Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site hydra.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!mit-eddie!cybvax0!frog!hydra!die From: die@hydra.UUCP (Dave Emery) Newsgroups: net.ham-radio,net.dcom,net.video Subject: Re: Listen to phone calls on your tvro Message-ID: <127@hydra.UUCP> Date: Mon, 9-Sep-85 00:10:52 EDT Article-I.D.: hydra.127 Posted: Mon Sep 9 00:10:52 1985 Date-Received: Tue, 10-Sep-85 04:08:06 EDT References: <125@hydra.UUCP> <777@vortex.UUCP> Organization: Charles River Data Systems, Framingham MA Lines: 174 Xref: watmath net.ham-radio:3211 net.dcom:1272 net.video:1485 > It should be pointed out that monitoring telephone conversations > from either terrestrial or satellite links would almost certainly > be construed, under current law, as wiretapping. This is, > I believe, a federal crime (probably a felony), and not to be > taken lightly. > > --Lauren-- > As far as I know (and I am an engineer not a lawyer) there is at least one other law (than 605) that concerns interception of telephone calls and that is the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968. This law which is section 2115 of title 82 (?) of the US Code is the basic federal anti-bugging/anti-wiretapping statute. Among other thing it forbids interception of any common carrier communications of aural or visual material that travels by "wire, cable or other means". It also forbids interception of any aural or visual material that travels for any part of its trip on a common carrier channel even if it is not being intercepted from a common carrier channel. And unlike section 605, 2115 forbids interception alone, not just interception *and* use or disclosure. I believe the operative phrase is something like "whosoever intercepts ..." as contrasted with 605's "whoseover intercepts and discloses ..." 2115 establishes both stiff federal felony penalties (I think 5 years and $50,000 fine) and, interestingly, also civil penalties (someone whose communications have been intercepted can sue the intercepter for damages). I do not know if 2115 is considered to apply to radio communications by common carriers, as I remember it it doesn't mention radio in this context, and because 605 is specifically about radio communications it might be assumed to take precedence. If 2115 is considered to apply to radio communications it would very clearly forbid even casually listening to any common carrier transmission whether or not any use was made of it's contents and even if this act of interception was in the privacy of one's home and did not involve disclosure. And a surprisingly large fraction of radio transmissions could be considered common carrier. For example SCA subcarriers, scrambled TV stations, virtually all mobile, marine and cellular phones, almost all satellite links (the transponders are owned by a common carrier and often leased to another common carrier that actually uses them to transmit information such as cable tv feeds), MDS transmissions, and almost all commercial users of the hf spectrum are common carrier services or could claim to be. In addition many non common carrier transmissions that have simply been routed via common carrier facilities at some point in their path could claim protection under 2115 (for example one could argue that if the local police use a leased telco line to connect to their transmitter site on a nearby hill then simply passively listening to them is a violation of 2115 since the communications went by common carrier for part of the way). How does 2115 apply ? I do not know where the fine line has been drawn by the courts in interpreting 2115. (I would appreciate citations of cases if anyone reading this knows of some). It certainly is true that nobody was prosecuted (that I know of) for watching satellite cable tv feeds even though these are clearly common carrier transmissions of aural and visual material. (It is currently quasi-legal to watch unscrambled satcom cable feeds under another act of congress). Yet there have been at least attempts at prosecution of people who have received the same video and audio (mostly HBO) from 2150 mhz MDS transmissions. I find that distinction puzzling since I cannot see a significant difference between receiving HBO from a 4 GHz transmitter out in space using FM modulation and a 2 ghz transmitter on the top of some nearby tall building that uses AM. Lauren claims that there have been successful prosecutions of people who have intercepted telephone calls from terrestrial microwave links. (He doesn't say under what statute but I presume 2115). I also fail to see the difference between listening to a 4 ghz ground based transmitter (FM-FDM presumably) on a tvro and swl receiver and using a scanner to listen to the FM 150/450 mhz IMTS mobile telephone calls. Many thousands of scanner enthusiasts listen to mobile phone conversations - yet I have never heard of a prosecution for merely listening to these common carrier transmissions (I think there have been some or at least some attempts in cases where information was disclosed or put to some use), and yet the distinction between microwave and vhf listening is widely presumed to exist. So the law is murky and even murkier in the area of intercepting satellite signals. It is apparently more likely to get you prosecuted if you intercept ground based microwave links (VHF/UHF is probably OK) and more complex signals (simplex FM is very safe). This makes little sense since these are all radio signals, all carry private communications that the users presume will not be disclosed, and all can be received with standard consumer equipment widely available to average people. Perhaps the only distinction is that millions know how to listen to calls on on their scanners, and until recently when several recently published books on tvro systems broached the subject there was a conspiracy of silence surounding simple methods of intercepting microwave multiplex FM signals. The data loophole There is one important hole in 2115 however, it carefully aviods mention of data, record (telex and the like), telegraph, teletype, facsimile and other forms of non-voice, non-video information transmission. It has been widely reported that this was at the behest of the NSA which had (at least in 1968) much more capacity to process and filter out material of interest in these forms of communications than it had to monitor telephone calls (which take (or took) human transcribers to laboriously take down the words). Apparently the courts have upheld this loophole, as there has been some recent effort to get congress to close it. Conclusion The intent of my posting on tvro interception of calls was to make a point about the vulnerability of microwave transmissions to interception by common consumer tvro and swl hardware owned by millions of people, many of whom live within easy receiving range of ground based microwave systems, and all of whom are in range of satellites carrying significant interceptable telephone traffic. Whether or not it is legal, whether or not it is covered by 2115 in addition to 605, it is clear that the proliferation of the hardware required into the hands of millions of Americans, many of whom beleive that it is their God given right to listen in to anything they can pick up, is going to make long distance telephone and data transmissions significantly less private. I am personally an advocate of what is becoming a more and more widely accepted national goal, and that is routing all long distance traffic via paths which cannot be intercepted by casual listeners with widely available equipment. At the minimum this means digital microwave transmission under DES or better encryption. Hopefully in many cases it will also mean fiber optic paths (which are at least much harder for the KGB and friends to tap than microwave or coax links). I have always felt that making an act as passive and invisible as intercepting a radio signal a serious crime was the wrong approach. Prosecution of such acts is necessarily so erratic and dependant on violations of the privacy of whoever is intercepting the signal that it seems worse than the crime in all too many cases. Perhaps more fundementally, the secret nature of listening guarentees that someone whose purpose is more sinister than casual observation of the electromagnetic fields around his back yard can almost always intercept whatever he needs to with little or no chance of getting caught. For this reason draconian laws only serve to reduce the number of harmless casual snoops, without doing much of anything about the professional information thief. Limiting efforts toward prosecution, however, will tend to force those who set up systems to consider designing in security by using encryption and transmission media that cannot be readily tapped, rather than living in the fools paradise of assuming that since it's illegal nobody will be doing it and communications are secure. And as someone on the net pointed out, the difficulty of proving interception took place will soon lead to proposals to make mere possession of equipment that could or might intercept private transmissions a crime. This of course will be rather interesting since there are so many examples of legitimate radio equipment that could be used to pick up forbidden private signals by merely pointing the antenna differently or keying in a slightly different frequency. This of course will result in licensing of such equipment only to people who have a proven need, and while once you could listen to your local fire department if you are a volunteer fire fighter or the airport control tower at your local airport if you are a private pilot you will probably have to prove need and be registered to own a receiver that covers other than the broadcast band (and let the heavens quake if you should decode an SCA subcarrier from an FM station). And think of all your neighbors accusing you of tuning your radio to a forbidden channel just because they don't like your lifestyle! I think it is too bad in this age of the digital revolution in transmission and storage of information and of readily available digital security devices to depend on oppressive legal avenues to protect communications that can be effectively secured by encryption. But that seems to be the direction in which the courts are going. David I. Emery Charles River Data Systems 617-626-1102 983 Concord St., Framingham, MA 01701. uucp: decvax!frog!die