6 ms·

Inside the Russian Short Wave Radio Enigma (2011)

47 points by yitchelle 12y ago

te_platt 12y ago
Such is the power of a mystery. A simple repeating beep captivates thousands. And yes, I had to read the whole article to the end.
awakened 12y ago
UVB-76 is a number station transmitting one-time pad encrypted messages. Old transport technology (radio) sending old, unbreakable crypto technology (one-time pad encrypted messages) at the speed of light all across the world. These technologies (as old as they are) will never be replaced with new infrastructure dependent technologies. The key is that they allow for decentralized, secure comms at the speed of light. No satellites or fiber required. It only takes a handful of guys to do it too. You can even run them from solar panels and battery packs from caves in Timbukto. Take that, nation state controlled Internet. The Great FireWall of X, does not stop radio. Try to jam omni-directional NVIS. Better yet, try to locate the guys receiving it.
- toyg 12y ago
  To be fair though, this is broadcasting, i.e. a one-way tech. It's also "decentralized" up to a point. I see your point though. It's what I feel when I see 70-year-old cars still running: any car made after 2000 relies on electronics in a way that will make them unusable in a few years from now; but those old tin-boxes will still be around then and beyond.
  - bagels 12y ago
    There's open source computers for the important bits, the locomotion. Of course the climate controls, radio and other stuff will eventually become useless with no direct replacement parts.
- cbd1984 12y ago
  > The key is that they allow for decentralized, secure comms at the speed of light. Until someone sends in a drone with a radio-seeking attachment on it and a few hundred pounds of high explosives strapped to its ass. It's hardly infrastructure-free when the infrastructure it relies on has just been blown to Hell.
  - hessenwolf 12y ago
    The sentry gun is always going to re-aim faster, because it does not have to travel along as large a circumference to be at a different angle.
  - gambiting 12y ago
    But antennas are neither difficult nor expensive to make. If it's destroyed another one can be erected within a day.
sanoli 12y ago
There's a 5-CD set released by a British label with only recordings of number stations. This guy obsessed with them has been recording for a long, long time. Check it out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Conet_Project http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Conet_Project Also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station
- scottlocklin 12y ago
  Or, you could just download them. https://archive.org/details/ird059 https://archive.org/details/ird059
lotsofmangos 12y ago
We must set up a steak and biscuits drone airdrop for the doggie.
majke 12y ago
For the curious, you can listen here http://uvb-76.net/ http://uvb-76.net/ And compulsory link to wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UVB-76 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UVB-76
mongrol 12y ago
Everyone knows that this transmission is for containing the power of a demon possessed victorian doll in a cylindrical display case.
kens 12y ago
"But no one has been able to triangulate exactly where the broadcast is coming from." - How difficult and expensive would it be to build a system to exactly triangulate these stations? It seems if you had three receivers many miles apart and precisely synchronized, and you timed the signals at nanosecond resolution, then you could correlate and find the location within a foot. I'm sure it's much harder than that, but it seems with SDR you should be able to do much better than primitive triangulation based on approximate direction. Does anyone know how to do high-accuracy triangulation. On a different topic... "If you drop a rock in this hole, it will take about a second to reach the bottom—whatever is down there is at least 32 feet below ground." - I've been thinking about high-school physics a lot lately so I feel obligated to point out that 1/2 A T^2 would be 16 feet.
- shoegumfoot 12y ago
  Part of the problem with that technique is that the waves are effectively propagating in a waveguide (between the surface of the earth and the ionosphere). So the characteristics of the waveguide (such as the conductivity of the ground) influence the speed of propagation. It's certainly important for things like LORAN, and I'd be surprised if it wasn't for this.
- rbc 12y ago
  Building a Wullenweber is an expensive business: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wullenweber https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wullenweber
damian2000 12y ago
Reminded me of the webdriver torso youtube mystery... http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/06/this-is-the-truth-behind-webdriver-torso/ http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/06/this-is-the-truth-behind-...
apaprocki 12y ago
FWIW, I came across this. Apparently there are updates very recently which claim to shed light on some parts of the mystery and has plenty of tech detail: http://shortwaveradioworld.blogspot.com/2014/07/uvb-76-buzzer-2014-new-facts-and.html http://shortwaveradioworld.blogspot.com/2014/07/uvb-76-buzze...
bane 12y ago
Side note: there's something really beautiful about the way analog radio degrades compared to digital transmission technologies. A couple years ago I got back into listening to golden age radio shows, some of them have gone through several layers of analog degradation before finally being digitized and there's a certain kind of beautiful quality to the way they sound. I remember as a kid when my grandmother bought me a cheap multi-band radio that could received shortwave and spending hours finding stations just to listen to the texture of the sound. Even the static can be soothing. I often times remember songs being better sounding under the distorting effects of AM radio than when I hear them in full digital glory.
CatsoCatsoCatso 12y ago
BBC Radio 4 did a good, enjoyable documentary on the subject of Numbers Stations, "Tracking the Lincolnshire Poacher" - though more focused on the British side of affairs. You can listen to it here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wvr6o7fBcTY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wvr6o7fBcTY They play a lot of the recordings and go into a fair bit of detail. It is a good listen, highly recommend.
bnjs 12y ago
I hope it's not the command and control signals to a Russian fail-deadly nuclear deterrent system.
- kjs3 12y ago
  Dr. Strangelove: Of course, the whole point of a Doomsday Machine is lost, if you keep it a secret! Why didn't you tell the world, eh? Ambassador de Sadesky: It was to be announced at the Party Congress on Monday. As you know, the Premier loves surprises.

47 points by yitchelle 12y ago

Such is the power of a mystery. A simple repeating beep captivates thousands. And yes, I had to read the whole article to the end.

awakened 12y ago

UVB-76 is a number station transmitting one-time pad encrypted messages. Old transport technology (radio) sending old, unbreakable crypto technology (one-time pad encrypted messages) at the speed of light all across the world. These technologies (as old as they are) will never be replaced with new infrastructure dependent technologies. The key is that they allow for decentralized, secure comms at the speed of light. No satellites or fiber required. It only takes a handful of guys to do it too. You can even run them from solar panels and battery packs from caves in Timbukto. Take that, nation state controlled Internet. The Great FireWall of X, does not stop radio. Try to jam omni-directional NVIS. Better yet, try to locate the guys receiving it.

toyg 12y ago
To be fair though, this is broadcasting, i.e. a one-way tech. It's also "decentralized" up to a point. I see your point though. It's what I feel when I see 70-year-old cars still running: any car made after 2000 relies on electronics in a way that will make them unusable in a few years from now; but those old tin-boxes will still be around then and beyond.
- bagels 12y ago
  There's open source computers for the important bits, the locomotion. Of course the climate controls, radio and other stuff will eventually become useless with no direct replacement parts.
cbd1984 12y ago
> The key is that they allow for decentralized, secure comms at the speed of light. Until someone sends in a drone with a radio-seeking attachment on it and a few hundred pounds of high explosives strapped to its ass. It's hardly infrastructure-free when the infrastructure it relies on has just been blown to Hell.
- hessenwolf 12y ago
  The sentry gun is always going to re-aim faster, because it does not have to travel along as large a circumference to be at a different angle.
- gambiting 12y ago
  But antennas are neither difficult nor expensive to make. If it's destroyed another one can be erected within a day.

sanoli 12y ago

There's a 5-CD set released by a British label with only recordings of number stations. This guy obsessed with them has been recording for a long, long time. Check it out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Conet_Project http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Conet_Project Also: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Numbers_station

scottlocklin 12y ago
Or, you could just download them. https://archive.org/details/ird059 https://archive.org/details/ird059

lotsofmangos 12y ago

We must set up a steak and biscuits drone airdrop for the doggie.

majke 12y ago

For the curious, you can listen here http://uvb-76.net/ http://uvb-76.net/ And compulsory link to wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UVB-76 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UVB-76

mongrol 12y ago

Everyone knows that this transmission is for containing the power of a demon possessed victorian doll in a cylindrical display case.

kens 12y ago

"But no one has been able to triangulate exactly where the broadcast is coming from." - How difficult and expensive would it be to build a system to exactly triangulate these stations? It seems if you had three receivers many miles apart and precisely synchronized, and you timed the signals at nanosecond resolution, then you could correlate and find the location within a foot. I'm sure it's much harder than that, but it seems with SDR you should be able to do much better than primitive triangulation based on approximate direction. Does anyone know how to do high-accuracy triangulation. On a different topic... "If you drop a rock in this hole, it will take about a second to reach the bottom—whatever is down there is at least 32 feet below ground." - I've been thinking about high-school physics a lot lately so I feel obligated to point out that 1/2 A T^2 would be 16 feet.

shoegumfoot 12y ago
Part of the problem with that technique is that the waves are effectively propagating in a waveguide (between the surface of the earth and the ionosphere). So the characteristics of the waveguide (such as the conductivity of the ground) influence the speed of propagation. It's certainly important for things like LORAN, and I'd be surprised if it wasn't for this.
rbc 12y ago
Building a Wullenweber is an expensive business: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wullenweber https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wullenweber

damian2000 12y ago

Reminded me of the webdriver torso youtube mystery... http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/06/this-is-the-truth-behind-webdriver-torso/ http://www.engadget.com/2014/06/06/this-is-the-truth-behind-...

apaprocki 12y ago

FWIW, I came across this. Apparently there are updates very recently which claim to shed light on some parts of the mystery and has plenty of tech detail: http://shortwaveradioworld.blogspot.com/2014/07/uvb-76-buzzer-2014-new-facts-and.html http://shortwaveradioworld.blogspot.com/2014/07/uvb-76-buzze...

bane 12y ago

Side note: there's something really beautiful about the way analog radio degrades compared to digital transmission technologies. A couple years ago I got back into listening to golden age radio shows, some of them have gone through several layers of analog degradation before finally being digitized and there's a certain kind of beautiful quality to the way they sound. I remember as a kid when my grandmother bought me a cheap multi-band radio that could received shortwave and spending hours finding stations just to listen to the texture of the sound. Even the static can be soothing. I often times remember songs being better sounding under the distorting effects of AM radio than when I hear them in full digital glory.

CatsoCatsoCatso 12y ago

BBC Radio 4 did a good, enjoyable documentary on the subject of Numbers Stations, "Tracking the Lincolnshire Poacher" - though more focused on the British side of affairs. You can listen to it here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wvr6o7fBcTY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wvr6o7fBcTY They play a lot of the recordings and go into a fair bit of detail. It is a good listen, highly recommend.

bnjs 12y ago

I hope it's not the command and control signals to a Russian fail-deadly nuclear deterrent system.

kjs3 12y ago
Dr. Strangelove: Of course, the whole point of a Doomsday Machine is lost, if you keep it a secret! Why didn't you tell the world, eh? Ambassador de Sadesky: It was to be announced at the Party Congress on Monday. As you know, the Premier loves surprises.