Number Stations | Hacker News Reader

Number Stations

priyom.org

64 pointsraptorraver23 comments

For years my backup strategy has been to compress and encrypt selected files, then send the hex dumps to transmitters in remote locales. Numbers station geeks dutifully jot down the data, filling pad after pad. When the data apocalypse befalls us, my recovery strategy will involve traveling far, having adventures, and collecting pages.

That's nothing. A friend of a friend of a friend created a program that read encrypted files and spoke each byte, digit by digit, using samples taken from real Russian number stations, then saved the audio file on a USB dongle and "forgot" it in some coffee bar, so that now he has all his files conveniently backed up by a dozen secret service organizations. He says accessing them might be a little problematic, however:^)

Is that the precursor to the Linus Torvalds quote?

“Only wimps use tape backup. REAL men just upload their important stuff on ftp and let the rest of the world mirror it.”

We clearly need a comic about Real Programmer Man and his exploits.

Isn't that what a decent chunk of xkcd is?

Check out Radicle. It's like a p2p git.

https://radicle.xyz/

I knew there was going to be Ethereum involved.

My favorite "number station" was the YouTube channel WebDriver Torso. For a hot minute, lots of people were trying to analyze the videos for "secret" messages hidden in the videos and wondering who they were for, when in reality they were a bunch of test videos for test automation...

Get a web SDR (DDG/Google), Fldigi and start playing.

Linux: install paprefs/pavucontrol, run paprefs, set a loopback device in the settings.

OpenBSD: The FAQ has a multimedia package on setting up sndio on monitor mode, nothing difficult.

> OpenBSD: The FAQ has...

That's basically the answer to every OpenBSD question.

True. And "page" instead of "package", as sndio comes in base.

I am living in southern Europe and it's extremely hard to listen a Number Station except for the most famous (The buzzer, the Pip, etc.). I rarely had the opportunity to listen some non Russian NS.

You need a decent radio with SSB support and a good antenna. Most of the cheap RTL devices are not covering HF band. For whom that want to start, my suggestion is to buy a Belka-DX: it's cheap (less than 150€), very portable (comparable to a cigarette box), it covers from 1.5Mhz to 30Mhz and has SDR capabilities (although with a very narrow bandwidth).

So, not sure I want to go down the Google-hole, but curious what changes have been going on recently with all the chaos in Easter Europe.

Are dormant stations coming alive?

All the cool kids listen to SKYKING now. There's a fairly persistent community around doing OSINT on that.

Not sure about becoming alive but numbers stations have been operating for awhile now. A simple one time pad [1] can be used .[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One-time_pad?wprov=sfti1

UVB-76, aka "The Buzzer" is a radio transmission of Russian origin with unknown purpose. It is listed on that site, link below:

https://priyom.org/military-stations/russia/the-buzzer

At the time of this writing, as the Russian invasion of Ukraine is on-going, rampant jamming of the buzzer is occurring. The buzzer can be listened to hear:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUgzv-8_EMc

You can listen to it in real time using WebSDR. It's on 4625 kHz so just go to a European WebSDR instance[0] and enter 4625, use mode USB (upper sideband)

[0]: http://websdr.ewi.utwente.nl:8901/

The jamming of UVB-76 is primarily done by pirates and is not new since the Ukrainian conflict. It’s been going on for many years.

My introduction to number stations came from Boards of Canada, who sampled them in their songs.

Been meaning to learn how to work with shortwave. I have an old sailing boat from the early 80s with a shortwave radio as old as the boat itself. So far it has just been a good ornament; it looks like some sort of steampunk contraption.

I was lucky enough to visit the 'Duga' radar which is responsible for the famous woodpecker transmission. It was a real treat, I didn't know I would see it when I was visiting Chernobyl in 2019.

That's a fascinating project to read about. The Australians currently have the world's best OTH radar from what I can tell, the capabilities of their system are incredible.

There's a nice video on Youtube of some Russian teenagers climbing up the Duga radar and walking along the top of it, it isn't for the faint hearted.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com