This has to be the mobile phone feature to end all features. A company called SpyPhone adapts mobile phones so that they can be used to eavesdrop on whoever has the device.

The idea is simple but cunning. The phone looks and acts like a normal GSM phone. When a special 'spygsm' number is called, however, the phone silently switches itself on and automatically answers, but without in any way revealing this to the user.

Anything the user then says is automatically picked up by the phone and transmitted to the eavesdropper, without the user being aware of a thing. The phone acts as if it's on standby, and will automatically drop the spy call if a real call is made to the handset at the same time. Terrifying!


According to SpyPhone.com:

"A modified Nokia 7260 able to monitor and spy on conversation from anywhere in the world. By installing an access telephone number into the phone and then calling the phone from that number activates the spy phone turning it into a sophisticated bugging device, allowing you to hear what is going on in the vicinity of the phone."

But it's not just Nokias that get the treatment - old Siemens phones have also been adapted, and it looks like Motorolas will be next. You'll never know if that second-hand phone will be listening in on you or not!

The company even provides some handy uses for the Spy Phone:

• Keeping track of your partner.
• See if you can trust your business partner.
• Listen in sales talks of your employees.
• Protecting your children
• To reveal secrets.

Fortunately, there's one safety net, and that's the price - the Spy Nokia 7260, pictured above, comes in at 1439 Euros, which is slightly more than you'd normally pay for a two year old phone! Still, if bugging's your game, pick up one of these phones, and give it to your friend!

[Source: SpyPhone, via GearLog]