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.
replyYou 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.
replyThat feels like something that could suffer from frequency analysis.
replyLike 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.
reply> Shortwave radios are also cheap and widespread, so it's easy to get one anywhere in the world
replyI 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.
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.
replyI 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.
replyI'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.
replyThe younger people I know tend to own such a radio in the form of the Baofeng UV-5R or the like.
A Baofeng UV-5R cannot receive shortwave, it's in the VHF/UHF range for receive/transmit and can receive commercial FM broadcast.
replyAh, true. My mistake.
replydef a niche consumer item these days. but pretty easy to make your own.
replySatellite unicast receivers also can't be located. Iridium pagers were (maybe still are?) a thing, for example.
replyHowever, carrying one of these is probably highly suspicious compared to a world band radio receiver.
> Like the article says, satellite messages can be traced while radio is broadcast to everyone
replyI 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...
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
replya consumer phone usually would only have an FM receiver
replyooh, new fodder for conspiracies about electric cars not having AM radios :-)
replyperhaps 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.
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