My Friend Has Gotten into Cell Phone Band

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Ryfly

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I'm not a 100%, might of been some analog phone. So my friend is a friend to a guy who has every scanner imaginable. He used to be a police detective then moved to private investigating. So my buddy and i went to this guys house for drinks etc and to listen in on some of the most interesting conversations yet! The scanner was some type of scanner i have never seen before. It was scanning through all Cell Bands, etc! I asked what type of scanner it was, and he said it was government issued one. Just one cost i think he said 3 or 4 grand. So it also was a digital decoder. So he hit the some button and before we knew it, we herd someone talking about goin to church, then another person talking about his wife driving him crazy, whats new on that part, etc. I felt sort of bad but totally like a ease dropper. He then went to the 2Ghz range and we started hearing data transmissions etc, and even in the 5 ghz range we started hearing house phones.

The scanner had no model code or even a name on it. Looked a lot like the Uniden Base scanners. A lot bigger though but buttons and all were similar etc. Boy how i like to get this ultimate scanner.

Makes me wonder if Uniden has Secret 10mhz to 10Ghz scanners that they sell to the NSA or FBI or the police.

Overall it was interesting to find a scanner that did listen to the most impossible thing to listen to, Cell phones. But we only heard 30 second of talk at a time, since the person was jumping from tower to tower. It looks like it's time to visit this detective more often lol
 

sjcscanner

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well, if he doesnt work for the govmt, then it is illegal. thats still cool though, maybe its just an older scanner, from before they made up the cell phone ban :)
 

rdale

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Those are analog cellphones and cordless phones, which are on their way out...
 

DiGiTaLD

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Ryfly said:
Makes me wonder if Uniden has Secret 10mhz to 10Ghz scanners that they sell to the NSA or FBI or the police.
My guess is such agencies probably wouldn't use anything made by Uniden for that purpose. If they have a need to monitor, there are much higher-end receivers out there that perform well beyond the capabilities of scanner-grade equipment.
 
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DaveNF2G

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sjcscanner said:
well, if he doesnt work for the govmt, then it is illegal. thats still cool though, maybe its just an older scanner, from before they made up the cell phone ban :)

Even if he does work for the government, what he was doing was illegal.

Monitoring without a warrant - violation of ECPA (and the 4th Amendment).

Monitoring in front of an audience - violation of ECPA and violation of the Communications Act.
 

CAPTLPOL1

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You must think you are addressing an audience of teenagers and childern. Maybe you are, but to the contributing factor and the ones that have built the database, please stopping being so childish and not mention such things. Not to mention that even if what you say is even remotely true, you would have just admitted to criminal activity.
 

mtindor

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Does everything need to be prefaced with illegal? I don't think anybody was questioning whether it was illegal or not. Everybody and their mother has monitored cell phones, cordless phones, etc. The OP seemed to be simply asking about what kind of 'scanner' or receiver might there be that would be able to monitor such things.

Maybe RR shouldn't "condone" such activity, but I don't think everything needs prefixed with an "Oh My Gosh, It is Illegal!" when this wasn't even what the OP was asking about.

It has been said in the past... if a tree falls in the forest and nobody is there to hear it, does it make a noise?

Mike

PS: I ran across a neighbor's cordless phone in the 920 mhz area the other day - I listened. After all, if you put your scanner in search mode and it stops on something, do you not listen to it at least long enough to try and determine what kind of transmission it is? Now, all somebody needs to do is prove it. After all, I could be a habitual liar and my own word would not be worth a grain of salt in court
 
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key2_altfire

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My first "real" scanner was a Radio Shack, PRO-52 I think, little 200 ch handheld. This was back in 1994. My roomie at the time was also a scanner geek and he found some keypad routines for my scanner... press 5, 7 and L/O simultaneously then turn on scanner. It blows away all your settings but opens up the cellular band. I only ever heard conversations on it once, and that was when I was in some boonie town, the airwaves were STUFFED with conversations... never got anything in L.A. city where I lived at the time.
 

Go-24

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Detective? LOL, what a whacker!

Not only was he doing something he shouldnt have been doing, he was boasting about what he was able to do. uhh huh huh looky boyz what I can do, I just likea rockford filz dude. And now you wish you could get your hands on something like that? LOL!

Glad to hear hes no longer in law enforcement.
 

CAPTLPOL1

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If you read his post, he was trying to say that he could decode the digital signals as well. Hence I refered to his post as childish. I know that AMPS analog cell phones can be picked up, put the poster was implying that he could pick up the digital ones as well.
 

16b

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I Have A Buddie Who Works For The Fbi And He Has A Gvmt Issue Scaner I Have Seen It And It Looks Just Like U Describe They Use Them To Monitor Peoples Cells He Says They Use Them To Catch The Drug Dealers And Every Fbi Anget Has 1 They Are Made By Uniden But U Have To Have Spcecial Authorization From The Fcc. And No They Dont Need A Warrent He Told Me They Dont Need One Its Legal For The Federal Agnecies And A Few Police Departments With Detectvies Who Are Cleared Specially By The Fcc.
 

n2mdk

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16b said:
I Have A Buddie Who Works For The Fbi And He Has A Gvmt Issue Scaner I Have Seen It And It Looks Just Like U Describe They Use Them To Monitor Peoples Cells He Says They Use Them To Catch The Drug Dealers And Every Fbi Anget Has 1 They Are Made By Uniden But U Have To Have Spcecial Authorization From The Fcc. And No They Dont Need A Warrent He Told Me They Dont Need One Its Legal For The Federal Agnecies And A Few Police Departments With Detectvies Who Are Cleared Specially By The Fcc.

:roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll: :roll:
 

trixwagen

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Yeah, we all know that there are devices that can tap digital cell phones (roving bugs, etc). But how about a photograph of this Government issue Uniden? Calling your bluff.


16b said:
I Have A Buddie Who Works For The Fbi And He Has A Gvmt Issue Scaner I Have Seen It And It Looks Just Like U Describe They Use Them To Monitor Peoples Cells He Says They Use Them To Catch The Drug Dealers And Every Fbi Anget Has 1 They Are Made By Uniden But U Have To Have Spcecial Authorization From The Fcc. And No They Dont Need A Warrent He Told Me They Dont Need One Its Legal For The Federal Agnecies And A Few Police Departments With Detectvies Who Are Cleared Specially By The Fcc.
 

Ch1ronTL34

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16b said:
I Have A Buddie Who Works For The Fbi And He Has A Gvmt Issue Scaner I Have Seen It And It Looks Just Like U Describe They Use Them To Monitor Peoples Cells He Says They Use Them To Catch The Drug Dealers And Every Fbi Anget Has 1 They Are Made By Uniden But U Have To Have Spcecial Authorization From The Fcc. And No They Dont Need A Warrent He Told Me They Dont Need One Its Legal For The Federal Agnecies And A Few Police Departments With Detectvies Who Are Cleared Specially By The Fcc.

Excessive use of capital letters. When typing in the English language, only the first word of a sentence and proper nouns get capitalized.
 
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Back in the late 80's I worked for an un-named cellular company; we had a custom controller that had been designed for the FBI that was about 18" x 18" with a 5.25 floppy. It controlled a Cushman service monitor and had a parallel printer port and a serial port to connect to a laptop. I could decode the analog control channels and decode the MIN's of users, I could enter a particular MIN and follow that mobile through each handoff and follow the conversation. The data would be stored on the laptop for later analysis. It was designed to allow the FBI to follow a subject and monitor their cell calls. In addition I had a SAM (system access monitor) with printer to perform system analysis as I drove around. Later we added a LCC test set to map system performance.
 

n2mdk

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Ch1ronTL34 said:
Excessive use of capital letters. When typing in the English language, only the first word of a sentence and proper nouns get capitalized.

And writes Fbi instead of FBI.
 
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