The Official Thread: Live audio feeds, scanners, and... wait for it.. ENCRYPTION!

[AK9R]

for our own entertainment

I think that's the key point. Scanner listeners are, for the most part, listening to signals for entertainment. I may not care for encryption, but there's no way in my mind that I can justify jeopardizing privacy or officer safety for my entertainment.

 

[Larry-G]

Anyway, this is a bummer. I just bought a new scanner and it's pretty much useless because of encryption. Looks like this once fun hobby will die out.

As said before, the UK market is much smaller than the US and we lost ALL our blue light services radio comms close to if not over 20 years ago and it has not “killed” the scanner market here. Same way the cassette tape, MP3 player, Spotify didn’t kill broadcast radio.

 

[tdave365]

This is going to attract so much hate, yet I have to post this.

Encryption if it is an available technology is tough to de-justify. The best justification for not encrypting in American law enforcement is that open broadcasting was part of the original fabric of police radio communication technology.

Early AM radios were capable, indeed marked with tuning guides, to specifically tune into city wide police broadcasts.

You bought a floor radio and it was expected that you would be able to listen in to police calls as easily and directly as you would to Amos N' Andy.

However unintentionally and however wrought by lack of technical sophistication this was possible, it's because of this that open public safety broadcasting has been a fundamental component of policing, reflective of our culture's commitment to individual liberty and our angst against the potential for government tyranny and totalitarianism, for most of time.

There are excellent reasons to not encrypt if you first accept American exceptionalism as a real thing in terms of freedom and liberty.

Any other nation on earth with the technology to encrypt its public safety communication would logically and immediately seek to do so -- assuming affordable. The same cultural consideration we have in the USA simply doesn't exist to such level elsewhere. Even early UK radios probably had the ability to listen in to police calls, but they never had the American spirit that led to us splitting up from them in the first place.

Open public safety communication is one of America's unappreciated birthmarks. It makes little sense to foreign countries who balk at our liberties and independence. I would expect encryption to swell within all other nations, but I would expect the fight to NOT encrypt to roar in the United States.

Like anyone reading this, I am not optimistic. What I have concluded and what I am now promoting is a flat-out b***s-to-the-walls replacement for police scanning, which would involve the evolution of a parallel human network of enthusiasts, working journalists, activists, and good people roaming or spotting in their cities and regions, and reporting on public safety drama in a very concentrated and channeled way. These spotters would have their own openly broadcast radio network that would be scannable by regular people everywhere and anywhere.

 

[AB5ID]

Encryption of all Police departments is inevitable and it's nobody's fault. Time, technology, and economics I have brought us to this point. It's just the evolution of radio. Scanning is still very entertaining and fun even without listening to the police, in my area.

 

[mmckenna]

However unintentionally and however wrought by lack of technical sophistication this was possible, it's because of this that open public safety broadcasting has been a fundamental component of policing, reflective of our culture's commitment to individual liberty and our angst against the potential for government tyranny and totalitarianism, for most of time.

All well said. I appreciate your honesty.

Used to be I could take my lineman's butt set and clip on a phone line and listen away.
Then people started using Voice over IP, and I can no longer do that. I can't listen in on phone calls for entertainment.
I therefore demand that VoIP be outlawed.

Total hyperbole. Yes, I'm having some fun here.

What a lot of people miss about the move to encrypted radio traffic is the need for the security of private information. A lot of agencies will claim "officer safety" and that is a very good reason, however the major push is actually about what information gets shared over the radio, and who can intercept it. FBI has established rules that such information needs to be protected at rest and when moved (even over radio waves). Established rules, as in they already exist. Public safety radio systems are simply catching up with those rules. Now that it's easier to do, it's happening.

Yeah, the days of all radio traffic being analog and in the clear were awesome, but those days are gone.

What I have concluded and what I am now promoting is a flat-out b***s-to-the-walls replacement for police scanning, which would involve the evolution of a parallel human network of enthusiasts, working journalists, activists, and good people roaming or spotting in their cities and regions, and reporting on public safety drama in a very concentrated and channeled way. These spotters would have their own openly broadcast radio network that would be scannable by regular people everywhere and anywhere.

Problem is, you can't buy that from Amazon and have it delivered to your door tomorrow. It would take a lot of work, and too many want to be consumers, not providers.
Buy the scanner, download a file, listen to police.

 

[tdave365]

Problem is, you can't buy that from Amazon and have it delivered to your door tomorrow. It would take a lot of work, and too many want to be consumers, not providers.
Buy the scanner, download a file, listen to police.

This is true, I dread getting off my own duff to actually demonstrate such a thing. But consider that there are countless examples of energized populations that do exactly this -- albeit not for police scanning. These groups would have some of the qualities, re-formulated a little, of all these:

• Volunteer firefighting groups
• REACT teams (of the day, but I believe they are still active)
• Independent content creators - as individuals (cobbled together they might be the basis for a loose federation, but they tend to be "independent" in their nature and identify more as freelance journalists)
• Shomrim groups

What I would hope is that the love for a structured communication order and radios, cheap ones, would draw those personalities to begin thinking about forming such groups.

The re-formulation would result in such an operating group looking like a "club", perhaps with a rented headquarter office, meeting place, that is not only a place to administratively maintain the group, but a physical place for members to socialize, organize and host charity events, and so on, and so on. They would be radio-centric ala REACT and GMRS radio groups, be driven to find and report on public safety activity -- safely -- and have the blessing of local public safety who if not outright embracing them, would at least tolerate them (ala Shomrim), understanding the important social work that they accomplish. There would probably always be some degree of chaotic tension but ultimately I feel these groups are a thing I think they would cope along with just fine in the end.

In an enriched area with a strong group like this, the passive consumers as you correctly note most people would be, would use police scanners to listen in on the teeming activity of the active ones.

By the way, entirely off in another direction, it looks like Chicago is going (mostly) dark.

 

[drdispatch]

By the way, entirely off in another direction, it looks like Chicago is going (mostly) dark.

Yes, it appears that when they (finally) switch over to their P25 system, police will be "E". (It's been in the works for years, so who knows when it will actually happen.)

 

[INDaviation]

Actually, the current UHF channels will be P25E. All but 4 zones have already been reprogrammed.

 

[drdispatch]

Actually, the current UHF channels will be P25E. All but 4 zones have already been reprogrammed.

Interesting. I had heard that they were possibly going to switch to the OEMC's 800Mhz system. Good to know, thanks!

 

[trentbob]

Not here to debate. My County went encrypted after the police Chiefs Association quoted the reason that's in the header of this thread.

We didn't have that many people with professional equipment or scanners to hear our tdma Phase 2 system, media types, First Responders and serious hobbyist.

Police really didn't mind at least that was the word on the street.

Criminals are stupid, that's why they're criminals, they don't have the wherewithal to purchase and program Phase 2 scanners so there really wasn't a lot of threat or danger for the officer until.. somebody streamed all the zones and anybody could pick them up on a cell phone.

Now you've got a problem.

I've been listening all my life and it's been a while now since the police have been encrypted and I miss it.

The reason I'm posting this is sometimes it's really frustrating. Three news Choppers over my house tonight.

Nothing on EMS or fire. The Choppers are talking to each other on the news Chopper to Chopper Aviation frequency but not talking about the incident. The news desks are not talking about the incident with the choppers on their channels. No EMS or fire indicates it's probably not an accident or a missing child.

I miss that situation or awareness of knowing what's happening on my street or backyard.

Not here to debate but sometimes encryption really hurts LOL

 

[Anderegg]

Not here to debate. My County went encrypted after the police Chiefs Association quoted the reason that's in the header of this thread.

We didn't have that many people with professional equipment or scanners to hear our tdma Phase 2 system, media types, First Responders and serious hobbyist.

Police really didn't mind at least that was the word on the street.

Criminals are stupid, that's why they're criminals, they don't have the wherewithal to purchase and program Phase 2 scanners so there really wasn't a lot of threat or danger for the officer until.. somebody streamed all the zones and anybody could pick them up on a cell phone.

Now you've got a problem.

I've been listening all my life and it's been a while now since the police have been encrypted and I miss it.

The reason I'm posting this is sometimes it's really frustrating. Three news Choppers over my house tonight.

Nothing on EMS or fire. The Choppers are talking to each other on the news Chopper to Chopper Aviation frequency but not talking about the incident. The news desks are not talking about the incident with the choppers on their channels. No EMS or fire indicates it's probably not an accident or a missing child.

I miss that situation or awareness of knowing what's happening on my street or backyard.

Not here to debate but sometimes encryption really hurts LOL

View attachment 135990

I am waiting for the poop to hit the fan when Los Angeles Police and Sheriff fully transition to their encrypted trunked systems. The MILLIONS upon MILLIONS of dollars the local LA stations there spend on helicopter ops/coverage...well, when the comms go dark they may point those tens of millions at lawyers to fight it n CA, at least for the media.

Paul

 

[trentbob]

I am waiting for the poop to hit the fan when Los Angeles Police and Sheriff fully transition to their encrypted trunked systems. The MILLIONS upon MILLIONS of dollars the local LA stations there spend on helicopter ops/coverage...well, when the comms go dark they may point those tens of millions at lawyers to fight it n CA, at least for the media.

Paul

Yeah I wouldn't count on the media spending millions and millions of dollars on lawyers to fight it.

Maybe accommodations will be made for dispatch only radios the media
can purchase, who knows, I'm not from California.

These Choppers are here because news outlets routinely do cop checks, where they call the dispatchers and get information. They also get tips from the public and sometimes the cops actually call the news media.

These three Choppers are from Philadelphia just south of me and the story might get a sound bite of 30 seconds and they'll mispronounce the town.

We don't really have newspapers anymore or reporters out looking for news locally. With the loss of advertising papers are pretty much going down the tubes. The local newspaper is paginated in Texas, they laid off 600 people and it's mostly wire stuff with an occasional local story of a school board meeting. Hard crime does not get reported anymore in my area since encryption.

We do have an Internet site that has local news and they print verbatim whatever the press release says 4 days later no matter how inaccurate it obviously is. Other than that all they do is cover car accidents and house fires.

I just wanted to bring to light how frustrating it can be sometimes not to have situational awareness on your street.

 

[darkness975]

Not here to debate. My County went encrypted after the police Chiefs Association quoted the reason that's in the header of this thread.

We didn't have that many people with professional equipment or scanners to hear our tdma Phase 2 system, media types, First Responders and serious hobbyist.

Police really didn't mind at least that was the word on the street.

Criminals are stupid, that's why they're criminals, they don't have the wherewithal to purchase and program Phase 2 scanners so there really wasn't a lot of threat or danger for the officer until.. somebody streamed all the zones and anybody could pick them up on a cell phone.

Now you've got a problem.

I've been listening all my life and it's been a while now since the police have been encrypted and I miss it.

The reason I'm posting this is sometimes it's really frustrating. Three news Choppers over my house tonight.

Nothing on EMS or fire. The Choppers are talking to each other on the news Chopper to Chopper Aviation frequency but not talking about the incident. The news desks are not talking about the incident with the choppers on their channels. No EMS or fire indicates it's probably not an accident or a missing child.

I miss that situation or awareness of knowing what's happening on my street or backyard.

Not here to debate but sometimes encryption really hurts LOL

View attachment 135990

Sad

 

[darkness975]

I just wanted to bring to light how frustrating it can be sometimes not to have situational awareness on your street.

Very few truer words exist in the English language.

 

[trentbob]

Very few truer words exist in the English language.

Hello my old friend, haven't seen you for a while, we worked on a few projects together successfully, I would react to your post except that appears to be optional here??? Whatever, it's nice to see you posting again.

 

[NebraskaCoder]

Sarpy County, Nebraska went encrypted last month and now Omaha Police in Nebraska are at the end of the month.

 

[Stephen]

Once the founder of Radioreference decided to make millions off broadcasting feeds, it started the end of part of hobby.

 

[jthorpe]

Once the founder of Radioreference decided to make millions off broadcasting feeds, it started the end of part of hobby.

correct

 

[chrismol1]

but in the line of things it was the apps. Back when broadcastify came out in the early 2010s's I don't think I've ever heard of anyone causing issues sitting at home listening to a broadcasting feed, except for that guy in Chicago past few years posting it real time on twitter. But the apps drew all kind of negative attention. and rarely you might hear about a criminal with an actual scanner, those were not as common as apps

A few years ago during my routine of watching police bodycams since 2013 it became apparent what was becoming common, as police were pursuing and suspect crashed and had a scanner app going left in the vehicle. Then I watched a pursuit full of people run when the car crashed, AFTER it was located crashed and the police lost the vehicle in pursuit. And when they got one of passengers who they came upon, they flat out told the cop they had the scanner app and thats why they knew where to go off an intercepting course. The driver got away. THe look on the face of the cops when they were told, it looked like it just blew their entire job to shreds. They realized the people thy were pursuing knew their actions and were able to counter. They looked defeated

 

[Brales60]

Honest question, as I'm new to this. Does anyone think the E can be cracked by the manufacturer? Some damn smart ass people out there who would have no issues IMO.