Along with cordless phones, baby monitors can also be picked up easily.
If you’re worried about someone eavesdropping on your cordless phone coversations, get yourself a digital spread spectrum unit. I suppose it’s technically possible to listen in to one of those, but it wouldn’t be worth the enormous effort involved. Even a standard digital model would be better than your old analog unit.
I guess I’m thick, but I don’t understand this at all. My scanner goes 24-7. I have a cordless phone and have never heard anyone on my scanner and you would think it would pick up my own conversations when I am on my phone. What’s this about?
Don’t get me wrong, I am not disagreeing with you all but wonder why mine doesn’t do that. I have had a BIG experience with the baby monitor though. Heard my next door neighbor talking to her Mother on the phone and threatening the old lady (in her 80’s) and calling her every name in the book and the old lady was just taking it calmly, so I guess it was an everyday thing for her to be treated that way. Make me really sad.
To pick up cordless phone conversations (or any conversation, for that matter), you need to have the correct frequency punched into your scanner. I’m not going to give you the range that normal cordless phones broadcast on, since I think the mods might get a little upset over that (the whole not-quite-legal aspect of it and all). If you don’t have one of the myriad of cordless phone frequencies punched into your scanner, you won’t pick them up.
As a firefighter, I don’t mind the public listening to what we’re doing. Heck, let 'em come and watch…I love to have an audience. As long as they don’t get in my way, that just irritates the hell out of me. We do our best to sound professional over the radio (although that doesn’t always happen, but thats another thread), nothing gets said that compromises anyone’s privacy, and the public can hear their tax dollars at work. The benefits definately (in my mind) outweigh the forseable problems.
Picking up cordless phones is easy. I accidentally (honest) picked up a neighbor once on a shortwave radio, and I know a girl who used to go on “baby monitor missions” with her brother. They’d get a baby monitor receiver and ride their bikes around the neighborhood, listening to cordless phones and other baby monitors. These were both years ago, so I don’t know if frequencies have been changed now. I’m not sure about cell phones, but anything that’s broadcast can be received, somehow.
No, I’m not looking for the code, but was just wondering why mine didn’t pick up anything. Now I know. 
Thanks for the information.
Ya gotta love those firefighters.