Party Vibe

Good to see this is written by a British reporter – Unfortunately I still haven’t managed to find time to get my Foundation license (if you can operate any other electronic equipment and are reasonable at maths it is easy to pass the exam) as they only do the tests once every year in my region and both centres are about 20km or more away from where I actually live.

I do have a commercial VHF/UHF radio license that covers the emergency comms systems I use at work and my pager transmitters although this only allows me to use ready built equipment or modules; a limited transmit power and also covers certain frequencies which are more useful in environments where the end users are less technical. Amateur licenses (especially the Intermediate and Advanced although those require more maths and electronic skills) allow you to use more specialised equipment and frequencies but the rules are you cannot use them for commercial gain although the skills you learn do transfer over to the workplace or within a wider community.

There is nothing stopping you or anyone else in most countries of the world buying a scanner or HF receiver and listening to amateur transmissions to get an idea of how this all works (Ofcom actively encourage this nowadays) and such equipment is way cheaper than it ever used to be. Where you live the hobby is quite popular especially near the coast; the folk who take part in it usually have day jobs keeping maritime comms systems working well. The profile of folk involved has changed a fair bit as well; it was once more popular with older males with former military backgrounds who were very much “pro government” but today its more diverse.

A lot of it does encourage a less adversarial attitude towards some govt organisations especially the Communications Ministry (as you need to get the licenses from them) but as the article says hams do stick up for secure and private comms systems and are prepared to argue against commercial companies building less than optimal equipment particularly when its poor design causes radio interference (such as power line networking).

Compared to the 1980s/1990s I’ve been a saint and not run an unlicensed transmitter for years :laugh_at:

I have to use different types of licenses for work related stuff (including test/experimental systems) as the global agreements for amateur licenses do not cover this usage and license exempt equipment (such as wifi or vehicle alarms / door bells) has limited frequency allocations or max transmitter power (often for good reason).

Even if you are a licensed amateur but want to set up something like a community wifi network (these are popular in German speaking nations) or small scale GSM base stations you need a different license from the Communications Ministry as such systems can be accessed by anyone with suitable equipment.

These aren’t difficult to get and cost about €100 max but when applying for one it often helps to either be a licensed amateur or to be able to prove to the Communications Ministry folk that you do know one end of an antenna from the other and what the correct domestic and global frequency allocations are for the area you are operating transmitters in.

The sort of traffic and applications you would monitor on radio amateur bands is a lot more technical although it is not encrypted and usually revolves around sending signals much greater distances worldwide often without the use of repeaters – most of the traffic you will hear is non controversial stuff discussing technology and/or the weather (hams worldwide often build communications systems that can survive any amount of rough weather or work with limited power sources).

In most nations its illegal to send encrypted third party traffic on amateur frequencies outside of very specialist situations such as assisting the Emergency Services when their comms systems have failed and some amateur run organisations such as RAYNET UK also have the same commercial licenses I use for this purpose.

A lot of the time the work done by radio amateurs goes unnoticed by those who do not take an interest in seeking it out and in Britain its always been a hobby associated with middle aged or older men but pretty much all the advances in wifi and mobile networks have been discovered by radio amateurs even if they are credited to the big companies such as CISCO, BT etc… (the chaps who run the local repeaters here are the same ones who climb the masts to fix the Airwave repeaters, coast radio stations or the mobile phone base stations).

@tryptameanie 984701 wrote:

I bet you are a lot less criminal than you used to be but why you aren’tin prison idk.

I’ve wondered that myself sometimes :laugh_at:

the “furry” broadcast was some sort of American joke and wasn’t even done using radio signals (although the end result did end up on the air) but exploiting default password use on a premium priced piece of broadcast equipment few European stations can afford (even though it might be made in Europe).

Its potentially even easier to hack most smaller European radio stations but no one bothers with it these days (attacks against commercial stations did occasionally happen in 1980s/1990s) as the sort of people who can are more likely nowadays to be legally assisting a community broadcaster anyway and its difficult enough for these stations as it is or if they are Dutch/German they would put their efforts into running their own pirate station anyway :laugh_at:

@tryptameanie 984704 wrote:

So you’re saying you aren’t in prison because of loopholes? :lol_big:

thats probably the case for about half of my generation :laugh_at:

TBH very little these days; my DBS was cleared of everything recently (which even surprised me) and a lot of the stuff you could get involved in 20-30 years ago is now no longer viewed as serious crime today folllowing global changes in societies views (for instance the fiasco of deep cover officers being mis deployed to stalk eco-protestors in the UK is unlikely to be repeated today as it did no one any good at all and only made things worse).

I don’t think for one moment Thames Valley were particularly chuffed with many things I did in my youth and were probably glad to see the back of me 10 years ago (and Suffolk equally relieved that I decided to behave myself having genuinely been given a “second chance” in life) but now there ar much worse threats to global security such as violent extremism/terrorism and political instability cops/feds in most Western countries do now realise what the priorities are (even if the politicians and those who elect them might not).

Since the 90s they (and Ofcom/GCHQ) know who I am anyway (and have classed me as “mostly harmless” as have their equivalents in DE, NL and CH) which is probably why Ofcom actually let me have licenses for the kit I work on; its then obvious what I am up to and that I am doing it for some positive reason (even if the way I might go about things might seem bizzare or unusual, although repurposing surveillance and radio equipment for wildlife monitoring is now widespread across Europe and Asia, its how most of todays nature programmes and discoveries are made).

it was the chaps at the local BBC / GCHQ / DTI (forerunners of Ofcom) monitoring station (most of whom are also radio amateurs) who told me how the “system” worked and how far you could push things before actually getting in real trouble….

maybe its a case of you “had to be around during the era” but during the 1980s/90s there was all sorts of really heavy shit happening worldwide, all the same shit going on in the Middle East was still happening but it was overshadowed by equally bad things occuring amongst domestic populations in Europe – England nearly went to full on civil war during the mid 1980s and it was only the drugs in the 90s which stopped it kicking off once more and they were no real solution to societies problems…

Getting back to the amateur radio scene one thing I have noticed which is really positive is there once used to be more division between “proper” radio amateurs (who did everything “the right way”) compared to pirate broadcasters, hackers, scanner listeners (this last group was often divided into pro and anti-police factions although everyone had respect for the Ambulance and Fire Brigade) but during the 1990s everyone realised they had a common interest in technology and it was often this which led to people tolerating each others diverse interests and lifestyles.

The monitoring station engineers (who retired in the 1990s as computers replaced much of their work) actually lobbied for community radio stations in the UK so later generations didn’t have to build illegal transmitters and risk their reputations and others safety like I once did…