Why would telecommunications experts work to distort and destroy audio codecs?

Hi, I'm trying to figure out why telecommunications experts would spend months or years of their life developing ways to distort and destroy ordinary telephone codecs so that they are extremely distorted and annoying. This occurred in a normal conversation on meditation and mindfulness (online), nothing to do with anything political or national security, etc. Why would anyone spend time doing that? Here is a sample of the audio in case anyone is interested in this. Note: Unfortunately my fiancée says I can't share this recording, because it's "secret". So, I am curious about your answers. There is nothing worth distorting or destroying and it is so annoying I can't even work next to her.