Yo! Alexander:
Thursday August 15 1996 16:46, Alexander Bilan wrote to Bill Cheek:
 >> For those not in the know.....WinRadio is a world-class, all-band
 >> receiver that plugs into an AT-slot in your PC and is fully controlled
 >> by the computer and the provided software.  Included below is the text
 >> from the WinRadio brochure.
 AB> Sounds like a product which will provide some interesting potential.  
And,
 AB> it would seem to solve any and all problems with interfacing your 
computer
 AB> with your scanner to do weird and wonderfull things.  I would be
 AB> interested in hearing your review on this product.
It arrived a couple of days ago.  I just got done rebuilding the home 
computer for it tonight.  If all holds up, I'll install WinRadio tomorrow or 
next day and get serious about the sucker.  Stay tuned.
 AB> Speaking of the computer doing weird and wonderful things, Our local
 AB> police force is upgrading their radio system (major bummer!) to a 
igital
 AB> trunked system. Good bye interesting scanning.
So it would seem.  But give that "digital" a grain of salt until you know for 
sure.  Most trunked systems are digitally controlled, but the voice comm is 
still analog and easily monitored.
 AB> They state its for keeping the criminals with scanners from getting
 AB> one step ahead. Quite understandabe
Yeah, the cop shoppes would like for the public to THINK that trunked systems 
are not monitorable, but that's BS.  It's more difficult, yes, but doable.
 AB> to the question, given enough basic information, how difficult is it
 AB> to create a decription program to decipher digital trunked signals?
If encrypted or digitized, forget it.  Have you been paying attention to how 
the government wants to make the "Clipper Chip" a law?  That's where the gov 
would have a back door key to read any encrypted comms they wanted.  Now why 
would they want to do something like that unless encryption were pretty fool
proof!  No way, Jose!
 AB> No doubt all the local radio/tv/newspapers stations will be looking
 AB> into some form of monitoring as well.
In many cases, the cop shoppes authorize the media to buy a trunked radio 
programmed just like theirs so they can follow the calls.  It does take 
special authorization to get one of these radios, though I understand there 
is a growing black or gray market in them now.   Nevertheless, we're still 
looking at plain analog signals for voice.
Bill Cheek | Internet: bcheek@cts.com | Compu$erve: 74107,1176
Windows 95 Juggernaut Team | Microsoft MVP
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