Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!swrinde!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sdd.hp.com!decwrl!hayes.fai.alaska.edu!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request
From: covert@covert.enet.dec.com (John R. Covert  10-Sep-1990 1123)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Re: Answering Machine as Room Bug
Message-ID: <12016@accuvax.nwu.edu>
Date: 10 Sep 90 15:21:43 GMT
Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu
Organization: TELECOM Digest
Lines: 37
Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu
X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu
X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu
X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 636, Message 8 of 11


 From: Dale Neiberg
      Washington, DC
      202 822 2402 (Work)

In TELECOM Digest, vol 10, issue 588, Tom Neff writes about his
experience with a Panasonic KX-T1470 answering machine:
 
>I turned on the shortwave receiver in my apartment this morning and
>was flipping past the 5-6 MHz neighborhood when I distinctly a voice
>coming from the speaker.  It was my friend in the other room!  
   
>     [process of identifying the culprit deleted]
 
>Is everyone with a Panasonic answering machine bugging himself?

The following is reprinted from _Monitoring_Times_ for September 1990,
page 101:

"Check this one out.  According to a reader in California, there is a
way to tune in _wired_ telephones on your shortwave radio.  This
reader says that he was talking to a friend on his new AT&T model 612
programmable telephone when he happened to switch on his shortwave
receiver.  There, to his horror, was his voice -- loud and clear!

"The signals reappeared every few kilohertz from 4.5 to 8.8 MHz, but
was particularly strong in the 6 to 7 Hz [_sic_] range.  Apparently
his voice was modulating the time base oscillator of the
microprocessor in the telephone!

"Has Ma Bell inadvertently planted bugs in homes and offices around
the country?  Let us know if you have been hearing strange voices on
your radio!"

(End of excerpt)

Dale