phreaking

/ ˈfriːkɪŋ /

noun

1. the act of gaining unauthorized access to telecommunication systems, esp to obtain free calls

Word History and Origins

Origin of phreaking¹

C20: blend of freaking + phone

Example Sentences

The golden age of phreaking was in the 1970s, when folks like Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak were selling phreaking starter kits in the University of California-Berkeley dorms.

From Slate

Take phone phreaking, which involved manipulating the multifrequency tones of the international telephone system to place free calls.

From Slate

Sector Seven also contained hundreds of worlds named after old Usenet newsgroups, and on one of these, the planet alt.phreaking, there was a statue of Draper posing with an ancient rotary phone in one hand and a Cap’n Crunch whistle in the other.

From Literature

After he taught Apple's co-founders Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak the "phone phreaking" trick, they produced and sold the hardware to college students, and used the funds generated to launch their computer company.

From BBC

Modern phones are just computers sending data over strands of glass like every other computer, and while you can still totally hack them, it’s not really phreaking in the classical sense.

From The Verge