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A ghostly radio station that no one claims to run (2020)
- Scoundreller 3y ago(2020)
- rkagerer 3y agoBetter take some recordings to play back in case the "Dead Hand" theory is correct. Could be a movie idea for a post-apocalyptic world where one crazy old nerd living in a trailer has been holding off annihilation and looks for someone to pass the torch to before he dies (reminiscent of Deccan Ribobe in Pratchett's Moving Pictures).
- dtx1 3y agoInteresting thought. That would be a very good Argument against the dead Hand. I wonder why its not beging jammed also
- aidenscott2016 3y agoThe buzzer and its colleagues are being actively jammed as we speak https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=z3fgJCJ_daE https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=z3fgJCJ_daE
- fifilura 3y agoThey are also transmitting codewords one or twice per week. A trivial part of the dead hand protocol would be to verify that the codewords progress according to schedule or the determined order.
- rkagerer 3y agoYeah, akin to one-time pad encryption.
- ethbr1 3y ago> one crazy old nerd living in a trailer has been holding off annihilation and looks for someone to pass the torch to before he dies LOST?
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- RadiozRadioz 3y agoAye, brother
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- jdietrich 3y agoThe dead hand theory is almost certainly incorrect, because the transmission is fairly unreliable and regularly experiences technical faults or goes off the air entirely.
- collegeburner 3y agotime delay. would have been silly to build a system that triggers instantly, seeing as a geomagnetic storm or whatever would initiate nuclear annihilation
- liamwire 3y agoSure, but how do you balance the time between that needed for recovery from a Carington-level event, and leaving it too long such that the adversary has taken out your silos and subs?
- yard2010 3y agoI would speculate it's not a one part scheme. First, a network of international spies would surface, then they could do whatever, even use the enemy nuclear weapons against them
- rytis 3y ago> The Carrington Event was the most intense geomagnetic storm in recorded history, peaking from 1 to 2 September 1859 during solar cycle 10. It created strong auroral displays that were reported globally and caused sparking and even fires in multiple telegraph stations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrington_Event https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrington_Event
- pi-e-sigma 3y agoThe whole point of having subs is that they are meant to be stealthy and survive the initial strike. If you took them out it's game over and the dead hand system is useless.
- collegeburner 3y ago
- hackernewds 3y agoisn't that just the plot of Pirate Radio
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- BobbyTables2 3y agoCould this be for time synchronization? Cheap alarm clocks just use the AC power as a known good oscillator. What if the Buzzer were simply a wireless version of this? (Instead of exotic atomic clocks or OXCOs) I’m not saying this is technically a really good idea, but as a cheap, fairly low-tech solution — why not ?
- winrid 3y agoIt's a neat idea but it's most likely just a marker so nobody else uses the frequency.
- crote 3y agoRussia has half a dozen WWVB-like shortwave radio time signals which would be far more suitable for that purpose.
- callalex 3y agoThere are already vastly better, available worldwide time sync radio signals that are fit for this purpose.
- eimrine 3y agoThe frequency is similar to those which are typically being used for that kind of task (Germany has shut down one of the biggest time sync radio station recently). For me it seems like a test for a wave pass, I mean if you want to send a message to some submarine via radio wave but have some hesitation whether the message reach the receiver, no callbacks are allowed for obvious reasons.
- kazinator 3y ago> It is thought to be the headquarters of a radio station, “MDZhB”, that no-one has ever claimed to run. Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, for the last three-and-a-half decades, it’s been broadcasting a dull, monotonous tone. That takes wattage. Someone pays the electricity bill. Follow the money and you have the operator.
- mattlondon 3y agoFollow the money in Russia? Good luck with that - it is notoriously corrupt.
- ThePowerOfFuet 3y agoThis is the military. There is no bill.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- winrid 3y agoI love the comment on the video pointing out that the sound started as a beep and has gotten drawn out over the years. Some old machinery in a closet somewhere slowly failing. Wonder if it's some worn out capacitors in the noise generator or an old tape reel (latter doesn't seem reliable enough IMO).
- JohnMakin 3y agoI must cry foul on the “dead man switch” theory (dead hand). I think maybe in 2020 pre-ukraine war it would have been plausible to imagine the russian military could maintain such an elaborate system out of the ashes of a crumbling soviet era, but it seems like their nuclear infra is likely crumbling if their main military force in ukraine is any indication. Given the fact as well this signal routinely goes offline, seems very debunkable.
- ndiddy 3y agoThe article is being a bit overly mysterious. The radio station exists as part of a Russian military communication network. Here's a website that documents the communication format and logs messages: https://priyom.org/military-stations/russia https://priyom.org/military-stations/russia
- mdhb 3y agoThey aren’t in anyway exclusively Russian for the record but the Russians might be one of the last to still be using them in practice though. Not because it doesn’t work but because it requires the end user to have access to specialist equipment which is quite unusual and hard to explain away and there are other ways to do the same thing that don’t have the same limitations. But just to be clear for anyone not familiar with this, what you’re hearing is the a message that was encoded using a one time pad and the reason it’s delivered in this quirky format is that it has certain properties that are ideal for clandestine work in dangerous areas where you need to pass a message over an open channel but you need to make sure that if anyone intercepts the message there is no information in there that will give any clues to the contents of the message or the intended recipient (I.e this second property is why encrypted email for example isn’t a suitable replacement). Beyond that there isn’t really anything that special about it. They are the two properties it provides and that’s the message it’s delivering. By way of a final example another famous one might be taking an ad in the classifieds section of a newspaper back in the day. The end user knows where to look and what message they are looking for but nobody beyond the sender and the recipient know that the ad is even a message with another meaning to begin with, unlike the numbers station example however, that wouldn’t be appropriate for sending key material or an OTP encoded message (it needs to be random data) or anything beyond a very simple and low bandwidth message (I.e the operation is ready to start).
- metaxy2 3y agoIt really highlights the amazing security level of one time pads, that they can be comfortably doing secret announcements on a public radio channel with provably perfect security. (Assuming an adequate PRNG--for such small messages they could easily be using a hardware PRNG; I wonder.) Only issue is that you have to have all of your recipients keep track (and not leak) a pad that is at least as long as the data you intend to send.
- pram 3y agoThis isn't a great article. The Russian military unambiguously operates this, and there are pictures of the instructions on what frequency to use to listen to messages on it: https://i1.sndcdn.com/artworks-O5t8V39LpJRaSz5h-gt5rZA-t500x500.jpg https://i1.sndcdn.com/artworks-O5t8V39LpJRaSz5h-gt5rZA-t500x...
- kvakvs 3y agoThe Russian wikipedia article sheds a lot light on why this exists. With it operated and maintained by the army, and the majority of messages transmitted in the working hours, this is to verify through the logs of receiving radio operators, that the random message been correctly heard, received and logged. Which means the operator was ready at any given time and fully awake/operational, to hear other real important transmissions.
- pkphilip 3y agoCould it be hiding data in the noise?
- rightbyte 3y agoThat is not falsifiable unless you got the key, right?
- happosai 3y agoThis is busywork. Countries that value efficiency shut down similar operations decades ago. Oil rich country pouring money to military doesn't ask "is this still useful", and the people working on it have no motivation explain their superiors that their own job is useless. Either you end up without job or you are reassigned to attack some village in Ukraine...
- bratwurst3000 3y agoI have many Russian friends and they told me similar things. This seems to be a good explanation.
- tivert 3y ago> This is busywork. Countries that value efficiency shut down similar operations decades ago. IMHO, those countries are stupid. IIRC, the CIA "valued efficiency" and switched to internet based communications, which are so easy to monitor that most of their agents in China and Iran got killed/captured. Radio has the unique benefit that it's pretty much impossible to monitor reception.
- mdhb 3y agoI’d love to one day read the full story on how that one went so sideways. There’s an outline of it here worth checking out https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/08/15/botched-cia-communications-system-helped-blow-cover-chinese-agents-intelligence/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/08/15/botched-cia-communicati... As best as I can tell they had people designing their tradecraft who really did not properly understand how the internet works not because they are incompetent but because the agency mentality is so heavily focused on compartmentalisation (which is ironic because a lack of compartmentalisation across systems is what ultimately screwed them here) that it was considered to be good enough by people who weren’t in a position to make that call and bringing in further experts to validate it violated the “need to know” aspect. I think that was a huge wake up call for those folks, when things go that badly they will end up rebuilding a lot of the people process and technology from the ground up. But for what it’s worth some of the websites in question are still available on archive.org if I recall correctly. But I don’t agree with the conclusion that the answer is use radio instead. I think a lot of things have changed in that world in the past 10-20 years and lots of things that were previously considered “best practice” suddenly became unambiguous signals that you were up to something that warrants a closer look. For example: biometrics mostly killed the idea of operating undercover means traveling on a passport issued in a fake name. There’s a LOT of these changes but that’s an easy one that everyone intuitively understands.
- jraph 3y agoIt's about "the Buzzer". I remember being a bit fascinated by this when I first heard of it a few years ago.
- emayljames 3y agoI wonder if 2 way satellite comms is just as effective as this old technique. The satellite sends mircowaves over a large area so isn't giving a location away. Tracking would be extremely hard.
- Scoundreller 3y agoDifficult to transport, high power usage and requires a specific view of the sky. SW radios can be acquired easily most anywhere. It’s just your vintage set that’s usually tuned to the local music station.
- op00to 3y agoThe reason satellites aren't used is their location is known, and because of this they are easily jammed or listened to. I'm not sure that the reasons you gave are really valid, especially for reception. > Difficult to transport I transmit to low earth satellites each weekend using a hand held radio that fits in a jeans pocket. > high power usage I use about 5w. > radios can be acquired easily most anywhere You can easily buy a radio that can do this for $20 on Amazon. I don't need a specific view of the sky on passes where the satellite is high enough in the sky, which happens one or two times a day.
- jdietrich 3y agoSatphones are illegal or heavily restricted in a lot of the places where spies might want to operate. https://www.outfittersatellite.com/Countries-with-Satellite-Phone-Restrictions_b_11.html https://www.outfittersatellite.com/Countries-with-Satellite-...
- yakshaving_jgt 3y ago> “There’s absolutely no information in the signal,” says David Stupples, an expert in signals intelligence from City University, London. There are occasional voice messages on this frequency, e.g., https://soundcloud.com/danix111/uvb-76-2010-11-11-14-00-utc https://soundcloud.com/danix111/uvb-76-2010-11-11-14-00-utc If you're interested in The Buzzer, it's probably best just to read the Wikipedia article. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UVB-76 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UVB-76
- cranberryturkey 3y agoi remember hearing about these on some pbs documentary, they were popular in the 80s during the cold war. I forgot what they were called.
- SomeoneFromCA 3y agonumber stations
- cranberryturkey 3y agothat's right!
- amatecha 3y agoReminds me of US’s “HFGCS”[0] which also sends [apparently] OTP’s, though from many stations (and on multiple frequencies) simultaneously. I imagine the continuous “buzzer” sound from the Russian station acts as both a way to keep the frequency in use, but also so that listening stations can determine if they are able to receive the Buzzer station properly. Easier to tune in if you have a constant carrier (or whatever) to look for. [0] https://priyom.org/military-stations/united-states/hfgcs https://priyom.org/military-stations/united-states/hfgcs
- op00to 3y agoHFGCS is far more "interesting" to listen to than numbers stations because there's actual traffic. It's also transmitted from multiple locations, so it's much more likely you'll be able to get a signal. Google a WebSDR and get to listening!
- amatecha 3y agooh yeah, I've heard a couple HFGCS transmissions w/my Yaesu FT-857D[0]! It's especially ominous-souding when the sound "echoes" because you're picking up more than one station simultaneously, each at a substantially different distance! [0] https://matecha.net/posts/yaesu-ft857d-off-grid-portable-kit/ https://matecha.net/posts/yaesu-ft857d-off-grid-portable-kit...
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- andyjohnson0 3y agoCheck-out The Conet Project [1] for recordings of "numbers stations" made in the 90s. The 4 CD set used to be freely downloadable, but this doesn't seem to be the case anymore - although a quick search indicates that there are full and partial copies available from various sources. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Conet_Project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Conet_Project
- XzetaU8 3y ago5 CD set, the 5th disc was included in the 2013 reissue. 1-4 CD Set: https://archive.org/details/ird059 https://archive.org/details/ird059 5th CD: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7S5Xbb9_kVA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7S5Xbb9_kVA
- tivert 3y agoI thought it would be neat to have a physical copy, but holy crap: they're selling the second-to-last copy the have on hand for $5,000: https://irdial.com/conet.htm https://irdial.com/conet.htm. They should really just reissue the thing, that's ridiculous.
- beaugunderson 3y agothis had a roundabout way of helping me pick my amateur radio vanity callsign (N7YHF) a few years ago... the Wilco took "yankee hotel foxtrot" from the Conet recordings (in sample form and by naming an album after it). I thought it sounded cool.
- TacticalCoder 3y agoA bit different but not totally unrelated: for years there's been one in Belgium/Brussels which would play 24/7... Three songs. One of them was Hotel California by The Eagles, another one was a Michael Jackson song and the third one I forgot. They'd loop, all day long, all week long, all year long: three songs and that's it. I never looked into it but it was weird. Wife and I both are our cars with one the channel set to that frequency and we'd sometimes listen to that station.
- InCityDreams 3y agoThe Eagles are a notorious bunch of copyright bastards. Let's see how they deal with nation states...
- Y_Y 3y agoIt really grinds my gears when people use "nation state" to mean country, but it happens so often I don't usually bother to comment. Belgium is the very opposite of a nation state, and anyone familiar with its history or modern politics can see that.
- sandworm101 3y agoThere are all sorts of strange stations like this. I know of one that has been broadcasting "testing 1 2 3 4 5 5 4 3 2 1" for at least five years, but on FM. IMHO whoever is running these is simply dominating a frequency to keep others off, holding the channel for some future or possibly forgotten use. Recorded here: https://www.reddit.com/r/britishcolumbia/comments/113civn/strange_radio_signal_around_merritt_bc/ https://www.reddit.com/r/britishcolumbia/comments/113civn/st...
- Y_Y 3y agoI run that radio station.
- more_corn 3y agoWhy is this hard? Onetime pad encrypted communications from spymasters to spys. Tune in with a radio from anywhere in the world. Hear your keyword and follow the instructions you memorized before leaving home. No equipment to be caught with, no return communication to be intercepted.
- wayvey 3y agoIf you want to listen in on this or a lot of other frequencies try the various receivers available at websdr.org
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