Is it true your telephone can work as a microphone even when it is still on the hook, allowing a third party to listen in to conversations in your home?
This may not be what you mean, but I know that cordless phone calls can be picked up with the right equipment. Actually my next-door neightbor has one and sometimes when I turn the phone on to make a call I can make out the conversation. This freaks me out a little, cause if I can hear them, then likely they can hear me. Guess there was something to be said for those aggrevating cords after all.
I’ll be in the back slapping the big nosed rasta man.
Yes, my husband and I were arguing about this after having watched “The Conversation” with Gene Hackman. I did a websearch and found out how to do it pretty quickly…lemme try it again and I’ll post a link if I find it.
“Love Story? There’s two things wrong with that movie: No Smokey, and no Bandit!” – Eric Forman, That 70’s Show
Actually, I heard this rumer as it pertains to non-cordless phones. There is a document on thesmokinggun.com from the FBI regarding ways the American Communist Party attempted to thwart the govenment from intercepting there communications. The document states members were advised to place pillows on top of their phones, or unhook them from the wall, so agents were unable to listen in.
I was able to find several items such as this one: http://www.force-ten.com/forceten/telephone6.htm
which I believe has to be planted in the phone first, but I’m almost postive I was once able to find something that would let you do it with anybody’s phone without planting anything. Maybe I was mistaken.
“Love Story? There’s two things wrong with that movie: No Smokey, and no Bandit!” – Eric Forman, That 70’s Show
The answer to your question is a tenative yes… It would require something to be planted in the phone as vixen said. However, just plain listening in on a regular, no that cannot be done. Let me explain about the phone system and the way it works (hey, you asked for it…)
The telephone works on line voltage. There is a constant ammount of power in the lines (though very little). When your phone rings, the voltage in the line increases (forgive me, i don’t remember the exact numbers on all this). This causes your phone to ring. When you pick up the phone, it will drop the voltage a little, causing the ringing to stop, and the call to commence. Now then, suppose someone else in your house picks up the phone? Well, the voltage is decreased a little more. Notice that they sound really loud, and the person you were talking to sounds really quiet? Eventually, if the line voltage drops to a certain point, you disconnect (ie, you hang up). In theory, if you had say, 50 phones in your house, and took them all off the hook when someone called, it would disconnect the call. Likewise, surely you’ve been talking to someone, and click over to get a call on call waiting. You forget about the other person after talking to caller #2, and hang up the phone. What happens then? The phone rings! It’s person number one. That’s what happens when there is too much voltage on the line, the phone rings. Got all that?
So in order for them to listen in on a phone, it would have to be off the hook to begin with, or they would have to push exactly the right ammount of juice through the line to make it pick up without ringing (which i doubt could be done).
Ever hear of a lock trace? That’s what the FBI uses (or used anyways, not sure if they still do it today) to trace calls so people couldn’t hang up. They’d push voltage into the line, meaning you couldn’t hang up a la the call waiting scenario i mentioned before. Hence the invention of the aqua box. This was a device created by some enterprising young phreaker (phone hacker) that simply drains the juice out of your phone line, disconnecting the trace and click, no more phone call. That help any? 
God WAS my co-pilot, but we crashed in the mountains and i had to eat him.
It’s not really the OP’s question, but yes, many (most?) modern radio scanners can pick up the “old” 49 MHz and analog 900 MHz cordless phones and baby monitors. You have NO idea how many baby monitors there are out there. Phones without multiple channels can certainly hear other phones on the same freq. if the distance and sunspots are agreeable. Intentional third-party interception of any telephony by any means is, of course, illegal. This includes cordless and cell phones as well as landlines.
Back OT true story:
Called a friend. Phone rang once (on my end) and then was picked up. I could hear every word of the conversation going on in the person’s living room, but no one replied when I said (or shouted) Hello. I even pushed keypad buttons, hoping the loud tones would get someone’s attention – I assumed someone had bumped the phone off hook right when I called.
Hung up, called back. Friend answered. I asked if they’d heard the previous call ring. Nope. To prove I’d heard their conversation, I quoted large chunks of it. Friend was remarkably unfazed by this.
I had already heard about the device mentioned by voguevixen, so I thought “Hmmmm, they’re under surveillance and I’ve stumbled upon it.” Nah, too weird. We lead boring lives of relative unimportance. OK, “Hmmmm, it’s possible to do that without planting a device first, it’s just freakishly rare for it to happen accidentally.” Well, I’ll buy that.
Keep in mind that Echelon is now tracking this thread in its entirety, so watch what you say…
I lead a boring life of relative unimportance. Really.
Well as i said, due to freak accident maybe the voltage hit exactly the right level…
http://www.beginbids.com/ubb/smilies/rolleyes.gif
God WAS my co-pilot, but we crashed in the mountains and i had to eat him.
not the 900 MHz anymore. it’s illegal for new scanners to be able to pick them up. older ones can, and those are worth big bucks on auction sites, from what i hear.
Didn’t Ray Bradbury do a story about the telehone-as-listening-device? I think it was called Dial 00, and was published in the late 50’s/early 60’s.
TT
“It is better to know some of the questions than all of the answers.”
–James Thurber
I heard on NBC last week that there is a whole building full of computers that can (or do) listen to every phone call in the US (maybe elsewhere as well) that listens for certain words used in the conversation. In turn, it selects all those conversations and distributes them to the proper authorities. Two of my friends also heard it so I’m not ready for a straight jacket. If this is true or possible, how would this be done (generally speaking)?
Don’t ever say 288 in polite company. Its just two gross!
It’s been awhile since I’ve read “the Puzzle Palace” about the NSA. If it’s being done, it’s done by them. They are the primary data collecting agency for intelligence I think. IIRC (and that’s a big if) they do have the computers to do this but the impression I got was that it was primarily used for certain numbers and international lines.
I hate to burst your bubble Shagrath Borgir, but your impression of how phone systems work is very mistaken.
The NSA does listen to foreign phone calls and radio boradcasts, as well as foreign television broadcasts and other stuff. I wouldn’t be suprised to learn that they had computers to help them determine which phone calls are the important ones.
But, the NSA is not legally allowed to listen to domestic calls. They also aren’t supposed to listen to calls in the UK, Canada or Australia (and Sweden too, I believe, although it could be Norway). Of course, what government agencies are * supposed * to do, and what they actually do are often two completely unrelated things. So, to be safe, don’t pick up your phone and talk about the People’s Glorious Revolution™, or you may draw their attention (as well as strange looks from your friends).
Hmmm, who would knocking on my door at this hour…
The NSA isn’t allowed legally to listen to domestic calls, but I have heard that with the cooperation of ATT they pay British intelligence to listen, and get the results from them. I’m not sure if this is still done, though. This was in the news within the last few months.
Arjuna34
{{{Is it true your telephone can work as a microphone even when it is still on the hook, allowing a third party to listen in to conversations in your home?}}}—Brymo
Aside from the use of Infinity Bugs, no.
Just as a matter of courtesy to those of us who can see you…please put on some clothes.
–Kalél
TheHungerSite.com
“If ignorance is bliss, you must be orgasmic.”
“Well, there was that thing with the Cheese-Wiz…but I’m feeling much better now!” – John Astin, Night Court
Yeah ok whatever… Trust me, i have a fair ammount of experience with this stuff. Besides, you offer no counter explantion. This is my account based upon my experience, so there.
God WAS my co-pilot, but we crashed in the mountains and i had to eat him.
for what it’s worth (second-hand only), two members of my immediate family work for the NSA, and both of them scoff at the idea that the government listens in on domestic phone calls.
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- IIRC the term used to describe the use of an unused telephone as a listening device is an “infinity microphone”, the implication that if it was possible to do this, you could do it from any other phone in the country and perhaps the world. Any noises occurring near the phone would be picked up by it and sent to wherever you were, over the phone line. Didn’t William Poundstone have this in one of his books? The sum of it was that it used to be very possible with Ma Bell era phone systems, but due to moderrn electronic/digital switching phone system equipment, is much less so now. - MC
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Right on MC, agreed. As for the NSA listening in on everyone all the time for certain “keywords”, that is impossible. Think of all the calls being made all over the US. There are simply too many, it’s just not plausable.
God WAS my co-pilot, but we crashed in the mountains and i had to eat him.