Top Secret Radio Frequencies & A Visit From The Secret Service

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[@ronaldgarrison8478]

It seems really bizarre to me that it could be illegal to listen to any particular communications, as long as you don't actively take measures to break through privacy measures. If someone is sending photons over my private living space, how can I be violating anything if I can "see" them?

[@RWBHere]

A blind eye is usually turned to such listening. But if you share any information which you might learn, the good eye starts to be used. If you then publish or sell the information, your collar will be felt, and your bank account will go on a diet.

[@NenadKralj]

@@RWBHere 😊 the perfect answer to a perfect start question 😎

[@Skank_and_Gutterboy]

That's the argument against laws banning car radar-detectors in the locales that do ban them. By law you're allowed to passively tune in to any signal that is broadcast, so why is it illegal to use a radar-detector to detect police speed-traps?

[@RevMikeBlack]

My wife is a prosecutor for the state in which we live in the USA. She freaks out every time I find and record a number station, like some government agency will be offended that I'm using my $40 shortwave pocket radio to bring down their empire. Explanations are useless.

[@Blitterbug]

@@Skank_and_Gutterboy It's not legal in the UK to passively tune in to any signal that's broadcast. Even as a kid in the 70s I knew this and used to be scared my older brother was going to get a visit from several large men one day, because he always had his VHF radio tuned to the police band. I think it was above 90MHz? Can't remember exactly.

[@BobHannent]

Back when I was studying, one of my lecturers had previously worked for Marconi. He said he was once asked to figure out how the Russians were intercepting a point to point link. He surveyed the area and told them to go and look at a shed which was conspicuously sitting on the roof of a building along the path of the signal. Sure enough, a Russian listening post, in a shack on a roof. No antennas sticking out, the antennae were inside the shed.

[@digitalchaos1980]

Quite clever, hiding in plain "line of sight"! 😁

[@harry2928]

apparently the shack material must not be conductive or capacitative-?-or something -enough to attenuate the signal much.

[@digitalchaos1980]

@@harry2928 Yah, must not have. Probably wooden or something like that.

[@crazyedo9979]

@@harry2928 That was probably a wooden russian hack shack.😁

[@colinstewart1432]

Ah, the old radio-transparent shed trick eh? Cunning.

[@Aengus42]

My Yupiteru MVT7100 took me to hundreds of places! The Space Shuttle on it's climb out from Florida as it went high over the UK about 12 minutes after launch, the coastguard, shipping, analogue mobiles & wireless landlines, airband of course! The Red Arrows just aren't the same without listening to Red one "Hooooolding the bank..... Now!" through gritted teeth as the Gs mounted. Tucked up warm in bed with headphones on listening to a C130 going around because of atrocious weather at Gander. The eerie Selcal tones echoing down from the ionosphere of aircraft flying the Atlantic routes. MIR always chatting away in Russian as it passed overhead. Visible as a point of light in the night sky just before it winked orange then disappeared as it passed into orbital sunset. I strung a longwire down the garden to see how far i could listen. I got Australian Selcal operators first hit! Couldn't get much further than that! That's just a smattering from the mid 90's. It was a fascinating hobby!

[@nisserot]

I have an Icom IC-R10 that I bought in the year 2000 (I live in Sweden). It was amazing being able to listen to everything that was broadcast in the clear. I used to listen to cordless phone calls, mobile phone calls, amateur radio, buses, police and everything in between. I even modified it with a discriminator tap so I could decode POCSAG data. It's sad that almost everything has been transitioned to encrypted digital modes now, taking away all the fun :(

[@memyself1566]

@Jim GM4DHJ I think that it was the whole intention of digital technology.

[@Equiluxe1]

I had the same scanner, one day I heard a signal where someone said "we have done the job should I fill in a green form" and a reply came back on the same frequency " no take it downthe bypass and make it look like an accident we will fill out a pink one" that has stuck with me ever since the frequency was on a government one.

[@memyself1566]

@@Equiluxe1 Thus, another example of establishment corruption and smokescreens. What a fascinating hobby though. Where did it all go wrong - digital technology.

[@SuperCanuck777]

i had one too in the late 90's best radio i ever had. it could pick up low band pmr mobiles ground wave up to 100 miles away. the most sensitive reciever ever made i reckon. quite selective too.

[@radioboffinG8KNF]

"Martin" emigrated to America where he got a top job in Computers, and I think now is retired living in the Mid-West. I met him a couple of times at his first-floor flat, and I sold him My Ford Granada which ended up being chased (and lost) across the New Forest. Interesting days. His one and the only receiver were an Icom R7000 with a 2m/7cm dual-band colinear on the roof of his two-storey building in Bournemouth.

[@RingwayManchester]

Yeah very nice bloke, he gave a lot more info which was best left out. Cheers Duncan.

[@memyself1566]

What a fascinating story of a totally unknown person (apart from the few who knew him and appreciated his contribution).

[@PeteRoe]

What a legend

[@m1geo]

A lot of familiar names kicking around here! 😂

[@DanielMasmanian]

​@@m1geo this has surely to be the friendliest chat on KZbin. Bravo to each of you, and thank you for it

[@jarekstorm6331]

I worked at Radio Shack (Tandy Corporation) in the US back in the late 1980s and we sold all sorts of scanners. The high end ones could be tuned to pretty much any frequency, and when connected to an antenna mounted on the roof, we were able to hear cordless phone conversations, and all sorts of things. They were very powerful back then, and you could just casually turn the tuning dial until finding something interesting to listen to.

[@RWBHere]

Many years ago, I was listening to the third harmonic of 49 MHz (near to some interesting repeaters 😉), when I heard what turned out to be a £2 million burglary in progress - at one of my previous places of employment. Turning the beam antenna gave very clear FM audio and a direction. Then one of the culprits mentioned a road name, a few miles away from here. Bingo! A quick 999 call, and playing of some of the incoming audio to the police over the phone, resulted in several arrests, followed later in the day by a visit from two big CID officers, to see how I had managed to overhear the transmissions. They were fascinated that my FT227R could tune to 147 MHz. (It only needed an adjustment to one internal component to extend its receive and transmit capabilities.) To my surprise and relief, they thanked me, asked me to keep monitoring those frequencies, to report anything else of interest, and left. What they didn't ask me about was that I had been monitoring their local repeater, on an adjacent frequency, when I stumbled upon the clandestine activity by accident. A few weeks later, all of their transmissions began to be scrambled. I wonder why? 😃 So I obtained my first scanner a little while later, to listen everywhere else.

[@RingwayManchester]

Wow! Would you mind dropping me an email? Would love to chat with you on this. [e-mail]

[@Chad_Thundercock]

I'm curious - why do you refer to it as the 3rd harmonic of 49Mhz instead of just 147Mhz? Or, better still, can you point me in a direction where I can learn more about that concept? Radio has always fascinated me, and I'd love to learn more about the hobbyist details.

[@vk3ye]

@@Chad_Thundercock Possibly to indicate that cordless phones were on 49 MHz but if it's a cheap transmitter there will be spurious signals (harmonics) at multiples of 49 MHz including at 147 MHz (which is 3x 49).

[@stringlarson1247]

Back in the '70s I was given a multi-band receiver. I remember sitting for hours at night slowly turning the dials scanning up and down the various bands listening to SW stations from around the world. The number stations were/are fascinating as were/are all the clear channel language broadcasts from around the world. Thanks for posting these. Now that the weather is going to be mostly shite here in the upper midwest US, I'll have some time to go thru your vids.

[@Hopeless_and_Forlorn]

In the 90's I bought an iCom scanner from an electronics shop I stumbled across in New York's Chinatown. It gave me access to unlimited frequency up to 1300 MHz, if I remember correctly. Since cell phone service was analog at the time, I could listen to local police frequencies and sometimes follow them to their cell phone conversations when they decided to switch to phones to evade the police scanners. Of course, everybody used wireless handset phones in their homes at the time, so I heard some interesting conversations just walking through neighborhoods with an earphone connected to the iCom. Walking through Newark and Elizabeth, I got an early preview of what gangsters talked about, long before the Sopranos hit the air. That was fun.

[@hs0zcw]

Where is police uses of radio got a lot more private with the adoption of frequency skipping and multiplexing. Even a simple scanner which could hear the police on the earlier radios could not figure out how to follow the police when they in prearranged order skipped frequencies with automated machinery.

[@petemitchell6788]

Stumbled? Drink too much do you? 😂

[@ambitioustoad6604]

Really enjoyed this vid. Took me back to that golden age of scanning here in the US in the late 80s and early 90’s and the joy of going through the various frequency guides. A younger, happier, and simpler time for me. It seemed everyone I knew had one as teen in suburban Philadelphia. The local Radio Shack was a place to chat Scanning and Amateur radio. We had 3 Scanners in our home. My parents frequently passed on watching Friday night television to go to bed with the scanner on. I decided to stop keeping up with the technology a few years ago, and it appears most police and fire are now encrypted where I live. With the advent of digital systems less info was sent via voice anyway. Listening to a local railroad defect detector and regional rail is the extent of it now.

[@samcollins6394]

I just absolutely love these historic videos you make. Anyone can do a product review/advert for something they have been sent or hit record while doing a pota/sota activation and present a never ending drone of dits and dars. It must take a considerable effort to research all these topics, find clips and stills, script them and fact check. I know you won't get awarded "youtuber of the year " but you certainly do deserve something. A recognition of presenting and collating some amazing historical facts and records that, I am sure, would otherwise fade off into obscurity. Thank you Lewis and long may it continue.

[@RingwayManchester]

Thanks so much sam! Yeah these take a long time, sometimes months in the making. I appreciate the kind words :)

[@davidsradioroom9678]

👍👍👍

[@digitalchaos1980]

I have to agree! I'm in the US but I find these videos fascinating!

[@ct6022]

@@RingwayManchesterrrr

[@ct6022]

😮

[@dsldude1152]

I remember listening to the Police do a PNC check on my car while behind me at a red traffic light. As I was all legal and local they didnt pull me over.

[@cageordie]

In the US that's an illegal search. There's an amusing video where Florida police stop their state attorney. They admit that they are in the habit of running plates. As soon as they discover what she does for a living they are backing away like she's a live grenade with the pin pulled. kzbin.info/www/bejne/kIfcaqWwjLCIeLs

[@filippocorti6760]

Legal for them to do that?

[@myothernameistaken]

@@filippocorti6760 Yes. Wait until you find out about ANPR. A modern cop car checks you automatically and tells the officers if you need to be stopped.

[@iLuvTenerife]

I got my first scanner - the Realistic Pro 32 in the late 80s, and had the Tandy Scanners books, never contributed to the Bournemouth PO Box , but remember being advised Practical Wireless and a few other publications I think. Back in those days, you could listen to all emergency services AND know instantly were to hear stuff literally local to you street. Split simplex? No problem- you knew where to have the other scanner monitoring. When an ambulance was called for my aging father - I listened to the Ambulance comms on the event. Great video again Lewis. Brings back that golden age of scanning.

[@l.a.2646]

Here in the states by the late 1980s programmable scanning receivers were becoming normal , but when I started scanning about 1975 I got a crystal receiver and had to order the frequency desired if it wasn't a common frequency for police,fire, ambulance etc. So an odd frequency would be grown and cut for the customer. I was given my first receiver from my uncle that was a chief in a volunteer fire company and it was probably one of the best gifts ever! And when programmable scanning receivers became available it made the hobby much more fun, and places like Radio Shack started producing frequency guides, but having a good hot receiver a high up antenna using limit scanning really helped in finding active frequencies. Now just routine traffic is via radio any "special info" is transmitted via cell phone these days. Being a volunteer firefighter like myself, it used to be the only way you knew you had a fire run or ambulance call-out was by having a scanning receiver "scanner". Cool story, cheers from Pennsylvania!

[@craigslater2321]

I had a Bearcat III scanner started in 1975 also

[@26TM205]

Excellent story. Ah the good old days. My favourite was capturing the copper chopper's video downlink on 2.4GHz. watching their thermal imaging camera when on a search was awesome. Ofcourse I never posted any footage on any public site, but it did get shared on a 10GHz microwave TV link with a friend 2 miles away. Sadly I havent seen anything for years now so I assume they have gone digital/scrambled. All good fun though. Air1 over and out lol

[@gary3561]

Lmao. Even the security service had a sense of humour 👌

[@wisteela]

Absolutely awesome. What a great bit of history. And huge respect for how they was with him. 73s M7TUD

[@rachelcarre9468]

I love stories like that about ‘5’. I’m surprised they left bits lying on the floor, they had a reputation for being ghosts.

[@ammocraft]

If you read Spycatcher, there’s a great story in there about these “ghosts” putting their foot through a ceiling whilst planting devices. 🤣

[@Mike-H_UK]

@@ammocraft But they (Leslie Jagger) fixed it before the owners came back the next morning!

[@jplacido9999]

Field jobs are sometimes dificult, and unexpected events happens. In police and military operations, Murphy's Laws should allways be taken into account...😅😅

[@ammocraft]

@@Mike-H_UK Yep, but the line form the author was funny as hell...I just didn't want to give it away in case anyone was reading it.

[@jester6856]

I really enjoyed that film. Like many on here , that subject rang a few bells,. It was a nightly event.. having a bath and listening to the cops on the radio... Or the odd cell phone conversation. God they were good days!!

[@CS7BHW]

My dears 80s and 90s scanning radio transmissions !!!! Love it ! tons of frequencies I heard that time .....

[@PsRohrbaugh]

This is one of the coolest stories I've heard in a while! Great video!

[@JayKayKay7]

I started scanning in medical school with a Fox receiver in Philadelphia 1980-84. I would be studying with the police frequencies in the background. I had a little newpaper map of the Philly districts and the frequencies programmed into my radio. Busy town. Later on when I first moved to Waco , Texas and the Branch Davidian Siege took place, I was using a unblocked ICOM scanner and listening to every three letter law enforcement agency chattering away. The best were the local guys on their cell phones talking to their wives why they weren't coming home. "All Hell has broken loose out here!"

[@davidsradioroom9678]

When I first lived in England, the police were on the FM broadcast band. I had a friend who would listen in, even though it was illegal. During my second UK residence, I would listen to utility stations of HF, also probably illegal. I don't know what the laws are like in the UK now, but "Martin" was wise not to publish his frequency list any more. In the US, we can listen to anything except cellular communications, but since they are now digital, it is a moot point. I find your channel exciting. I wish I could visit the UK again to do some serious listening. 73.

[@alangiles4616]

As the police were so keen on secrecy it must upset the old school coppers today if they know that especially on Twitter lots of would be coppers (PCSOs) are forever on there talking about the jobs they are on even supplying photos of dodgy cars and vans showing their number plates and even mentioning the names of the coppers who arrested the culprits. One I follow is obvs a complete fantasist as he seems like Craig of Coronation St, gets involved in all ops, but he provides chapter and verse regardless.

[@nobodynoone2500]

Passively reciving a broadcast being illegal is creepy af. Would just incentivise me to do so.

[@godfreypoon5148]

@@nobodynoone2500 It's about as sensible as telling people they aren't allowed to read things from a billboard on the roadside. If you don't want it known, don't broadcast it.

[@michaelf7093]

It used to be illegal to have a mobile receiver, i.e. to listen into police activity from your car, without a ham permit. Now, of course, Broadcastify makes this totally moot.

[@charleshunziker7416]

In 1985 I was at a hotel near Heathrow and I picked up a police chase in London on my FM radio

[@EportChris]

Classic, thanks mate 😊 My old GRE and Realistic scanners bring back those memories of staying up til all hours scouting through frequencies as an inquisitive teen in the mid to late 90s. Back then the airwaves were constantly buzzing. Could have done with that guide to navigate them 🤣 great times 👍🏻

[@fredjones100]

Regarding the monitoring of his phone, I'd love to know more about how that operation was run. When a local exchange was being upgraded to digital (in the 90s) there was a lot of interesting stuff ripped out and skipped including a recording device for just this kind of covert call monitoring. It had a label on it with basic contact details for the group responsible who were based in a city about 150 miles away, so clearly not the sort of thing that your local PO/BT guys dealt with. I'd love to know who they were recording on that machine and why - given how few lines were run from that exchange I'd almost certainly have known them all too!

[@daveb5041]

In the early 90s I got our old VCR to pick up cell phones. Old version had 13 channels you would manually tune to you local stations channel one could ch 56 or 2 or set to around 800 mhz in the high uhf and you could get the frequency of the 2 or 3 towers in your town. Only one came is clear. Imagine only having a few towers with analog channels in 2022? I bet it's around 1000 to 5000 channels and hundreds of antennas with dozens of arrays.

[@Eon119]

I also have memories of a friends dad who used to have a Tandy Realistic scanner. He used to listen to the Police (and everything else). I'm sure he said the police helicopter call sign was India 99. This was around 89-91.

[@truckingscouser]

Most police helicopters are assigned the x-ray India 99 call sign, our local helicopter (Merseyside) was designated 'Mike one' and it was based at Mike one one 😉

[@andyclark1426]

I was a power engineer responsible for standby power supplies at many of these “unknown” or if you like secret radio masts, I’d would surprise you where many of them are as not all are in middle of nowhere

[@SoundLad]

Wish I never sold my original scanner and scanner 3 book. I had a Pro62 realistic. Brought back memories of my first scanner thanks Lewis 👍

[@georgespeck8761]

As I live in the united states, I still have a large collection of scanner frequencies books today.the oldest is 1985.

[@carlashby6174]

Used to love listening to Securicor G4S vans etc on am 165.975 back in the day.On my first hand held scanner.

[@alexrandall8478]

Brilliant storytelling. Thank you for all of this amazing and endlessly intriguing content.

[@truckingscouser]

Great video Lewis, I'm quite new to your channel and have watched most of your old videos, it was nice to see this one so soon after uploading it 🙏

[@RingwayManchester]

Thanks very much!

[@sagsfv3122]

I still have the 2 scanners that were in my "Beast" a modified 67 Chevy Suburban decked out with all sorts of fun stuff: My "Tweaked" Cobra 140 GTL CB radio, 2 scanners: Scanner 1 - Realistic Patrolman Pro 7A. - 8 Channel VHF 138 - 174 MHZ; Scanner 2 - Realistic Patrolman Pro 10. 8 Channel VHF / UHF (all Public Safety freqs), A Kenwood TR-7400A 2M XCVR, an Icom 2m thumbwheel VHF handi-talkie, a Federal Signal Siren/PA - with a 200 W PA speaker up front, All Motorola speakers inside: 1 below, 1 above the mirror and one in the back by the rear mounted 6" amber emergency flasher. I also had a portable amber flasher for the dash or the roof (Preferred, since it did not impede my vision)! If anyone even LEO gave me any sh-t, I had FEMA ID in my personal collection of emergency ID badges (ALL LEGIT), as well as vehicle placards from FEMA, and the LA County S.O. But just to be SAFE, I also had a big Machete tucked on the left side of the driver's seat and an Arkansas toothpick mounted under my seat (this was besides the 12G short barrel shotgun I had mounted behind my seat (Shhhhh)! The morning of the 94 Northridge Earthquake, I was driving around the stricken area radioing in fire reports directly to the LA City F.D. That evening, I was the acting liaison between the LA County Sheriff's and the California State Police. LA had declared Martial Law with a curfew, but I was exempt from that BS! Ahhh, the good 'ol days!

[@b.jmcwhattabloke8624]

I started scanning in the 1990`s and still listen in on the aircraft & emergency services today . Back in the early years, everything was analogue , or FM which I could hear on a realistic H/Held 10channel scanner. I then bought a Bearcat 500 channel scanner 7 years later, which I still use now. After the big shake up for the radio spectrum , and Police going digital , I could still hear them by listening in on the "link" channels on UHF. They then went entirely UHF encrypted digital, while most of the Emergency , Fire brigades went over to the Government Radio Network on uhf digital in the clear. I had to buy another digital H/held scanner to listen to them.I used either the telescopic antenna, or an outside Discone in the later years. Scanning is the best hobby ever !! I`m in Australia , and the wacky Government do strange things to make a hobby more difficult.

[@jamiemoo2000]

Being able to monitor the EMS was interesting before they all gradually migrated over to the UK Tetra Airwave Service with its TEA2 encryption pre 2000,with Lancashire Police being one of thee first forces that took up Tetra with MM02. My first scanner being a Realistic PRO74 from Tandy, then a Yupiteru MVT-7100 and the AOR3000. Also 31MHz cordless phones was interesting before DECT phones put paid to this. Good old days of scanning recievers. And the old 1st generation ETACS mobile phones, Vodafone, One2one, BT Cellnet and Orange.

[@jamiemoo2000]

You do some very interesting Videos Lewis on the Radio Hobby covering lots of subjects.

[@nobodynoone2500]

You can decrypt easy, the codes are floating around, or decypherable with free tools.

[@jamiemoo2000]

@@nobodynoone2500 impossible tea2 encryption.

[@digitalchaos1980]

You'd think with those cordless phones frequencies being so low they'd have a tendency to possibly skip every so often. Wonder if anyone's conversations ever made it around the world! 😆

[@domestinger8805]

@@nobodynoone2500 do elaborate

[@sumpyman]

It's around 1988 and I'm in my 4th year (now year 10) Physics lesson we were all huddled around the teacher that had just bought one of these scanners. We were listening into the mobile phone airwaves that were analogue at the time and one of the conversations was of a guy telling his mate about how he ate his kebab the previous night. It wasn't about the take away fast food variety!

[@MENSA.lady2]

I was listing to this stuff using an ex WWII radio from a Sherman tank back in the 1960's I still can..

[@5nowChain5]

I used to work for a (long defunct) company that built lots of interesting bits n pieces inc. racks of comms listening gear for various agencies, (they were a piece of art, as the quality of assembly was perfect). Looked like the sort of thing that wound up in fake water towers on LOS microwave links to Telecom Tower.

[@rowanjones3476]

The one on a nuclear power plant site that happened to be directly inline between two towers used for a microwave link across the Irish Sea? I guess someone had to build it!

[@77thTrombone]

That last vignette at 7:50 - there was a similar setup in Washington DC created in the 1980s or '90s. Difference was, the Russians put an "embassy" sign on it and maintained it nicely.

[@koltinn]

The cheeky ending though..

[@diogeneslantern18]

I have seen numbers stations videos here and there but your channel is the first one that has really piqued my interest in the hobby. What a rabbit hole

[@tectorama]

It used to be fun listening to mobile phones when they were analogue. You wouldn't believe the number of people who were having extra marital relationships. Baby alarms and walk about phones were interesting at times too.

[@M70ACARRY]

My wife went next door to visit our neighbors after we moved in. They were a lesbian couple. She came home to tell me she heard my voice over their police scanner. They had been listening to our cordless phone, which operated on 49 MHz. I quickly purchased one with encryption.

[@5roundsrapid263]

In the ‘90s, I picked up lots of people cheating on their spouses, plus a couple bookies taking bets. Sports gambling was illegal at the time in the US. Now they have apps for it!

[@paganphil100]

tectorama: There are still many people using "cordless phones" which can be received by anyone with the right type of SW Receiver or scanner if they are close enough.

[@tectorama]

​

[@tectorama]

@@paganphil100 Yes , mostly in the 49mhz range.

[@wazza33racer]

You should have hummed the Lincoln Shire poacher song to the secret service agent spooks and told them it inspired you.That would have been ironic. In the early 1990's I was talking to an ex Australian federal cop about the Deakin center in the capital, Canberra. He looked really concerned that a civie truck driver new about the secret file facility that kept a dossier on every Australian citizen and was connected by underground tunnels to federal parliament and the US embassy.

[@deildegast]

Not related to wireless, but some friends of mine in Germany in the 1980s took a band picture in a harbour area from the roof of their van. They never knew what there was behind the band that resulted in this, but one evening a week later they got a visit from a security agency demanding the film and all copies of the pictures ;) So sometimes you could attract the "wrong" kind of attention quite quick.

[@joeblow8593]

Interesting as always, cheers from across the pond

[@LavenderSystem69]

Honestly, the one story that I wish I could remember would be the one about the time a couple kids pissed off the government by finding and listening in on a classified radio frequency using little more than a photo in a PAO release and a formula that was printed in one of their school textbooks. Well, the government couldn't exactly stop publishing PAO releases for legal reasons centered around government accountability and transparency, but you bet your sweet bippy that the formulae for finding radio frequency ranges based off antenna lengths quietly disappeared from textbooks and haven't been published since...

[@thebigmacd]

BS. Antenna calculations are published everywhere.

[@jimmybx0072]

Any HAM radio operator could do this too. Basic antenna building.

[@lindaj5492]

Love the “that’s the building next door” - busted, but with a sense of humour. There’s a fenced-off shed on top of Blackheath Hill; off to the right as you approach from the New Cross area. Used for training & research into radio tracking during the 1970’s. 🤫

[@wayneschenk5512]

Amazing stuff can still remember listening to mobile conversations only one side though.

[@brianjonesg8aso403]

You could also listen in to baby monitors and get a 24 hour bug in a neighbour's house!

[@twoheart7813]

I first got into VHF when I was a teen using a Radio Shack patrolman AM/VHF high radio. Mostly listened to ham & police until I discovered a Mobile phone network just outside the 2 meter ham band. Being before cell it was a service that the rich and some businesses used. At night it came alive with drug dealers & pimps, a real world education for me :o)

[@markli3889]

The things I used to hear with my ICF 2001D back in the late 80's 😉

[@TRIPPLEJAY00]

Lewis this is the best story so far. Great work as always. Take care buddy.

[@nerd8192]

They had those books in my local Library back in the early 2000's.

[@ProtoNeoVintage]

When you joking with your friend during a telephone conversation and as your gag you say "and to the government agency listening that last part was a joke", then you get the text message from an unknown number that says, "we know!".

[@PaulMansfield]

when i was a student I worked at Pye Telecom in cambridge in the late eighties. There were also many interesting people there.

[@simonsimon325]

A very interesting story, well told. I reckon he was meant to find the little phone piece, and the slip redirecting his mail. Wanted to scare him into stopping, but it obviously didn't work and they ended up having to pay him a visit anyway. Probably had his phone tapped for ages before they left the bit on the floor for him to find.

[@RobWhittlestone]

Excellent, fascinating story. All the best, Rob in Switzerland

[@g3cwi_Radio_Adventures]

Another well made presentation. Thanks!

[@DeeMcQueen]

Love this story mate. Late 90's I had a bear bearcat trunk tracker. Living in London you can imagine the stuff I heard and even followed in a vehicle. Anyhow enough of that story haha.

[@paulshiels6287]

Great video! Very well presented and researched. It's a shame everything's going digital.

[@applejacks971]

"That's the building next door..." lol! Epic troll, well played :)

[@brianjonesg8aso403]

Interesting, the use of a PO Box removes a lot of the safeguards we expect from Her Majesty's Mail, as once it gets to the PO Box, it has been delivered as addressed and can be tampered with, opened, or even removed. In the Laughing Policeman Wireless Society we had an arch-enemy in the form of buffoon Police Sergeant William Malcom Bowden 3116 (Retired on medical grounds). We had a PO box set up and hit a period when no post was there to be collected. Assuming foul play, we showed pictures of 2 police officers, not in uniform, and it was confirmed that these two had taken our post. We thought we had got them for theft, but unfortunately, the post had been delivered as addressed and then it was up to the owner of the building what happened to the letters. This seemed unbelievable, but this was confirmed by the Post Office Users' National Council. Luckily the post was only of a trivial nature, but we will never actually know.

[@baronedipiemonte3990]

Here in the U.S. mail is "sacred" and cannot be seized or opened except with a warrant. The most that can be done is that law enforcement, or a government agency acting in the course of justice (trying to find a person for the purpose of service of judicial process, or a bail fugitive) is applying for what is known as a "Mail Cover". This is made to the US Postal Inspection Service (Post Office Criminal Investigators) and if approved, any incoming or outgoing mail to/from a given address or addressee/sender is recorded. Only the information on the outside of the envelope or on shipping label /package is recorded or copied. This is only for a certain length of time, i e. 30-60 days. After which a new application has to be made. I just described how it's supposed to work... Here at least, the government can't just summarily take your mail. Not even from a mail drop or private PO Box. It's a federal crime for anyone other than the owner or the postal service to remove anyone's mail 📬 from a mailbox or mail recepticle. Fun Fact .. about two dozen postal service mail carriers here are fired, arrested, and convicted (all they get is 5 years probation and a criminal record) every year for obstruction, destruction, failure to deliver the mail so they don't have to deliver it.

[@thomascrabtree]

Nowdays you can have post to email services which act like a PO box but will receive and automatically scan everything and email it to you immediately, so police can't intercept it. You don't even get a box number but a rotating code which you can change at will.

[@crf80fdarkdays]

@@baronedipiemonte3990 haha here in Australia they will actually open boxes containing "drugs" then continue to seal them up and send them on their way so that they can bust you with it in your possession. They get more evidence that way, I know of a case where they seized a package and the person meant to receive it kept ordering more (were talking about well over ten grand Australian here). Well when the police swatted her she had a box sitting with address of the dealer on it, it was a box she was going to use to send money in.

[@5nowChain5]

The GPO/BT/Post Office was and still is a Government Agency, as such they can and will intercept/read your mail at will. There's No such thing as privacy, as too many anti-terror laws set up since the early 1900's and all the staff are covered under the official secrets act. Everything gets x-ray scanned and sniffed for prohibited chemicals and substances.

[@TheGraeme61]

What an interesting video .Certainly brings back memories on how we listened to the airwaves .My first listening experience was on a binatone which had sw am fm (my parents owned) then i bought a Fidelity shortwave radio got about 1 hour listening before the power transformer packed in .After the 3rd replacement within about a month i gave up. For airband i bought a little pocket binatone radio, had that for years ,many enjoyable hours listening to atc and pilots.Since then Amateur radio improved my knowledge on buying better quality radios etc.Anyway keep the quality videos rolling and thank you once again.

[@emmarandom9609]

Ugh yes, Fidelity haha they were always less than stellar quality... Mind you, I do have an old CB3000FM base station next to me now that still works. Even reasonable ESR on the original caps still & from appearances it's not a low hour unit. (mind you, it does splatter across about 5 channels lol but then they did from new)

[@laverdanick]

Ah, Brookmans Park Transmitter, it’s changed quite a bit since I worked there in the early 80’s. My first job was to clean 2LO, which was in storage there at the time.

[@jimsvideos7201]

What a time to be alive.

[@alastairbarkley6572]

I had (and still have) a Realistic (Tandy) Pro34 scanner purchased in around 1986. it was deeply disappointing and picked up almost nothing (except, where I was living then, strong analogue mobile phone signals, but only one of the callers). Much of the after-market add-on stuff available, supposedly to improve reception, was awful rubbish too; badly designed pre-amplifiers which just output intermodulation products and spurii and antenna systems which looked the biz but did nothing else. I found one of mine the other day and checking it over, discovered that it had never even been connected internally - some terrible low-quality co-ax terminated in thin air. No wonder it didn't bloody work.

[@Skorpychan]

So, the lesson here is that if anything changes in the vicinity of your phone, assume the authorities are bugging it. Also, listen for a click when you pick the phone up, or when someone else picks the phone up when you call. That's a tap. They apparently REALLY hate it when you talk to them.

[@Scotscan]

Truley times that ars gone but not forgotten! I remember my first scanner was the Realistic PRO-26 which if memory serves right was probably RRP £300 in the mid to late 90s. 25 - 1.3GHz had plenty to listen to back then - mobile phone and cordless calls aplenty in fact one day I remember tuning around 31 - 31MHz looking out my bedroom window with binoculars to see someone begin a call on a cordless and the scanner sprung to live from a good 1.5 - 2km away. Ahhhh those were the days.

[@joshgreen2164]

I live in the states and in my area all police radio is encrypted (to hide their criminal activity) if you have a scanner and get caught breaking the law it means you get extra charges.

[@amojak]

i used to work for the home office, rolling out WARC etc.. if only 'Martin' had asked :)

[@luish19779]

In 1998 I got scanner and I listen Cellphone communication in my country U.S. I think was the 800 MHz or 900. I listen inalambric teléfon or the McDonald drive thru in my room. Basically I hear EVERYTHING. 😉

[@haywoodyoudome]

You should've spent the time getting better at English.

[@crazyedo9979]

"Men in plain clothes"😂🤣😂😁

[@M7BCN]

He must have been a suspected spy. Great story. Can still pick up baby monitors on 49MHz.

[@rohnkd4hct260]

I started in the monitoring hobby all the way back in 1972. Loved it! Even worked all summer to buy a Scanner. But today, very little to listen to. Between Trunked radio, P25, MODAT,(Mobile Data Terminals) and of course ENCRYPTION! There is very little to listen to, even on HF, There you have to deal with ALE. Used to enjoy Rail Road, but they are going NXDN. Guess I still have my Ham Radio.

[@Jason-io5bu]

They were a Happy days My home town of Bournemouth

[@qmsarge]

Looks like 'Martin' was treated pretty leniently. Especially when his listing was found in a vehicle of the IRA. In India if this happens 'Martin' would be now running between courts, lawyers and the police.

[@Daimo83]

I was a kid in the 90's and yeah it seemed like every other "grown up" had a radio and antenna sticking out of their house.

[@dougtaylor7724]

Back before cell phones went digital a friend bought a trunking scanner. That thing would light up and talk constantly on Friday afternoon with people having affairs meeting after work. There were some voices I recognized. So glad I never bought one. That thing could get you and others in trouble.

[@clangerbasher]

I only have a passing interest in this really. But these little snippets you put out do deserve a book at some point.

[@matambale]

Great video, thanks - could you switch to using "Average Bob" or "Average Ted" instead?

[@b3j8]

Anybody remember a company called CRB Research? They used to sell lists for all sorts of radio users incl Govt users. Mostly from FCC license records

[@stuartvaughan8599]

Another brilliant video Lewis. Keep them coming.

[@Ben_3113]

Great video as always mate, thank you

[@gsneff]

If some government agent told me I couldn’t publish information that didn’t violate anyone’s natural rights, much less information that anyone could obtain on their own with just a little effort, I would take out a full page ad in the biggest paper I could afford to publish that information.

[@glenjarnold]

Ah, the good old days of being able to tune into both frequencies on the various near neighbours' old cordless phones base and handset units, and winding them up by pretending to be aliens or secret agents (allegedly!)

[@nobodynoone2500]

You realize you can still do this with digital right? Just requires a bit more imagination.

[@jhonsiders6077]

As a teen I used to ride my bike around with my handset until I got a open channel and make a call ! I had as I said a mobile bicycle phone 😊

[@ArferNower]

Interesting video...I remember listening to the police on the normal FM bands before they were moved to allow more local broadcast stations to develop, remember getting my first scanner in the 80s it was a AoR800e cost £199

[@digitalmediafan]

Yes ditto they used AM mode around 100 mhz. Completely bizzare choice of frequency when you think about it !

[@ammocraft]

Yes, I had memories of listening to the Met on 100MHz FM, on a normal home stereo…was beginning to think I dreamt it, as it was a bizarre frequency choice.

[@truckingscouser]

@@digitalmediafan my local force (Merseyside) used 150 MHz am for their county wide radio (CH) but 450MHz NFM for their PR handsets

[@jplacido9999]

Only a blockhead would choose 100 MHz for a police frequency...😂😂😂. First FM broadcast receivers were 87.5 - 100 MHz (I still have a old tube radio like that). Then it went 87,5 - 104 MHz (already transistor radio at the time...). And finally 87.5 - 108 MHz (for the "western world" of course)

[@ammocraft]

@@jplacido9999 Which is why i had convinced myself I dreamt it. I had no other radio scanner at that time.

[@nigelsheridan6229]

I still have one of these guides somewhere in the loft along with my realistic pro 16.

[@jonescrusher1]

ha, nice touch with the post-it note

[@Trevor_Austin]

The Arqiva offices shown are along the A1000 in Brookmans Park.

[@wisteela]

Watching this a second time I think that the part of a telephone was to warn him they were monitoring his cordless phones, and maybe to switch to a fixed landline.

[@FirkhamHall]

Hmmm Bournemouth you say?? I wonder if I could meet 'Martyn' haha. Great report thanks Lewis.

[@richardbaxter2057]

Many, many years ago, when I was just a kiddy, our next door neighbour, who’d worked Bofors Guns during the war and who’d made a living in the Jewellery trade thereafter, told me a lovely story that occurred after his de-mob. He’d had a fascination with radio and managed to get his hands on all the requisite kit and equipment in order to restore, revitalise and operate, an old Lancaster Bombers radio set (nowt like a touch of ambition, is there)! 😜 Anyhow, finally “came the day” and the great switch on was good to go.....On went the power switch and duly “blacked out”, became one area of the local populace.....🤪😂😂 Needless to say, this wasn’t a popular move on his part......and just like my dad, who’d managed to shoot the neighbours bum with the air rifle he’d literally “just been given”, he had his new toy removed from him......😢🤪😂 Never got into coms myself (too thick) but I remember all the big sets that out Cadet Force had at School and the receiving cards, recording chats with folks as faraway as Oz and Canada! And aunty, listening to the coppers on her radio......😂😂😂

[@georgesmith8113]

Loved those early days!! 👍👍👍👊😎

[@SocialistDistancing]

Sounds like your friends were doing some intel gathering and then a bit psy-ops. Very interesting and sounds like a lot of fun. I have a few interesting scanner stories. The "authorities " never came to my door, but I did gather some very interesting information.

[@xkeyscore1120]

I enjoyed that. Oh the memories 🤣

[@ManuelPinner]

I have a SDR Play RSP DX, can Receive from 1 Hz to 2 Ghz, use it Mostly for Police Dispatch and AM and Ham Radio Communications, also Here in the US Ham can Use All Radio Receivers for Experiment Radio like Space Radio Astronomy,

[@ElRel]

Interesting about the listening station. If it was something official surely the directional antennae would be hidden in radomes.

[@matthewlee2686]

I miss the 90s. I had a really nice scanner that would pick up cell phones and alot more.

[@russoft]

Dear Lord. "Do you have a license for that"

[@sweiland75]

so I've learned that if you invite yourself into an English home you will be served tea.