Key Points on Apple's Early Days and Phone Freaking

Apple's Early History

• Apple's Origin: Apple, now a $3.5 trillion company, owes part of its early survival to an illegal product.
• The Blue Box: Co-founders Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak created a device called the Blue Box in the early 1970s.

The Blue Box and Phone Freaking

• Functionality: The Blue Box allowed users to make free long-distance calls by hacking phone systems.
• Technology: It used a 2600 Hertz tone, tapping into a method called "freaking," where phone connections could be manipulated through specific sounds.
• Discovery History:
  • In the late 1950s, a blind child named Joe Andia accidentally discovered phone manipulation through whistling, due to his perfect pitch.
  • A community formed around this "phone freaking."

Economic and Cultural Impact

• Cost Advantage: The Blue Box circumvented high phone call rates, which could exceed $3 a minute.
• Rarity and Value: Less than 100 Blue Boxes were made, selling exorbitantly at auction later due to their rarity.

Resistance and Evolution

• Countermeasures:
  • Phone companies eventually implemented Signaling System 7 (SS7) in the early 1980s to separate control signals and prevent sound-driven manipulation.
  • Despite SS7, other forms like brute-forcing calling card codes emerged in the 1980s.

Continuing Security Challenges

• Modern Vulnerabilities: Even today, vulnerabilities in systems like SS7 allow for interception and manipulation. An example includes exploiting SS7 to intercept calls by tricking networks using fake identifiers.

Additional Insights

• Experiment on SS7 Vulnerability: A collaboration experiment demonstrated easily accessible SS7 system flaws to intercept smartphone calls, highlighting ongoing security concerns in telecommunications.

Understanding these key points gives a perspective on how early tech whether illegal or legal has shaped modern technological security mechanisms and challenges.