PBX Fraud - What is a Telco's Responsibility?

Forums › ICT Policies and Regulation › PBX Fraud - What is a Telco's Responsibility?

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#301082 22-Feb-2010 17:25

Mycenius:
maverick: As a side note Mycenius , would be interesed to hear what feedback you do get from Consumer rights groups, so wouldn't mind seeing how you turn out with the outcomes... I think a lot of people will be interested in the proceedings and outcomes, especially since there are some pretty polarised views.

Hi Maverick - a quick follow up to your query - FWIW we have looked into this further including the T&C's for the service provided and so on; and we are having some further discussion about with the Telco... But basically I don't have any clear cut answer, outcome, or conclusion Maverick - which I think is what you expected or suspected... As I may have mentioned we have had assistance from the Telco to help lessen the impact on the business regardless, and in no way was this thread intended to bag the Telco, but likewise it would be foolish for a business not to at least explore all avenues to mitigate the impact, etc, etc.

P.S. BTW I have also heard through the grapevine there have reportedly been several other fraud incidents of the type I have been dealing with recently around NZ (although have not been able to confirm any details first hand).

Thanks for the feedback, yes this is what I would have suspected, Fraud is nasty business and there are no winners, the scum buckets that do this deserve a bullet.

Yes there do seem a spate of them, but this happenes every few years, they target a country pepper it move on, come back a few years later.....scumbags

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#301083 22-Feb-2010 17:29

maverick: Thanks for the feedback, yes this is what I would have suspected, Fraud is nasty business and thete are no winners the scum buckets that do this deserve a bullet.

Yes there do seem a spate of them, but this happenes every few years, they target a country pepper it move on, come back a few years later.....scumbags

Maverick, I feel you are not expressing your feelings. You should let it go, tell us what you are really thinking.

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#301103 22-Feb-2010 18:04

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#310691 24-Mar-2010 12:39

i've just received this PABX security alert from Telecom (names, emails and phone numbers removed):

<quote>
A potential security risk to PABX users

Hi X,

To ensure your company’s security, we constantly monitor the amount and type of traffic on your phone lines and act on anything that looks out of the ordinary. I now want to alert you to a potential risk that has recently affected some customers.

Fraudulent calls have been made to Somalia through some customers’ PABX phone systems. The cause of this problem is when an automatic voicemail system (or similar) that allows incoming callers to dial extensions directly and sometimes even outside lines doesn’t have the appropriate security measures in place. In this instance, hackers have been able to make a large volume of international calls that have been charged to the customer’s account.

Are you at risk?
All customers with a PABX system who are not following recommended standard security measures, particularly regarding the use of a PIN for remote access, are at risk from this threat.

Minimising your risk
It is vital that you check your PABX system is secure. Included are some steps for you to follow to check your system, and I suggest you do this as soon as possible.

If you want to be sure you have the correct security configurations in place, you may wish to arrange for a Telecom Service Technician to visit your premises (normal call out charges will apply). Or if another provider maintains your phone system, you may like to arrange for them to visit.

Will I have to pay for fraudulent calls?
We have been reviewing and in some cases cancelling the resulting fraudulent call charges on a customer-by-customer basis. However please note you are responsible for ensuring our security instructions have been followed, and for any charges to your account that result from inadequate security measures – so please ensure you take the required steps immediately, to secure your system.

If you have any questions about this issue, please contact me directly (details below) or call 0800 XXX XXX.

Yours sincerely,
</quote>

Sales Engineer
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#311312 25-Mar-2010 15:23

And today i got a follow up phone call from the telecom rep who sent it out, making sure i got it, read it and understood. I dont even have my lines with telecom any more - they said they were getting the word out even still as they wanted people to understand the problem regardless. They didnt even try to use the call as a sales pitch to get me back on telecom for lines.

Thats pretty good customer service on Telecoms part, in my opinion.

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#317591 13-Apr-2010 01:44

I've read through this whole thread and unfortunately none of what I've read came as a real shock as I was unlucky enough to see an overseas company defraud telstraclear out of $30,000 in a weekend through a similar method.

By the time Telstraclear picked up on it the fraudster had already nearly managed to get an identical service setup with Vodafone fast tracked. Vodafone were keen to install until I gave them the heads up and advised it would be wise to do some homework on the company.

Sure enough their fraud squad had already worked out that something was up and were onto-it, so Vodafone seem to at least be doing some sort of background checks when it comes to people purchasing primary rate lines.

Well I've seen very good arguments here for both and against customer responsibility and feel the telco has some duty to protect itself and its customer from liability. a fair solution would be for the teleco to split the COST incurred with the customer as a goodwill gesture as a one off and then run a press release to educate users and show what a nice reasonable company they are.

If Teleco's had better relationships with their clients they could even turn such an unfortunate situation into a long term relationship. Seems some telcom's are keen to speak to companies before sign up and around contract renewal time, but not so much between.

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#317602 13-Apr-2010 06:32

Just to add to this over the past few days there has been a huge amount of traffic originating from Amazon EC2 servers attempting brute force SIP attacks.

It's a worthy reminder that if you have open SIP ports and aren't running intrusion detection software on your SIP PBX then your system is potentially wide open.

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#317624 13-Apr-2010 08:38

sbiddle: Just to add to this over the past few days there has been a huge amount of traffic originating from Amazon EC2 servers attempting brute force SIP attacks.

It's a worthy reminder that if you have open SIP ports and aren't running intrusion detection software on your SIP PBX then your system is potentially wide open.

I assume your talking about a PC based SIP PBX system??

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#317625 13-Apr-2010 08:40

Just FWIW Re: My original post the NZ Police completed obtaining call logs (via Search Warrant) from the Telco owning the physical lines and verified all calls had originated from overseas (and likely from compromised numbers there) - but I don't think this is a surprise to anyone here (including Me)...

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#317632 13-Apr-2010 09:06

old3eyes:
sbiddle: Just to add to this over the past few days there has been a huge amount of traffic originating from Amazon EC2 servers attempting brute force SIP attacks.

It's a worthy reminder that if you have open SIP ports and aren't running intrusion detection software on your SIP PBX then your system is potentially wide open.

I assume your talking about a PC based SIP PBX system??

No he won't be , Incorrectly hardware based SIP PABX devices are also vulnerable to attack if they allow sip redirection or unathenticated user access,

Yes I am a employee of WxC (My Profile) ... but I do have my own opinions as well

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#317730 13-Apr-2010 12:32

maverick:
old3eyes:
sbiddle: Just to add to this over the past few days there has been a huge amount of traffic originating from Amazon EC2 servers attempting brute force SIP attacks.

It's a worthy reminder that if you have open SIP ports and aren't running intrusion detection software on your SIP PBX then your system is potentially wide open.

I assume your talking about a PC based SIP PBX system??

No he won't be , Incorrectly hardware based SIP PABX devices are also vulnerable to attack if they allow sip redirection or unathenticated user access,

But hardware based PBX system have no way running any sort of intrusion detection. It has to be done at the customers router end..

Regards,

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#317860 13-Apr-2010 14:43

old3eyes: But hardware based PBX system have no way running any sort of intrusion detection. It has to be done at the customers router end..

I've recently seen a hardware IP PBX that's been hacked due to poor configuration.

Unless the device support intrusion detection, it's better to limit what can come in through the built-in firewall/3rd party firewall.

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#317950 13-Apr-2010 17:58

old3eyes:
sbiddle: Just to add to this over the past few days there has been a huge amount of traffic originating from Amazon EC2 servers attempting brute force SIP attacks.

It's a worthy reminder that if you have open SIP ports and aren't running intrusion detection software on your SIP PBX then your system is potentially wide open.

I assume your talking about a PC based SIP PBX system??

In the context of intrusion detection I was but the issue isn't only one with PC based PBX's. Any IP based PBX that has an insecure dialplan or setup can be used for fraud purposes. Incorrectly configure something like a Cisco UC500, Epygi Quadro etc and you'll have h8xors laughing all the way to Somalia..

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#317953 13-Apr-2010 18:01

old3eyes:
maverick:
old3eyes:
sbiddle: Just to add to this over the past few days there has been a huge amount of traffic originating from Amazon EC2 servers attempting brute force SIP attacks.

It's a worthy reminder that if you have open SIP ports and aren't running intrusion detection software on your SIP PBX then your system is potentially wide open.

I assume your talking about a PC based SIP PBX system??

No he won't be , Incorrectly hardware based SIP PABX devices are also vulnerable to attack if they allow sip redirection or unathenticated user access,

But hardware based PBX system have no way running any sort of intrusion detection. It has to be done at the customers router end..

Not true. Most will have provision for only allowing designated IP addresses to use port 5060. If you have no need for external phones (and certainly from a security perspective running these over a VPN is the best option) then port 5060 should be locked down to the IP of your VoIP provider.

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#319479 16-Apr-2010 18:26

Added a thread here that adds some thoughts

http://www.geekzone.co.nz/forums.asp?forumid=43&topicid=60027

Yes I am a employee of WxC (My Profile) ... but I do have my own opinions as well

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