U.S. Endorses ENUM

esarjeant writes "It looks like the the U.S. has endorsed ENUM (also known as E.164.arpa). This means you get a single number for phone and Internet, look for demos at Spring VON (San Jose, April 1-3) and VISIONng will be engaging in US trials. Essentially this means you get a new TLD of e164.arpa with your phone number in front of it." The addresses look pretty long and unwieldy, but supposedly consumer devices will make it easier to use.

Comments

I think

[Timesprout]

this is going to make writing women's phone numbers on beer mats a tad more difficult.

Re:I think

[Library Spoff]

this is gonna mean *making up* phonenumbers more difficult ;)

Re:I think

[Library Spoff]

...cause i'm *ALWAYS* being asked for mine...
in my head :)

Re:I think

[dhuv]

We will have to go back to doing things the way things were before the phone.

Re:I think

[Bartmoss]

Luckily, a non-issue for most geeks. ;-)

Re:I think

[Anonymous Coward]

come on man, this is /. ... there's the small issue of /.ers getting phone numbers in the first place

Re:I think

[joe_bruin]

dude, i totally scored her number, check it out: 1.0.0.127.e164.arpa

HEY, WAITAMINUTE!

Spam direct to the home?

[Lawrence_Bird]

or was that fiber to the curb? Doesn't this make it all that much easier to track people down?

Re:Spam direct to the home?

[Lawrence_Bird]

hey moderator.. help me understand how its off topic? Havent heard of cell phone users getting spammed? Now we can have a spam autodialer/ portscanner for all the phones and inet connections. How does this make my life any better? Is it that complex to remember a phone number and an internet username? This IMHO has *nothing* to do wiht making things better for the consumer and everything to do with business selling direct to you. " The Department of Commerce said it will support an electronic-numbering system, known as ENUM, which would allow consumers to specify a single identifier for their telephone numbers, e-mail and Instant Messaging (news - web sites) addresses, fax numbers, and mobile phone numbers. In a letter to the State Department, Assistant Secretary of Commerce Nancy Victory said the U.S. should endorse the effort but work to ensure that users' privacy and security will be protected and innovation and competition would be encouraged. "

Re:Spam direct to the home?

[dissy]

> Doesn't this make it all that much easier to track
> people down?

Not at all.

Does the DNS system we've had all this time make it easier to track you down if someone had your IP address? Not at all.

Besides, if i wanted to wardial now, there is nothing to stop me.

Do you think its OK i dial all phone numbers on a telephone and write down who answers, but not to use a DNS database to see who has a domain linked to their phone number?

The latter would be less annoying atleast, i dont have to have you answer the phone disturbing you to know the number is active.

Right now IP addresses resolve back to hosts.
This isnt www.domain.com -> 192.168.0.1.
This is the other direction.

192.168.0.1 resolves to www.mydomain.com
This allows 555-1212 to resolve to phone.mydomain.com

That is all.

If you have 192.168.0.1, then you also get
1.0.168.192.in-addr.arpa to use to point to a host/domain. (For real IPs that is)

This allows your phone number to point back to a host/domain (IE phone.mydomain.com) as well.

You still have to know one of the two before hand.
The only possible info you can gain is that a phone number DOES or DOES NOT resolve at all.
If it does, you can assume that number is valid/active.

Right now the only method to do that is... lets see.. I can call it and see if someone answers. I can look it up in a digital phonebook (Technically the real phone book too, but it is not sorted in an easy way to do that kinda search) or just call up and ask the phone company if that number is available, you want it on your line.

And since this is reverse dns, it has to be setup.
A phone number could very well be active and if you dont wanna give it a domain, dont!
I dont have to have my IP resolve back to www.mydomain.com if i dont want it to. (Ok there are some technical reasons like SSL and SSH need this, as well as IRC etc, but those are rare.)
Just like you dont have to put it in the phone book (Well, ideally heh)

You can have an IP address and hand that out all over the place, just like you can only hand out your phone number.

DNS was made to make remembering IPs not needed.
Now they want to do the same thing with phone numbers, and all people do is bitch.

Hope this clears up some stuff.

First 10 Digits

[mhaisley]

First 10 digit dialing, now this? Seems we could base somthing off of just the number its self, although that seems to be the way the idea is going.

It looks like were getting ever closer to the point where I have to enter a username and password to make a phone call. Seriously folks, the phone is the simplest computer interface in the world, don't ruin it. I don't want email on my phone, and caller id on my tv, I want tv on my tv and other people on my phone!

Re:First 10 Digits

[dubious9]

If you think about it, if someone is trying to get a hold of you why should they have to try several distinct numbers and addresses? Doesn't it make sense to have just one, and information gets routed to the appropriate interface (phone, e-mail, IM, etc.)?

Besides, there will probably be some directory assistance to find people. Even people who are not listed can give you their number once and your equipment will remember it based on the short identifier you give it.

The Future (tm) will be "Call John" "E-mail John" "Im John" Not "Phone 4.3.2.1.5.5.5.2.0.2.1.e164.arpa"

Come on, what could be easier that instead of dialing, typing or whatever, you just tell your device who you want to contact.

Re:First 10 Digits

[ConceptJunkie]

Seriously folks, the phone is the simplest computer interface in the world, don't ruin it.

Too late. Have you seen some of the wireless phones these days? Just like every other consumer electronic device, phones are getting close to being unuseable without the user's guide. Each cell phone I've gotten over the last 6 years I like less than the one before. I can't wait until this absurd marketing-executive-spawned nonsense of phones that take pictures and phones that do text messaging through the numeric pad and other stupid gimmicks dies a well-deserved death. I want a phone to call people! I don't need companies Microsoft-ing cell phones so that they do a bunch of unrelated useless tasks and do nothing well. I don't need to friggin' surf the Internet on an 80x120 pixel screen!

Just because you can, doesn't mean you should. I'm the biggest gadget freak I know, but these new phones just look stupid to me.

Re:First 10 Digits

[mccalli]

If you think about it, if someone is trying to get a hold of you why should they have to try several distinct numbers and addresses?

Because I want them to.

I answer the home landline nearly 100% of the time. I answer my mobile maybe 70% of the time (depends on location and context). I respond to email at a different frequency to my phone call response. And all that is before we take into account that I have several different email addresses for different purposes, and also four different phone numbers (two home landlines, one mobile, one work).

I want communication separated out by purpose.

Cheers,
Ian

Re:First 10 Digits

[mpe]

f you think about it, if someone is trying to get a hold of you why should they have to try several distinct numbers and addresses? Doesn't it make sense to have just one, and information gets routed to the appropriate interface (phone, e-mail, IM, etc

Because people wear different "hats" and very few people would want to give out their personal telephone number for business usage or vice versa.

Re:First 10 Digits

[stripes]

phones that do text messaging through the numeric pad and other stupid gimmicks

The text messaging on some phones is quite easy to use, and frequently costs less money then a short call...and is a lot less intrusave to recieve (and sometimes make). So for me, text messaging via the keypad is a win.

I don't need to friggin' surf the Internet on an 80x120 pixel screen!

I can't say I've really found web browsing on a phone all that useful. Except once. I had taken a walk in a show storm and managed to get lost on twisty little roads. Mapquest even on the tiny phone was quite useful. A GPS might have been better, but I didn't have one. That was 3 years ago or so, I havn't had great use for a web browser in my phone since.

I don't think this new addressing scheme will have anything to do with how we use cell phones though, just how we use computers to talk to cell phones...

Plus, isn't this just Carl Malamute's tpc.int all over again? Same thing, revers the digit order, put dots between them...

Re:First 10 Digits

[farnz]

OTOH, every smartphone I've considered (and my next phone *will* be the Sony Ericsson P800) does work just like any other cellphone for standard voice calls (dial the number and press Yes to call, press Yes to answer a call, press No to hang up). It's only when you want to use the "gimmicks" that they become more complex.

And there are good uses for some of the technologies you mention. Text messaging is *extremely* useful for getting in touch with people who may possibly be in a meeting (you get your message across, and they can judge whether or not it's worth responding, or if they should wait until they escape). Surfing the Internet has at least two good uses; firstly, my network provider (Orange UK) offers a "Where's My Nearest" service (find cash machines, petrol stations etc). Secondly, Directory Enquiries costs more to call than it does to access via WAP.

Re:First 10 Digits

[jaavaaguru]

wap.google.com in a pub quiz rocks!

Re:First 10 Digits

[sql*kitten]

I answer the home landline nearly 100% of the time. I answer my mobile maybe 70% of the time (depends on location and context). I respond to email at a different frequency to my phone call response. And all that is before we take into account that I have several different email addresses for different purposes, and also four different phone numbers (two home landlines, one mobile, one work).

Having different devices addresses and giving different people different details is a clumsy and inelegant solution. A far better idea is to have one contact number, connecting to any of your devices, and have an intelligent means to sort calls depending on the originator's device and their own identity, then decide what to do with it. You can already do something like this with the smarter mobile phones, using caller groups (my Nokia 6310i can be set to divert a particular caller group to voicemail without ever ringing during certain hours, but ring for them the rest of the time, for example).

I want communication separated out by purpose.

But you don't have that now - you don't know until you answer it that a business contact might have gotten your home number. Or a family member calls your mobile in an emergency. Far better for your phone to take care of that for you. That's what computers are good for, taking care of if-then-else decisions so people don't have to.

Re:First 10 Digits

[Anonymous Coward]

Having different devices addresses and giving different people different details is a clumsy and inelegant solution. A far better idea is to have one contact number, connecting to any of your devices, and have an intelligent means to sort calls depending on the originator's device and their own identity

No, it's not. I have a mobile, which about 4 people have the number to. I use it only for emergencies - people who just call for a chat use my landline (and that includes people who have the mobile number).

SO if I get a call on my mobile, I know it's important. I want to be able to ignore my mum if she just wants a chat and I'm busy, but if someone got sick and is in hospital, I want to know, so I'll answer my mobile.

Separate by caller is a very blunt instrument.


But you don't have that now - you don't know until you answer it that a business contact might have gotten your home number.

I do - I don't give out my home phone number. My company does not give out my home phone number.

Now, if you allow people making calls to specify how important it is (so, say, my phone can decide to only ring for important calls if I'm busy), that would be useful. Of course, you'd need a per-caller score list too, so you could specify that people from work don't ever get to call as "urgent" when you're at home, and you'd need laws to prosecute phone-spammers if they call at anything above "junk", but...

Re:First 10 Digits

[CelloJake]

This whole system doesn't rule out the possibility of one person having more than one identifier. You could have a Personal Identifier and a Business Identifier and attach them to different devices and/or different ring patterns. The idea is that if I want to call my best friend, I don't have to try to think of his cell when he doesn't answer at home. And If I need to email my boss its the same ID as if I called him. Using a combination of different devices and phone numbers and addresses and the time of day to figure out whether a message is important is not very reliable. This system has the basic features that would allow real communications screening to work. -Jacob

Re:First 10 Digits

[Planesdragon]

I want communication separated out by purpose.

Then get a seperate line for your "business", and one for yourself. Any filtering beyond that can be handled by Caller ID.

Re:First 10 Digits

[Tacky the Penguin]

If you think about it, if someone is trying to get a hold of you why should they have to try several distinct numbers and addresses? Doesn't it make sense to have just one, and information gets routed to the appropriate interface (phone, e-mail, IM, etc.)?

I would like to be able to change my email address without changing my phone number. You think spam is bad now? Consider how bad it'll be if you have one universal address. As soon as you get into the system, you're toast. The only way to stop the 100 message a day flood will be to change your universal phone/email number.

Re:First 10 Digits

[Dr. Photo]

I can't say I've really found web browsing on a phone all that useful. Except once. I had taken a walk in a show storm and managed to get lost on twisty little roads.

Would that be, "a maze of twisty little roads, all alike"?

great

[Ubi_NL]

So, if I post to usenet, google archives this, and any idiot in the world has my phone number.

no thanks

Re:great

[dphoenix]

Don't worry - it'll be fine as long as the spam-blocking is as good as Hotmail's spam blocker. Oh wait.. uh oh. :)

Re:great

[Anonymous Coward]

X-No-Archive: Yes

Re:great

[garcia]

Type your phone # in google as it is (ie: 555-555-5555), if you are listed it's going to show who you are and where you live.

My gf used it to track down the location of a harassing caller.

Re:great

[praedor]

Yes, fine. Basically just a phonebook. The problem is that with this new system, a person would have that info to enter at google and get the info. With it as it is now, you enter someone's email address and all you will get are other instances of that email address posting (to usenet, public mailing lists, etc). You wont get anything REAL on that email address.

If you enter my email address at google you wont get anything on me but other posts. Type my phone number, happily provided by this bogus system, and now you know my phone number and address. You have now specifically gained info on me as an individual in ways unavailable from just my semi-anonymous email address.

Re:great

[Brent_Litzer]

I can look up 90% of people right now using technology 50+ years old. Uhhhhh have you ever heard of the phone book?!

Re:great

[asuffield]

Anything which reduces the number of people posting to usenet is probably good. Anything which lets you track down and hurt people being morons on usenet is *definitely* good.

Re:great

[Viol8]

Yeah , that'll really fool the spammers who suscribe to the newsgroups on a day to day basis.

Re:great

[k12linux]

Type your phone # in google as it is (ie: 555-555-5555), if you are listed it's going to show who you are and where you live.

That's all well and good, but how often do you put your phone number on your usenet posts? Do you give it to every web server you visit?

<sarcasm>Wouldn't it be wonderful if every server you visited for any reason could result in somone getting your home phone #? Maybe it's just the server operator looking at their web logs, or maybe it's somebody in between sniffing network traffic. Of course it would make it easier to get that snobby girl's phone number from down the block. Just set up a web site and get her to go to it somehow. Wow, what a wonderful tool for stalkers.</sarcasm>

But I guess if you want to have a contoversial political discussion with someone else, you bettter use some type of anonamyzer for all your e-mail and other Internet correspondance.

BTW, my phone number is unlisted, so at least in my case that google search would be pretty pointless.

Re:great

[Anonymous Coward]

His complaint was about the google archive. I mean, if you`re going to post your info publicly, you have to assume someone might read it...

Re:great

[Anonymous Coward]

You make an excellent point, Anonymous Coward!

PS Topposting R00lez.

In message on 05:22 AM February 14th, 2003 (#5301084) Anonymous Coward said:
> X-No-Archive: Yes

Re:great

[zm]

This is how it works:

• someone calls you at 1-202-555-1234
• the network translates that into 4.3.2.1.5.5.5.2.0.2.1.e164.arpa (which is basically your E.164 phone number, in a fancy format)
• the network does a DNS lookup on that number and gets a list of your URL's
• those URL's are most likely sip, but may also be tel, mailto, http,... (is there an URL scheme for IM?)
• YOU give your operator your URL's and their preference
• the caller's device will try your contacts in the order you specify, and subject to the device's own capabilities (for example, a phone will ignore any http URL)

In other words, no, it's not the end of the world. Usenet will work just the same... And yes, I implemented an ENUM based system at my previous place of work.

zm

Too many numbers, so little time

[Txurlo]

Oh well, with all the news surrounding new numbering plans... I'll think I'll just wait for the neural interface with GPS built-in... now wait...

One number...

[More Karma Than God]

One Number to rule them all, One Number to find them,
One Number to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.

Re:One number...

[djrogers]

Shouldn't that be "One Number to *ring* them all?"

Opting out?

[pongo000]

I choose to have my phone number unlisted and unpublished. Does this mean I will have to disclose my phone number if I'm using an e.164-enabled device? Or will I just have to sit this one out on the sidelines, confident that it will die the quick death so common with flash-in-the-pan technology?

Personally, I don't want to be ubiquitously accessible. I don't want my internet and telephone services magically tied together. This sounds like a scheme that will benefit vendors, providers, and marketers more than it will benefit consumers.

Practicality check

[vinsci]

The addresses look pretty long and unwieldy

Reminds me of X.400 e-mail addresses, which weren't so successful. The main reason were exactly their long and unwieldy addresses: multi-line e-mail addresses! There too, applications were supposed to hide the complexity, but someone has to type it into the application to begin with.

I prefer callto:// URI:s any day.

Re:Practicality check

[Anonymous Coward]

I prefer callto:// URI:s any day.

It's spelled "tel:". See section 2.7.2 of RFC 2806.

Re:Practicality check

[vinsci]

Doh - that should of course have been sip:, not callto:.

For more on SIP, please see:

• SIP tutorial
• Some Open Source SIP software
• More Open Source SIP-capable software

Oh, great.

[dphoenix]

Telemarketer: Hello, sir! Can I interest you in a university diploma?
Me: "It's 4 am."
Telemarketer: It's 8 am here, sir! So How about that university diploma?

This is a horribly, horribly bad idea. :)

Re:Oh, great.

[Anonymous Coward]

Every time it happens :

Ok Give me your home number and I'll call you back
or

Do you know that I was in the toilet ! and came to hear you commercial

666 domain = ENUM = US?

[Anonymous Coward]

Could this be the number that Revelations is talking
about and not your social security number?

I love the quote: "
U.S. should endorse the effort but work to ensure that users' privacy and security will be protected and innovation and competition would be encouraged."

...and this is the same US government that is proposing
patriot II?

Could they be talking about Microsoft when they mention
innovation? After all everyone knows Microsoft is very
good at legal innovations.

Re:666 domain = ENUM = US?

[Anonymous Coward]

Well someone's smoking good crack this morning

Re:666 domain = ENUM = US?

[Xformer]

Yeah, but it's a pity that US citizens can't say who without being hauled off into exile.

International

[mccalli]

you get a new TLD of e164.arpa

Hmm. Not .arpa.us then? Is the idea that all numbers across the globe fit into .arpa, or is this an example of an inappropriate TLD?

.com and .org have a sensible argument to make themselves out to be international. Phone numbers are definitely region-specific however, and they certainly should be encompassed within . domains.

Cheers,
Ian

Re:International

[mccalli]

and they certainly should be encompassed within . domains.

Oops. Certainly should be encompassed within .<country code> domains.

Cheers,
Ian

Re:International

[yesod]

The given example starts with the US country code '1' - so the use of the arpa domain is fine.

All UK numbers would be within 4.4.e164.arpa - as the UK country code is 44.

Re:International

[Ben Hutchings]

E.164 phone numbers are international. They begin with a country code, which in the case of the US happens to be exactly the same as the long-distance prefix.

Re:International

[mpe]

Hmm. Not .arpa.us then? Is the idea that all numbers across the globe fit into .arpa, or is this an example of an inappropriate TLD?

Don't you mean "another", rather than an... e164.arpa is a SLD anyway.

.com and .org have a sensible argument to make themselves out to be international.

If that were the case these domains wouldn't be very well used, especially .com. Since it is hard and expensive for a commercial entity to operate globally.

Phone numbers are definitely region-specific however, and they certainly should be encompassed within . domains.

Over most of the planet phone numbers are "country" specific. Maybe what would be needed would be an additional TLD of .nanp to cope with the one case which isn't country specific.

Re:International

[mccalli]

If that were the case these domains wouldn't be very well used, especially .com. Since it is hard and expensive for a commercial entity to operate globally.

Well...no. I run a commerical entity that operates globally. This commecial entity consists of one person - me. However, it has no trouble dealing with customers across the globe and it does this through use of its .com website. All depends on the nature of what you're offering (I do a very small scale hosting service).

Cheers,
Ian

Re:International

[Skweetis]

.arpa is used for reverse DNS lookups. For example, if your IP address is 1.2.3.4, the DNS name 4.3.2.1.in-addr.arpa corresponds to it.

Re:International

[mpe]

Well...no. I run a commerical entity that operates globally. This commecial entity consists of one person - me.

Your "global company", of course, accepts any kind of currency potential customers might have handy

However, it has no trouble dealing with customers across the globe and it does this through use of its .com website.

Tough luck if they want to use the phone.

All depends on the nature of what you're offering (I do a very small scale hosting service).

"very small scale" and "operating globally" sounds somewhat mutually exclusive.

Re:International

[Fastolfe]

No, in-addr.arpa is used for Internet address lookups. The arpa TLD is there to act as a TLD for services like this. The service itself is always represented as a second-level domain under arpa.

Re:International

[Fastolfe]

This is making the bad assumption that phone numbers are currently and will always be mapped to political (ccTLD) boundaries.

Phone number prefixes (country codes) are actually handled by the ITU, so "top-level" numbers in a given phone number are not under the control of the country they map to.

In addition, a lot of countries use the same prefixes (e.g. US and Canadian numbers). If you're looking at a phone number, how will you know which country-specific TLD it's supposed to map to? You'd have to do another lookup to figure out which TLD has ownership of that prefix, then do a lookup against that TLD's phone number set.

Phone numbers are really already built with sufficient information to get it routed to the right geographical region anywhere in the world. They were designed that way. That's how international dialing is even possible. It seems redundant to try and force these numbers within political boundaries of a ccTLD when the number itself already has sufficient information to support delegation.

Re:International

[timmyf2371]

"very small scale" and "operating globally" sounds somewhat mutually exclusive.

Not necessarily - the internet is a global marketplace.

The OP has a small scale hosting service, which has a website. The website is available to anyone round the globe, 24/7 (not accounting for downtime). He doesn't mention what he uses for payment methods, but services such as Worldpay and even Paypal allow for funds transfer in many currencies.

What is your definition of global?

Tim

More Information about ENUM

[Animus Howard]

From http://www.networkmagazine.com/article/printableAr ticle?doc_id=NMG20020304S0011:

"Just how does ENUM turn phone numbers into domains? When an ENUM client queries DNS, it reverses the phone number ordering and applies the domain name at the end. If the original number is +1-415-947-6022, for example, the ENUM client removes all the dashes and punctuation to get 14159476022. The phone number is then sent to DNS as 2.2.0.6.7.4.9.5.1.4.1.e.164.arpa, assuming the server is located in the .arpa domain."

Re:More Information about ENUM

[the_2nd_coming]

ooooo...sending it backwards makes it all better.

Re:More Information about ENUM

[Animus Howard]

> ooooo...sending it backwards makes it all better.

It does, because that makes it encrypted. I invented a similar scheme for passing secret notes in the second grade. Nobody ever intercepted a message and figured out the code.

Seriously, look at any multi-dot domain and the most significant element is always on the right. So it makes sense to have the area code on the right, the exchage in the middle, and the "last" 4 digits on the left.

Re:More Information about ENUM

[pro-mpd]

It does, because that makes it encrypted.

Ergo, your number is safe because any attempt to decode it violates the DMCA! Yay!!

Some interesting observations....

[Quantum Jim]

First of all, is this going to allow me to type "T.T.A.L.L.A.C.0.0.8.1.e164.arpa" when I want to go to the "1-800-CALL-ATT" or would I have to use the actual numbers?

Secondly, how long until we get:

Just type T.T.A.L.L.A.C.0.0.8.1.e164.arpa to save up to 44% on long-distance internet browsing!

Finally, why is this addressing scheme named after Arpanet (*.arpa)? Isn't that a bit out-of-date?

Re:Some interesting observations....

[artg]

It's a reverse lookup : if you reverse-lookup an IP address w.x.y.z you actually query the DNS for z.y.x.w.in-addr.arpa, though typical tools hide this stuff from you.

Re:Some interesting observations....

[dissy]

> First of all, is this going to allow me to type
> "T.T.A.L.L.A.C.0.0.8.1.e164.arpa" when I want to
> go to the "1-800-CALL-ATT"

Um.

About as much as it allows you to type 1.0.168.192.in-addr.arpa to get the host that points to this IP, then resolve the host to get the exact IP you started with and clearly knew to do this.

If you have the T.T.A.L.L.A.C.0.0.8.1.e164.arpa, you KNOW the number!!!

This is reverse DNS for phone numbers (instead of IPs)

When i make phone.mydomain.com resolve to my phone number, it would be nice for my phone number to reverse resolve back to phone.mydomain.com, and that 2nd part of the process is where e164 comes in.

Re:Some interesting observations....

[Quantum Jim]

Thanks! I was a little confused about what this was: I thought that the e164 scheme was like some type of url or urn that the browser could resolve. I think I understand now. :-)

Telemarketers

[Pharmboy]

So, not only will I get spam telling me how to "enlarge my member" but phone calls during dinner, too. Isn't that special.

Basically, though, this is voice over IP

[dphoenix]

This is actually Voice over IP though, which brings a whole lot of other problems. I think it's irresponsible to be trying to switch the entire US to Voice over IP when clearly there isn't the bandwidth to support that kind of thing.

Re:Basically, though, this is voice over IP

[rugger]

Of course there is enough bandwidth. It isn't like the current telephone network system has insuffient bandwidth to cover all the voice calls we currently make.

Don't forget that all voice calls are transmitted over the phone networks on 64K virtual circuts.

Voice over IP, as long as we can keep the IP networks sufficently responsive (a big if), should work fine since telephone companies would be forced to redirect their current voice bandwidth into IP bandwidth.

In unrelated news...

[Uninvited Guest]

The FBI has reported to the Justice Department that it will no longer need or request individual warrants to wiretap individual phone numbers.

Why not use DNS Resource Records?

[Slotted Aloha]

Why not use DNS Resource Records to route lookups for the phone user@domain to the appropriate directory server (aka Call Manager)?

Also, I can't wait to "access Internet services through a telephone keypad"...

Textual Internet Phone Numbers

[Anonymous Coward]

What the Internet really needs is a set of numbers to connect to commonly used people and sites. The current system (tld's, subdomains, @-signs, etc.) is way too confusing. People have a hard time understanding it and finding what they are looking for. A number similar to a phone number for looking up people and businesses on the Internet would simplify things a lot. The only catch I see is that there are a lot of Internet addresses, and perhaps a 32-bit number would be required to identify all of them.

Further, I propose a system to extend the Internet phone numbers to have a textual equivalent. It would be a word or series of words that might be chosen to describe the person or business owning the number. Further, suffixes could be used to identify the nature of the name, such as commercial or the name of the country of origin. To distinguish between the various Internet addresses accessed by the number, a prefix could optionally be added to specify the protocol with which to connect, and for families, businesses and groups, a user name could optionally be specified in addition.

This new system would be a dramatic simplification of the current system with its confusing and obfuscated methodologies. Numbers are much better for identification, and with the usability enhancements I have described would be far superior.

Re:Textual Internet Phone Numbers

[Anonymous Coward]

That was great, thank you.

Re:Textual Internet Phone Numbers

[Wonderkid]

You may like to check out GoNumber.net Personal listing. Something we invented in 1992, but are only now starting to focus on in order to be 'on time'. Thanks to the fact GoNumber.net is a directory NOT a technology / standard, it can adapt, so your GoNumber really does last forever, even if new communications mediums arrive in the future. And our system allows you to choose a GoNumber that is between 1 and 10 digits in length. It can even represent the letters on a phone keypad. Furthermore you can input the alphanumeric equivalent of your GoNumber into the GoNumber field at www.gonumber.net or surf to www.gonumber.net/xxxxx where xxxxx is your GoNumber or alphanumeric equiv. For example, http://www.gonumber.net/555123

No thanks

[pben]

I will stick to pben264378459276@hotmail.com or pben13527648@yahoo.com

I some how don't think giving up your name for a number is going to take off in the 21st century. Phone numbers go back to a time before computers, when relays were high tech.

Settle down, man, it's better than you think.

[DarklordJonnyDigital]

Y'know, this isn't going to be as bad as you think it is.

Sure, it's been argued that this means anyone can find out your phone number from your IP, your IP from your phone number or something similar, and telemarket the living daylights out of you. Not true. Unsolicited telemarketing spam, as you've no doubt been reading on Slashdot, is likely to soon become illegal in all states and most of Europe - at least, that's what I see happening. The closer the internet comes to the phone system, the more quickly we'll see spam being made equally illegal.

As well as encouraging people and corporations to get the broadband into peoples' homes - and I see just about every home "having the internet" within the decade - this system could provide a way of linking a physical location or house number with an internet address, making it easier for legitimate marketers to get along with consumers. I'm already seeing banner ad servers that see from my hostname the I'm in the UK and serve me advertising for UK ISPs - expanding on this concept, we might some day find all banner ads like Slashdot's - serving us only advertising that interests us (Megatokyo shirts, web servers, ThinkGeek) and less online casinos, spyware and fake Windows dialog boxes!

Re:Settle down, man, it's better than you think.

[isaac]

Sure, it's been argued that this means anyone can find out your phone number from your IP, your IP from your phone number or something similar, and telemarket the living daylights out of you. Not true. Unsolicited telemarketing spam, as you've no doubt been reading on Slashdot, is likely to soon become illegal in all states and most of Europe - at least, that's what I see happening. The closer the internet comes to the phone system, the more quickly we'll see spam being made equally illegal.

Oh! Well, I feel so much better then, seeing as how NOBODY ever does anything illegal. After all, I'm sure all those unsolicited emails in my inbox are for perfectly legal and legitimate businesses! And look what a good job the junk-fax laws have done - I've never gotten a fax spam!

</SARCASM>

Make something possible and it will happen. Create a marketing opportunity, and it will be exploited. Nature abhors a vacuum.

-Isaac

Re:Settle down, man, it's better than you think.

[- FuckingNerds -]

"Unsolicited telemarketing spam, as you've no doubt been reading on Slashdot, is likely to soon become illegal in all states and most of Europe..."

But, that is the problem! Now that we are into the legal/not legal arena, we need to define spam. And correct me if I'm wrong, but charities, politicians, and people doing surveys never spam... or so the law thinks. The definition of spam will be messed with for years to come and if marketers have their ways they will be able to survey your needs, then sell you their product based on their scientific results! (+-75% margin of error of course)

Re:Settle down, man, it's better than you think.

[mpe]

Sure, it's been argued that this means anyone can find out your phone number from your IP, your IP from your phone number or something similar, and telemarket the living daylights out of you. Not true. Unsolicited telemarketing spam, as you've no doubt been reading on Slashdot, is likely to soon become illegal in all states and most of Europe - at least, that's what I see happening.

Since a fair amount of spam is sent by criminals anyway why should one more help anyway? Especially since spam can be sent from anywhere... It's not as if the UN security council is passing resolutions against spammers.

Re:Settle down, man, it's better than you think.

[praedor]

You lost me. How would this privacy violation encourage anyone to provide broadband to anyone? What diff does it make what the nature of your identifier is wrt whether or not broadband is made available?

I'd STILL be stuck with dialup, being in a USA rural area (meaning BIG wide open spaces vs the equivalent in the UK where it appears that DSL is doable with just a little goading/support from the guv'mnt)...it would just mean I would have the same old slow 56k connection but broadcast to everyone what my phone number is...and I'm UNLISTED for a reason.

Re:Settle down, man, it's better than you think.

[Anonymous Coward]

There's more than just spam to worry about. I don't want ANYONE to have my phone number unless I specifically CHOOSE to give it to them.

Once your phone number is attached to your computer, your anonyminity dramatically decreases (or disappears altogether).

Re:Settle down, man, it's better than you think.

[Archfeld]

Who decides who is a legitimate marketer ? If I want to hear from a vendor I will contact them, otherwise they should be restricted to public advertising, targeted spam, and mail should be illegal. The only good thing about it is stuffing the pre-paid return envelope back in the mail empty...

They've got that right.

[Anonymous Coward]

Using INTs is just lame.

Great!

[SecretAsianMan]

looks like the the U.S. has endorsed ENUM

Great! Maybe we will all start using enum instead of #defined constants!

Re:Great!

[Anonymous Coward]

It was a secret asian that killed Lady Mondegreen!

DNS should be reversed...

[wowbagger]

(NOTE: I realise what I am about to propose will never happen.)

The DNS system should be reversed - in other words, this site should be http://org.slashdot

Justification: The ideal would be for the domain to move from the least specific to the most specific. Consider the current system: First, you have the protocol - the most general part of the URL. Then, you have the domain, moving from the most specific to the most general. Then, you have the URI (directory and filename), which moves from the most general to the most specific.

Now, consider if DNS were to be reversed. You would move from the most general (the protocol), then the TLD, then the organization, then the machine, the directories, the file name, and any CGI args.

The ENUM system would be more in line with telephony - you would have the country code, then the area code, exchange, and finally number, just like the current system, rather than having to reverse the number.

You could still have the completion feature you have now - if you type tel://555.1212 the system could automatically apply the default country code and area code, it would just prepend rather than append.

(Oh, BTW: on ENUM, they should have allowed each logical grouping of the telephone to be one subdomain - in other words, county code.area code.exchange.number, rather than c.o.u.n.t.r.y.c.o.d.e etc.)

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[mccalli]

The DNS system should be reversed - in other words, this site should be http://org.slashdot

Used to be the case in the UK. The UK's primary network system was JANET (Joint Academic NETwork), and its systems worked as you described.

For example, I used to go to University in Lancaster. My email address was csc345@uk.ac.lancs.cent1. To communicate with the rest of the world however, I learnt to always write this as csc345@cent1.lancs.ac.uk.

Cheers,
Ian

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[vinsci]

For once, this is something they got right in the UK (they still drive on the wrong side of the street, though. ;-)

What you propose was actually the standard way of adressing internet hosts in the UK many moons ago. Since all net related software was provided with source, they were patched to handle this way of addressing hosts.

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[batemanm]

For example, I used to go to University in Lancaster

Are you sure it wasn't in Bailrigg :-)

--
csc515@cent1.lancs.ac.uk

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[mccalli]

Well if we're being picky about it. :-)

Was there in 1990/1993. Yourself?

Cheers,
Ian

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[twoshortplanks]

IMHO it makes more sense to specify the most specific section of the domain first, as the general bit can be assumed.

For example, I have a default domain of twoshortplanks.com. This means I can type "http://zen" into my browser and it looks up "zen.twoshortplanks.com". Where is is most useful is for things like "mail". When I move around I DHCP and that sets the default domain completion for my DNS, meaning when I'm at home I can get "mail.twoshortplanks.com" when I look up "mail" and when I'm other places like work I get "mail.otherplace.com". Very handy.

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[cyba]

> The DNS system should be reversed - in other words, this site should be http://org.slashdot

Reversed? Wouldn't it be http://gro.todhsals then?

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[stevens]

IMHO it makes more sense to specify the most specific section of the domain first, as the general bit can be assumed.

For example, I have a default domain of twoshortplanks.com. This means I can type "http://zen" into my browser and it looks up "zen.twoshortplanks.com".

Well, that doesn't matter to the OP's suggestion.

If you type http://zen/bob.html, it expands that to http://zen.somedomain.com/bob.html. there's nothing stopping the inverted names from doing the same thing, and in fact they make *more* sense.

Instead of adding default domains in the middle of the URL between the host and path, they can just be prepended: http://zen/bob.html becomes http://com.domain.zen/bob.html

I always hated that most hierarchies are displayed most general -> least general, except for DNS!

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[harvalen]

That depends on what you're used too.. It makes just as much sense to me to add it in front of the name.

For example the iso standard for dates specify year-month-day, so if I just say 02-14, it's easy to assume that I meant 2003-02-14. Or if I say just today is the 14th it's easy to assume that I mean 02-14->2003-02-14
Same thing for telephone numbers where it's --, where it let's you just chose and it fills in the rest.

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[twoshortplanks]

No, thinking about it more, I supose it doesn't...I guess I always thought of it as autocompletion, and while "completing what you type" makes sense then "inserting it before you type" makes less so... but I guess you could get used to it really quickly.

We'd have to reverse email addresses too. Oooh, Would that mean that I'd want to write:

com.twoshortplanks@fowler.mark

How Bajorian.

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[Russ Nelson]

Yes, basically, you're right.
-russ

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[Dr. Photo]

My email address was csc345@uk.ac.lancs.cent1. To communicate with the rest of the world however, I learnt to always write this as csc345@cent1.lancs.ac.uk.

Puny human!
Morbo laughs at your backward ways!

</Morbo>

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[Richard W.M. Jones]

Yes, me too! I was rwj@uk.ac.dl.cxa IIRC ... Of course this was long before a certain Mr. Berners-Lee started corrupting the internet :-)

Rich.

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[batemanm]

94-97. They phased out cent1 in 96 IIRC and replaced it with three machines (unixa-unixc). I think they have now gone back to having one machine again (cent1) but usernames are based on real names and not subject.

Re:DNS should be reversed...

[Anonymous Coward]

Which would suit that large fraction of the world's population who go first by their family name just fine...

cool

[the_2nd_coming]

so now the US will allow enumeration or return types!!!! thank god.

The joys of new technology

[Kadagan AU]

Is this technology supposed to replace our current email addresses (theoretically), or be in addition to them? Either way it seems dumb.

If it's a replacement, who says I want to give the whole world my phone number? If I want them to have it, then I'll give it. Also, if you move and get a new phone number, are you forced to get a new email address too?

If it's in addition to my current addresses, why bother? It's just one more place I have to set up spam filters. One more address to check. Also, couldn't spammers easily pick up a few phone books and use those numbers to vastly increase the size of their database?

just some thoughts.

~Jon~

This is good

[Anonymous Coward]

However, I can't determine why Java left them out . I know that ther are ways to
simulate them, but sometimes I just want a simple C type enum.

Now every programmer in the world must devise
their own method to simulate them, since it is very common, including being used all over the place in the JDK, like Color.white, Calendar.MONTH, etc.

By NOT providing them, they have also created a type safety problem. There is no guarantee that an enum is a valid value. Sure, it can be a bit complex to get enums right, but better in the language than by the millions of independent programmers. Now I can pass any int variable or literal and there is no problem. YUCK!

Re:This is good

[wcbarksdale]

I once disliked Java for that very reason, but I have since realized that enum is not as essential as you might think in an object-oriented language.
Basically the main purpose of enum in a language like C is to provide support for polymorphism. (Please forgive any syntax errors or the like in the following, it has been a long time since I've written in C.) If you were writing a calculator along the lines of dc or whatever, you might have at some level:

struct expr {
enum type {NUM, OPER};
enum binop {PLUS, MINUS, TIMES, DIVIDE};
type t;
union {
enum binop b;
double value;
} data;
struct expr *left;
struct expr *right;
};
double evaluate(struct expr *e) {
if (e->t == NUM)
return e->data.value;
switch(e->data.b) {
case PLUS:
return evaluate(left) + evaluate(right);
case MINUS:
return evaluate(left) - evaluate(right);
case TIMES:
return evaluate(left) * evaluate(right);
case DIVIDE:
{
int x;
x = evaluate(right);
if (x == 0.0)
return 0.0;
return evaluate(left) / x;
}
}
}
void print(struct expr *e); /* an analogous recursive function */</ECODE>

Now, I would argue that this is pretty ugly in and of itself; beyond aesthetics, though, it also leads to bugs. Suppose you later add to your calculator an exponentiation operator. You call it whatever you like in the enum, and add it as one of the statements in the switch. You compile and the evaluation still works fine, but when try printing the original expression you print nothing or crash. Oops, you forgot to add the operator to the print function... In a big enough program, you invariably forget to make the change somewhere that is not tested.
A bigger problem of the same kind lies in the way you are handling different types of expressions. Suppose you decide to add variables to the language. If you don't change evaluate, you'll treat the data member as a binop (rather than as a variable) and end up doing random unpleasant things.
Contrast that example with this one in Java:

abstract class Expression {
public abstract double evaluate();
public abstract void print(java.io.PrintStream s);
}
class NumericValue extends Expression {
public NumericValue(double value) {v = value;}
public abstract double evaluate() {return v;}
public abstract void print(java.io.Printstream s) {/*...*/}
double v;
}
abstract class Binop extends Expression {
public Binop(Expression left, Expression right) {
l = left;
r = right;
}
public void void print(java.io.PrintStream s) {
s.print(l);
s.print(this.toString());
s.print(r);
}
Expression l;
Expression r;
}
public class Plus extends Binop {
public Binop(Expression left, Expression right) {
super(left,right);
}
public String toString() { return "+"; }
public double evaluate() { return l.evaluate() + r.evaluate(); }
}
/* et cetera */

It's more lines of code, I'll grant that. But it's also considerably easier to maintain. Useful commonality is much easier to factor out, with the print function here for instance. And if you forget to write evaluate() for some class, the compiler will complain about it.
You give the examples of java.awt.Color and java.util.Calendar. Take another look at Color. The constants defined there are actual Color objects, not just ints. You can't pass 8675309 to a function that expects a Color object, as you sometimes can with C-style enums. In fact, an enum wouldn't be very useful here, as a Color seems to be in essence a 4-tuple. You *could* possibly have an enum that just defined those several colors and handled them specially from a standard 32-bit color, but this would be somewhat inefficient. Having a constant in a class like Color does allows the constant to be initialized when the class is loaded and thereafter treated as any other Color is treated. Calendar, on the other hand, is just a very bizarre class altogether.
One advantage an enum can have over inheritance that I didn't address here is the ability to use numerical properties of the enumerated type. For instance, you can have a for loop over all types, or define a set of properties that you can use binary operations on.

Re:This is good

[UnknownSoldier]

> I once disliked Java for that very reason, but I have since realized that enum is not as essential as you might think in an object-oriented language.

Enums provide a few big benefits in C++

1. They are constants
2. You can't take the addres of them inadvertantly.
3. They are guaranteed to be inlined.

Basically, they are a safe #define replacement.

Plus, the autoincrementing of the value is another big factor. Especially when used in tricks like this sizeof() bitcounting..

Good for spammers!

[dubbayu_d_40]

It'll be to easy for spammers to find recipients at random, the scheme looks too ordered.

Why does it matter?

[Improv]

Does it really matter that the different parts of
an URL have different degrees of specificity?

A stupid question from a stupid US citizen...

[Anonymous Coward]

..that lives in the new Nazi-Country (formerly known as "Land of the free").. making it easier to track down ppl is the main purpose of this crap wrapped in pointless shit...

Re:A stupid question from a stupid US citizen...

[frp001]

Ah... I wouldn't worry about it too much... The rest of the world will follow soon ;-).

Illegal or not, it will still happen daily

[dphoenix]

There are many states that have clear restrictions and laws regarding e-mail spam, but this is never tracked down or dealt with. Specifics like no forged headers, no using anonymous remailers, and so on. But it's tough to track down, and spammers are very crafty, and thus little gets done - at all. Connecting the two (phone, internet) will only worsen the problem. Perhaps, senators would be more interested in legislation and enforcement if they have a 9 year old daughter being offered penis enlargement during dinner-time.

Re:Illegal or not, it will still happen daily

[djrogers]

This is easier to solve than most people think - simply write the law in such a way that the producer/distributor of whatever is being sold/promoted via SPAM is punished for it, regardless of wether or not they 'directly' sent it out. After all, there's always one way to get in touch with the penis enlargement people - order the stuff ;-)

ring.. ring..

[mrselfdestrukt]

Me: Hello?
Someone: Hi, is this 2..2.0.6.7.4.9.5.1.4.1.e.164.arpa ?
Me: Yes.
Someone: Did you get my e-mail?
Me: Who is this?
Someone: Do you want to improve your sex life by having a penis enlargement.
Me: I'm sorry , but I already have a large penis.Goodbye.
*click*

ring..ring..

This is news?

[image]

About time the rest of the US caught on. I've been using ENUM's since Pascal:

TYPE
Suit = { spades, hearts, clubs, diamonds };

Or C:

enum suit { SPADES, HEARTS, CLUBS, DIAMONDS };

Or Java:

public final class Suit {
public static final Suit SPADES = new Suit( "Spades" );
public static final Suit HEARTS = new Suit( "Hearts" );
public static final Suit DIAMONDS = new Suit( "Diamonds" );
public static final Suit CLUBS = new Suit( "Clubs" );
private String _name = null;
private Suit( String name ) { _name = name; }
public String toString{ return _name; }
}

Oh wait. Now I read the article! Nevermind...

Re:This is news?

[Anonymous Coward]

hmmm.....how about

public interface Suit {
public static final int Spades = 1 ;
public static final int Hearts = 2 ;
public static final int Diamonds = 3 ;
public static final int Clubs = 4 ;
}

class Game implements Suit{ ....
}

Re:This is news?

[Brummund]

For example, your code isn't type safe. Check out
Substitutes for Missing C Constructs (About 1/3 down the page). The other tips are also quite useful.

Add international sign?

[Kjella]

+1 to dial US
+47 to dial me (Norway)

Shouldn't really add more than one number, there's not more than 256 countries today I think.

Not that I really care about this idea anyway...

Kjella

Why can't we drop numbers?

[slim]

IMHO email addresses, domain names and URLs are easier to remember and use than numbers. There are very few phone numbers I can type in from memory (my own, my parents', my work's... that's probably it), and dozens of email addresses and web site front page URLs.

Rather than embed a clunky phone number into a DNS entry, can't we hide phone numbers behind a directory the way DNS hides IP addresses? The spam issue would need to be addressed of course, but the sooner I can use a payphone without needing to look up a number manually the better.

Re:Why can't we drop numbers?

[vidarh]

I'm even worse. I couldn't remember my fiancees, my work or my moms number if my life depended on it. It's not that I've got a problem remembering numbers - I remember my bank account numbers etc. with no problems at all. The reason is simply that I never type the numbers in, I always use my cellphone either for the call itself or to look up whatever number I need.

Using numeric addressing on the internet as well is the last thing I'd want.

Re:Why can't we drop numbers?

[dissy]

Um.. but what you want is exactly what this does!
Didnt you even bother reading what enum does???

(Sorry if this sounds like a personal attack, it is indeed not. Its just this is the 5th reply ive made correcting people that dont know what ENUM is yet think they have the right to bitch about it and claim it shouldnt exist)

ENUM is reverse DNS for phone numbers.

The point of ENUM is that YES it is better to use domains/hosts and not numbers!

ENUM exists to do the same thing DNS does for IPs right now.

Do you go around and type 1.0.168.192.in-addr.arpa to get to 192.168.0.1? Or do you type in mypc.mydomain.com ?

Well, now myphone.mydomain.com will resolve to my phone number using an ENUM record.
Then my phone number will (Using the e164 standard here) reverse resolve back to myphone.mydomain.com

Its the same method www.mydomain.com resolves to an IP. This does that for phone numbers.

IPs and Phone numbers have nothing to do with eachother, and this will not let people magically obtain one from the other and steal your soul.

Technically i can make www.mydomain.com have an A record for an ipv4 address, an AAAA for ipv6, and also an ENUM for a phone number.
They have nothing to do with eachother other!!

ENUM will allow you to call me (using the existing phone system as it is right now) by calling phone.mydomain.com which will resolve to my phone number.

Hope this clears up some stuff.

ENUM in the News

[nycview]

ENUM in the News

EFA expresses security concerns over ENUM, SMH, November 27, 2002.

Enum's potential applications aren't as widespread as promised, New Architect, July 2002.

Internet Telephone Numbering System (ENUM) offers promise of a single point of contact for all communication devices, ITU Press Release, May 31, 2002.

Listing Again, The Economist, April 11, 2002.

Phone number-to-e-mail service raises privacy concerns, Computerworld, October 5, 2001.

Your Rights Online: A Number For Everything, Slashdot, September 4, 2001.

One number & and no escape anywhere, The Times, September 3, 2001.

Re:ENUM in the News

[Anonymous Coward]

Due to excessive bad posting from this IP or Subnet, comment posting has temporarily been disabled. If it's you, consider this a chance to sit in the timeout corner. If it's someone else, this is a chance to hunt them down. If you think this is unfair, please email moderation@slashdot.org with your MD5'd IPID and SubnetID, which are "7cec8392fa6fb9e2eff32f1e259515bf" and "fce1c29668e9ef704458f9316db6ce8c".

BOSTON, Massachusetts (AP) -- A group of U.S. soldiers, parents of soldiers and six U.S. House members filed a lawsuit in federal court Thursday seeking to stop the president from launching a war against Iraq without a declaration of war from Congress.

The People's Investigation of 9/11

We declare a national emergency in uncovering what really happened on 9/11/2001 through an immediate call for an independent collaborative investigation worldwide. The U.S. government could help us but instead is doing everything it can to stop any investigations into 9/11.
The People's Investigation of 9/11 is an assemblage of international researchers and activists. Task-based functional groups work together on various projects, including research topics and volunteer efforts, in unison with other 9/11 evidence-finding efforts. Until a legitimate independent citizen's committee is funded and recognized by the U.S. government or a world political body or court, it is left up to the citizens of the world to investigate and share what they know with others.

What we know

"There was plenty of time to shoot down several of the planes, particularly the one we all knew was heading toward the Pentagon, which had enough time to fly 270 degrees around the Pentago and then hitting it where the least number of employees were working. Interviews with pilots in the air during the attacks indicate they were asked to land or simply verify the Pentagon was hit."

Scarificing Lives for a pretext

In his book, The Grand Chess Board, the former secretary of state laid out a plan detailing what the U.S. should do in order to establish and maintain global hegemony. He suggested that control over Central Asia was absolutely necessary. One of the major obstacles to the achievement of this plan, he noted, was the problem of securing domestic support for military presence and action abroad. In light of the horrific attacks on 9/11 his words carry additional significance.

"The attitude of the American public toward the external projection of American power has been much more ambivalent. The public supported America's engagement in World War II largely because of the shock effect of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor."

"Moreover, as America becomes an increasingly multi-cultural society, it may find it more difficult to fashion a consensus on foreign policy issues, except in the circumstance of a truly massive and widely perceived direct external threat."

"It is also a fact that America is too democratic at home to be autocratic abroad. This limits the use of America's power, especially its capacity for military intimidation. Never before has a populist democracy attained international supremacy. But the pursuit of power is not a goal that commands popular passion, except in conditions of a sudden threat or challenge to the public's sense of domestic well-being. The economic self-denial (that is, defense spending) and the human sacrifice (casualties, even among professional soldiers) required in the effort are uncongenial to democratic instincts. Democracy is inimical to imperial mobilization."

Zbigniew Brzezinski, former national security advisor, in "THE GRAND CHESSBOARD - American Primacy And It's Geostrategic Imperatives," Basic Books, 1997.

In a January 13, 2002 Washington Post op-ed piece, Henry Kissinger argued for a quick commencement to the proposed war against Iraq - while people still remember 9-11, he said. A military operation against Iraq must begin with haste - "while the memory of the attack on the United States is still vivid and American-deployed forces are available to back up the diplomacy."

This is NOT a test. This is real, so wake up and SHOUT AT THE TOP OF YOUR LUNGS!!

Bush did it. 911 was an inside job.

http://www.copvcia.com/

http://www.lightscion.com/Sounds/g_b_ruppert.mp3

http://energycrisis.org/de/lecture.html

Impeach Bush over 9/11

http://www.cooperativeresearch.org/Sept11/septembe r11home.htm

This means that

[kinnell]

Spammers will be able to compile email lists from the telephone directory, promting everyone to go ex-directory, and rendering the phone book obsolete

A symbiosis will be encouraged between email spam and phone spam

Telephone numbers will be available all over the internet, even if they are ex-directory

Changing your phone/fax number will require changing your email address, and vice versa

Moving to a different region will require a change of email address, thus rendering an obvious advantage of email irrelevant

Of course there are advantages as well, but I'm feeling cynical today. Is it just me, or does this plan seem a little naive? A bit like ten years ago, when the internet was going to solve all the problems of the world overnight, and make everyone suddenly nicer.

Re:This means that

[myalias]

The proposed addressing scheme seems nearly identical to that used by TPC.INT for the past 10 years or so.

One may want to check with them about similar problems they have had and how they were[n't] solved. Spam was definitely a problem, as was other "Tragedy of the Commons" problems.

I believe Marshall Rose had a lot to do with that addressing scheme.

Re:This means that

[dissy]

I just wanted to point out that not a single point in your post is possible or true.

I think it all goes around the fact that you are under the (incorrect) assumption this links phone numbers to email addresses.

It doesnt (Thank you for reading the article)

If you have a block of real IPs, you get an in-addr.arpa block to setup reverse dns.

Lets say i have www.mydomain.com point to my IP address.

Is it more insecure or bad for any of the reasons you pointed out that i ALSO have my ip address resolve back to the same host?
No.

And that is all ENUM is, for phone numbers.

If you want phone.mydomain.com to resolve to your phone number, people dont have to remember your number. that is good!

ENUM allows the phone number to reverse resolve back to phone.mydomain.com (Or whatever host/domain setup you want)

Technically you can give out your phone number, just like you can give out your IP address.

But remembering numbers sucks.

DNS lets us not remember IPs already, and now it will let us not have to remember phone numbers.

Did anyone hold a gun to your head to make you register a domain and use DNS for your site?
No.
And noone will do the same with your phone number.

I personally would love phone.mydomain.com to always resolve to my phone number, even if my phone number changes alot.
Thanks to ENUM i can have that.

If you want to dial numbers and only put IPs in your webbroser or send email to person@ip.ad.re.ss then more power to you.
But ill use DNS thank you.

GoNumber.net a more innovative solution?

[Wonderkid]

You may like to check out GoNumber.net Personal listing. Thanks to the fact GoNumber.net is a directory NOT a technology / standard, it can adapt, so your GoNumber really does last forever, even if new communications mediums arrive in the future. There are privacy controls built in (being upgraded as you read this). GoNumber.net allows you to choose a GoNumber that is between 1 and 10 digits in length. It can even represent the letters on a phone keypad. Furthermore you can opt to input the alphanumeric equivalent of a GoNumber into the GoNumber field at www.gonumber.net or surf to www.gonumber.net/xxxxx where xxxxx is your GoNumber or alphanumeric equiv. For example, http://www.gonumber.net/555123. Or try inputting 'GOiSS' into the GoNumber input field at GoNumber.net to see a GoNumber weblink in action.

Re:GoNumber.net a more innovative solution?

[Anonymous Coward]

How is that innovative? It is really just a directory of people's information. Any community database can do that.

ICQ has been doing it for years (http://wwp.icq.com/your_ICQ_number). It's free of charge and a lot more popular than GoNumber.

Re:GoNumber.net a more innovative solution?

[Wonderkid]

yes, but it's ugly and badly designed. ICQ is a great chat service, and that's the point. If you switch to (for example), AOL or MSN, then you don't use your ICQ number any more. GoNumber is boring, but it does it's job of allowing you to replace ALL your information with one lifetime number.

Patent encumbered??!

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought enum was patent encumbered. Had this changed? Can enum be used in free software applications??

illegal in all states and most of Europe

[dpilot]

but what about Nigeria?

And if you are overseas?

[hussar]

I would love to see what their plan is for supporting members of the US Armed Forces and Foreign Service and US expats overseas. We get a number like this while in the US and then we are stationed outside the US. What happens then?

I am still waiting for about 50% of online merchants to figure out the APO/FPO system and how to mail me products. I would rather the Dept. of Commerce fix that problem first before they help telemarketers spam me no matter where on the globe I am.

And what about costs of the calls/transmissions? If I am in Southwest Asia and someone in the US calls my ENUM, who gets tagged for the long distance bill?

Re:And if you are overseas?

[sql*kitten]

And what about costs of the calls/transmissions? If I am in Southwest Asia and someone in the US calls my ENUM, who gets tagged for the long distance bill?

Sounds like a /. poll question. I nominate 'CowboyNeal'.

IPv6

[matithyahu]

So if we can't switch to IPv6 this is supposed to happen? But how are they planning on those two interacting? I imagine that they won't have ENUM for devices or IPv6 for people but won't this make it a little more complicated. You sending the one email but it being routed to eight different devices doesn't necessarily make things easier

Re:IPv6

[robertchin]

Well, no, IPv6 addresses are never supposed to be statically allocated, instead relying completely on hostname resolution. Not to mention the fact that you probably couldn't remember an IPv6 easily, not to mention several. If this conforms to the same in-arpa DNS system, then this would imply that the enum numbers would provide a reverse lookup mapping. I don't know anything about enum though, so this is all conjecture.

Stupid

[johnburton]

I was going to write a long email ranting about but this but decided not to bother as nobody will use it anyway so it doesn't matter

Re:One number...Mod'ed rundundant????

[dmanny]

Some people have no sense of humor.

So old, it's new

[mwood]

Wowee, another case of the Internet catching up to OSI, which defined address prefixes based on E.164 telephone numbers a decade ago.

Too many questions

[PurplePhase]

It is a brief article, so it brought up a lot of questions for me:

So this is supposed to connect *all* our phone lines with *all* our e-mail addresses and *all* our domains? Or is it that everyone suddenly has these new e-mail accounts and websites which each of us needs to manage and check because the government or other superpowers might decide to leave us notice there instead of, say, on my voicemail machine or sending me a form letter?

How do the e-mail addresses fit into it again?

And so now when my phone company tells me it will take 1 week to move my phone when I move, are my e-mail and domain out for that time, too, or are they required to provide an outside-accessible secured e-mail server and access so I can update my website? How about if I move out of their broadband service area? How about if I change my ISP to cable or satellite? Or if I move into another phone service's area? Does the phone company host my e-mail and website, or my ISP?

And do we get to choose our phone numbers, or do they magically decide at one point in history that *that's* the phone number you keep for the rest of your life? Or do you keep the number for your lifespan?

When they have to extend the phone numbers to 11 digits or more, are they going to revise all old numbers so they start with additional 1's or 9's or something (thinking mostly about the DNS)?

"could be routed to a telephone, an e-mail inbox or a fax machine, depending on the application."

Who decides these routings? Or are we all going to be required to have a magical box to connect us to the outside world? Or are we all issued passwords so we can remotely configure our preferences (yeah, like 99% of the country is going to want to do that, let alone keep their passwords).

Which organization is going to coordinate all of this? Government? Public? Private? Verisign?

We are talking about doing this for everyone, right? Who's going to do the tech support?

8-PP

Re:Too many questions

[Tony Hoyle]

I've read the article about 3 times and still can't see the utility of it. My phone number is *not* public information and has nothing to do with my email address, nor do I want it ever to do so.

VOIP can use IP addresses and therefore works fine on the back of the existing DNS system - there's zero need for a 'new' standard.

Good move for VoIP

[Anonymous Coward]

This is actually a very important move to pry the phone system out of the clutches of the regional monopolies. They had wanted to use the phone number allocation process to control VoIP adoption, but ENUM sidesteps that. See the following recent stories:

http://news.com.com/2100-1033-982130.html
http: //biz.yahoo.com/bw/030210/102182_1.html

What about Phone Changes

[sckienle]

I still got calls for the person who last had my phone number for years after it was switched to me. Now I can get personal emails for the prior "owner" of my phone number and not even have the chance to tell them I'm not Kim before they go on about what happened to them last night.

Leaving that and telemarketers having everyone's email address immediately and automatically aside, I am confused as to the utility of this. I would much rather have permanent transferable alphabetic EMail address, which I do have on pobox.com, than my telephone number.

What ENUM is for

[Ben Hutchings]

Please read the usage scenarios in this Internet Draft if you don't know what ENUM is about.

Re:What ENUM is for

[Anonymous Coward]

Note: The author's email address is at the extreme bottom of the document cited. He might be interested in hearing about people's views on this technology.

Another Network Solutiosn monopoly?

[Anonymous Coward]

So will we have to pay Network Solutions for every ENUM, or will companies have to pay to use the ENUM name on every product or service? NetSol's currently the only holder of a US trademark with "ENUM" in it, though it's "ENUM World". (See http://www.uspto.gov/web/menu/search.html to do your own trademark search).

No

[praedor]

I wont use it, thank you. My phone number is unlisted. I take pains to protect that and I use a relatively anonymous email address that cannot easily be tied to me in the real world.

I will not go for having my phone number pasted all over the net, part of every newsgroup posting, email-based opinion expression, etc. My phone number, address, etc, are not for wide open, general consumption.

Re:No

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, that's all cool and all, but you don't mind if the rest of us move into the 21st century anyway, do you?

Re:No

[praedor]

No prob. Just give me your phone number, and while you're at it, your address. From there I can get just about anything else I want.

Are you married by the way? Is your wife hot? Or, if you're female, are YOU hot? Are you married and willing to entertain a stalker?

Does the "21st Century" automatically mean no privacy nor even the illusion of privacy? "21st Century" doesn't mean ANYTHING except what you make it mean and thus your comment is without real content. This system of enum is broken at the start. Broken from the privacy standpoint, broken from the standpoint that people's location and phone numbers CHANGE, and broken from the standpoint that many people are unlisted FOR VALID reasons (of course, there is no need to justify being unlisted as that is entirely a choice you are free to make...fortunately).

There are other problems, of course, just read some of the other messages about it.

And this is different from .tpc.int *HOW*?

[renehollan]

You know, .tpc.int.

"The Phone Company"

For those who don't know (and are too lazy to check here, this is a free service that maps fax numbers to email addresses, so, if you know a fax number, you can send a properly mime-formatted fax (or plain text, it works), to them via a .tpc.int email address: it gets routed to a local internet to fax gateway (presumably a local call away from the destination fax machine), and thence to the desired destination.

Being free, coverage is not perfect, of course, and there are limits to how much each gateway will accept (per origin, hour, day, week, etc.) but the system works surprisingly well!

Yes, fax machines are not phones, but the concept obviously extends there.

Re:One number...Mod'ed rundundant????

[wcbarksdale]

No, it was because everyone already knows that bind handles DNS lookups.

This could be a problem

[osgeek]

Without legislation to seriously hinder spammers, this thing looks like trouble. The abuses stagger the mind.

For the love of Eris, WHY?!

[metamatic]

Maybe I'm dense, but can someone explain to me why I might ever want this?

Re:For the love of Eris, WHY?!

[Viol8]

You're forgetting , most of these sorts of stupid ideas are not for the benefit of us mortals , they're to benefit big corporations and government to make it easier for them to charge us, sell us rubbish abd keep tabs on us. No one in their right mind would want one number for everything , its about as daft as having 1 PIN number for everything.

Pure bliss

[jcoy42]

You've got to love this scheme.

What happens when the next nasty worm breaks out? And just think of all the new devices to exploit which will bring everything down.

And you can't call to report a problem with your email because the phone is out too.

Yep, tieing all devices to one single point of failure sounds like a dream come true.

How is it possible.....

[El Cubano]

given this:

In a letter to the State Department, Assistant Secretary of Commerce Nancy Victory said the U.S. should endorse the effort but work to ensure that users' privacy and security will be protected and innovation and competition would be encouraged.

"The time has come for the United States to be more active on this issue," Victory wrote. "We must ensure that ENUM can be implemented in a pro-consumer, secure and competitive manner."

That DoC can have it both ways? Security means encryption. Encryption will either scare off competitors (afriad of the legal wrangels with the DMCA now) or prompt the big comapnies to beat any small competitors over the head with the DMCA. Nevermind that the DMCA may not even apply in some situations (that hasn't stopped the big comapnies up until now).

It seems that this initiative can have competition OR security, but not both, given the current legal climate surrounding anything even remotely considered "secure."

Ass Backwards

[keyslammer]

What you want is to be able to call people up using a hostname. Constructing host names from a phone number is practically a step backwards.

One reason why we use host names instead of IP addresses is that most people find them easier to remember.

Another reason is that IP addresses (much like telephone numbers) are subject to change - by using a host name we are isolating ourselves from a more volatile part of the system.

I want to be able to contact people no matter what phone number they're attached to through a name, just as I would their web page. There's no good technical reason at this point not to view telephony as any other network service.

But the normal method

[pommiekiwifruit]

Is for one person to read out their number, the other person rings it without answering, and you both type in names on the "last dialled" / "missed calls" lists of your phones without having been charged by either network!

The only problem is the stalker with hyper hearing who also notes down the number while one of you is saying it aloud, but that is easily fixed by having one person dial their number on the other persons phone, as long as you like them enough to not worry about whether their hands are sticky or not.

My bar's too stingy for beer mats anyway.

Sounds familiar

[Srass]

Something similar has already been tried, about 1997 or so. It was called NumNet. You don't hear much about them, do you? It was a stupid idea then, too.

Numbers are, at least for me, less mnemonic than letters. Besides, I moved two years ago. Someone else has my old phone number, but my email address is still the same.

I like it that way.

ENUM is much more than just a global ID.....

[mzito]

It's a fundamental bridge between two different worlds - the PSTN and IP networking. The real utility of this is not so much the one-id-for-every-contact, its things like pstn->ip telephony->pstn. Some of the applications include:

-Combining with SIP to provide global number portability - no cell phone roaming overseas, etc.
-Reducing international tariff burdens by terminating calls in countries with better tariff agreements with the destination (i.e. it is much cheaper for the UK to call France than for the US to call France, so you route the call over IP to the UK, then go PSTN from the UK to France).
-Simplifying carrier-transit agreements

And these are just the ones we've come up with so far. It's worth noting as well that part of the ENUM spec is the use of a new dns record type - NAPTR, which allows regular expression functionality in DNS RRs...the mind reels at the possibilities.

For the people who want to know about e164.arpa, that is planned to be the global TLD for ENUM. Thanks to the miracle of DNS delegation, each country code can be administered by the country itself. The only one that's really complicated is the US, since it includes other countries in the +1 country code.

The problems with ENUM are primarily that most of the phone companies have solved some of these problems with proprietary (generally inferior) solutions. They're slow-moving to begin with and don't immediately see the utility in implementing ENUM. It's mostly up-and-coming CLECs and VoIP companies that are looking to ENUM to both generate revenue and save money.

Plus, there is already enum support in a variety of products. Cisco's VoIP suite includes ENUM support (only the SIP line, not the H.323), so you could roll out ENUM within your organization. I have a feeling that ENUM will be much like BGP or DNS is today - 95%+ of the population will either use or benefit from it, and never be aware of its existence.

Thanks,
Matt

Great...

[fudgefactor7]

Now I can get spam no matter where I am!

I wonder how long this will take for it to be abused. What, maybe 2 seconds?

Does this give phone numbers corresponding IP?

[WebMasterJoe]

So, I'm not sure I understand it, but does this mean that my cellphone is going to have an IP address, of sorts? If so, this could mean that it could be incorporated into our current DNS system. Think - I could have some CNAMEs set up for my domain, so you could call me at cell.joestoner.com, home.joestoner.com, or work.joestoner.com, and this last address would also be the same ip as webmaster.phone.mycompany.com!

I'm hoping that my impression of this is right, because it would be pretty damn cool.

Oh flippin' great!!!!!

[drxenos]

Now I can be REALLY targeted by mass-marketers!!

Ummmm....

[DCowern]

The addresses look pretty long and unwieldy, but supposedly consumer devices will make it easier to use.

Have you seen an IPv6 address lately?

Seriously. I think 4.3.2.1.5.5.5.2.0.2.1.e164.arpa is a hell of a lot easier to remember than 23AF:4DE5:4AB5:23CE:CD2B:2FBB:AE4E:EB13 because it's made up of already-memorized numbers. Just my .02.

Spam Spam Spam

[artificial-intellect]

So how soon should I expect to get a call from MR.FRANCIS SANKOH from APEX BANK OF NIGERIA? As if telephone marketeers weren't bad enough....

I Just Don't Want This

[Uart]

Ok, so it sounds convenient right? People will be able to find you regardless of the mode of communication, right?

Right. BUT here are the problems.

1) Now the Government can also find me.
2) I'm pretty sure someone will use this to track you/your communications
3) Sometimes I want someone to have my email address but not my phone number, or vice versa, etc.
4) I don't like the idea of being labeled with a number.

I'm sure you call all add others. For me, those concerns weigh heavier than any conveniences.

hell no

[Anonymous Coward]

I like to keep everything seperate. I don't care if it'll be easier for people to get in contact with me. The likely result is the people that I "don't" want to get in contact with will be able to get in reach with me. I like to remain as much anonymous as possible thank you very much. This technology isn't going to get my support one bit. It will get my hatred though :) I don't associate my cell phone number with my home number, same with my e-mail address, none of them are associated, unless I choose to let the person know of any of the other ones. I enjoy my privacy.

no no no!!!!!

[nege]

ok ok ok , this is becoming unnecessarily confusing. Lets just do this...

1. implant chip in everyone's head with a unique id of somesort. Make it as many digits / alpha as you please. this will be government issued.

2. create a new type of internet...we will call it "the grid".

3. hook it up so that every person is on "the grid" can "see" each other. think AOL instant messenger, complete with buddy lists.

4. you can "call" anyone on your buddy list, in real time and speak via an ethereal telepathic connection, with traffic being monitored and controlled by "the net" (for performance reasons, as well as to keep the terrorists out)

5. uhm, well, profit I guess.

There you have it! Why bother with a new TLD???

Re:no no no!!!!!

[nege]

wow. troll? someone needs to get laid. now THATS a troll. lol

Give us a "do not contact" list system first!!!

[eyefish]

As any educated slashdot reader knows, the instant (and I literaly mean 1 second later) that ENUM becomes operational there will be millions of spam messages targeted to those poor souls.

So, I recommend lawmakers first create a global "do not contact me" list where anyone can go in and declare their ENUM "spam-less".

Of course, this will NOT stop spammers from moving their operations to other countries were such laws do not apply and then send you spam anyways.

In other words, I think the ENUM idea is a great idea, but one which spam will very likely kill. Just imagine, once a single spammer gets a hold of my "universal address" there is NO WAY I will be able to stop such spam. Today at least I can get a different email address and get done with it, but once you have your ENUM tied to your home address, personal website, home phone, fax, work phone, cell phone, beeper, etc, changing emails/numbers/addresses all of a sudden becomes VERY hard. As a matter of fact I wouldn't be surprised if the spam community is actually lobbying to get ENUM approved.

Note that I *wish* I was wrong (and if I'm proven wrong you can trust me that I'll be the first one to be happy about it), but my take on this is that something like ENUM will only work effectively in the long future when all countries agree on a worldwide do-no-call list with legal penalties regardless of in which country you are.

Re:Give us a "do not contact" list system first!!!

[Dirtside]

regardless of in which country you are.

Man, some people will go to any lengths to avoid ending a sentence with a preposition. :)

Alternate joke: Yoda? Is that you?

It's Spammeriffic!

[Royster]

Imagine all of the opportunities to sell enlargement creams, investments in dead dictator's uncleared bank accounts and printer toner cartridges. All you have to do is a dictionary attack against the known area codes and local exchanges. Wow! Imagine the growth in the US economy!

think in-addr.arpa.

[Anonymous Coward]

numerical PTRs, mang.

Secret Agent Man

[Anonymous Coward]

"they givin' you a numbah an' takin' whay yo' name!"

Technical Information

[vericgar]

Click here for the RFC (2916)

Yeah Give Out My Phone Number

[shadowxtc]

I really want to have an IP address forced upon me. It's not bad enough we have to divulge our address whenever we make a connection. Now they want to force us to divulge our phone number along with it by default? Fuck that.

US Toll-free routing is very complex == $$$

[bdolan]

Note that when you look up a US local phone number, it has only one destination (subject to local number portability) However, with US toll-free numbers (i.e. 800, 888, 877, 866, 855), the destination location is dependent on the time of day, the calling party id, and the relative amount of traffic sent to one location versus another. A toll-free number can have a separate destination for a given calling party 10-digit US phone number, area code or other criteria so that a call you place and one I place may end up on different carriers and different parts of the country. Also, a toll free number often absolutely prohibit connections altogether from some portions of the US (or Canada etc). Routing these calls properly is not simple.

For reasons such as this, I think we can expect a lot of hands out looking for money for putting small records in databases (registration) and for looking such up. Look at the business models of the heavy sponsors of ENUM.

You forgot the ending!

[Anonymous Coward]

One Number to rule them all, One Number to find them,
One Number to bring them all and in the darkness bind them,
In the land of Marketing where the spammers and telemarketers are.

telephony URLs already exist, see RFC2806

[blackketter]

I'm not sure why phone numbers belong in DNS, it makes more sense to use RFC2806, which already specifies URLs for telephony, like:

tel:+358-555-1234567

points to a phone number in Finland.

Last Post!

[alpg]

The misnaming of fields of study is so common as to lead to what might be
general systems laws. For example, Frank Harary once suggested the law that
any field that had the word "science" in its name was guaranteed thereby
not to be a science. He would cite as examples Military Science, Library
Science, Political Science, Homemaking Science, Social Science, and Computer
Science. Discuss the generality of this law, and possible reasons for its
predictive power.
-- Gerald Weinberg, "An Introduction to General Systems
Thinking"

- this post brought to you by the Automated Last Post Generator...