[TrunkCom] Is digital encryption the future of radio?

[MILLINNIUMCLEAN@aol.com]

 Yesterday I went and bought two new Cobra FRS walkie talkies for $79 apiece. 
On these two new FRS radios, there is the regular analog talk. But also, on 
these new radios there is a Voice Private button. When you push the Voice 
Private button, the radio switches to digital mode. When you are in digital 
mode on Voice Private, there are 29 key codes that you can program in both 
radios to have your voice transmissions encrypted. So only the people that 
have the same FRS radios and the same key codes programed in will only hear 
and talk to each other. If you want to run open transmissions, so that 
anybody can here you, you just push the Clear button to return to analog 
open. 

  So I decided to try something. First I programmed FRS channel 1 (462.5625 ) 
into my scanner. Then I talked on that channel in regular analog open mode 
and I could hear myself loud and clear. Then I hit the Private Voice button 
and put in one of the four digit encryption key codes in it. When I talked, I 
couldn't hear nothing except a dead key. One the other FRS radio I pushed 
Private Voice but did not enter one of the codes. When I tried to talk again, 
I heard the same thing on the other radio that I heard on my scanner, a 
silent dead key. So what does that mean. It means if a cheap radio service 
like the Family Radio Service can come out with encryption on one their new 
radios, then why wouldn't a muti-million dollar radio service like public 
safety, be using full digital encryption in the future?  


--- StripMime Report -- processed MIME parts ---
multipart/alternative
  text/plain (text body -- kept)
  text/html
---