Xref: utzoo rec.autos:25637 sci.electronics:8737
Newsgroups: rec.autos,sci.electronics
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: the laser speed measuring device
Message-ID: <1989Nov23.163650.27209@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <89325.164006BHB3@PSUVM.BITNET> <1517@nosc.NOSC.MIL>
Date: Thu, 23 Nov 89 16:36:50 GMT

In article <1517@nosc.NOSC.MIL> koziarz@halibut.nosc.mil.UUCP (Walter A. Koziarz) writes:
>Get set  to buy those 'Edmunds Scientific' LASERs!  The transmission of light
>is not regulated by the FCC so we can JAM the LASER toys!!

Interfering with a police officer in the performance of his duties is illegal
almost everywhere.

Also, the FCC's jurisdiction, as I understand it, technically includes the
entire man-made electromagnetic spectrum.  The FCC *specifically decided*,
for fairly obvious reasons, that optical frequencies weren't worth worrying
about and exempted them from regulation.  They could un-exempt them easily
enough.  I don't think anybody is going to take very kindly to you spraying
laser light around at random.  (The FCC specifically prevented the police
from setting up radar-detector spoofers along the highways, on the grounds
that spraying the law-abiding populace with microwaves unnecessarily was
antisocial.)
-- 
A bit of tolerance is worth a  |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
megabyte of flaming.           | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu