[Milsurplus] Sixty year old IFF gear security lapse

Mike Morrow kk5f at earthlink.net
Fri Jul 16 10:13:00 EDT 2004


Here's some trivia.

It's well known that the ABK/ABF/SCR-595/SCR-695 IFF transponders were
marked on their nomenclature tags and referred in their operating manuals as
a "RADIO RECEIVER" rather than the technically correct "RADIO
RECEIVER-TRANSMITTER."  Reportedly this was to mislead the enemy in the
event of equipment capture.

I don't image that fooled any enemy technical intelligence section, but I
just noticed that the nomenclature plate for my ABK-5 has the unit
designation of CZR-43AAY AIRCRAFT RADIO RECEIVER.  To properly maintain the
ruse of a receiver, that should have been CZR-46AAY.  The "43" was used for
a receiver-transmitter, "46" should have been used for a receiver.  So the
equipment numerical nomenclature plate did in fact show the unit function
for what it really was.

73,
Mike / KK5F




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