hackers when there are spending huge amounts of time and money
to arrest hackers when there are other much more dangerous people out there. It is the murderers,rapists,
terrorists, kidnappers, and burglars who should be punished for what they have done, not phreaks. In his
opinion, the phreaks do not pose a threat to anyone. They do not out to hurt people or there computers.
He suggested two ways to get rid of phreaks and hackers, one is to get rid of computers and telephones,
in which case the phreaks and hackers would find other means of getting what they want. (Like that is
really going to happen.) The other way is to give us what we want, which is free access to ALL
information. Until one of those two things happen, the society are not going anywhere.
The second phreaks is John Mill. He also agree that phreaking is a morally right act. In order to show
that phreaking is morally right, he said that it must be shown that it daes have a positive effect on the
general happiness in the world, and then proceed to show that any negativ e effects that phreaking may
have are sufficiently minor so as to be outweighed by positive effects. And if the positive effects are
greater than the negative effects, then clearly the act is morally right.
The other preaks is John Draper. In 1972, he discovered how to make free phone calls using a plastic toy
prize whistle he found in a Cap’n Cruch cereal box. He thinks phreaking is the art and science of
cracking the telephone network so as, for example, to make free long-distance call. The whistle that he
used reproduced the 2600 hertz tone necessary to authorize a call.
An original member of the now famous "Homebrew Computer Club", Mr. Draper (AKA Cap’n Crunch),
designed his own computers and helped create the "Blue Box" tone generator which like the toy whistle
reproduced the 2600 hertz tone that allowed users to make free phone calls. Introducing, among others,
Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs to the computing world, and a generation of hackers to the glorious
concept of "phone phreaking", spawning the worldwide "2600" clubs. His work with Jobs and Wozniak
led him to become the 13th employee of Apple computers, designing telephone interface boards, and
developing both hardware and software for the Apple II. Among his many accomplishments, is the
software program Easy Writer that he wrote. It was the world’s first word processor.
Back in the 1970’s, he was caught by the FBI and went to jail twice for stealing thousands of dollars
worth of phone calls using his own "Blue Box" that he developed[9].
He is now a sought after Security consultant and Conference speaker, and has been touring the security
conference circuit for years. His security expertise has led him to appearances on Nightline, Good
Morning America and various radio shows nationwide, most recently on CNET radio in San Francisco,
and The Learning Channel (The secret life of hackers).

9. Conclusion
Phreaking is a kind of illegal action that must be stopped. Although their purpose is good such as

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extending knowledge, but the impact is make the company and the people suffered. Goverment in every
country have power to protect the citizen from phone fraud. Protection can be done by build the law
about phreaking. This law have to be strict and known by public. So that mass socialization needed, not
only socializing about the law existence but also the knowledge about the phreaking itself. In the end, it’s
hoped that people would have awareness about this crime. However telecommunication company have
the greatest part to protect them. Phreakers knowledge time to time is getting genius, they can easily find
the way to do phreak while the TELECOM (Telecommunication Company) technology is still left
behind, especially in the developing countries. In that case, the TELECOM have to be more aware and
do some research to omit or lessen the phone service vulnerabilities. There should be a good
communication between telecommunication company in each country in case of exchange knowledge
about telecommunication security.

Reference
[1] Bruce Sterling, 1994, THE HACKER CRACKDOWN Law and Disorder on the Electronic Frontier:
First Edition, Edisi Pertama, Bantam Books, Texas.

[2] Conny Larson, 2000, TELECOM CRIME The Masters Programme in Information Technology and
Law, http://www.juridicum.su.se/iri/masterIT/Course_A/teach/Telecom%20%Crime.pdf
(http://www.juridicum.su.se/iri/masterIT/Course_A/teach/Telecom %20%Crime.pdf).

[3] Jolly Roger, A Short History of Phreaking, http://isuisse.ifrance.com/emmaf/anarcook/frekhist.htm .

[4] Revelation Loa, THE ULTIMATE BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO HACKING AND PHREAKING Part 1,
http://www.apocalypseonline.com/security/text/tubhp1.asp.

[5] The Anarchist’s Cookbook, http://alt.ph.uk.com/node20.html.

[6] Computer Crime and Hacking ,

http://www.cs.usask.ca/undergrads/ljh886/articles/computerCrime.htm .

[7] Michelle Finley, http://www.cs.usask.ca/undergrads/ljh886/articles/computerCrime.html.

[8] Above the Law: The Journal of Priveleged Information.

[9] Cap’n Crunch , http://www.ravenmatrix.com/interviews/32/

(http://www.ravenmatrix.com/interviews/32/).

[10] UNDANG-UNDANG REPUBLIK INDONESIA NO 36 TAHUN 1999 TENTANG

TELEKOMUNIKASI .

[11] Predator, Phreaking Tutorial.

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