I would have thought the advent and wide deployment of digital switches
was what made it impossible. If not that, then surely the modern
switches have anti-phreaking software built in.
The irony is that the era of the public phone is coming to an end,
as they've been almost completely supplanted by cell phones, except
perhaps in airports and the like.
It's hard to imagine now how much of a convenience pay phones
must have originally been. The idea of calling anywhere in the
world from any down town street corner must have seemed as
amazing as wireless phones seem to new adopters (like me) now.
My wife and I were recently at a wedding in Las Vegas trying to
meet up with the other guests from the same wedding. It
finally became obvious that some of the guests were not
looking in the right place for the rest of us due to a
breakdown in communication. No problem, everyone involved has
a wireless phone. A quick phonecall amounting to "where are you?
We're right below you, head down the stairs to your right" put
the matter to rights. Mindboggling. I begin to see how people
burn through serious airtime in a month now. Seductive technology.
I wonder how we managed without it.
>
> On Fri, 8 Jun 2001, Gabe Steiger wrote:
>
> > Is it still possible to phreak a phone by unscrewing the talk speaker?
> > I tried unscrewing the mouth peice once, could not unscrew it. Bastard
> > would NOT budge.
>
> You've figured out why it is no longer possible to phreak. The phone
> companies passed a law that required phone manufacturers to screw the
> mouthpiece on so tight that nobody could unscrew it. Therefore, phreaking
> is no longer possible ;(
>
> Here's a great site call Phone Trips:
>
> http://www.wideweb.com/phonetrips/index2.html
>
> Sellam Ismail Vintage Computer Festival
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> International Man of Intrigue and Danger http://www.vintage.org
>
--
Jim Strickland
jim_at_DIESPAMMERSCUMcalico.litterbox.com
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Received on Fri Jun 08 2001 - 11:24:48 BST