This is completely strange, and very long. I’ve exhausted all my ideas, and need fresh ones.

Some background.

  1. my neighbor is old, very very old. Also, they are not very mobile. So something like creeping up to the window and listening in is out of the question. Although, a very long time ago (decades) they did used to hang out near an air condition vent, listening to our in person conversations.
  2. when I say neighbor, I mean they live in a small house connected by a breezeway to my house. I do admit they are rather close. Yes I do have access to thier house.
  3. i have no real idea of thier level of technological expertise. They are pretty manipulative so even though I’m under the impression they’re very limited on expertise, it’s possible they know more than they let on. Let’s just say at this point, they say they have difficulties placing calls to thier saved contacts on thier jitterbug flip phone, but when your not looking they’re already on the line with someone, like five seconds after you walked out the door. As far as we know they do not have access to the internet, but who knows. They do know how to navigate to at least a limited number of websites though. (Slight fear of them seeing this post, haha)
  4. they digest far right media. This in itself doesnt seem relavent, but I suppose, in my head, this might be able to give them awareness of the types of technology that one might use to pull something like this off.
  5. It is remotely possible that someone could have installed something inside the house maybe about 15-20 years ago, and given the neighbor access to it.
  6. they are on a limited income, and are not independently wealthy. Any technology would have to be no only easy to use, but on the less expensive side as well.

So… Maybe about once a year for the past few years a topic or phrase that was talked about over the phone would come up in conversation the next day. Not a big deal, written off as coincidence. That’s just how it goes sometimes. Well now, we’ve had a falling out. For the past few weeks they have brought up many private conversations I have had over my cell phone with at least 2 different people. They repeat not just what I say, but what the person on the other end of the phone says as well. I say, “Man, im pretty sure they’re hearing my phone calls.” The other person says, “Maybe there’s a bug somewhere.” The next day they start to prattle on about…a bug on the wall. But not a real bug…oh what do you call those things…you know, bugs that know things. Or I say “I’m worried about this escalating.” The other person jokingly says “Oh, don’t eat or drink anything from them, unless they take some first… They may try to kill you.” The next day neighbor is handing me a concoction they’ve made. “Oh, I’ve just sat down with this mixture I’ve created for my health. Everything I put in it is sitting on the counter there. (Cue various herbal supplements / tinctures) here have the first sip… it’s not going to kill you.” They are bringing up / creating situations centered around private converstaions from the night before. They may skip a day or two here and there, but it’s a pretty regular occurrence.

Something worth mentioning, is that while im on the phone call, I will turn on my Bluetooth and use my earbuds. Everytime the buds connect, the call drops, and we have to call each other back. I figured I was pushing a button wrong or something and hanging up. But since the neighbor has gone somewhere, we have not been able to replicate the situation.

Things we have tried but have since been disproven:

  • At first we thought we were leaving windows open and they could just hear it…but all windows were closed.
  • maybe they can hear through the walls somehow, they are thin. But its never been a thing before. (why would they have to hang out by aforementioned vent, then) We blast the radio real loud and see how much we can hear from neighbors porch. Can’t make out exact words and doesn’t explain hearing the other person.
  • well thier radio automatically connects to iPhones ( un-updated iphone from the air drop debacle/ f-ed up feature of the radio involving nfc and bluetooth) and it did pair with my phone at some point. Maybe they can the other person over thier radio. But we tried to make it work and just cant replicate it.
  • we’ve checked obvious places for a walke talkie looking receiver. Nothing.
  • we’ve used one of those cheap bug detectors off Amazon and checked the house…and the vent. No wires comming out of strange places as far as we can tell.

I’m at my wits end. What could they be using and how can I stop it? It maybe all a coincidence, but then its as much so as Facebook / Google targeted ads that arent listening your conversations. I mean, what, are they an advanced algorithm that can guess what your thinking based on all available data on you?

Help! And thank you for taking the time. Also, sorry about the format / spelling getting all this out on mobile is tough.

TL:DR. My really old neighbor seems to hear my both sides of cell calls to at least 2 different people. Is there simple, rather cheap technology put there that they could be using. And how do i go about finding it / making it stop.

  • Bono is a TWAT@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I really don’t mean to be a grammar Nazi, but the amount of times you misspelled “their” is crazy. Check to make sure your auto-correct is good. There’s no way it should have allowed “thier”.

    • FarFarAway@lemmy.worldOP
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      1 year ago

      Yeah, I know…

      I before e except after c…

      It’s definitely a chronic problem I have. Since I changed phones a while back, it gives me suggestions but I have to manually select them. Typically, it underlines the misspelled words but in these apps, it just doesnt.

      And as many times as i spelled “thier” here, it all just went to shit.

      I will double check my settings.

      Sorry about that. :\

      • gorillakitty@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        The way I remember it is that the first part of “their” is “the”.

        You can also remember it because “they” starts with “the”.

        I don’t know if that’ll help but I hope so!

      • iAmTheTot@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        I before e except after c…

        FYI that’s an awful “rule” and as far as I know isn’t taught anymore because, again, it’s terrible. There’s more exceptions to it than follow it. Such as “their”.

        I’ve seen an expanded version that includes “or when sounding like ‘a’ like in ‘neighbour’ and ‘weigh’,” but that’s still far from perfect. For example, leisure doesn’t fit either of those. Deceive has it come after a c, doesn’t sound like an ‘a’, and the i still comes after the e. Forfeit is another, and of all the words I’ve used so far, it produces yet a new sound with the same vowel conbo.

        English is just a really whacky language because of its history and influences.

        • DpwnShift@kbin.social
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          1 year ago

          There’s more exceptions to it than follow it.

          Well, that’s definitely not true. It is an unreliable “rule” though…

    • LifeBandit666@feddit.uk
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      1 year ago

      I don’t know, some autocorrect just suggest the most used word for that set of screen taps. When you tell the autocorrect to remember a word by selecting it, it then just becomes another word to the autocorrect, and the more you select that spelling, the more it’s suggested.

      So what I’m saying is that OP has trained their, sorry thier, autocorrect wrong.

      Just for that silly sentence above I’ve just had to delete the misspelling and the capitalised version of it from my own dictionary, and had to skip over 3 American misspellings just to write this sentence because I’m British.

    • Bono is a TWAT@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Here we go again, Reddit habits die hard I guess. Suggesting to someone that their auto-correct is messing up becomes a cause for downvotes.

      What if that was on their resume and they didn’t catch it?

      You guys have nothing but hate in your hearts.

      • MsPenguinette@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        English is already fucked up. I think we should just vote for “there” to be the unified spelling and have it be up to the reader to interpret

        • Milkshakinit@kbin.social
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          1 year ago

          Lol, right?! There’s literally a dedicated word for that (synonym) and endless examples that make a definition of it redundant haha.

      • subignition@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        At the time of posting, your comment is voted 18 to 1 in favor.

        You got one downvote and reacted this way?

        Respectfully… take a deep breath and a step back. You’re going to be fine.

      • MsPenguinette@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        Enlish is already fucked up. I think we should just vote for “there” to be the unified spelling and have it be up to the reader to interpret. Cause at this point, it’s just pendants who bring it up while I feel like everyone else is able to understand what is meant. Homonynes are wierd, we understand people speaking them perfectly fine

      • DpwnShift@kbin.social
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        1 year ago

        The only “reddit” thing here is whining about downvotes. Everything else you’ve said has been fine and seems like it was well-received…

        But I’m not in-charge here, so what you want!