The Mother of WiFi
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The Mother of WiFi
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About this listen
Hedy Lamarr was a Hollywood actress known for her beauty, but she was also a brilliant inventor who helped create the technology for Wi-Fi, GPS, and Bluetooth. Born in Vienna in 1914, Lamarr had a curious mind and an early interest in how machines worked, and her mother introduced her to the arts. She gained fame as an actress in Europe and Hollywood, but her unhappy marriage to an Austrian munitions dealer led her to flee to London and eventually to Hollywood, where she met billionaire Howard Hughes. Hughes fueled her innovative spirit and gave her equipment to use on set, and they worked together to develop faster planes for the military.
However, Lamarr's most significant invention was a communication system she developed with composer George Antheil to guide torpedoes during World War II. The system used frequency hopping, which switched between radio frequencies in an unbreakable code that prevented radio waves from being intercepted. Although their invention was initially dismissed by the military, it became the basis of modern wireless communication technology.