Gizmodo Australia » telephone

Phreaking The Phones: Before There Was Hacking

Brian Lam — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:40:03 +0000

Before there were computer hackers, there were phreakers. And before there were macs, Jobs and Woz kept themselves busy building their own blue boxes (Above) which would emulate precise control tones to seize control of the phone system.

They were inspired by this Esquire article from 1971 called Secrets of the Little Blue Box, by legendary writer and typewriter fetishist Ron Rosenbaum.

Woz’s boxes were simply, by standards of circuitry, but the original creator of the Blue Box, built his with failsafes in mind in case the law got too suspicious.

He sighs. “We had this order for a thousand beeper boxes from a syndicate front man in Las Vegas. They use them to place bets coast to coast, keep lines open for hours, all of which can get expensive if you have to pay. The deal was a thousand blue boxes for $US300 apiece. Before then we retailed them for $US1,500 apiece, but $US300,000 in one lump was hard to turn down. We had a manufacturing deal worked out in the Philippines. Everything ready to go. Anyway, the model I had ready for limited mass production was small enough to fit inside a flip-top Marlboro box. It had flush touch panels for a keyboard, rather than these unsightly buttons sticking out. Looked just like a tiny portable radio. In fact, I had designed it with a tiny transistor receiver to get one AM channel, so in case the law became suspicious the owner could switch on the radio part, start snapping his fingers, and no one could tell anything illegal was going on. I thought of everything for this model – I had it lined with a band of thermite which could be ignited by radio signal from a tiny button transmitter on your belt, so it could be burned to ashes instantly in case of a bust. It was beautiful. A beautiful little machine. You should have seen the faces on these syndicate guys when they came back after trying it out. They’d hold it in their palm like they never wanted to let it go, and they’d say, ‘I can’t believe it. I can’t believe it.’ You probably won’t believe it until you try it.”

[Esquire, Photo of the Blue Box taken at the Computer History Museum]

Telephone Tone Musical Puts Some Real Life Musicians to Shame

Jack Loftus — Sun, 03 Aug 2008 17:30:00 +0000

This video makes the 15-odd years I put toward practicing and performing with a musical instrument to shame, and I’m pretty sure this guy probably set this all up in an afternoon. Sick, nevertheless. [ExciteChina via Random Good Stuff]

First-Ever Phone Directory and Instruction Manual to Be Auctioned

Addy Dugdale — Fri, 16 May 2008 16:10:00 +0000

This is the world’s first phone directory—and it’s going up for sale next month in New York at Christie’s auctioneers. The Telephone Directory, Volume 1, Number 1, for New Haven, Connecticut, aptly enough, is, at 20 pages, more of a pamphlet than the kind of thing that big strong men rip in half to make the ladies swoon (and us geeks shrug and say, “SFW?”) But the funniest thing about The Telephone Directory (apart from the estimated price) is the first eight pages—which are instructions on how to use the telephone.

Should you wish to speak to another subscriber… you should…commence the conversation by saying ‘Hulloa!’ When you are done talking, say ‘That is all!’, and the person spoken to should say ‘O.K.’ … While talking, always speak slow and distinct, and let the telephone rest lightly against your upper lip, leaving the lower lip and the jaw free…”

The directory dates back to 1878 and is expected to fetch between US$30,000 and US$40,000 when it goes under the hammer, on June 17. Oh, and it also states that profanities or improper language should be reported immediately. That is all. [Christie's via Daily Mail]