[Scan-DC] Police: Encrypting scanners thwarted criminals

[Lee Williams]

As a 40 year veteran police officer I will tell you that full encryption of law enforcement frequencies used by local law enforcement is not necessary for officer safety. Obviously having the ability to encrypt when necessary is. Democracy dies in darkness means exactly what you are seeing and not hearing in this country as agency after agency encrypts. The challenge for the people who read this is to fight against it when your local jurisdiction starts making plans and statements to encrypt. Towards that end please feel free to contact me for some arguable points that can be used in public meetings, letters to officials, and forwarded to the media. It may be a losing battle but it's one we should wage!
________________________________
From: scan-dc-bounces at mailman.qth.net <scan-dc-bounces at mailman.qth.net> on behalf of Joseph M. Durnal <joseph.durnal at gmail.com>
Sent: Wednesday, July 25, 2018 8:43 AM
To: Scott, KB3JQQ
Cc: Scan-DC at mailman.qth.net
Subject: Re: [Scan-DC] Police: Encrypting scanners thwarted criminals

Now that I know who Lindsey is, I’ll concur.

When I first found streaming online of scanner feeds I thought it was
great, but that was in the days before anyone and everyone was online.
Also,it used almost all of your bandwidth and CPU.  It did not occur to me
that one day it would contribute negatively to the hobby I enjoy.

It isn’t like the police didn’t know that their radio transmissions could
be heard by the public, but it was less of a concern because the public who
was listening would need to put some effort into it, purchasing the right
equipment, finding and programming the frequencies, etc.  These days, it
costs nothing, takes no effort, and zero know how to listen in on the
police.  If there is anything that works well for a criminal, it’s
something thy don’t have to pay for, put any effort into, and any idiot can
do.

I know my local departments are well aware of the public streams and they
know how to avoid it when they need to.  They even know some people and
addresses that are known to use scanner apps.  The anomaly is Frederick
City, which has been encrypted since I can remember.

On many occasions I’ve been able to take a different route to avoid police
activity.  Maybe there is some self serving in that I want to save myself a
few minutes, and I especially don’t want to drive through their man hunt
perimeter, and I’m sure they’d rather I didn’t either.

I suppose, it is what it is.  The next generation of radio enthusiasts will
have to settle for listening to hams and noaa weather.

J


On Tuesday, July 24, 2018, Scott, KB3JQQ via Scan-DC <
scan-dc at mailman.qth.net> wrote:

> Thank you Lindsey.
>
>       From: Alan Henney <alan at henney.com>
>  To: Scan DC <Scan-DC at mailman.qth.net>
>  Sent: Tuesday, July 24, 2018 1:35 AM
>  Subject: [Scan-DC] Police: Encrypting scanners thwarted criminals
>
> New Hampshire Union Leader (Manchester)
>
> 23 July 2018
>
> Police: Encrypting scanners thwarted criminals
>
>
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