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Radio Station Hijacked Eight Times In the Past Month To Play 'I'm a Wanker' Song (bleepingcomputer.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bleeping Computer: An unknown hacker has hijacked the radio frequency of a UK radio station to play an obscene song eight times during the past month, according to the radio station's manager who recently revealed the hacks in an interview with BBC Radio 4. The hacks have been reported to Ofcom, the UK's communications regulator, who together with the radio station's staff have tried to track down the culprit at last three times, without success. Ofcom and radio station officials believe the hacker is using a mobile radio transmitter to broadcast a stronger signal on the radio station's normal frequency, overriding its normal program. In eight different occasions, the hacker has taken over broadcasts and has been heard talking, screaming, or singing, and then playing "The Winker's Song" (NSFW) by British comedian Ivor Biggun, a track about self-pleasure released in the 70s. Station manager Tony Delahunty told BBC Radio he received phone calls from distressed listeners complaining that their kids started humming the song. Fellow radio stations also called Delahunty to inquire about the hack, fearing similar hijacks.
"calls from distressed listeners complaining that their kids started humming the song" -- that's hilarious
> Ofcom and radio station officials believe the hacker is using a mobile radio transmitter to broadcast a stronger signal on the radio station's normal frequency, overriding its normal program.
Either this is the weakest commercial radio station in the world, or the "hacker" has access to a massive amplifier and antenna, or he's just overriding the station's frequency in a very small area. My money is on the last of those, and also that this story is of negligible significance.
Or perhaps the officials are wrong and the guy is overpowering a much weaker studio-to-transmitter link and using the station's own signal to broadcast his onanistic outrage.
This is just an old fashioned pirate radio.
I've never heard so many cries of "Well, I never!" There were bodies lying prostrate on fainting couches all about the city! The horror!
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
It will be awhile, but if the pirate continues doing this, they will find him and grind them into dust.
Most people don't realize that the BEST jokes are the ones that happen only a few times and when the jokester does it enough to be noticed but stops before they get caught.
Some of my best pranks are ones I only did a few times with long intervals in between. The best being an E-mail prank that I only pulled twice in 3 years and nobody suspected that it was me until a decade later after I told the Sys Admin staff the secret on my last day so they could fix the hole. I still remember the crazy searching for the perpetrator and the hand wringing memos from embarrassed management types getting posted on the bulletin boards in the break room....
Then there was the changing of the channels in the cafeteria TV's that just mysteriously happened even though they where out of reach and the remote controls locked up in the boss' office...I did that one a couple of times a week, using an IR recording/playback device, for a month, stopped when the Boss set up a surveillance camera, then did it every few weeks once the camera disappeared. I'm sure it drove him crazy because he was complaining about it in public... Not sure if he caught on to me after I left there or not, but I got really tired of CNN only on the TV's at lunch.
"File to fit, pound to insert, paint to match" - Aircraft Maintenance 101
Yeah that could have been worded better. Signal hijacking or intrusion is a better word. The transmitter towers are line of sight from the studio so all you need is a transmitter and antenna to get in the way. I wish the Max Headroom guy would come forward and reveal the details. The statute is limitations is long up.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
You should look into the history of the word "Hack" ... it didn't originate with computers, but with model railroading and made the leap over into computers via MIT's model railroading club.
For pity's sake, are you new? Hacking and phreaking (which is a word put together from phone hacking) were terms applied to radio, telegraphy, and telephony long before computers. Where do you think the term came from? It's from cutting into communications - sometimes it involved physically cutting into the wires, sometimes it involved cutting into signals. Hence the word "hack". One would find a myriad of ways to piggyback onto transcontinental radio and telegraphy.
Take your two minutes of rage and face it into a mirror.
a mobile transmitter... sounds like ge's got himself a CB radio with sidebands (illegal in the UK) which can hit the FM spectrum allocated to radio stations
What CB radios do you guys have that'll do 230Khz wide signals in 88-108MHz? Certainly can't get this with a 27MHz CB....
Sendmail is like emacs: A nice operating system, but missing an editor and a MTA.
There are parts of Europe which haven't switched to DAB+
Oh, boy I can't wait for another finicky all-or-nothing digital broadcasting system and hundreds of radio sets at the recycling bin.