Article: U.S. Inventors Develop Prepaid Telephone Calling Card

ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 23 -- Ariel Charytan and Elie Seidman, both of New York, have developed a calling card.

According to the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A prepaid long-distance telephone calling card has two or more distinct personal identification number (PIN) numbers each obscured by opaque scratch-off material. Each PIN number is associated with prepaid value. A user can scratch off the opaque material for PIN numbers one by one, and the value for each PIN number expires in a way that is unrelated to any other PIN number on the card."

The inventors were issued U.S. Patent No. 7,400,715 on July 15.

The patent has been assigned to Epana Networks Inc., New York.

The ...

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