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Posted to users@spamassassin.apache.org by Loren Wilton <lw...@earthlink.net> on 2021/06/25 12:51:24 UTC
Another evil number
From a fake "subscription" spam:
You can reach out
to our Customer Support Team+1 (800) 781 - 2511.
Re: Another evil number
Posted by "@lbutlr" <kr...@kreme.com>.
On 25 Jun 2021, at 12:24, RW <rw...@googlemail.com> wrote:
> On Fri, 25 Jun 2021 05:51:24 -0700
> Loren Wilton wrote:
>
>> From a fake "subscription" spam:
>>
>> You can reach out
>> to our Customer Support Team+1 (800) 781 - 2511.
>
>
> Is it common in the US to put 800 in brackets like that?
Yes.
> In my
> experience brackets normally go around either country codes or area
> codes, digits that may be optional.
800 is an area code, it's just a special area code that is not tied to an actual area.
The normal format for phone number in the US is
(AAA) XXX-NNNN
Where AAA is the three digits area code, XXX is the three digit local exchange (a largely historical feature) and NNNN is the number.
Sometimes a "1 " precedes the area code and sometimes in calling areas that do not require ten digit dialing, the area code will be omitted. "+1 is correct, but is Arely used in the US.
The oddest thing in that is the space surrounding the - and the lack of space before +1
--
"Are you pondering what I'm pondering?"
"I think so, Brain, but pants with horizontal stripes make me look
chubby."
Re: Another evil number
Posted by David B Funk <db...@engineering.uiowa.edu>.
On Fri, 25 Jun 2021, Greg Troxel wrote:
>
> RW <rw...@googlemail.com> writes:
>
>>> You can reach out
>>> to our Customer Support Team+1 (800) 781 - 2511.
>>
>> Is it common in the US to put 800 in brackets like that? In my
>> experience brackets normally go around either country codes or area
>> codes, digits that may be optional.
>
> Yes, it common. The proper form is
>
> +1 800 782 2511
>
> but people in the US do not write numbers like that.
>
> The normal way in the US would be
>
> (800) 782-2511
>
> and i find the spaces around the - to be unusual. But really there is a
> fair degree of variation.
And then there's the obfuscation that spammers/phishers use.
Here's an example from a recent message I found in one of my spam traps:
> if you have any issue regarding your order.
>
> Reach us at +1 [805} 429-6748
>
> Thanks & Regards
>
> +1 [805} 429-6748
Those bracket/brace mismatching are verbatium.
--
Dave Funk University of Iowa
<dbfunk (at) engineering.uiowa.edu> College of Engineering
319/335-5751 FAX: 319/384-0549 1256 Seamans Center, 103 S Capitol St.
Sys_admin/Postmaster/cell_admin Iowa City, IA 52242-1527
#include <std_disclaimer.h>
Better is not better, 'standard' is better. B{
Re: Another evil number
Posted by Greg Troxel <gd...@lexort.com>.
RW <rw...@googlemail.com> writes:
>> You can reach out
>> to our Customer Support Team+1 (800) 781 - 2511.
>
> Is it common in the US to put 800 in brackets like that? In my
> experience brackets normally go around either country codes or area
> codes, digits that may be optional.
Yes, it common. The proper form is
+1 800 782 2511
but people in the US do not write numbers like that.
The normal way in the US would be
(800) 782-2511
and i find the spaces around the - to be unusual. But really there is a
fair degree of variation.
Re: Another evil number
Posted by "Kevin A. McGrail" <km...@apache.org>.
Ahh party lines. Almost as bad as using my parents' line for a modem and
they would pick it up. And rotary. You hated anybody with a nine in their
number.
I always wanted to know the history behind how the White House got its own
CO. I figured it was security related since it's 202-456-xxxx which was the
old CO basis.
Best, KAM
On Thu, May 5, 2022, 19:45 @lbutlr <kr...@kreme.com> wrote:
> ...
> I never had to deal with exchanges myself, but I did have to deal with a
> party line.
>
> Do. Not. Recommend.
>
> Especially not when you're 14 and trying to talk to this girl about
> serious topics over the course of several hours...
>
Re: Another evil number
Posted by "@lbutlr" <kr...@kreme.com>.
On 2022 May 02, at 22:40, Kevin A. McGrail <km...@apache.org> wrote:
> Fascinating thread I just stumbled on. Yes, in early parts of the phone system, the letters were geographic and referenced the street for where the central office was located switching those calls. For example, in Arlington VA, my grandfathers number was 533-9389 which was referred to as JE3-9389 and the CO was on Jefferson St. I'm pretty sure this fell apart rapidly as the system grew.
At least here a lot of time the names for the changed were neighborhood names, or the name of a prominent street in the area, but not necessarily the one the CO was on.
For example, the CO near where I lived when I was about 8yo was located on Pennsylvania Street, but the exchange was named Pearl, because Pearl was the street that had a small commercial district on it and, I think, had once had a streetcar line (before my time).
The University exchange was 871 (UniverSity, I guess?), and most of Denver University's numbers were still in 871- in the 1990s.
The whole history of telephone exchanges is filled with odd little stories, but most of the information about why and where and when has been lost, and quite. A lot of exchanges forgotten.
I tired to do some research on the Denver exchanges around 20-25 years ago, but there really wasn't much there. Phone books would generally list the letters, but not the names, and sometimes the phone books were even divided by exchange first, and then names.
I never had to deal with exchanges myself, but I did have to deal with a party line.
Do. Not. Recommend.
Especially not when you're 14 and trying to talk to this girl about serious topics over the course of several hours...
--
Overhead, without any fuss, the stars were going out.
Re: Another evil number
Posted by "Kevin A. McGrail" <km...@apache.org>.
I think the 80's horror film with Jeff Goldblum was really the final
nail in the coffin. -KAM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O9Jm1YPQRsM
On 5/3/2022 3:47 PM, Loren Wilton wrote:
> Named toll codes stayed around until the mid to late 1960s. What
> finished them off was the introduction of DDD - Direct Distance
> Dialing, or the area code system we are all familiar with.
--
Kevin A. McGrail
KMcGrail@Apache.org
Member, Apache Software Foundation
Chair Emeritus Apache SpamAssassin Project
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kmcgrail - 703.798.0171
Re: Another evil number
Posted by Loren Wilton <lw...@earthlink.net>.
> Fascinating thread I just stumbled on. Yes, in early parts of the phone
> system, the letters were geographic and referenced the street for where
> the central office was located switching those calls. For example, in
> Arlington VA, my grandfathers number was 533-9389 which was referred to as
> JE3-9389 and the CO was on Jefferson St. I'm pretty sure this fell apart
> rapidly as the system grew.
Whether it referenced the CO or not was a regional thing at best. For
instance my home number when growing up was YU-71314, where YU was Yukon.
For the first year or two that we had a phone it was only YU-1314, the 7
came along later when it became possible to direct dial more than the single
CO you were attached to. There was absolutely nothing within several
thousand miles that was named Yukon, Alaska, or anything else cold. The CO
was on Foothill Blvd, which was a two-lane undivided street.
The main reason fo naming toll areas was memorability. It wasn't easy to
remember a 7 digit number, but a prefix followed by 3, 4, or 5 digits
(depending on the era and where you lived) was much easier to remember, or
at least so Ma Bell thought at the time.
Named toll codes stayed around until the mid to late 1960s. What finished
them off was the introduction of DDD - Direct Distance Dialing, or the area
code system we are all familiar with.
Loren
Re: Another evil number
Posted by "Kevin A. McGrail" <km...@apache.org>.
Fascinating thread I just stumbled on. Yes, in early parts of the phone
system, the letters were geographic and referenced the street for where
the central office was located switching those calls. For example, in
Arlington VA, my grandfathers number was 533-9389 which was referred to
as JE3-9389 and the CO was on Jefferson St. I'm pretty sure this fell
apart rapidly as the system grew.
However, you can see this referenced in things like
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4jZeTtGeQYg and was a real hotel. It was
Hotel Penn in NYC (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hotel_Pennsylvania).
That hotel was recently closed but until then, you could add the NYC
area code (212 I believe) and call that number still. Will be
interesting to see where the number goes now.
Anyway, we are working on an RBL for these evil numbers tracking. It's
going to require a plugin we think but we've been doing a fake RBL in
KAM.cf for these evil numbers. If you are calling and confirming the
numbers are evil and want to help RBL them, ping me off list.
Regards,
KAM
On 6/25/2021 7:21 PM, Grant Taylor wrote:
>
> My understanding is the letters were (the first?) part of the phone
> switch / exchange name. The following Wikipedia article supports this
> and has more details.
--
Kevin A. McGrail
KMcGrail@Apache.org
Member, Apache Software Foundation
Chair Emeritus Apache SpamAssassin Project
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kmcgrail - 703.798.0171
Re: Another evil number
Posted by Grant Taylor <gt...@tnetconsulting.net>.
On 6/25/21 1:12 PM, Bill Cole wrote:
> There was also an old nomenclature system that mapped the local exchange
> prefix to 2 letters and a digit, with the 2 letters being an
> abbreviation of some word. For example, as a kid I had a "Parkview 1"
> number: 721-xxxx. Businesses would often put their numbers in print ads
> using those, e.g. PA1-1234. Parkview was not an actual place, but all
> the PAx exchanges in St. Louis were within a mile or two of Forest Park,
> i.e. people who might be able to have a view of the park from an
> adequately tall tree.
My understanding is the letters were (the first?) part of the phone
switch / exchange name. The following Wikipedia article supports this
and has more details.
Link - Telephone exchange names - Wikipedia
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_exchange_names
--
Grant. . . .
unix || die
Re: Another evil number
Posted by Bill Cole <sa...@billmail.scconsult.com>.
On 2021-06-25 at 14:24:13 UTC-0400 (Fri, 25 Jun 2021 19:24:13 +0100)
RW <rw...@googlemail.com>
is rumored to have said:
> On Fri, 25 Jun 2021 05:51:24 -0700
> Loren Wilton wrote:
>
>> From a fake "subscription" spam:
>>
>> You can reach out
>> to our Customer Support Team+1 (800) 781 - 2511.
>
>
> Is it common in the US to put 800 in brackets like that?
Yes.
> In my
> experience brackets normally go around either country codes or area
> codes, digits that may be optional.
In the US system (NANP) toll-free numbers were initially implemented as
special pseudo-area codes. For many years area codes were strictly
geographic except for 800 and later 888 toll-free numbers, and we had 3
types of dialing: 7-digit "toll-free local," 1+7-digit "local toll," and
1+3-digit-area-code+7-digit "long distance toll." In border areas,
(###) ###-#### was a common format in print. Because toll-free numbers
worked most like long distance toll calls, requiring '1+###' as a
prefix, they got the same punctuation treatment.
Inordinate additional detail:
For some time, we also had "local exchange" dialing, where one could
just dial the last 4 digits for local numbers sharing the same 3-digit
prefix. There was also an old nomenclature system that mapped the local
exchange prefix to 2 letters and a digit, with the 2 letters being an
abbreviation of some word. For example, as a kid I had a "Parkview 1"
number: 721-xxxx. Businesses would often put their numbers in print ads
using those, e.g. PA1-1234. Parkview was not an actual place, but all
the PAx exchanges in St. Louis were within a mile or two of Forest Park,
i.e. people who might be able to have a view of the park from an
adequately tall tree.
--
Bill Cole
bill@scconsult.com or billcole@apache.org
(AKA @grumpybozo and many *@billmail.scconsult.com addresses)
Not Currently Available For Hire
Re: Another evil number
Posted by RW <rw...@googlemail.com>.
On Fri, 25 Jun 2021 05:51:24 -0700
Loren Wilton wrote:
> From a fake "subscription" spam:
>
> You can reach out
> to our Customer Support Team+1 (800) 781 - 2511.
Is it common in the US to put 800 in brackets like that? In my
experience brackets normally go around either country codes or area
codes, digits that may be optional.