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Domain: state.pa.us
Stories and comments across the archive that link to state.pa.us.
Stories · 2
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Customer Asks For Itemized Bill, Verizon Tells Her To Get a Subpoena
suraj.sun writes with this quote from an article at Techdirt: "A woman, who called Verizon to try to find out about the $4.19 she was being charged for six local calls, was told by Verizon reps that the only way it would provide her an itemized bill was to get a lawyer and have the lawyer get a subpoena to force Verizon to disclose the information. Instead, the woman went to court (by herself) and a judge told Verizon (.docx) to hand over the itemized bill info. 'It is a basic matter of fair business practice that a consumer should be able to contact a utility about a charge on a bill and learn what the charge is for and learn that the charge was correctly applied. The only verification that Verizon's witness could offer that a charge like [the customer's] $4.19 measured use charge was accurate and billed correctly was her faith in the accuracy of Verizon's computer system. The only way that Verizon would offer any information about a past charge in response to a consumer inquiry was to require that customer to hire a lawyer and subpoena their own usage information. By no reasonable standard could this be considered reasonable customer service." -
Pennsylvania Law Requires ISPs to Block Child Porn
feed_me_cereal writes: "Salon has an article describing a new law in Pennsylvania which requires ISPs to prevent access to child pornography on the internet. Under this law, the government can give ISPs a list of websites to block. Failure to do so can result in fines from $5,000 to $30,000 + jailtime. While stopping child pornography sounds noble, it seems that these powers will do little to meet this goal and much to allow the government to decide what websites are suitable for public viewing." Reader lightspawn provided this link to the law itself as well as another story at freedomforum.org.