No more encryption in calif as of Jan 1 2024

[mmckenna]

Bonus question for you. Why didn't you ask these questions under your other account?

Thanks for pointing this out.

Some guys just love the drama. I worked with someone like that once. It was such a pain in the arse.

So what's the jig here bro? Sounds like you have some good answers but, the back-and-forth that this Peter guy started is unfortunately distracting everyone from what most of us cali people want to know, did this DOJ mandate screw us over?

People who live in California rarely call it "cali". People that call it "cali" are usually an outsider trying to make others think they live there.

"DOJ mandate screw us over".
Depends on what your point of view is.

If you like protecting your private info, then it's not getting screwed over.
Scanner listeners are in a great minority. There's more people that like NOT getting their PII stolen than there are scanner hobbyists.

In your opinion, with the experience you have in this industry, in this state.. How numbered are our the days of pub safety Rx here in the golden state? The radio enthusiasts of California have enjoyed some of the most open PS communications in the country.... is it over?

Have you not read anything that's been posted?

None of this mandates encryption. It's been said many, many times, but people just don't want to read/understand/comprehend.


The mandate is to protect PII/CJI. For some agencies, that means encryption. For some, it means a lot of traffic will switch to other methods.

And as a bonus question... what do you suspect the 20+ analog counties are to do about this? Are we going to see a wave of DTRS and Digital conventional deployments in these areas?

Probably best you answer that yourself. All the information is out there. It just takes someone reading it with the right mindset. It's all been posted here, and it's been posted over and over again since late 2019. Unfortunately there are a lot of people out there posting bogus info. I'm not going to waste all my free time trying to counteract all that.

 

[GTR8000]

So you have the same email name as the name of the other account I’m referring to. Now THAT’S a coincidence.

Noticed the same thing earlier. That's some whopper he's telling, but I suppose he won't cop to it, huh? Must think you were born yesterday. More excuses than Heinz 57...or was that 67? 💀

 

[CopperWhopper67]

Noticed the same thing earlier. That's some whopper he's telling, but I suppose he won't cop to it, huh? Must think you were born yesterday. More excuses than Heinz 57...or was that 67? 💀

Before y'all slander me for something I didn't do, you must know that yes I made an account for my roommate with a secondary email because he kept bothering me with questions he wanted ask the community and was too lazy to make his own. I was frankly tired of it and told him here's an account do it yourself. He went Rambo with the encryption this and that. I have been a member for well over 4 years and would have to be smoking something very potent to dupe an account just to troll about E. C'mon, people what is this, the 10th grade??

 

[mmckenna]

too lazy to make his own.….what is this, the 10th grade??

Hmmmmm.

 

[Chris52]

The one any only thing I’d like and agree with that ever came from this state. Now back to you’re electric lawnmowers, weed eaters ect.

 

[CopperWhopper67]

Hmmmmm.

Understandable if it's hard to believe, but it's what happened. Sorry that a simple misunderstanding blew up and destroyed this thread....

 

[d119]

I think this thread is about done anyway - the point has been hashed out, all that's left is political rhetoric. LOCK TIME @KevinC!

 

[APX7500X2]

These are legit question any citizen would want to know.

the city has aprox 61,950 People in it

I'm going to spitball here and say maybe on the high side, 500 of them care about the police being encrypted or even know what a scanner is.

I bet if you spent a week at Gateway Plaza asking the average person if they think the police should encrypt their radios 80% of them would have the deer in the headlight look ,15% would say no just because you said the word police, and the other 5% would want to picket on the lawn of the PD because it would be drama, but they wouldn't really know what they were there for.
And congrats your trolling has gotten you to over 30 posts....Speeding towards expert.....................LMAO

 

[Peter_SD911]

the city has aprox 61,950 People in it


I'm going to spitball here and say maybe on the high side, 500 of them care about the police being encrypted or even know what a scanner is.

I bet if you spent a week at Gateway Plaza asking the average person if they think the police should encrypt their radios 80% of them would have the deer in the headlight look ,15% would say no just because you said the word police, and the other 5% would want to picket on the lawn of the PD because it would be drama, but they wouldn't really know what they were there for.
And congrats your trolling has gotten you to over 30 posts....Speeding towards expert.....................LMAO

Well always glad to be schooled by someone (free account) who has absolutely no Idea about the politics of a county he has never even visited...let alone "researched".

The Gateway Plaza reference was a dead giveaway. Why would anyone even be at that place since it's not the center of any political activity in the county. The Pacific Garden Mall /Town Clock is the center of activity. Gateway is "commercial" and everyone in SC knows that "commercial is bad".

Fact: Santa Cruz county is full of hippies...hippies that protest anything and EVERYTHING under the sun, moon and stars. Every single one of those protesting hippies (and pods thereof) has a scanner .
Santa Cruz is also home to UCSC...More radical than UC Berkeley.
Those UCSC classrooms also have scanners!

They care...
...and the politics show it.
Otherwise that system would have been fully double super encrypted long ago....like back in 1990 when they all went to the sabers and planned the Netcom move from the basement at 701 Ocean street.

I'm pretty sure after spending a very good portion of my life and career inside the Board of supervisors chambers and the 4 incorporated cities city goverment centers (of said county)...that I may claim my "Expert" status here.

I don't need to drop anyone here my resume...I'm confidant of my ability on this subject matter AND feel comfortable enough to share my opinion with the others here in this forum.

If you want to take pot-shots at me, then kindly get your facts straight about the county that I used to reside in (and raised a hippie family in) and go spend the $30 for a premium account so I may take YOU a bit more seriously.

If the word "politics" scares you, then stay out of the discussion. I never made this a left-right issue. All I did was point out that things are very, very different in Santa Cruz county.

Come visit sometime. We have beautiful beaches and an awesome VHF-Hi public safety system that has "personality". It's one of the most action packed and entertaining radio systems in the country. Still in sweet Analog!


Bring your tie-dye...your scanner...and some patchouli oil and insence...be ready to march and protest to you hearts desire.

 

[belvdr]

go spend the $30 for a premium account so I may take YOU a bit more seriously.

Why does a premium account lend more credence to someone's opinion?

 

[KevinC]

Why does a premium account lend more credence to someone's opinion?

It doesn’t.

 

[belvdr]

It doesn’t.

You and I know that, but I'm curious why he would think so.

 

[KevinC]

Stop it. Just stop it. One warning, no need to reply to this.

Not directed at @belvdr

 

[mmckenna]

I'm just here purely for the entertainment value at this point.

 

[Chris52]

I need to get out more often (outside of the Maryland forums) 😂 Keep it going, I just popped some popcorn.

 

[APX7500X2]

Well always glad to be schooled by someone (free account) who has absolutely no Idea about the politics of a county he has never even visited...let alone "researched".

The Gateway Plaza reference was a dead giveaway. Why would anyone even be at that place since it's not the center of any political activity in the county. The Pacific Garden Mall /Town Clock is the center of activity. Gateway is "commercial" and everyone in SC knows that "commercial is bad".

Fact: Santa Cruz county is full of hippies...hippies that protest anything and EVERYTHING under the sun, moon and stars. Every single one of those protesting hippies (and pods thereof) has a scanner .
Santa Cruz is also home to UCSC...More radical than UC Berkeley.
Those UCSC classrooms also have scanners!

They care...
...and the politics show it.
Otherwise that system would have been fully double super encrypted long ago....like back in 1990 when they all went to the sabers and planned the Netcom move from the basement at 701 Ocean street.

I'm pretty sure after spending a very good portion of my life and career inside the Board of supervisors chambers and the 4 incorporated cities city goverment centers (of said county)...that I may claim my "Expert" status here.

I don't need to drop anyone here my resume...I'm confidant of my ability on this subject matter AND feel comfortable enough to share my opinion with the others here in this forum.

If you want to take pot-shots at me, then kindly get your facts straight about the county that I used to reside in (and raised a hippie family in) and go spend the $30 for a premium account so I may take YOU a bit more seriously.

If the word "politics" scares you, then stay out of the discussion. I never made this a left-right issue. All I did was point out that things are very, very different in Santa Cruz county.

Come visit sometime. We have beautiful beaches and an awesome VHF-Hi public safety system that has "personality". It's one of the most action packed and entertaining radio systems in the country. Still in sweet Analog!


Bring your tie-dye...your scanner...and some patchouli oil and insence...be ready to march and protest to you hearts desire.

So paying for a subscription makes you an expert with 30 posts LMAO

You are nowhere close to an expert in radio communications. You are like every politician, you have some key words and a few facts and you spew them around to make people think you know what you are talking about, but in the end a real expert would make you look dumb

Oh wait, that was already done LOL

 

[JKPHOTO]

It sounded like they were working with an outside agency, probably that did not special those radios. I heard several references to drone testing...

 

[KF6NFW]

The CLETS thing has to do with CaDOJ, it's not me being 'hung up'. CaDOJ came out in 2020 and reminded agencies that when they signed agreements to connect to the CLETS network, they agreed to protect that information in all forms and at all times.

https://oag.ca.gov/sites/all/files/agweb/pdfs/info_bulletins/20-09-cjis.pdf

This isn't something new, agencies agreed to this when they signed up. Most just ignored it because "everyone else was doing it" (always a good justification….).

Agencies had to submit a plan to DOJ by the end of 2020 on how they were going to meet the requirement. I had to fill out ours and submit it.
The plan didn't mean we had to go to encryption immediately, it meant that we had to have a plan to protect PII. Not doing so risked getting our connection to the CLETS database pulled. After all, we'd signed an agreement years ago saying we understood the requirements and would comply.

As for the agencies in Santa Cruz County, yes, they are all VHF analog as of right now, but the equipment is in place to go to P25. Repeaters and remote receivers were upgraded quite a while back. Mobiles and portables have been in place for quite a while. Essentially they are waiting on a decision to go to P25 trunked countywide, or to use P25 conventional. When that decision is made (it's all about budgets), they'll begin the process of switching to P25. I've spent quite a bit of time talking with no only the local agencies, but also the county radio shop. Plan is for everything controlled/operated by the county to go 100% encrypted.
It's only a matter of time. The hardware is all in place, just waiting on budgets and the decision on trunking vs. conventional.



That's not the issue.

We are addressing these same issues in Oregon. I live just over the border in Oregon near Modoc county. I monitor, All the top counties along the border as they are easy for me to hear, even at 100 plus miles. Of course it helps living mile high in the desert. Recently legislation was introduced to ensure public access. We are discussing the single channel encryption options and keeping everything else public. Of course that poses problems of its own. Especially if like me, you live in a single horse town. I mean that nearly as serious as it sounds. Our Sherriff's dept uses single freq operation for the entire county. I have met with our county often on radio issues as part of my job. I am aware that several in dept hope that we can keep single channel ops and NOT encrypt. We are already under budget like most everyone else, but our county populations is only around 3k, and our county is bigger then some of our states on east coast.

CLETS was a designed step to ensure no matter what direction radio went, the data had to be protected. This has presented problems for various things.

Of course we would all be foolish to think that Mother M and other radio producers arent behind this push also. While I did see the comment about the public having access never seemed to be a problem before, while that is mostly true, this is not the issue. In fact thats not even really a part of the argument.

 

[KF6NFW]

I'm sure it can seem that way to someone on the outside looking in. But, you're pretty far off the mark.

For the last 10 years or so, it's been difficult to buy non-P25 public safety grade radios. Every vehicle, hand pack, repeater that I've seen in the county is already P25 capable. Radio consoles were recently updated, so the encryption capability is not the issue.

The county shop is ready to go. All the repeaters/receivers are P25 capable right now. Backhaul is mostly addressed. They have the KVL's and the radios are ready. Plans for handling encryption keys are in place. I've been talking with them making sure our plans will jive with theirs.

As for enforcing the mandate, CaDOJ made it clear that failure to comply can result in CLETS access getting pulled. No, they haven't done that yet that I'm aware of. But there is a tool to enforce it. DOJ is doing the right thing by giving agencies time to comply. It's not an easy process and it takes time. But Santa Cruz County is well ahead of most others.



I think it's something like 21 radio sites for the county. When you consider the tax base/number of taxpayers, it shows what a huge job it was to accomplish that with short funding. It's been a tough job and they've done well.



Not quite.
The hang up is the county's decision on wether or not they are going to do a trunked system or stick with conventional. That's still in process, but converting to trunking would be a large burden on the small tax base. Switching to P25 conventional with encryption could happen pretty quickly if they are given the go-ahead.



I don't think any law enforcement agencies WANT to ignore it. Most are well aware of the need for encryption. Funding is a challenge, but as equipment is replaced through attrition, P25/encryption capable equipment will be installed. Might take a while, and the CaDOJ is aware of this. That's why they are not pushing hard on it. Most large counties/agencies are already on P25 systems with encryption capability. The more rural counties will come along in time.

And remember, encryption is NOT required. The requirement is to not handle PII over clear radio channels. There are ways around that that don't require equipment upgrades. Some agencies are already doing that and you may not see them switch to encrypted radio channels for quite a while. Doesn't mean they are not in compliance with the CaDOJ mandate.

A common easy work around is to do PII over MDT.

 

[mmckenna]

A common easy work around is to do PII over MDT.

And no doubt that is what some agencies will do.
While many who don't understand these systems will claim that the CLETS requirement -mandates- encryption, it does not.

MDT's are a good solution, but they don't fix everything. Hard to type on a slippery screen while in pursuit. Radio is still the preferred means of communications for most officers, and being able to pass necessary info over the radio quickly and without concern of who's listening is a valuable tool.

Single frequency agencies are facing a challenge on how to meet this. What it comes down to is that all these agencies in California agreed to the CLETS requirements when they signed the paperwork.

Encryption is still one good way to meet this. I know, the scanner listeners don't like it, but that's lower on the list of concerns than hobbyists would like. There are many ways to handle this that don't require putting scanners at the top of the list of requirements.

As for vendors pushing encryption as a way to make money….
Any radio purchased for public safety use in the last 10-15 years is capable of some form of encryption. Digital capable radios usually include some form of encryption in the cost. It's usually not AES256, though.
There isn't as much money to be made off encryption as some like to think. I purchased a couple of Harris XL-200's and single key AES256 was a 1¢ cost line item. Encryption key management software was about $1500, if I recall correctly. That's not an insurmountable cost for any agency.