DTMF

Dual-tone multi-frequency (DTMF) signaling is used for telecommunication signaling over analog telephone lines in the voice-frequency band between telephone handsets and other communications devices and the switching center. The version of DTMF used for telephone tone dialing is known by the trademarked term Touch-Tone (canceled March 13, 1984), and is standardized by ITU-T Recommendation Q.23. It is also known in the UK as MF4. Synonyms include multifrequency pulsing and multifrequency signaling. Other multi-frequency systems are used for internal signaling internal within the telephone network.
As a method of in-band signaling, DTMF tones were also used by cable television broadcasters to indicate the start and stop times of local commercial insertion points during station breaks for the benefit of cable companies. Until better out-of-band signaling equipment was developed in the 1990s, fast, unacknowledged, and loud DTMF tone sequences could be heard during the commercial breaks of cable channels in the United States and elsewhere


The engineers had envisioned phones being used to access computers, and surveyed a number of companies to see what they would need for this role. This led to the addition of the number sign (#, sometimes called 'octothorpe' or 'pound' in this context) and asterisk or "star" (*) keys as well as a group of keys for menu selection: A, B, C and D. In the end, the lettered keys were dropped from most phones, and it was many years before these keys became widely used for vertical service codes such as *67 in the United States and Canada to suppress caller ID.
Public payphones that accept credit cards use these additional codes to send the information from the magnetic strip.
The U.S. military also used the letters, relabeled, in their now defunct Autovon phone system[1]. Here they were used before dialing the phone in order to give some calls priority, cutting in over existing calls if need be. The idea was to allow important traffic to get through every time. The levels of priority available were Flash Override (A), Flash (B), Immediate (C), and Priority (D), with Flash Override being the highest priority. Pressing one of these keys gave your call priority, overriding other conversations on the network. Pressing C, Immediate, before dialing would make the switch first look for any free lines, and if all lines were in use, it would disconnect any non-priority calls, and then any priority calls. Flash Override will kick every other call off the trunks between the origin and destination. Consequently, it was limited to the White House Communications Agency.
Precedence dialing is still done on the military phone networks, but using number combinations (Example: Entering 93 before a number is a priority call) rather than the separate tones and the Government Emergency Telecommunications Service has superseded Autovon for any civilian priority telco access.

Present-day uses of the A, B, C and D keys on telephone networks are few, and exclusive to network control. For example, the A key is used on some networks to cycle through different carriers at will (thereby listening in on calls). Their use is probably prohibited by most carriers. The A, B, C and D tones are used in amateur radio phone patch and repeater operations to allow, among other uses, control of the repeater while connected to an active phone line.

DTMF tones are also used by some cable television networks and radio networks to signal the local cable company/network station to insert a local advertisement or station identification. These tones were often heard during a station ID preceding a local ad insert. Previously, terrestrial television stations also used DTMF tones to shut off and turn on remote transmitters.
DTMF signalling tones can also be heard at the start or end of some VHS (Video Home System) cassette tapes. Information on the master version of the video tape is encoded in the DTMF tone. The encoded tone provides information to automatic duplication machines, such as format, duration and volume levels, in order to replicate the original video as closely as possible.
DTMF tones are sometimes used in caller ID systems to transfer the caller ID information, however in the USA only Bell 202 modulated FSK signaling is used to transfer the data.
A DTMF can be heard on most Whelen Outdoor Warning systems.