Likely there are top-secret satellites doing exactly that for specific geographic regions. These likely wont retain all gathered data indefinitely however, and even if data is shared its tainted politically.
Ask HN: Are there any projects to do historical archiving of RF spectrum?
21–27 of 27 posts
Re: Ask HN: Are there any projects to do historical archiving of RF spectrum?
#22As vitovito mentions, wideband data in high resolution is incredibly expensive from a storage perspective. There are entities that do it, but this also has the same privacy concerns as saving every packet that comes over a wire - in fact if you record 2.4 MHz and 5 MHz you will be picking up someone's (hopefully encrypted) private data. I don't think it is illegal, but the technical aspects of this are pretty dauntin…
Google was deemed to have broken wiretapping laws when it scooped up unsecured wifi data while collecting images for Streetview.
Re: Ask HN: Are there any projects to do historical archiving of RF spectrum?
#23The closest thing I know about is websdr (http://websdr.org)
Re: Ask HN: Are there any projects to do historical archiving of RF spectrum?
#24>all the radio information as 9/11 transpired I know it's not everything, but if you are interested in this the New York Times has an excellent feature using the ATC tapes and some recorded phone lines in the military/air defense system. http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2011/09/08/nyregion/911-t...
Also here is beeper messages that somehow wikileaks got a hold of.
Re: Ask HN: Are there any projects to do historical archiving of RF spectrum?
#25Most of the major radio astronomy observatories maintain archives (e.g., [0]). Of course, they mostly use highly directional dishes pointed at the sky, but local radio signals can create interference[1]. So, those archives provide some probe/record of terrestrial RF spectrum. Of course, those telescopes are generally placed in radio-quiet locations.
Re: Ask HN: Are there any projects to do historical archiving of RF spectrum?
#26As vitovito mentions, wideband data in high resolution is incredibly expensive from a storage perspective. There are entities that do it, but this also has the same privacy concerns as saving every packet that comes over a wire - in fact if you record 2.4 MHz and 5 MHz you will be picking up someone's (hopefully encrypted) private data. I don't think it is illegal, but the technical aspects of this are pretty dauntin…
Google was deemed to have broken wiretapping laws when it scooped up unsecured wifi data while collecting images for Streetview. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-24047235
In my country back in the eighties, the TV networks broadcasting scrambled content over the airwaves sued some people who were making a profit modifying receivers to unscramble the broadcasts without entering the numeric key (it was a very weak scheme).
The court ruled that no law was broken as the signals were being sent over the air, and therefore had no expectation of privacy. And since at that time the descramblers were sold to the user, there was no problem with modifying the hardware.
This is why they switched to leasing the descrambler boxes when they upgraded their system (and chose a system for which descramblers were not easily publicly available).
It always seemed a sensible ruling to me. Though I don't think anything has changed legally, I suspect the ruling might be different if such a case were tried today. :/
Re: Ask HN: Are there any projects to do historical archiving of RF spectrum?
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
Listening is 100% fine in the USA. Transmission without a ham license, and in certain bands, will net you some fines and maybe jail time.
Any spectrum recordings would almost be guaranteed to include copyrighted content, and in the US distributing those recordings would fall afoul of the DMCA.
That's not how RF works. The courts have heard cases like this. Look up the talk on CreepyDOL from defcon.