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."

Comments

There are so many places to take this story

[shadowspar]

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."

It's the Dolphin

[Nidhogg]

1. While cruising at a depth of 400 feet, the USS Dolphin was able to send e-mails up to a distance of three miles to a relayer buoy, which transferred them to land

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. :)

I wouldn't worry 'bout THAT one...

[SvnLyrBrto]

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

Marine Noise Pollution

[TheShrike]

Quoting from the Whale and Dolphin Conservation Society:

The impact of noise on cetaceans has been little studied. However, from the evidence that is available there are reasons to be concerned that their normal behaviour may be interrupted or otherwise adversely affected. They may also be displaced from areas that are of importance to them. Impacts may occur over tens and sometimes even hundreds of kilometres. The difficulty involved in detecting impacts does not mean that they are not occurring or that they are not of significance.

Just something to think about.

Security, or the /. effect?

[eric2hill]

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... ;-)"

This could be useful.

[Shoeboy]

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)