The Zone provides electromagnetic protection to electronic radio telescopes and federal facilities that monitor other communications for our national security. Wireless in this part of West Virginia is regulated.
Now wireless identity thieves called “skimmers,” can steal your personal information out of the air surrounding your purse or wallet using RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) interception technology. Read this article by Grey McKenzie and take action to protect yourself at http://popularwireless.com/blog1/Az
The Coast Guard in this Press Release point out that they do pursue prosecution of persons responsible for fake calls. Marine radio users should never make false distress calls or make fake calls by telephone.
Let the medical community know who can answer questions about your medical history by prefixing contacts with ICE (in case of emergency) for those who can answer important questions about medical history or keep medical staff from using materials or drugs that you are allergic to. (It is also a great iea to put an ICE list on the refrigerator! Creating an ICE entry in your cellular telephone dial list is an excellent idea! It might save your life some day so take the time to create an ICE number.
Today, Sunday December 23, 2007 there is foreign ship traffic (Russian language) on 462.725 MHz on the Chesapeake Bay. This is a GMRS repeater output frequency not even listed in international treaties as valid for foreign ships in the USA. There are six authorized channels and 462.725 is not one of those.
The signals appear to have come from one of two cloe-by ships the first is the FREDERIKSBORG, call sign ZDHU5, mmsi: 236365000, registered in GIBRALTAR, underway to Baltimore, MD. This cargo ship is owned by RUNGSTED SHIPPING LIMITED. The other possibility is the ATLANTIC RUNNER, call sign V3XR, mmsi: 312455000, registered in BELIZE. The mmsi broadcast by the Atlantic Runner’s AIS may be invalid since the ITU has no record of the mmsi. This is also a cargo ship en route to Baltimore.
In December ships have been heard on 467.550, 467.575, 467.600, 467.650, 467.675, 462.725 MHz. The number of instances of FSI have been down some but the number of ships violating international treaty in our waters remains way to high. The shipping industry is regulated. The International Telecommunications Union, our NTIA and FCC have rules that visiting ships are supposed to follow. These violations should not be happening. One can only wonder how such violations would be handled in other countries. Ship’s radio officers and the captains of these vessels ought to know better.
Text Message vs Morse Code
Perhaps there is something to say for Morse Code after all!
On Sunday December 9, 2007 the PRA filed a complaint with the Federal Communications Commission against Rockaway Township, New Jersey. Multiple GMRS licensees with repeaters using 462.700/467.700 MHz have been experiencing severe interference on their repeater input frequency making use of their repeaters almost impossible. A PRA Enforcement Team member used radio direction finding techniques to identify the culprits as the snow removal crews of the Rockaway Township Department of Public Works. The suspect radio system was operating with a high-power and most-likely wide band (25 KHz) repeater output on Family Radio Service channel 13, DCS 071, 467.6875 MHz. Repeaters with inputs on 467.700 are receiving interference.
The PRA contacted the Rockaway Township Mayor’s office by telephone on Friday December 14 at 2:00 PM after there was no apparent resolution to the interference all week long. The day before, one of the victim licensees contacted the Director of Public Works and spoke to him by telephone but to no avail. On Friday the City Administrator agreed to review the matter and requested through the PRA‘s telephone contact a copy of the complaint. Copies were FAX’ed to Rockaway Township and the FCC. The City administrator had not gotten back to the PRA by 5:00 o’clock PM . There was no response from the Township which means GMRS licensees will have to endure a weekend of municipal interference to their systems because a clever unscrupulous radio shop in Rockaway decided to abuse the Family Radio Service with an illegal install.
The PRA’s complainant was interviewed on Friday December 14 and said, “Just prior to noon (a few hours), one of the users (snow plow drivers) played a rock song on the radio for short (02-:05) duration–At least 3 times. It seems they have little knowledge or regard to proper radio use. I also heard, over the last few days, the guys saying “10-4 Good Buddy” and other CB’isms. It sounded like this radio system was somewhat of a novelty to them.”
GMRS licensees and their families are now facing major winter weather over the weekend and may not have emergency use of their own radio repeaters – that they have a right to use as General Mobile Radio Service licensees. An unlicensed municipality has built an unconventional pirate-radio system to respond to Winter weather and in so doing has rendered licensed systems unusable. There may be other radio systems in New Jersey or New York that use 467.675 also experiencing interference.
GMRS licensees in Rockaway Township, NJ and any licensee impacted by the township’s unlicensed system are encouraged to contact the Mayor’s office by telephone to express their opinion on the matter. Please be polite, but ask that the operation on FRS 13 be immediately terminated. Lack of planning on their part does not constitute an emergency on our part.
UPDATE Sunday December 16, 2007
As the snow storm went through New Jersey this weekend the Township’s activity on Family Radio Service channel 13 continued. The Township continues to operate regardless of the interference they are causing innocent victims. You know that if the situation were reversed and citizens were interfering with a licensed city frequency the City Administrator would be on the phone immediately to the FCC demanding action. We can only wait and wonder while the snow plow crews play rock and roll on the radio and shout 10-4 good buddy!
The PRA has written an email to the Mayor, Louis S Sceusi, in hopes an elected official will take a greater interest in the interference the township is causing.
Read this Wired article from 2006 about the proliferation of pirate FM stations in the United States. This activity and the wasted FCC resources assigned to cite or fine retailers of analog television sets is stopping the FCC from dealing with REAL radio fraud on GMRS. FM pirates you are wasting government resources!
WASHINGTON (AP) – Best Buy Co. (BBY) (BBY) Inc., Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) and six other retailers will sell equipment enabling owners of analog television sets to continue to view programming after the 2009 nationwide switch to digital broadcasting, the federal government said Tuesday.
(PopularWireless.com) A member of the Personal Radio Association’s Enforcement Team for the State of Virginia found this parking-lot call box and several others like it broadcasting on General Mobile Radio Service frequency 462.575 MHz from a college campus. An official complaint was
filed with the FCC Enforcement Bureau office in Gettsyburg, PA. by the PRA after units were found in multiple campus locations.
Two of the call boxes attracted considerable attention after broadcasting recorded emergency announcements every few minutes, one after the other, twenty four hours per day for over a week in November 2007. The call boxes were heard from a considerable distance and did interfere with licensed GMRS users attempting to use their family’s repeater in the vicinity of the college. At least one of the boxes was off frequency tolerance as measured by a sophisticated two-way radio measuring instrument. Subsequent to filing the complaint the Commission contacted the college administration. Transmissions from the malfunctioning boxes ceased after that contact was made. The FCC is currently investigating.
The college had no FCC license to operate the call box transmitters on the GMRS frequency. These call boxes have manufacturer identification plates indicating the boxes are CALL24 brand, a division of RCS Wireless Technology. The identity of the company that sold and installed the boxes is not known to the PRA as of the date of this article.
General Mobile Radio Service frequencies require an FCC license. Organizations, companies, schools, or associations have been ineligible to license in the GMRS since 1989. Only individuals are eligible to license in the GMRS.
Schools are eligible to license such devices within a large pool (hundreds) of radio frequencies set aside for commercial or local government use. Obtaining the proper FCC license does require the expense of a frequency search and use of a frequency coordinator as well as an FCC license fee.
GMRS licensees share just eight repeater output frequencies. Across the USA GMRS licensees have found unlicensed use by commercial GMRS pirates as they were coined. Presumably unscrupulous radio shops put unsuspecting victims on GMRS channels to reduce the fees charged to their customers and to maximize their profit.
Technorati Tags: GMRS,CALL24,FCC,PRA
Ever since I was a kid, the radio hobbies lured me to the magazine racks at the local bookstore, but as the years went by the magazines that piqued my interest dwindled in number. Despite fewer print publications, my personal interest in things wireless increased and especially as new technology was introduced! Creating PopularWireless.com was a logical progression of my own interests. The Internet, like the old computer bulletin boards I would frequent, allowed building communities of friends occupied with the same wireless interests.
The print publications were and are still important to the wireless hobbyist because in these magazines we have dreamed still dream as we read them. Remember Radio-TV Experimenter with White’s Radio Log, and the old Popular Electronics? The wireless listening and electronics hobbies were always enhanced through a subscription to these publications. The early magazines kept experimenters listening and building. We dreamed of buying the latest radio, building a project, or logging a radio station that a reader on the opposite coast had logged the previous month. The dreams focused our interests and later our on-line communication. We fell asleep in the easy chair with the magazines in our laps.
Today our hobbies are still supported by EXCELLENT print publications. The magazines have not lost the attraction though the writers/authors may have changed. My recent visit to a Borders bookstore reminded me that wireless hobbyists probably take great publications for granted. Because of the Internet we may have dismissed the print media as no longer viable. That just is not so. The print magazines are still relevant.
Hint to moms and dads. You can use a magazine like Monitoring Times, Popular Communications, Scanning USA, or QST to stimulate or suggest a technical hobby for your children. Pursuing a hobby that encourages reading and study may do more for a child’s future than spending hours in front of a mindless video game. To others the magazines still stimulate discussions, self study, technical or topical interest and we also focus our attentions on new technologies. The better articles in these magazines are hobby text books from which we can still learn new things.
A great deal of information has indeed moved to the Internet but as I read the latest issue of Monitoring Times I remarked on what I had missed by not having read every issue. I also wondered about the publications I received as benefits to joining a technical or hobby interest organization like the Long Wave Club Club of America.
My Christmas gift suggestion for the radio geek in your life is a subscription to a great magazine. It is something many of us have sorely missed aware or not.
How Verizon Wireless learned to stop worrying and love open access. Step one: Realizing it’s a way to add low-cost customers
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