OT: One fe the 'phone Techo's (No VOX but ADSL still kickin)

[serfty]

Saturday, we're moving house. In preparation I had my telephone number moved to our new (nearby) lodgings. This was done Friday morning and all calls are now going to my new address. (including some FAX's, which was a pain as I had not yet relocated my FAX machine :? )

However, while I can no longet make 'phoen calls, my ADSL B'band is still working here in my old address; hence this post.

This tells me that the modem is still happily talking to the exchange and ADSL is not 'phone number related. Postulating it is more to do with the SUername/Password stoed in the ADSL modem.

Perhaps when I relocate my Desktop tomorrow to the new premisis and connect it all up, I will still have this access.

Can any shed light on this?

 

[markis10]

Your DSL is tied in with your line, it looks like the line is still active to the exchange for voice but not any further which allows the net to still work, hopefully the DSL moves when you do, it took me 2 weeks to move mine and in the meantime I was using 3 phone for data, $800 bill from 3 later that month, ouch!

 

[Guest]

Re: OT: One fe the 'phone Techo's (No VOX but ADSL still kic

Can any shed light on this?

a technie needs help?!

 

[NM]

ADSL is tied to the physical line at the exchange, and not to the phone number. The phone number is just a mapping at the switch gear at the exchange.

The thing that is constant with the physical line is the Full National Number. This is what Telstra use to identify the actual line. This number always begins with a N and then has seven numbers and normally finishes with another letter. The number is not the same or even similar to the telephone number.

Your telephone number is then mapped to this full national number at the exchange. The full national number does not change when you move house and someone else moves in and has a new phone number connected. The FNN at that premises remains the same.

Its this FNN that Telstra need to perform any fault troubleshooting. The service centre can look up the FNN if you provide the telephone number.

 

[Platy]

I believe that you will have to cancel (and re-order for your new place) your ADSL BOTH from a phone line perspective and from a Bigpond perspective ie. two calls to two separate parts of Telstra. You won't be able to reconnect your Bigpoond until your phone ADSL is reconnected.

On a related topic - I have wireless ADSL and have recently found that the neighbours signal drowns out my own - the laptop adaptor searches for the strongest signal thus tried to link to the neighbours and then MY 128 BIT SECURITY (WEP) IS AUTOMATICALLY DISABLED!!!

I urge ALL users of Telstra wireless ADSL to be extremely careful that:

- Your wireless adaptor is set to ONE channel only (not on automatic roaming for signals) and that the SSID (identification name of the connection) is named and set into the adaptor menu AND the modem menu (you may be able to log onto modem by typing in 10.0.0.138 into explorer address)
- Check the site survey in the adaptor menu to see if there are any other strong signals in your area - you may be using your neighbours modem or vice versa!!!
- Double check that your security configuration is set to 128 bit with the WEP number installed and matched to both the adaptor and modem
- DON"T EVEN TOUCH the drop down menu on the configuration/SSID field in the adaptor wizard once all is set up - if you do you will LOSE your security settings and leave your computer open to attack!!!

Of course Telstra officially DENIES that it is possible for people to inadvertently (or intentionally) connect to others wireless data channels beacuse of the security (128 bit WEP key) is reasonably uncrackable - but this is simply not true since the the security settings of the adaptor can be disabled as happened to me - one Telstra techno admitted it was possible - I have heard of two cases where people have had to pay huge sums on their (wireless) internet connection due to excess data arising from piracy of their channel.

This is especially important if you are firing up your laptop in a CBD where wireless signals abound and a large corporate data flow could piggy back your service and presto get your cheque book out to pay out$10,000s.

Equally troubling is an open channel is obivously open to hackers.

So fellow travellers, please do be very careful with your wireless connections - I am not an It or technical person and had to work all this out the hard way by asking a lot of people a lot of questions.

Telstra is selling a solution which is not secure if you use their default settings (ie auto roam on the adaptor).

Enough of that - looking forward to my first Q400 flights Saturday and Monday...

 

[NM]

Of course Telstra officially DENIES that it is possible for people to inadvertently (or intentionally) connect to others wireless data channels because of the security (128 bit WEP key) is reasonably uncrackable...

Well that is only true if both the AP and the client are using reasonably recent firmware that prevents the transmission of weak IV frames. These are the frames that contain the info that can lead to cracking WEP keys.

Most late model WiFi APs and client adapters do suppress the transmission of weak IV frames. However, many older cards that have not been upgraded with firmware that fixes the weak IV frame transmission are still very much vulnerable to brute force cracking of WEP.

Now I assume the stance taken above that 128-bit WEP is safe is based on the assumption that cards supporting 128-bit WEP will be new enough to not transmit weak IV frames, but that is not always a good assumption, especially if using some of the cheap PCMCIA wifi cards from less reputable manufacturers.

128-bit WEP is certainly better than 64-bit WEP or no encryption at all. However, using WPA is generally considered more secure than 128-bit WEP. All WEP variants use a static encryption key, while WPA (even in Pre-shared key mode) dynamically changes the encryption key regularly. Both WEP and WPA use RC4 encryption. The major different is in the key management for WPA.

Even better would be the use of IEEE802.11i as WPA2 using AES encryption and a form of EAP (LEAP, PEAP, EAP-TTLS/TLS for authentication). This would be a good corporate solution, but its unlikely a wireless broadband ISP service is going to go to that level any time soon.

I guess I should leave it at that or I will be in trouble by the Off-Topic posting police again :roll: .