Ok, you've all seen the comercials on tv talking about NYNEX telephones, and how other phones are unreliable, and charge lots more , etc etc etc. And you might think, "Yeah sure, there's no such thing as a non-NYNEX payphone." Well, just because you've never seen one, doesn't necesarily mean they don't exist. These other phones are the COCOTs. COCOT stands for Customer Owned Coin Operated Telephone. All a COCOT is is a phone that a private owner rents, leases, or buys from a company. You will never find a COCOT in a public place. They can only be bought/rented/leased by a private citizen. The COCOT is hooked into the regular customer l oop, as opposed to the seperate data loops NYNEX payphones operate on. What that means is, when you dial a local call, you put in a quarter, and the owner just gets his monthly bill from NYNEX. He get's fifteen cents for each call you make, because it only costs him ten cents for the call. So when you get a COCOT, the company sends you a phone, a key, and instructions. Whenever you need some change, you run to your COCOT, open it up, and get the change out. So you're probably thinking, "Yeah, great, cut the bullshit and tell me how to steal calls from one." Ok, here's the info. When you pick up the handset, the dialtone you are hearing is not coming from the CO, but rather, from inside the COCOT. So in essence, what you are hearing is a fake dialtone. Aurally, you can't tell the difference. But before you get to the real dialtone, you must put in a quarter. Here's the catch. By law, 800 numbers (ie, toll free numbers) must be free from payphones. So here's what you do. *Hey You! Pick up the phone, and dial an y 800 number. Try, 1-800-loan-yes. When the person answers, just sit there quietly, until they hang up. Or, if you're feeling particularly, evil, tell the operator, "Oh, sorry, I meant to dial 1-800-usa-loan." When she hangs up, wait for a few moments. You will most likely hear some clicks, hissing, or other noise. Then you will get a dialtone. This is the real, unsuped dialtone. Any call you make now is being billed to the customer's loop. So if you call a 900 number, or long distance, he will see it on hi s bill. Ok, so now you start hitting keypad numbers to dial, and "Hey, I don't hear anything!" Well, on many COCOTs, the keypad is disabled until it knows there is a quarter in there. There is no way around this, unless you have your trusty Rat Shack tone dialer (and you'd better, or you stink). Just hold this up to the phone and dial away. Stop Reading!* But that's not all that's interesting about COCOTs. You will notice that the COCOT doesn't have the number for it anywhere on it. There is a great reason for this. It's because if you dial into the phone, it won't ring. Instead, you get a synthesized voice reading you a menu of the phone's maintenence routines. These can be very useful, because you can do all sorts of interesting things with this, not the least of which is to access the COCOT's 300 baud modem. Yeah, there's a modem in there too. I'm not sure what it's used for, but if we could reverse-engineer it, then maybe we could tote a laptop down there w/out a modem and still dial up boards. Granted, i t'd be damned slow. If you want the number for the COCOT, pick up it's handset, and dial 1-800-my-ani-is. You will hear a recording that tells you the phone number for the phone. Whoopee! That's all for this file. Look for more knowledge and wisdom from the Omega bbs's co-SysOps, Epidemic and Bungalow Bill. The information below is brought to you courtesy of Count Zero.
COCOTs at the Rat in Kenmore Square: 617-247-8195, 617-247-7913, 617-247-8208, 617-247-9437
Two others I know of: 617-720-4430, 617 -233-9872
Here is a company that deals with COCOTs. Try out your social engineering skills on them:
Cointel, Inc. 130 Broadway St. Somerville, MA 02145 1-800-322-7741