Bluffing the Eavesdropper in Live-Action TV series.
- On All My Children, a villain has bugged his girlfriend's house, suspecting (correctly) that she's on to him. Luckily, she finds it and proceeds to sing his praises to her equally suspicious friends, who play along when they realize what she's doing. However, it's then subverted, as even though he wrongly believes that she still trusts him, he knows the others don't.
- In the Angel episode "Dad", Wolfram and Hart have cameras in the Hyperion Hotel and are spying on the team. Lorne hears the humming sound the bugs make and passes a note to Angel telling him that they are being watched and explaining his plan. He also sneaks a hint into their conversation that he should read the note in the janitor's closet to avoid being spied on. The team then Bluff The Eavesdropper for the rest of the episode: even the audience don't know it was all an act until the end.
- Used more than once on Babylon 5:
- Played With in one episode: Londo discovers a listening device in a bag of groceries from a Drazi grocer. He spends a few moments saying several insulting things about the Drazi ambassador's wife under the pretense of not knowing he was being recorded, before "accidentally" dropping and smashing the bug.
- In another episode, Londo, Magnificent Bastard that he is, pulls this off without even being in the room. He gives some information to his aide Vir Cotto. Vir is later captured by one of Londo's enemies, who uses a Centauri telepath to get the information from Vir's mind. The information is false, but the bad guy thinks it's true because Vir thinks it's true.
- In a fourth-season episode, Garibaldi, now a private investigator/troubleshooter, is escorting a couple of visitors when they're ambushed by paid killers. He tells his panicked clients to think about nothing except their destination, so that they will be able to meet up again if they get separated from him. He doesn't tell them that their pursuers are telepaths who can read their minds, and he's using them to give the telepaths a false destination. He then proceeds to lead them to an entirely different part of the station and has a guard report the location of the gunmen to Security.
- On an early episode of Benson, listening devices are found in several rooms of the Governor's mansion. Benson goes the extra mile with this trope and has the staff recite a scripted scene for the eavesdropper.
- In Better Call Saul, Lalo calls Hector to tell him he has proof of Gus Fring's treachery, but then realizes that Gus has bugged the phone. He instead says (over Hector's strenuous objections) that he couldn't find proof so he's going to do a full-on assault on Gus that night. Gus, who is listening in, decides to bunker down, leaving his lawyer Saul unprotected...
- Le Bureau des Légendes: After a bug is found in Dr. Balmes's office, she and Malotru conduct a legitimate therapy session, which results in the listener ceasing to monitor them.
- In one of the last episodes of Boss before the series was Cut Short, Kitty is hired to talk with Kane while wearing a wire to get information on his plans. Instead, she shows Kane her wire to get back into his good graces, and the two enact this trope.
- Breaking Bad: Hank has enlisted Walt to put a tracking device on Gus Fring's vehicle. Walt manages to tip off Gus, but Gus tells him to proceed, then only drives between home and work in an attempt to allay Hank's suspicions.
- Burn Notice:
- Michael often bluffs people listening when he knows he is being bugged.
- Michael gets it used against him: in one episode when it's clear that his apartment is under surveillance, he tries to hold an innocuous conversation with Fiona, who instead uses the opportunity to force Michael to talk about their relationship (which is still innocuous, at least to the people listening).
- Chuck realizes in one episode that Casey is eavesdropping on him, so he begins talking about sandwiches with Morgan to annoy Casey.
- Doctor Who:
- "The Two Doctors": The Doctor gives some key exposition to his companion about the progress of a prototype time travel capsule and is overheard by one of the villains, but he later reveals that he knew the villain was listening and sabotaged his exposition accordingly so that they would believe the device was safer than it actually was.
- "Spyfall": As part of her plan to escape 1943 Paris, the Doctor has SOE radio operator Noor Inayat Khan send a wireless message, which the Germans intercept, claiming that the Nazi officer the Master is currently impersonating is a Double Agent. This gets him arrested, allowing the Doctor to steal his TARDIS.
- In Farscape, Crichton and Aeryn eventually do this to Scorpius, apparently getting him to believe that their relationship is at an end and Aeryn can't be used against Crichton. "Apparently" being the operative word; Aeryn ends up getting kidnapped in an operation that Scorpius apparently had a hand in, so the whole gambit is rendered completely pointless because Crichton ends up offering Scorpius everything he wanted in return for Aeryn's safety.
- General Hospital: Jason is forced to wear a mic by the FBI to bring down Sonny. He's able to clue Sonny in on it without letting the FBI know about it. They are not pleased.
- Needless to say, this happens in Get Smart, and needless to say, Max talks loudly and woodenly into the listening device.
- Hogan's Heroes:
- Hogan finds out that one of the new prisoners of war is actually a German spy, so they pretend to trust him and tell him they're going to take him to their secret hideout blindfolded. They then let some false information slip out while talking and make noises that imply their hideout is under the watertower.
- In "Eight O'Clock and All is Well", a Mole uses the technique against them. As far as the Heroes, listening through a bug in Klink's office, are concerned, the new prisoner is playing Klink to get out of a punishment. Meanwhile the Mole has passed Klink a note identifying himself as Gestapo, and is pouring Klink a drink.
- In another episode, the Germans plant a bug in the prisoners' barracks. Hogan uses it to feed the Germans false information, with the prisoners reading parts off of scripts.
- A comedic version on Leverage when Nate's ex-wife is approached by a member of his team. She was flirty and talked about all of her ex-husband's shortcomings, including in the bedroom, before finishing by saying that the worst thing he did was forget that she bought him that button camera.
- In Lois & Clark, a bad guy has tapped into Lois's eyes and ears, so he can see and hear everything and orders her to break up with Clark. She manages to scribble a note behind her back to warn him.
- While trying to round up the Cavendish Gang, The Lone Ranger realizes that Cavendish only faked being knocked out. So, he bluffs him with a story of a cavalry detachment nearby, then reveals to his friends later, that he was faking so that Cavendish would be distracted while he came up with a plan to get the entire outfit.
- This was done in the season 3 finale of The Mentalist, to give one of the CBI employees who might be Red John's spies the room number of a person they were hiding. The person is actually somewhere else, and the room number is a trick to reveal who is Red John's spy.
- While posing as a spy couple in NCIS, Tony and Ziva have (simulated) sex because they know the room is being filmed.
- The Prisoner (1967):
- In "Hammer into Anvil", Number Six takes advantage of the fact that he's being watched to give the impression he's spying and sending secret messages, as part of a Paranoia Gambit to break a particularly nasty Number Two.
- In "It's Your Funeral", some of the prisoners (who call themselves "jammers") invent and circulate nonexistent conspiracies against the people who run the Village, forcing them to waste time and effort sifting through the chaff for any wheat that might exist.
- The Punisher (2017): Upon finding out that her office is bugged, Madani decides to feed the bug false information about a fictional sting where Frank Castle will buy guns from a dealer, in hopes of luring out the people who are targeting Frank. This prompts Billy Russo and a team of mercenaries to go to said warehouse. A deadly shootout ensues during which several of Madani's SWAT officers and her partner Sam Stein are killed, as well as all of the mercenaries except Russo.
- In one episode of Scrubs, Dr. Cox realizes that Doug is listening to him and says to himself:Dr. Cox: If this kid [Doug] doesn't leave I'm gonna kill him!
Doug: ... (begins to leave)
Dr. Cox: ... Now, if you leave, I'm going to know that you were listening to me and I'm gonna go ahead and kill you anyway! - Seinfeld: While in the diner waiting for a reporter who's going to do a story on Jerry, he and George notice a young woman eavesdropping on their conversation, so to mess with her they pretend to be gay for each other. It turns out that she's the reporter Jerry was waiting for, who then outs them in her school newspaper as gay. They try desperately to convince her that they're not gay — Not That There's Anything Wrong with That.
- The Shield:
- At one point, Vic realizes that a fellow officer is wearing a wire for IA. Vic then uses this to record himself "confessing" to the cop that he's not bad, he just actively cultivates a reputation as a corrupt and murderous cop to intimidate gangs and crooks into thinking he's a loose cannon.
- At one point the Strike Team realizes that their clubhouse has been bugged. They all laugh along loudly as Shane tells a long drawn out joke for the benefit of whomever's listening, while at the same time using paper and pen to plan how to move forward.
- In the climax of the Star Trek: The Original Series episode "The Deadly Years", due to having been rapidly aged by mysterious radiation and gone senile Kirk has stepped down from command and his incompetent replacement has led the ship through the Romulan Neutral Zone and the latter are about to destroy them. Suddenly a cure is found, a restored Kirk appears on the bridge and gives an order to relay a message to Starfleet... using a code previously established as having been broken by the Romulans, which briefly causes the crew to wonder if he's still senile. Nevertheless, they open the channels and Kirk sends a message that the Enterprise will self destruct via the Corbomite Device and destroy any ship in a huge radius. The Romulans intercept the message and leave.
- In one episode of Sue Thomas: F.B.Eye, the characters play football. The other team hides their mouths during huddles so Sue, who is deaf, cannot read their lips. On the final play, they let her see their lips, but call a fake play. She doesn't fall for the bluff.
- White Collar: Fowler is tapping Peter's phone, so Peter pretends not to know that his cell phone is also bugged and uses it to call Neal so they can feed Fowler false information.
- In "Little Green Men" of The X-Files, Scully is followed by two tacky spies. She ditches them off by calling Mulder's answering machine (other shadowy people occupy his apartment) and giving them wrong info about where she's heading.
- The Wire: Marlo picks up that he is being waatched by the police, so he answers a phone call and talks in code like he's picking up a drug shipment from the train station, and once at the station, picks a random woman and offers to carry her bag out, at which point the police pounce and detain the pair, only to be made fools, revealing their wiretap and catching a lawsuit from the woman.
