Williamson County Encryption

[Beaky]

Sounds like the move has been made or is happening today. Most all Fire, EMS, Law will be encrypted. I'm not sure what is left to scan. The VHF's are still up due to station alerting for most departments and mutual aid I think will be on the Public Safety TG's

WCEMS was on EMS PRI and Comm was calling stations on CENT DISP.

If you do not have a "System Radio" you will not hear anything.

 

[Nebuchadnezzar]

Round Rock is still in the clear.

Wilco is such a joke, I'm seriously entertaining the idea of moving into Travis county, but for now Round Rock is staying on the sane reasonable side of the fence and I hope they continue to do so. From monitoring their comms for the past year or so and my limited contact with the RRPD I can say that they are efficient polite and conduct themselves with the professionalism that Wilco lacks and is attempting to hide behind encryption.

 

[SCPD]

I hope these guys aren't so dumb that they try and run encrypted on State Inter-op frequencies too. Encrypting Fire makes absolutely no sense what-so-ever. Especially when Mutual Aid is required.

 

[Beaky]

To my knowledge no they will not. If someone who is encrypted runs a call with someone who is not they need a talkgroup to go in order to communicate.

 

[Nebuchadnezzar]

For those of you now deafened in Wilco, the encryption is applied at the repeater/control console. The input frequencies can still be scanned, there is no way they can encrypt the transmissions from hand held's to the repeater. It's good for one side of the conversation at the very least. Take all the system frequencies and subtract 45mhz to get the input frequency to listen to, toss em all in a bank and scan away. Hope this helps a little.

 

[Beaky]

Now at what point does it become illiegal to intersept an encrypted message? Is it after the message has been encrypted or is it when the sender keys up on the input (Radio to repeter?). He is intending to send a message on what he knows to be and encrypted talk group... and somone is listening to the input to the repeater? Is that message considered part of the encrypted message? Is that "safe" to monitor?

I've always heard it is against the law to listen to Military encrypted and other encrypted messages...where is that law on paper? Anyone know any links to this topic

 

[Nebuchadnezzar]

Now at what point does it become illiegal to intersept an encrypted message? Is it after the message has been encrypted or is it when the sender keys up on the input (Radio to repeter?). He is intending to send a message on what he knows to be and encrypted talk group... and somone is listening to the input to the repeater? Is that message considered part of the encrypted message? Is that "safe" to monitor?

I've always heard it is against the law to listen to Military encrypted and other encrypted messages...where is that law on paper? Anyone know any links to this topic

I would think that the encrypted traffic is fair game until encryption is applied. If you have a program that runs the received traffic through an algorithm to defeat the encryption then that is illegal. I'm not an attorney and this is only my personal opinion, but receiving unencrypted traffic does not sound like a violation of the law. I'm looking for the exact law, but am having little luck, if anyone can post it I would like to read it for myself.

http://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/217103.pdf

 

[PJH]

Oh really.

Funny, my mobile and portable radios are encrypted the minute /i press the PTT. As a US Marshal once said...."You care to revise that BS story?"

 

[Nebuchadnezzar]

Oh really.

Funny, my mobile and portable radios are encrypted the minute /i press the PTT. As a US Marshal once said...."You care to revise that BS story?"

Do you use a Motorola Astro saber on this p25 trunked system?

From my understanding, the encryption option is selected on the dispatch side and not selected on the radio like the old Saber III radios.

 

[PJH]

The field radio xmits it. Been that way since the 70's. The dispatcher can click a button to encypt their transmissions if they want.

CBP use to have it so that all the field units where encypted by dispatch wasn't, but its was still end to end encrption between the field units. It can be implemented in many ways.

IT would defeat the purpose to transmit in the clear to have it repeated encrypted.

The repeaters do not do the encyption. The DIU3000 does...and all that happens with theQuantars is to resync the transmission so it all works.

 

[PJH]

Of course its more complicated than that, but thats the cliffs notes verison.

 

[Nebuchadnezzar]

The field radio xmits it. Been that way since the 70's. The dispatcher can click a button to encypt their transmissions if they want.

CBP use to have it so that all the field units where encypted by dispatch wasn't, but its was still end to end encrption between the field units. It can be implemented in many ways.

IT would defeat the purpose to transmit in the clear to have it repeated encrypted.

The repeaters do not do the encyption. The DIU3000 does...and all that happens with theQuantars is to resync the transmission so it all works.

You apparently know your stuff, much more than I do. The fact still remains that scanning the input freqs is apparently working.

 

[blantonl]

The fact still remains that scanning the input freqs is apparently working.

Are you absolutely sure about that? Fact and apparently are pretty diverse views.

I'd like to hear a confirmation from someone that this is indeed the case - and then I would suspect we have our first case of a P25 system that encrypts at the infrastructure level and not from the subscriber units.

 

[PJH]

My guess is that he is hearing other talkgroups that are not encypted...since there is almost no realistic way of determining what he is hearing based soley on the inputs. In short, no system manager in their right mind would do this as it defeats the purpose of any secure setting.

Its no different than shouting to your neighbor that his wife is sleeping with the milkman while listening to the response on a cellphone while looking at him.

 

[Nebuchadnezzar]

My guess is that he is hearing other talk groups that are not encrypted...since there is almost no realistic way of determining what he is hearing based solely on the inputs. In short, no system manager in their right mind would do this as it defeats the purpose of any secure setting.

Its no different than shouting to your neighbor that his wife is sleeping with the milkman while listening to the response on a cellphone while looking at him.

As PJH said it's difficult to confirm what I'm hearing on the inputs, In Round Rock almost everything is unencrypted, When I get a chance I will run up to Georgetown out of range of Round Rock and see what can be heard.

PJH you're right that it doesn't make much sense but the way the Motorola system p25 system was explained to me the input frequencies from mobile units shouldn't transmit encrypted traffic. I really don't see your dog in this fight PJH and I think we all understand your point of view, if you have anything constructive to add please do so, but you incessant nay saying is far from helpful.

 

[PJH]

For a field unit to tx or rx ANY encrypted traffic on ANY Motorola 3600 or mixed vendor APCO25 9600CC system, an encryption module is REQUIRED along with the proper key loaded in the radio. Thats how it works. I can give you a whole slew of part numbers for DVP, DVI, DES, AES and ADP and all their varients from the 1970's to current...

No fight, its just how it works.

 

[Nebuchadnezzar]

For a field unit to tx or rx ANY encrypted traffic on ANY Motorola 3600 or mixed vendor APCO25 9600CC system, an encryption module is REQUIRED along with the proper key loaded in the radio. Thats how it works. I can give you a whole slew of part numbers for DVP, DVI, DES, AES and ADP and all their varients from the 1970's to current...

No fight, its just how it works.

As a relative newcomer to the scanning hobby I'm learning new things daily. A well informed friend of mine explained the encryption process as somthing that was set from the controlling console, I suppose enabling encryption could send a command to the mobile radios to broadcast encrypted and I assume that would be the best design. This friend also said that if the system was encrypted that you could pick up unencrypted traffic on the input frequencies. I can also see how a system could be designed to work in that manner. Having just gotten back from Georgetown which is fully encrypted I heard a 10-4 reply and two garbled broadcast around one second each that could be the result of encryption or poor digital decode. As I don't scan wilco other than round rock which is not encrypted I don't really have much riding on the result. I am still unconvinced that it's not possible to hear unencrypted traffic on the inputs but the validity of my friends claim is in question. If someone who lives in the effected areas of wilco could look into the matter perhapse we could clear it up.

I apologize if I gave out incorrect information, My source up until now has never given me reason to doubt him. I was simply attempting to give some alternatives to people who in my book are being repressed by their public safety agencies which are there to protect them.

 

[PJH]

In short (And also because I am driving), your buddy is incorrect on how encyption works. I can explain more later if needed.

 

[Nebuchadnezzar]

In short (And also because I am driving), your buddy is incorrect on how encyption works. I can explain more later if needed.

When you have some more time I would appreciate a more in depth explanation, still new to radio trying to learn as much as I can.

 

[vanillajedi]

Don't want to hijack the thread but sad that Williamson County scanning has come to this.

Also somewhat disturbing is that the area media has basically rolled over on this story. The encryption has been in the works for awhile but "Whoops, we forgot to include a provision for the media to be notified about breaking events" hasn't so much as raised any ire from them.

Yeah no cover-up going on there. (Sarcasm mode on) Oh well, I guess I'll listen to Travis County, I can't believe they can function without every channel encrypted, I'm sure their just barely hanging on....