(orchestra music playing)
- Hello there brain stuff,
I'm Jonathan Strickland
and I'll be listening in on your
private conversations today.
What's that?
Privacy? (laughs) You're so cute.
But I'll tell you what,
how about I teach you
how to listen in too,
without getting into all the legality,
history or ethics of it.
Let's take a look at
how wire tapping works.
Now, there's many ways
to tap into a phone call.
I'd be remiss if I didn't at least
acknowledge that a multi-million dollar
market exists where governments pay
phone companies to patch
them in and record your calls
or that it's also possible
to hack into satellites
that transmit phone signals.
But, since we've only got limited time,
let's talk about what's
called the roving bug method
of wire tapping a mobile call.
The FBI and other intelligence agencies
have made use of this technique
by remotely activating
a handset's microphone
so they can eavesdrop on
any conversation nearby,
sometimes whether you're
phone is powered on or not.
All it requires is a bit
of software downloaded
to the device that modifies
the interface displaying
when a call is in progress.
This spyware then places a call
to the eavesdropper,
activating the microphone
without the owner ever even knowing.
The only practical way to avoid this
is to routinely peel the
battery out of your phone,
or you could buy a
continuing supply of cheap
prepaid burner phones.
Haven't you seen The Wire?
Oh, but, you want to
know how to tap a phone
the old-fashioned way
by bugging a landline.
Well, the earliest versions of this
were simply extra wires connected
to the line between your phone
and the telephone company.
The line circuit carries your conversation
as electrical current fluctuations
representing the air
pressure of sound waves.
Wire taps convert the
electrical information
on the line, back into sound that can be
listened to or recorded.
You can even use a bug that transmits
the audio information as radio waves
to a nearby receiver.
You know, the standard
agent parked in a van
listening to headphones routine.
As with any circuit, you can hook up
components anywhere along the line.
It's like adding an extra
phone jack in your house.
The easiest way is to attach another phone
somewhere along that line.
You do this by cutting
one of the modular plugs
off of a phone cord so it's red
and green wires are exposed.
Next, you attach the exposed wires
to their corresponding
colors at an accessible
point on the outside line.
This can be anywhere along
the entire length of wire,
even on a clip at a junction box.
Once it's attached, just plug the cord
into your phone tap and start listening.
But, a few tips before
you start wire tapping.
First of all, it's, you know, illegal.
Second, disable the taps microphone
so the subject won't hear you
breathing on the other end,
and so you don't have to
wait around for someone
to pick up the phone, you can
use a voice activated recorder
for dictation to capture
when they start talking,
when the line goes dead,
it'll just turn itself off.
So, now that you know
how to tap a phone line,
what do you think?
When should the government be allowed
to listen to your calls?
Let us know in the comments below
and before you end up
tearing your home apart
looking for that bug I planted there,
please don't forget to like this video,
subscribe to our channel
and visit us at howstuffworks.com,
because if you don't, I'll know.
