| ▲ | hypeatei 11 hours ago |
| This reminds me of UVB-76[0], a shortwave military radio in Russia. It would be interesting know why they're using this method to communicate covertly rather than beaming down messages to a phone via satellite or something. I'm not an expert on radios, though, so maybe it's not as clunky as I'm imagining where an undercover asset is hauling around bulky equipment. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/UVB-76 |
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| ▲ | teeray 11 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| It’s simple, reliable, and effective. Shortwave receivers can be made fairly compact. They’re also very prevalent in most countries (every ham transciever), so there’s nothing suspicious to pack. People find numbers stations interesting, so they are often streamed online. One time pads have their logistical shortcomings, but are still the best encryption possible. The OTP can be compromised in known, visible ways, where a phone has myriad invisible ways to be compromised. |
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| ▲ | smegger001 5 hours ago | parent [-] | | You could probably cheat with the one time pad and use a book as a key, pick a pre determined starting point go diagonally down accross the page convert the letters to numbers and xor that against the message. It would be near enough to random and less conspicuous than a pad of random numbers when searched. | | |
| ▲ | teeray 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | That feels like something that could suffer from frequency analysis. | | |
| ▲ | ted_dunning 18 minutes ago | parent [-] | | It's called a book cipher and it is definitely subject to various statistical attacks, especially if you have a list of almost all books. |
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| ▲ | ndiddy 11 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Like the article says, satellite messages can be traced while radio is broadcast to everyone so it's impossible to find out who's listening. Shortwave radios are also cheap and widespread, so it's easy to get one anywhere in the world and if your house gets searched, it won't be suspicious if you have one. |
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| ▲ | tdeck 11 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > Shortwave radios are also cheap and widespread, so it's easy to get one anywhere in the world I always hear this in discussions about number stations, but I don't think this is true in the US. In fact, I don't think I've ever seen a general consumer "shortwave radio". Unless the regular AM band counts, which seems to be medium wave. | | |
| ▲ | ndiddy 9 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | The term for shortwave radios targeting the general consumer market is "world band radio". They look like a standard portable AM/FM radio except they'll also pick up long wave, medium wave, short wave, and maybe weather band. They're more of a niche in the US now that internet streaming is a thing, but you should still be able to get one at most electronics stores. Of course like most niche products, you'll get much better selection and pricing online. | |
| ▲ | smegger001 6 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I used to have little battery powered AM/FM/Shortwave/weather radio lost it a couple house moveings ago. Kept it around for the emergacy weather radio during flood events and other extreme weather when internet/power isnt reliable. Should probably pick up a replacement come to think of it. | |
| ▲ | JohnFen 9 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I'm in the US. At least half of the people I know own shortwave radios, although most don't think of them as "shortwave radios". They're more often called "world radios" or some other such synonym. I could run out to a consumer electronics store right now and buy one. The younger people I know tend to own such a radio in the form of the Baofeng UV-5R or the like. | | |
| ▲ | lukeinator42 8 hours ago | parent [-] | | A Baofeng UV-5R cannot receive shortwave, it's in the VHF/UHF range for receive/transmit and can receive commercial FM broadcast. | | |
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| ▲ | gorfian_robot 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | def a niche consumer item these days. but pretty easy to make your own. |
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| ▲ | lxgr 10 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Satellite unicast receivers also can't be located. Iridium pagers were (maybe still are?) a thing, for example. However, carrying one of these is probably highly suspicious compared to a world band radio receiver. | |
| ▲ | ErroneousBosh 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | > Like the article says, satellite messages can be traced while radio is broadcast to everyone I don't buy it. Satellite downlinks are broadcast to everyone under a potentially massive footprint. Take a look at the footprint for QO-100 which you could use with very inexpensive equipment that looks pretty much like a normal satellite TV dish. https://jeremyclark.ca/wp/telecom/sdr-for-qo-100-satellite-r... |
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| ▲ | nemomarx 11 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Phones usually contain the hardware for radio too, so making sure agents have some set of models for that doesn't sound bad. Even if you had to use a dedicated one having a radio at home isn't that conspicuous? Or in a car, etc |
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| ▲ | jacknews 11 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| perhaps they're not directed at deeply embedded lone spies with radios in their attics, but at 'military assets' which as a matter of course can receive these transmissions on a designated schedule. |
