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Getting back to the technical side, a speaker can also act as a [rather poor] microphone, and indeed it does take some circuitry modification to make use of it that way. But the real question is: even if the phone has been modified -- where is the "tapped" audio going? Using the speaker as a microphone would be both unnecessary (since there is also a mic!) and undesirable (whatever sound it picks up would be too weak, buried in noise, and extremely muffled and hard to make out any speech).

Back in the 1970's, my brother showed me a very simple, tiny circuit that could be put into a handset of a phone that would transmit the audio by FM using the power supplied by the phone line -- so you could pick it up on an FM radio in the next room. That works, but... you have to be very close to pick up the signal. Nowadays, it is probably trivial to add a bluetooth transmitter, but again, the receiver has to be fairly close. It might be better to route through a nearby WiFi router to some (any) distant internet connection.

If someone has access to the wire going to the phone, then of course it might help to modify the phone to keep the connection open at all times instead of just tapping in on phone calls, but most landline phones would severe the handset's mic and speaker from the line when it is "hung up". If the line was kept "off hook" to keep power going, then the phone line might remain busy and be unable to receive calls.

But if the goal is to listen in all the time, the modification would be better placed alone the line or phone base instead of the handset. Generally, it's simpler to just place a radio-transmitting microphone out of sight somewhere! The only reason to use a phone for eavesdropping would be to be able to pick up the incoming voices during calls, but that merely requires tapping the line -- no need to modify the phone.

So just think about all of that -- and the situation as described seems extraordinarily unlikely.

But I am not a surveillance expert nor hobbiest.

deleted_user_2906614 wrote:
I’m afraid I still disagree rather strongly, as the idea that mental illness is something to be kept secret from (absolutely) everyone is one that does far more harm than good. Here in the UK, organisations such as Rethink and campaigns such as Time to Change exist to challenge this misconception. https://jjujutsukaisenmanga.com/

In addition, it is untrue that in all parts of the world a person can receive professional help for mental health problems when they like. And I’m not talking about remote Pacific islands; I have been waiting 14 months for the ‘routine’ 20-minute psychiatric review that the NHS is supposed to provide for me at least every six months. By and large, the infrastructure to deal with mental illness is not there in this country, ever since Enoch Powell thought that all he had to do was take the dynamite to every Victorian asylum and the problem would go away of its own accord.

Maintaining the taboo is not the way to deal with mental illness, and I find the suggestion unreasonable. As this discussion is now far outside the scope of Freesound or this thread itself, that’s all I’m going to say.

i am also thinking the same.