111–120 of 169 posts
Hi all, I am the author. I 1) have no idea how this made it to the top position, 2) now feel much guiltier about posting so infrequently, 3) apologize for the design of my blog being almost actively hostile to users, but then maybe that was the point?
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Pager messages collected on September 11, 2001. They are also a type of communication which is transmitted without encryption.
s/is/was/ I miss the days when there was a messaging service you could buy in order to recieve text messages nationwide without transmitting your location. RIP POCSAG
I think the OP's write up misses one very important piece of the puzzle: Politics. Newt Gingrich who was Speaker of the House at the time got embroiled in an incident that was recorded from a cell phone conversation. https://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1997/01/13/tape/index.shtml Now fast forward to a few years later with the Patriot Act and metadata controvery that Edward Snowden exposed... same shit, different day...
I wonder why it's always the same names that crop up as the reason for bullshit regulations.
I had (and probably still have) a Radio Shack Pro-2006 scanner from the late 80's. Even pre-Internet, instructions on how to bypass the cellular band block were easily found on Fidonet and local BBSes, and all it involved was removing a single diode. https://www.wentztech.com/radio/Equipment/Pro2006/pro2006mod... It was really a golden time for snoop...er..listening to cellular phones because they were so enormously…
Stories please!
The call was a professor at the local state university talking to a woman whose identity I was not able to determine. Almost the entire conversation was about how much he hated Palestinians. That they were subhuman and should be wiped out. I grew up in the South and had heard hateful things before but this was the first time I heard someone advocate for genocide so openly. That conversation has stuck with me ever since, making me wonder what's going on in people's minds that they keep hidden from the public.
At one point in the conversation the woman asked if he was on a cell phone and if anyone could overhear them. Despite there being no way of them knowing we were listening, it still caused my hair to stand on end. He said it was unlikely. The quality of the signal didn't waver during the call and was strong the entire time was he probably was stationary nearby. So very odd that he didn't call using a landline given the cost of such a cell call.
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Stories please!
Not op, but fun story to share. The year was 1999, I had befriended a strange group of friends from an IRC support channel. We all lived within 250 miles of each other and one day decided to have a gathering with about 6-7 randoms from the channel. Hilarity ensued as we played games of command and conquer, Starcraft, and Serious Sam. I was yelled at for saturating the 1.5mbps SDSL line with my webcam, streaming views…
*in the USA. Radio receivers and scanners sold outside the USA, even if they are made inside the USA, have no restrictions. US manufacturers usually label these radios as "export" versions. It reminds me of the early days of web browsers when "export" versions of Netscape and IE only supported a maximum of 56-bit encryption for SSL.
Or GPS receivers not working at high altitude unless you buy some Asian brands with right chipsets.
You're very very unlikely to ever make it above 60,000ft at a speed faster than 1000kt unless you own a fighter jet.
I had (and probably still have) a Radio Shack Pro-2006 scanner from the late 80's. Even pre-Internet, instructions on how to bypass the cellular band block were easily found on Fidonet and local BBSes, and all it involved was removing a single diode. https://www.wentztech.com/radio/Equipment/Pro2006/pro2006mod... It was really a golden time for snoop...er..listening to cellular phones because they were so enormously…
Roughly in this genre, the 9/11/2001 pager text data ( https://911.wikileaks.org/files/index.html ) are an interesting peek inside people's putatively private conversations.
People are getting automated messages of Mozilla Mac builds being complete during the disaster.
I was 16 when this happened so I had no idea pagers were used like this. Sort of how push messages or chatops is used today. To aide developers or ops people with notifications.
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s/is/was/ I miss the days when there was a messaging service you could buy in order to recieve text messages nationwide without transmitting your location. RIP POCSAG
POCSAG and FLEX are still quite active, in the UK at least.
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Not op, but fun story to share. The year was 1999, I had befriended a strange group of friends from an IRC support channel. We all lived within 250 miles of each other and one day decided to have a gathering with about 6-7 randoms from the channel. Hilarity ensued as we played games of command and conquer, Starcraft, and Serious Sam. I was yelled at for saturating the 1.5mbps SDSL line with my webcam, streaming views…
Serious Sam didn't come out until 2001. How did you play it in 1999?
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Or GPS receivers not working at high altitude unless you buy some Asian brands with right chipsets.
Note that the rules require GPS receivers not to work when above 60,000ft AND at a speed higher than 1000kt. Some manufacturers made that an OR, but that's not required. You're very very unlikely to ever make it above 60,000ft at a speed faster than 1000kt unless you own a fighter jet.