Hi Richard; I know very little about internet and wireless, but I have an idea. Is there any chance the phone company could have given out the same number or password to two people. It sounds like two people are using the same line. The other possibility is, could the phone lines have gotten crossed and someone elses calles are coming in on her line. Just a few ideas to unravel and apply to the situation. Terry Powers
-----Original Message----- From: Richard Ring [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Thursday, August 31, 2006 4:51 PM To: Braillenote List Subject: RE: [Braillenote] wireless connection help Hello: First, this doesn't have much to do with wireless connectivity. The Braillenote can connect to a wireless network provided that it is equipped with a wireless network adapter. This does not seem to be the case here. Second, to the best of my knowledge, there has been no evidence of a virus that has brought harm to a Braillenote. You cannot set the Braillenote to automatically dial up, and it definitely does not attempt to go online in order to search for updates. The Braillenote doesn't do anything automatically. When the unit is turned off, the only thing that causes it to react in any way at all is when you either plug in or unplug the AC adapter. When you do this, the unit informs you that either the AC is on, or off. Again, there is simply no way that the Braillenote is dialing on its own. Was the unit always plugged into the phone line at all times? Was the Braillenote the only device that utilized the phone line? If the Braillenote made these calls, someone would have to have deliberately attempted to use it to go on line. And this could not happen remotely; the Braillenote does not have any facilities wherein it could be controlled from a distance. -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Simon Moore Sent: Thursday, August 31, 2006 3:34 PM To: [email protected] Subject: [Braillenote] wireless connection help I am trying to help a friend who has a braillenote and is experiencing a rather serious problem. Before explaining the problem, I am running into difficulties understanding how the braillenote works. Although I am fairly competent when it comes to computers, not being a braille reader I cannot rummage around to see how the braillenote system works. So I joined this list a while back to first see if anyone had experienced a similar problem (they haven't, thankfully) and to see whether this was the right place to post questions of a more technical nature (given the level of expertise this lists posters demonstrate I'm sure this is a good a place as any to look for help). My friend purchased a braillenote about nine months ago and connected to her ISP using a regular telephone dial-up connection. Everything worked very well, and still does. However, when she received her telephone bill it was immediately clear that something was wrong. Her bill for the first three months was in excess of £1,000 and subsequent quarterly bills were of a similar level. Needless to say she has now closed this line. She was using a dedicated telephone line to access the internet, one that had been used with her old computer with no problem and no one else had physical access to that line. Looking at the bill it is clear that the charges are due to the telephone line being used to make calls to her ISP for long periods, over 24 hours in some cases. We have been able to cross off a few obvious causes for these excessive charges. First, user error. She religiously closes her dial up connection and switches the unit off after use, so that's out. Second, the telephone company have investigated to see whether there was a problem with the line itself, no fault was found. Moreover, the pattern of calls is inconsistent with such a fault. Looking at the pattern of calls the excessive use causing the inflated phone bill tends to be grouped together and, on several occasions, have been made when she is not even in the country. What is more, they go on for some considerable time (e.g. 24 hours) and, for a few, terminate but seconds later a dial up connection is re-established and the line remains in use for several more hours. To me this looks like someone is maliciously using the braillenote's dial up connection to connect to her ISP. The other possibility seems to be that the braillenote itself is taking it upon itself to connect to the internet. Both of these explanations founder when we recall that the braillenote is switched off after use. But it is switched off using the toggle switch on the side of the unit, not unplugged. And I am utterly stumped as to how this can be happening. As far as I can see the braillenote is dialing out, this is the only explanation which fits with the information I have available. But how and why? So here are my questions: 1. does the braillenote have wireless connectivity and, if so, is it protected by any sort of firewall or something similar? 2. when the braillenote is switched off is there any way for an external device to force the braillenote to switch itself on? 3. is the braillenote programmed to contact the internet for any reason, for example, to download upgrades? 4. is it at all plausible that someone can remotely hijack the braillenote and maliciously use the dial up connection? 5. does the braillenote have any anti virus protection? Is it possible that someone might have uploaded a trojan or other malicious software which might be causing this? If anyone here has any thoughts on the above questions or has any insight into what might be causing the problem I would be very pleased to hear from you. And sorry for such a long email to those of you uninterested! Kind regards Simon Moore ___ To leave the BrailleNote list, send a blank message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To view the list archives or change your preferences, visit http://list.humanware.com/mailman/listinfo/braillenote ___ To leave the BrailleNote list, send a blank message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To view the list archives or change your preferences, visit http://list.humanware.com/mailman/listinfo/braillenote ___ To leave the BrailleNote list, send a blank message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] To view the list archives or change your preferences, visit http://list.humanware.com/mailman/listinfo/braillenote
