On Tuesday, Simon McCallum of Otago University's computer science department issued a press release critical of what he regarded as the unfair and anti-competitive "traffic management" Telecom Xtra was imposing on its new 'Go Large' broadband accounts. Yesterday his phone became unusable as it was spammed with repeated untraceable calls from a Telecom trunk line.
Let's let Simon tell it:
As of 2 pm today (9th of the 11th) my work phone has been ringing constantly. When I pick up there is no-one on the other end and within 30 seconds of putting the phone down it rings again. This has effectively put my telephone out of action. I have complained to our Information Technology Services (ITS) and they have reported that the calls are coming from a Telecom main trunk line with no caller ID. For whatever reason someone is attacking my phone!
On Tuesday I wrote a press release criticising Telecom, today I cannot use my phone!
Currently my phone is still ringing with no-one on the other end, within 48 hours of my press release my phone is being attacked. I am not a conspiracy theorist, but regardless of who is attacking my phone this is not a good situation. I did not believe that this sort of thing would happen from talking about Net Neutrality.
I'm travelling this morning, so I haven't been able to call Telecom and seek assurance that this really isn't what it looks like. Perhaps someone from the company could click the "Discuss" button below and put our minds at rest.
If it's for real, my assumption is that's it's some idiot junior employee rather than management. It's happened before.
Meanwhile, more little horror stories in our Ihug discussion thread. Nice to see a nod from the Herald. But what's up with the Herald website? It's been barely usable in the mornings for a couple of weeks now.
Spare Room comes up with some truly ghastly yet oddly compelling video. And you thought your work conference was totally lame.
NZBC is unkind enough to bring up some unfortunate predictions in the local blogosphere.
And, finally, a Public Address System discussion for the weekend: where are we at with the All Blacks? Tracey Nelson's England game stats might help focus your mind …