AT&T offers way to stop unwanted dialing

NEW YORK (AP) — Kids making too many calls to astrology hotlines? Or worse?

AT&T Corp. said Thursday it had started selling a $90 computer-based device that allows people to prevent a phone from being able to dial certain numbers.

The AT&T Call Controller, about the size of a small tape recorder, is installed between the phone set and the wall jack. It has a touch-tone pad to program out numbers.

AT&T plans to market the device to parents, owners of vacation homes and owners of small businesses who are trying to control phone use.

The Call Controller descends from the technology behind private exchange networks that are set up in most large businesses, said product manager John Petruska.

“When you dial a number in a telephone, it captures that number, looks at it, looks at the information in its memory and determines what it should do,” Petruska said.

The device doesn’t stop incoming calls or calls to 911, the emergency line in many communities.