legal question on use of scanner

[GlobalNorth]

Encryption is the act/methodology of obscuring an information stream [letters, numbers, or data streams] into a cipher. EAMs are encoded ciphers and the USG has no reasonable concerns about their decryption, otherwise - they would not send them in the clear.

 

[JethrowJohnson]

P25 solved a (small by today's standards) part of the problem by making things packet based instead of pure analog, which locks out everyone with an older scanner or an el cheapo radio (such as a Baofeng) from listening in, now you need to drop a couple hundred bucks for a scanner that'll reconstruct them into audio. That should drive a fair amount of the public away.

However, it doesn't because we have scanner apps and live feeds. I have nothing against them, but I do have something against the idiots that use them and then show up at some random place because the cops are there.

As for the federal offense part, if someone is truly determined, they'll completely ignore that and just not tell anybody. Making it difficult to do so does help, and doing occasional key changes requires the guy that decrypted it to redo the process all over again.

Sometimes the bad outweighs the good and agencies go fully encrypted because it's becoming a nuisance to them.

About the legality of scanner audio, there's not anything I've heard of in the US that prohibits you from distributing that audio. Broadcastify would be a shell of what it is now if that was true. For your videos I do recommend turning it down or off for the duration of your recording just to cut down on potentially distracting things, but it's not illegal to have it in the background or anything.

IANAL but this last part is my understanding of the whole situation.

Well I know that obviously if something's a federal offense it won't stop anyone, that's just like saying if firearms were banned no one would have one and that's ridiculous, but like you said it does make it a lot harder to, but if they do get caught with the scanner while or after committing a crime and the police book it as evidence and they find that it has an encryption key algorithm in there, then that guy's gonna be in some deep trouble with the feds I think.

 

[JethrowJohnson]

Encryption is the act/methodology of obscuring an information stream [letters, numbers, or data streams] into a cipher. EAMs are encoded ciphers and the USG has no reasonable concerns about their decryption, otherwise - they would not send them in the clear.

That sounds like a reasonable explanation to me.

 

[KevinC]

Sorry, but "encrytion" has more than one meaning and yes EAM's and similar are considered encryption. If you say "voice encrytion" in your post instead of encrytion, change "hear" to understand, and drop what an encrypted voice signal sounds like (because not all voice encrytion sounds as I would take your description to be, then I would not argue wth it.

Wouldn’t EAM’s be encoded as opposed to encrypted?

 

[JethrowJohnson]

Wouldn’t EAM’s be encoded as opposed to encrypted?

🤷‍♂️ P25 is considered to be encoded in a way, but they let us decode that. I don't know.

 

[JethrowJohnson]

If two departments both use P25 but one uses Motorola radios and the other uses Harris radios, would both systems work the same because it's the same technology or would they work differently because of the different manufacturer?

 

[GTR8000]

This thread officially no longer has anything to do with what the OP asked. Welcome to RadioReference.

 

[KevinC]

This thread officially no longer has anything to do with what the OP asked. Welcome to RadioReference.

I’m going off the rails on a crazy train.

 

[KK4JUG]

Getting legal advice in this forum is like trying to find out what color the number 7 smells like.

 

[KevinC]

Getting legal advice in this forum is like trying to find out what color the number 7 smells like.

Obviously it’s purple. Duh…

 

[KK4JUG]

But what does purple smell like?

 

[KevinC]

But what does purple smell like?

The number 7.

 

[RRR]

Show me a publicly available scanner that you can put an encryption key into....

Until then, it's a moot point. Scanners can't encrypt radio traffic, there is no place in it to even put a key into.

I did hear tell of special SDS200 units for Govt use that were equipped to handle encryption, however, I have no evidence that they ever went through with making them. And where would one obtain software to put in an encrypted key anyway?

Ain't happening.

 

[KK4JUG]

The number 7.

Well, of course.

 

[dlwtrunked]

Well if they don't want the public to hear it then why wouldn't they scramble the signal? Bc if they do that then it not only makes it way harder for anyone to decipher it but also a federal offense to do so.

I am not sure I understand the point you are making above. They do not care if you "hear" a signal but do not want the message to be understood. In addition, it is harder to change keys for voice encrytion (scrampling) than keys for decoding a message like an EAM. Again, I am not sure I understood your point above.

 

[dlwtrunked]

I am not sure I correctly understand the point you are making above. Sometimes, it is harder to change keys for voice encryption (scrambling) than keys for decoding a message like an EAM. May be your main point is that they could prosecute if someone broke the encrypted voice signal. True (but I think there has never been a prosecution) but I think that law was more for communications providers to use in advertisement more than for actually doing anything else. Personally, I think "laws" are never a substitute for technology.

 

[bob550]

 

[KB4MSZ]

I did hear tell of special SDS200 units for Govt use that were equipped to handle encryption

How do you encrypt "humming"?

 

[JethrowJohnson]

I am not sure I understand the point you are making above. They do not care if you "hear" a signal but do not want the message to be understood. In addition, it is harder to change keys for voice encrytion (scrampling) than keys for decoding a message like an EAM. Again, I am not sure I understood your point above.

Because if they don't want anyone to know what they're saying, then why take a chance by assuming no one can figure out their codes. Spoken codes can be figured out over time if you pay enough attention, but if they encrypt their traffic, then in order to hear them you'd have to somehow install an encryption key software which is probably extremely hard for a civilian to do. So encryption would be more secure that way. So my original point was: it's not illegal to listen to their messages if it's not encrypted.

 

[JethrowJohnson]

I am not sure I correctly understand the point you are making above. Sometimes, it is harder to change keys for voice encryption (scrambling) than keys for decoding a message like an EAM. May be your main point is that they could prosecute if someone broke the encrypted voice signal. True (but I think there has never been a prosecution) but I think that law was more for communications providers to use in advertisement more than for actually doing anything else. Personally, I think "laws" are never a substitute for technology.

I agree. The only thing a law could do is get him in trouble with the feds (I think) but that's if he gets caught with it.