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."

Comments

Pirates

[fisticuffs]

What exactly are the "pirates" pirating? Does mere communications count as "piracy" now?

what's with the !pirates tag?

[Animaether]

read up, whoever tagged this story with "!pirates"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pirate_radio

piracy has widespread meanings, from the somali crazies type pirates to software/music/movie/etc. pirates to pirate radio communication.

just like hacker vs cracker, that battle was 'lost' many decades ago, probably before you were even born.

40 year old tech?

[DomNF15]

With defense appropriated funds accounting for a large chunk of the USA's annual budget, you'd think they could use something newer than 1970's era technology for long range com...wouldn't the time/money/resources spent on busting the "pirates" be better spent on a new (secure) system?

The definition of "Pirate", among other things...

[geekmux]

So now pirate is going to be used for anyone using something for nothing?

So now "prostitute" is going to be used for anyone selling sex?

So now "pilot" is going to be used for anyone flying a plane?

Uh, hate to break it to you, but sometimes the right word is used properly. But if you prefer, we could always call them "hackers" and really stir up the geek shit pot...

Not used anymore...

[Skuld-Chan]

Asides from the fact that these operators were way outside their respective allowed band, they did no harm as these satellites aren't even used anymore by the US-Navy (for whom they were built). They should repurpose them for civilian use if possible - which would be cool as they are geo stationary.

Why is this even illegal?

[hackel]

If the incompetent soldiers at the U.S. Navy can't figure a way to secure their own satellites, why should the citizens of another country on the other side of the planet be prosecuted, fined, or worse, merely for sending out a radio signal that happens to match the same frequency the U.S. military used? This is insanity. It makes me angry that the Brazilian government is cooperating at all with the U.S. Defence Department in targeting these individuals. They should be protecting them! If a U.S. soldier is wounded in the field and is unable to radio for help, he or she should curse himself first, for joining the military, and second his idiot government for designing such an insecure satellite.

I hope more Brazilians and others from around the world get in on this act! Perhaps there's a way we can use it to multicast data as well, that would be brilliant!

Re:So if i pirate Music with these Satellites...

[PopeRatzo]

...were water boarded 183 times by the marines.

When I saw that the CIA had waterboarded a terror suspect 183 times, it made me wonder how the decision was made after they had waterboarded the guy 182 times and not gotten what they wanted to try just once more.

Can't let this one go without comment

[sean.peters]

Much of the parent is misleading or false.

An income tax is much more complex and labor-intensive than all other forms of taxation.

It's true that our current income tax system is complex... but it's hardly true that this is an essential feature of income tax systems. We could have a simple income tax system, but we've chosen not to. Similarly, excise and sales taxes can be complex, and some of them are... at the very least, they vary wildly from state to state and product to product.

The only reason for having one is so that you can use carrot-and-stick methods to manipulate the population ("do something we like, get a tax credit; do something we don't like, pay more"). That's the only "benefit"; otherwise it is inferior in every way to all other forms of taxation.

This is utterly ridiculous. The reason for having an income tax is that it can be made progressive (in other words, you can make rich people pay proportionally more), in ways you can't with sales/excise taxes. That's the benefit of an income tax system... and yes, it is in fact a benefit. The carrot & stick effect is by no means exclusive to income taxes, either - excise taxes on, for example, cigarettes, are explicitly a stick being wielded against tobacco use.

Re:Can't let this one go without comment

[LordVader717]

Your assumption actually proves you're not experienced in the matter.
It's actually quite the opposite. Rich people aren't generally affected by sales tax. That's because rich people generally put their money into real estate or invest in shares. Proportionally they use much less on living than the less wealthy do. That's why sales tax is highly regressive.
It's a little far fetched to claim that lower classes only pay for food and rent. They also spend their money on consumer goods like TVs and computers, furniture, household equipment, cars and not least leisure and going out, all of which is hurt by sales tax. For rich people all of this is mere pennies.

Re:Same Thing with Video Game Consoles

[Belial6]

No, they put that in to maintain a monopoly on the manufacture of cartridge and software for the NES. They didn't want just anybody to be able to sell their own software directly to customers without Nintendo getting a paid. It wasn't to stop piracy. It was to stop the legitimate writers of software from selling their work.