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Underwater E-Mail for Submarines
/ writes "The Massachusetts-based company Benthos has developed a way for submarines to send e-mail underwater at distances of up to 3 miles (to a relay buouy) at 2,400 bps, using sound waves. Military and commercial applications abound."
All these posts from people shows something about our collective mentality.
.. uh.. research? You know? Science?
Everyone seems to assume that the only use for 'submarines' are 'combat submarines'.
Sheesh. Ever heard of
> Seaman: Sir! Sonar detected!
> Captain: Get a fix on it, mister!
> Seaman: Yessir...it's coming from 10.128.144.6!
> Captain: Torpedo room! Lock onto ping source and fire at will!
Hey, 10.*.*.* is friendly fire!
(Of course, if you're broadcasing your presence at 10.*.*.* over the external network, that's different. In that case, you probably deserve to get blowed up real good!)
Mr. Shoeboy, please tell us that the link in your post is fake. I didn't think there was anything left that could disturb me. "Dolphin males have a prehensile penis. They can wrap it around objects, and carry them as such." Wow. That's way more impressive than picking up a pen with your toes.
-B
I agree with the potential benefits for interpreting and understanding dolphin language. The problem is that if this becomes a "relied upon" technology like VLF antenna's that already exist or microwave transmitters we might soon see the underwater "flooded" with noise pollution. In China they are already coming to grips with this in that excess noise pollution has effectively "blinded" the Baji Dolphin that survives almost entirely by echolocation. Too quick of an embrace and we could end up messing with the Beluga Whales and literally "talking them to death." This isn't meant to be an anti-progress rant just a call for sane use. Porn is not more important than whales. The sailors can stick with magazines if they have to. Incidentally U.S. Submarine sailors already receive 30 words each month (at least) in e-mails from Home. As I understand it the sub surfaces and "downloads" burst traffic including personal messages relayed via the sub command centers. My guess is this is intended to be a support to the VLF emergency circuts that allow for underwater transmission in time of emergency. -------------------------------------------------- A toast to e-mail free whales exerywhere. -------------------------------------------------- PolarBearC
THE PENTAGON. (AP) A group of terrorist sea mammals claims to have possession of the authorization codes that grant access to the US Navy's nuclear arsenal.
A spokesanimal, known only as 'fLiPpOR', claims that the group will obliterate human civilization as we know it unless all water-polluting industry is immediately halted.
They also demand that all natures of fishing by humans cease immediately; and further that 12 tonnes of herring be dumped into the ocean off the coast of Spain.
Problems first became apparent when the ship's monitors of the USS Portent nuclear-class submarine began to flash the message "wE bR0kE uR lAmE @$$ 'K0DEZ' - tHe d0lphInS 0wN j00!!!!#$$!!@@!" Department of Defense officials refused to comment on speculations that marginally intelligent marine animals were able to defeat their cryptography measures.
"We are tired of being pushed aside as mere 'animals'" commented an unaffiliated dolphin on conditions of anonymity. "The frustration of being labelled a 'second-rate life form' gets to all of us, and someone finally snapped."
There is a spellbook here; eat it? [ynq]
I expect that they'd use this when passing within three miles of a US (or friendly) military ship. The friendly ship could then do the equivalent of a mail call with even pausing
I'd also expect lots of 'fake' mail calls to keep eavesdroppers from deducing actual locations. They should use a towed responder buoy, so that single source 'fake mail call' couldn't be distinguished from dual source (miles apart) 'real' mail calls.
Then again, factoring in Doppler analysis, I bet this is just demonstrator technology, and won't be used for submarine e-mail at all. Spread spectrum sonic C3I (Command, Control, Communications, Intelligence) links could have other uses like control of remote units.
Spread spectrum is definitely the way to go, if you want to hide even a short burst transmission. It should make it easier to bury your signals in the gurgle of the deep
If you can go to bed, knowing you did a valuable thing today, you're very lucky. If you can't... it's not bedtime
They weren't trying to hack into it! They were just pinging it!
---
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
The FCC was created because the airwaves *were* becoming a big ball o' static. There's nothing theoretical about it - read your history books.
The FCC continues to exist because some politicians found it a convenient backdoor way to regulate content. The "ownership" issue is also coming up in defending the seizure of frequencies used for one purpose so they can be sold, SOLD, to another group for some quick bucks.
These are fairly separate issues and it is possible for both sides to be correct.
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
without going into too much detail, ADCAP Mk 48s go a hell of a lot further than the kind of ranges this thing's supposed to work over.
If you're sneakily "swimming" a torp out off-bearing to come at the target from different direction so he can't follow the line-of-bearing back to the initial firing point, *maybe* this thing is useful. I *think* they actually download that into the torp and send corrections over the wire if they need to -- any bubbleheads who are /.'s wanna comment? (Or I could ask on sci.military.naval.) For a "snap shot" where you're trying to get off a torp directly down the other guy's line of bearing, then get the hell outta Dodge, this thing would not be useful -- you'll have to trust the torp to home on the target and not get spoofed by countermeasures. But then, torps are pretty smart li'l fishes.
I suspect that any kind of acoustic-communication guidance is a heckuva lot easier to jam than it is to make it work over any real-world type torpedo range.
"How many light bulbs does it take to change a person?" --BMcC-->
Because the bandwidth for ELF is in seconds per character -- a relatively brief email could take half a day.
"How many light bulbs does it take to change a person?" --BMcC-->
RYAN : Captain, I'm telling you he wants to defect!
MANCUSO Sonar, Conn - Jonesy, has he sent any emails in the last hour?
JONES Conn, Sonar - getting a fix on them now captain...
Aye captain, two to the Konavolov which seem to be taunts, one to his cousin in Chechnya, and there seems to be a stream of unidentified messages sent through a forged Hotmail address...
MANCUSO My orders are specific Mr Ryan. Russian submarine spamming has been getting out of hand.
Mr Thompson - flood tubes one and two and plot a solution.
--- Hot Shot City is particularly good.
Not to mention the ASW guys would love to find one of these gadgets -- with a range of three lousy miles, it's like a neon sign saying "SUBMARINES THIS WAY."
Locate comm buoy, use as initial search datum. Lather, rinse, repeat.
This has got to be the most ill-conceived idea since the Navy tried to train sea gulls to crap on enemy periscopes. (I bet you think I'm making that one up.)
"How many light bulbs does it take to change a person?" --BMcC-->
You'll also have to find a way to stabilize the comm dish/feed horn so it's always pointed at the satellite, no matter what the wind and waves are doing. I'd like to know how you'd go about miniaturizing such a stabilization system -- I doubt the buoy could be smaller than, say, a large flower pot. Especially when it has to have some sort of flotation bladder.
"How many light bulbs does it take to change a person?" --BMcC-->
OTOH, given that present military communication tech for subs is much slower than 2400bps, it may have some value in the event that a sub commander deems it necessary to risk detection versus in order to have high-speed communications for a few hours. Although communication via this method is detectable, it's probably much less detectable than surfacing and using radio, for instance.
Because the relay is in the form of a buoy, I envision an aircraft dropping a disposable relay buoy in the general vicinity of the sub (along with a bunch of decoys not in the general vicinity of the sub ;-) and the buoys self-destructing a few hours later after the message has been transmitted or received.
The most likely applications, however, are likely to be civilian. There are plenty of underwater activities involving submersibles - both human-piloted and remotely-piloted - that could benefit from this. That the test was carried out on a military vessel is more of a "marketing" thing - if there are potential military applications, who better to have test it? The commercial application may be where the profits are made, but the military can serve a valuable role on the R&D side while the bugs get worked out.
forget about bringing a girl into the house, cause he *WILL* hear you... and be able to give a frequency count too
I bet he'd also call out the Doppler and aspect changes. :o)
"How many light bulbs does it take to change a person?" --BMcC-->
- This means that they don't necessarily need to avoid detection... salvagers can now email to the surface. Imagine-- taking a photo of a wreck and sending it to the surface as you're doing the dive.
- This means that they won't necessarily be manned by contact-starved sailors. Email can be for other uses besides "hi, mom!" and porn.
...and "hi, mom" and porn won't necessarily even be the first uses that come to mind.
2. Even military submarines aren't always in combat situationsThis might not have implications for Joe Schmoe, but there are a lot of commercial and research-related uses for this technology.
Do something about world hunger. Click here
The Dolphin (SS-555) is the Navy's non-combatant deisel-powered research submarine. That boat is older than most of us and security about it's position is not a major concern.
Having served in the submarine Navy I seriously doubt this will be an option aboard the combatant vessels. Sub captains don't need any more excuses to have litters of kittens underway.
But then again... even having served as long as I did... I was constantly surprised by the military's stupidity. :)
...have the sub release a buoy that transmits an (encrypted) data payload when it hits the surface? Then, the sub can wander off and wait for an (encrypted) reply to be broadcast.
Less risk of direct detection that way, aside from the noise of releasing the buoy (which would not be negligible, but still better than sitting there screaming at 2400 baud).
DNA just wants to be free...
Actually, it's already a problem: engine noise from tankers and other assorted large watercraft and all.
It's kind of like the problem we have topside with light polution, although arguably light pollution is somewhat easier to deal with, since it's directional.
DNA just wants to be free...
You know, I wondered about that too, as well as how useful this type of communication could be in wartime. Then, after reading some more comments, I had a different take.
So they have to be within range of a buoy to send and receive. Tells me that they probably aren't going to be using this out on the open ocean. And another poster pointed out they already have their own ulra-low-freq communications system, why would they need to supplement this with a 2400 bps data comm?
Lonely sailors. These poor guys are submerged for months with no contact with the outside world right? No letters from home, nothing. So maybe the use for this is to send and receive short messages from home. Perhaps once or twice during a deployment, the sub comes within the 4 miles or so of one of several 'e-mail buoys' and uploads/downloads email? Doesn't sound like much, but when you are locked in a can underwater for four months, getting a letter from home probably is a very big deal. Guy I worked for who was in the nuclear navy said the biggest danger they had on patrols was not from being in harms way, but from sailors going apeshit because of the psychological pressure.
I don't know
There is much cruelty in the universe, John.
Yeah, we seem to have the tour map.
This man, driven insane by the lack of "$$$ QUICK" and "Free Porno" messages in his mailbox, hides in his only remaining refuge- under the sea. As Internet law has long held that people sending unsolicited e-mail shall be shot on sight, he concocts a devious way to return canned meat to the world.
Recent developments in Artificial Intelligence have created incredibly intelligent computer systems - they very nearly approximate the mental capacity of small sea creatures. With this, and the fifty-year-old technology of submarine e-mail, he forges the dreaded SPAM FISH. *dun dun DUNNNN!!!*
Using nanotechnology to automatically reproduce, these spam fish quickly reduce the Internet to its pre-2000 state - so much junk e-mail gets spread that there is roughly enough bandwidth remaining to match today's 56K modems. While the majority of end-users weep at the loss of their streaming video porn and free MP3s, the geeks of the turn of the century - now old, and considered useless by most of Silicon Valley, vaguely remember a post on Slashdot (back before Natalie Portman used the DMCA to shut it down).
(hey, how about that? I incorporated AI, nanotech, Natalie Portman, and off-the-wall future predictions into one post, and even managed to stay vaguely on-topic!)
-Joe
I don't know much about military submarines, but I have spent over 20 years working with, on, and in research submersibles. Maybe I can shed a little light on the subject of underwater email.
For research purposes, there are lots of uses for tranfering data between a submerged sub and the surface. After all, one of the things research is involved in is collecting data. For some of the data, real time analysis is important.
F'rinstance, the geodetic position of the sub is of interest to more than an enemy. If you are collecting information about a wellsite for an oil company, it would be nice to know that you are on their lease. Because GPS, Loran, or any other RF-based surface navigation signals don't travel underwater, the sub can't know its geodetic position without a little help from the surface. Sea-mail (a term I coined for underwater email) can provide that help.
Another way that sea-mail can help is to reduce misunderstandings between the bottom and the surface. Voice communicatons underwater are so bad that 2400 BPS sounds good by comparison. If the folks in the sub encounter something that needs to be discussed with the surface, text on a screen is less prone to mistakes in interpretation than poor conversation. Especially when the topic of conversation is homophores or suckopods or other things that techs on the sub aren't familiar with.
Finally, comm from a moving sub is a natural evolution from what underwater acoustic modems were developed for: getting data from the bottom to the surface without wires. If you want to know the temperature, visability, or whatever conditon on the bottom, you have to place a sensor there. To collect the data, either a wire or an acoustic link must connect the sensor with the surface. If you've ever strung a few miles of wire off a moving platform, you can see why folks are putting money into the alterative.
Getting email to submerged subs is a good thing. I hope it continues to improve until it becomes as reliable as wired commo up here where the sun shines.
The tech is aimed at the military, and the company claims that it doesn't give the sub's position away. I belive that an earlier press release (http://biz.yahoo.com/bw/000608/ma_benthos.html) makes this statement more clear by tacking on ..."without giving
away its position by raising an antenna or surfacing", which is a different matter entirely. I'm highly dubious of this, but maybe we're guessing the wrong thing as to how this functions.
Further, the range is only 3 miles. This really limits the military uses of it. OK, so you can have it bounce of buoys (and maybe seafloor retransmitters?) but still--that's a lot of infrastructure if we're spying on someone across the pacific.
Returned Peace Corps IT Volunteer
Mm. I should have responded more fully the first time. The reason the government regulates content is that the frequencies belong to the people. If the government sold you a license to broadcast at a particular frequency based on (say) first come first serve, and then you could use it any way you wanted, then you would own it- it would be your property, not the people's. Instead, the government makes you prove that you deserve to the one person who gets to broadcast at that range over everyone else who wants to, because you're becoming the custodian of a public resource. They (attempt to) make that decision based on how well you'll serve the public interest. That means saying, "If your content is not at such-and-such a level of public good, based on some method that we can measure, then you don't deserve to be the custodian of this slice of public property."
You can argue that the particular regulations that the FCC makes are not the best regulations for forwarding the public good, but it seems to me clear that they have have the right to influence content.
You'll notice that the laws governing print media are far less stringent than those on broadcast media. Newspapers and magazines can get away with way more than television stations can, simply because they don't use up any public resources.
--
-jacob
-jacob
PGP ain't gunna save your ass when that unseen enemy targets you based on your "re: me too" reply to the south park mailing list.
Rule #1 of a submarine: Do NOT MAKE NOISE
Rule #2 of a submarine: Do NOT MAKE NOISE
NightHawk
Tyranny = Government choosing how much power to give the people.
And traceroute suddenly offers new military applications as well.
now our lonely sailors can get UUencoded porn spam from newsgroups, even four miles underwater!
That should really help with their seamen problem?
--
What happens when you outlaw guns
I suppose that when I tell my g/f that my job is sending me away on a submarine mission for 6 months I'll have to supply her with an email now? Progress sucks sometimes.
-- You see, there would be these conclusions that you could jump to
Hey, this is wonderful. Not only are whales and dolphins harrassed endlessly by the sound of motors, now they can be tortured by the screeching of 2400 baud modems.
Proud member of the Weirdo-American community.
Wouldn't sending email from a submarine allow someone to detect its location? If the whole point is that the subs are supposed to be hidden ...
(Actually, there must be a way to solve this --- as otherwise radio contact from the sub to a base would have the same problem. I'm not schooled in military technique, tho; anyone know what the solution is?)
Seriously, this borders on silly. At the least it would be a Really Bad Idea...
1) As many have stated before, the main rule on subs is Be Quiet. I would imagine it would be rather a sort of Bad Thing to be able to be found by 2400bps whine. :)
1a) As of right now, needless to say, there is not a huge market in civilian oceangoing subs. :) The military already has its OWN system of getting in contact--namely, basically ELF pages sent at very slow rates (we're talking less than five words a minute--probably more like five CHARACTERS a minute--in Morse) telling them to come to periscope depth to pick up their messages. :)
2) As many others have noted, this is probably not a Terribly Healthy Thing for other forms of life that depend on sound for echolocation and communication in deep-water environments, namely, cetaceans (whales and dolphins). As it is, scientists are concerned about the noise levels that ALREADY exist, to the point of diverting ships away from breeding areas of whales (momma whales aren't terribly crazy about the sounds of motors from cruise ships).
3) Whales and dolphins aside, I'd imagine the humans at depth would be going minorly batty, and by voyage's end would be ready for the psychiatric ward of your local VA hospital :) There is a reason why most modem manufacturers disconnect the speaker after a successful connection--namely, modem sounds are damned annoying to most people. :)
4) I don't want to THINK of all the natural sources of noise that'd cause literal "line noise" (earthquakes, ELF pages, other subs, boats, whales humping/telling the metal whale to shut up that infernal racket, etc.). :)
-Windigo The Feral (NYAR!)
I can imagine Steve Jobs demoing this technology under the name "SeaPort" at Sea World: While Shamu swims in the tank, he'll throw in a waterproofed iBook and use a "SeaPorted" keyboard, mouse to view web sites with it. Then he brings up a picture of sardines and then Shamu jumps out of the pool to give him a kiss.
It is entirely possible that the objective of this research is not for use with submarines which may be involved in combat, but other vessels. For instance, wouldn't it be wonderful if the research submarine Alvin could carry a webcam down next time they visited an undersea vent? OK, at 2400 it's not going to update very often, but still...
My dad's a retired chief who did his twenty in the sonar shack; all the way from GUPPY boats to 688s before he retired (ie. forget about bringing a girl into the house, cause he *WILL* hear you... and be able to give a frequency count too).
Proposals like this thing, AND the acoustic email thing in the main topic would make him laugh his ass of... about two seconds before he reached out and twisted your head off for sugessting such a damn stupid idea.
Simple fact is: sound BAD... quiet GOOD.
These survallance ships would be sitting ducks just screaming to ivan : PLEASE KILL ME PLEASE KILL ME.
Active sonar announces your position to a passive listener LONG BEFORE you get enough of a return to track your target. On subs, the ONLY time they're used is to perfect your solution right before you fire on your target... and usually it's not even necessary even then, passive sonar is so good it's SCARY.
Ditto w/ skimmers. The only time skimmers use active sonar is when the whole world knows where you are already, such guarding a CVBG from subs. And even then, a CVBG can go silent and "dissappear" for a distrubingly long time.
I dont think you need to worry about this thing bothering the whales.
john
Imagine all the people...
On that note (Windows and the Navy):
http://www.sciam.com/1998/119 8issue/1198techbus2.html
:wq
Just something to think about.
--
If R is the set of all sets which don't contain themselves, does R contain itself?
Doesn't this sound like a fairly open security hole? I can see it now...
;-)"
"...in related news, a US Trident nuclear submarine was found to have been hacked and has been sending it's military GPS position to an IRC channel for the last 3 weeks. Sources close to the incedent have been thrown in the brigg, and the hacked Windows 2000 box was sent back to Microsoft (OS Division) with a Post-It note saying Please Fix. Linux zealots were heard laughing around the world."
Or I guess maybe the better point to make is...
"Oops - sorry Admiral. I'll have the lights back on in a minute! Running the web server process on the main computer was a good idea until its URL got posted to Slashdot...
LOAD "SIG",8,1
LOADING...
READY.
RUN
I can see it now...
[ping]...[ping]...[ping]
Seaman: Sir! Sonar detected!
Captain: Get a fix on it, mister!
Seaman: Yessir...it's coming from 10.128.144.6!
Captain: Torpedo room! Lock onto ping source and fire at will!
------
------
You are in a twisty little maze of open source licenses, all different.
"This is the first time that a submarine, operating at submerged depth and speed, has been able to communicate without giving away its position by raising an antenna or surfacing."
Instead, the submarine gave away it's position by screaming a whole bunch of digital noise loud enough to make every sea mammal within 4 miles go deaf.
yay for progress?
--
What happens when you outlaw guns
Are you trolling, or are you serious? The government regulates broadcasting because if they didn't, the airwaves would be a big ball o' static and no one could use them for anything, including transmitting the Truth about the Government. That's why the FCC exists. It was not a plot against the citizens by the Man; it was created as a necessary regulatory body.
--
-jacob
-jacob
I have two passions in life, dolphin molestation and slashdot. The problem is that when I'm scuba diving, I can't tell if slashdot has been updated. Just 5 minutes ago, I was wondering if there was some way to get new headlines emailed to me while I'm living out my flipper fantasies. All that karma has paid off!
Science, is there anything it can't do?
--Shoeboy
(former microserf)