Man cleared of abusing NTL customers

[MetaWraith]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/06/08/ntl_swears/

Yesterday Gibbin was cleared of the charges because a magistrates court ruled the message was not offensive enough

He did it by punching random buttons ?

[Kliro]

I suppose theres some sort of code, like when you get through to someones answerphone, if you know the code, you can acess it.

6 months seems pretty harsh for that, I doubt anyone was genuinely offended by it.

[Roy MM]

Originally Posted by MetaWraith

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2005/06/08/ntl_swears/

He did it by punching random buttons ?

Every time i phone NTL i hit random button, it gets me through quicker.

[Ramrod]

This enabled him to change NTL's welcome message to something he felt was more appropriate. Hero

__________________

Originally Posted by Kliro

6 months seems pretty harsh for that, I doubt anyone was genuinely offended by it.

You reading the same story that the rest of us are?

[Kliro]

Nope, don'th think so :

After an urgent investigation the ISP tracked the call to the house of Ashley Gibbin, a 26 old year taxi driver from Teesside. He was charged with sending a grossly offensive message and faced a possible six month sentence

[quadplay]

I find it hard to believe he

a) did it by punching random buttons
b) had been on hold for an hour

Mainly because I seem to remember the message was heard on a Sunday - when the call centres were closed...

[greencreeper]

Love it Respect

[Kevin]

I find it totally beliveable is it Ntl after all :-)

[MovedGoalPosts]

Originally Posted by jimbo

I find it hard to believe he

a) did it by punching random buttons
b) had been on hold for an hour

Mainly because I seem to remember the message was heard on a Sunday - when the call centres were closed...

But if somehow the message system had gone wrong enough so he didn't get the messages, but ended up in a loop somewhere. It happens often enough with these dodgy systems that you press button 2, 5 9 or whatever as instructed, you hear some daft click and that's it your in telecoms nomans land. From there there might just have been some sort of fluke. I bet there's a password / code on there now though.

As for phoning on Sunday, or indeed any time CS is closed, why do you still have to put in your own phone number, the select options 2, 5, 9 or whatever to then get the "we are closed".

I wonder how many punters actually get hacked off enough by ntl's limited hours so they either don't get new subscribers or loose existing ones?

[nffc]

Maybe he could do with <mod edit>

[Warning... NSFW.]

Warning - not suitable for a family forum. Link removed. (Chris T)

Originally Posted by jimbo

I find it hard to believe he

a) did it by punching random buttons
b) had been on hold for an hour

Mainly because I seem to remember the message was heard on a Sunday - when the call centres were closed...

Most of the drink machines actually supplied by Coca Cola have a debug menu that you can access by pressing four of the buttons in the correct sequence. I`m sure that the debug menu has been called up by accident on more than one occassion. Therefore I don't find it entirely unbelievable that a punter could accidentally access these functions.

http://www.i-hacked.com/content/view/12/48/

[nfs6600]

I remember getting a call off my team leader on that faithful day telling me to call and listen to it. I thought I dialled incorrectly at first. They had lots of people the next day hunting him down

[Stuart]

Originally Posted by jimbo

I find it hard to believe he

a) did it by punching random buttons

It's unlikely, but not impossible.

the messages on most voice mail and IVR systems can be changed by phoning a certain extension number. It's entirely possible that the software controlling that system had a bug exposing that extension number to the outside world.

So how come NTL hasn't been prosecuted for abusing its customers as corporate policy?!