The Collaborative International Dictionary
Wire tapper \Wire tapper\ One that taps, or cuts in on, telegraph wires and intercepts messages; hence (Slang), a swindler who pretends to tap wires or otherwise intercept advance telegraphic news for betting. -- Wire tapping.
Usage examples of "wire tapping".
Odd bits which made no intrinsic sense but which would be woven into the warp and woof of Quail's imaginary trip, would coincide with his memory: half an ancient silver fifty cent piece, several quotations from John Donne's sermons written incorrectly, each on a separate piece of transparent tissue thin paper, several match folders from bars on Mars, a stainless steel spoon engraved PROPERTY OF DOME-MARS NATIONAL KIBBUZIM, a wire tapping coil which The intercom buzzed.
I was a fair hand at wire tapping, when I had the kit: but it was in Putney.
This trial was the first incident of wire tapping used as evidence instead of liquor, and the first time that Purple gangsters faced a Federal judge.
They had rolled many a souse and separated more than a single rube from his bank roll by such archaic means as wire tapping and fixed mills, but so far they never had risen to the heights of murder.