Trying to settle an argument...

[hoeser]

I am right on the edge of Windsor/Essex and Chatham/Kent in Tilbury Ontario and I am just starting to take an interest in the scanning hobby...

A few very simple questions for you guys if you wouldn't mind:

A) Can we listen to police around here?
B) Is it legal?
C) What type of equipment is required? From what I gather I'd probably do fine with a Uniden BCD396XT?

Thanks!

 

[Forts]

A) In your area, basically just the OPP
B) Yes, provided you don't share with others the things you hear, or personally gain from it
C) Any modern digital scanner (such as the 396XT) would do just fine

 

[hoeser]

So the OPP are non-encrypted and everyone else is running Encryption around here?

 

[VE3JSO]

opp has some encrypted channels but 99% of there coms you can hear in the clear with a digital scanner the chattham kent police are using a tsys called edacs provoice and at the present time there are no scanners that can track it and i don't think there going to be on any time soon but like forts said scanners are legal if you keep what you hear to yourself.

 

[VE3RADIO]

Chatham-Kent is not encrypted, its provoice and it can be heard if you use DSD or buy a Provoice radio.

 

[Jammin_Jay]

I am willing to give DSD a try in decoding Ottawa Police on the EDACS system.
Could someone link me to the software, or pvt msg me to download it.
I understand its linux based.

 

[hoeser]

Now this is getting interesting and even more appealing. So Provoice is an encoding standard without encryption? Do Provoice scanners exist? I like the idea of a provoice DSD on Linux, I am an AIX&Linux systems engineer by trade so this is right up my alley... I am curious as to how you send the digital signal to the system... is it as simple as line-in on a sound card??

 

[gary123]

DSD can be downloaded from the wiki page

 

[Forts]

Now this is getting interesting and even more appealing. So Provoice is an encoding standard without encryption? Do Provoice scanners exist? I like the idea of a provoice DSD on Linux, I am an AIX&Linux systems engineer by trade so this is right up my alley... I am curious as to how you send the digital signal to the system... is it as simple as line-in on a sound card??

Correct, ProVoice is simply a modulation scheme just like P25, MotoTRBO, AEGIS etc etc. They all come with or without encryption. And no, there are no ProVoice scanners.

As far as how DSD works, yes it is thru your sound card.... But that's getting off topic for this thread. Head over to the Wiki and the Digital Signals Decoding forum and you will find all the info you need.