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Brazilian Pirates Hijack US Military Satellites
blantonl writes "Brazilians all over the country are using modified amateur radio equipment to communicate with each other using US Military communications satellites — effectively creating their own CB radio network on the backs of the US Military. Recent efforts to crack down have resulted in arrests of some of the users, however the behavior still continues today."
I remember when those birds used to pickup terrestrial FM stations. You could listen to the downlink 'in the clear.' This use of military satellites goes back to, at least, 1978.
Toil is Stupid. Don't be Stupid.
Bad geek! It's called Pirate radio, and it's been around longer than the Pirate bay!
"Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
What exactly are the "pirates" pirating? Does mere communications count as "piracy" now?
They may be extending an older term referred to as Pirate Radio which referred to the 'piracy' of radio frequencies. But how can you steal a frequency? :)
Keep in mind this term was around long before internet piracy and I'm guessing they are extending this concept to illicit satellite usage that is very much like a broadcasting communication technology. The military might not be needing these satellites to remain silent just like the FCC doesn't absolutely need silence on all non-allocated radio bands.
Remember, almost every word has baggage before you pick it up and use it. Even worse is the fact that that baggage is very much subjective.
My work here is dung.
One standard amateur VHF transceiver, one frequency doubling circuit, one reasonably high gain antenna. And possibly some satellite tracking software. All easily available.
These are old "bent pipe" FLTSATCOM birds from the 1980s. The transponder tech dates to the 1970s. It's all going to be superseded by the Mobile User Objective System very soon now, so it might even be a good idea to just sell Brazil the old system. Well, assuming the GEO slots aren't needed.
Pirates are only in the news because they're sloppy. Ninjas would have killed whoever found out before they found out then covered up their tracks. You obviously don't know anything about ninjas, you should go do some learnin' before you anger a ninja, I suggest here (realultimatepower.net) to get the real deal.
NASA budget: $17.2 billion - DoD budget: $515.4 billion - nuff said...
Ships call for help using a 406 MHz EPIRB. The signal is picked up by the COSPAS-SARSAT satellite network and relayed to a local SAR station. The 406 MHZ beacons are a big improvement over the old 121.5 and 243 MHz beacons, as they support identification and GPS data. The old beacons basically just scream "Help!".
Come on folks, this is a serious news article :-)
I've spent a tremendous amount of time listening to these bootleggers on the FLTSATCOM satellites. It is rather easy for them (the Brazilians and others) to modify a amateur radio or other transmitters to use these satellites.
Basically, these satellites work by listening on one frequency (an uplink), and rebroadcasting what they hear over a specified frequency bandwidth to listeners (a downlink). The uplink and downlink frequencies are well known and published across many mediums - including Mil-Std documents which specify how terminals should interact with these satellites.
I published a spectrum analysis article on this very topic here (shameless plus):
http://radioreference.blogspot.com/2008/10/vhfuhf-spectrum-analysis-using-rf-space.html
This method of communication is actually very secure for the US Military - since they rarely use clear voice on these transponders - meaning, they encrypt all transmissions to and from.
Now, an open repeater, in Geospacial orbit, provides a set of repeaters for anyone to use... either the US military (which they still actively use) - or others who have equipment that can transmit to, and reiceve from.
For those that are dismayed by this approach, understand that when this technology was developed, security by obscurity was a common approach even for military agencies. It wasn't feasible even 10 years ago to "authenticate" use access to open satellite transponders.
Lindsay Blanton
RadioReference.com