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I realize that 1979 was a long time ago, but am I the only one who understands that in 1979, phone billing records only listed long distance calls? Local calls triggered a relay to make the connection - since there was no charge for making a local call, there was no reason for making a record of the event.

So, whether an expectation of privacy existed for local calls is irrelevant. The fact that the overwhelming majority of calls made in 1979 were local makes a difference as to whether the ruling still applies.

but am I the only one who understands that in 1979, phone billing records only listed long distance calls?

That depends on whose system and which plan you were on. Most people in Chicago (early 80s), for instance, had "minutes" assigned, and there were degrees of "localness". In any event, all calls were tracked to determine how many units were used.

In the old days of dial phones they had small recorders that picked up the tiny static pops made as the dial spun around and opened and closed a contact. The pops were picked up by a small AM receiver. Later they could slow down the playback and count the static pops to determine who you called.

The recorders could be placed anywhere near the phone line coming into the house...or inside an external telco wiring box.

The thinking was it was a radio signal and there was no protection for any signal that the suspect happened to broadcast.

All of this just feeds the myth of there being a private telephone call. In reality there is no such thing as a private telephone call, and there never has been such a thing as a private telephone call. Domestic governments, foreign governemnts, organized crime, and amateur criminals have always had a limited or a broad capability to wiretap conversations and/or disconnect and reconnect telephone services. The scope, details, and parties involved vary with the era and the telephone technologies; but the fundamental insecurity and lack of privacy remains a constant reality throughout the decades of telephone services.

The decade of the 1970s is when the NSA deployed telephone surveillance system known as PREDATOR, and they then equipped and trained the Canadian CSIS to employ PREDATOR against U.S. targets to circumvent U.S. laws and Congress. Here we are now decades later with people acting as if the lack of privacy were somehow something new and any more acceptable than it was unacceptable then.

At some point people are going to have to realize the technology is inherently impossible to fully make private against intrusions by foreign governments or domestic governments. They must also realize there are totally inadequate safeguards against domestic governments attempting to exploit these inherent limitations in the security of private telephone communications. Doing so in any effective manner first requires the recognition by all involved that there is really no such thing as a private telephone conversation.