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Comment by edrxty | Hacker News Reader

Seconded. You can still have a requirement to ID in the clear if you want, but all other modern radio systems are encrypted and any interesting protocols will be largely indistinguishable from encryption from a regulatory point of view. Ham radio is first and foremost for experimentation, not ragchew, and there's no point maintaining a radio service that is fundamentally crippled.

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My concern is that the moment you implement encryption you've opened a race to the bottom in people abusing the license for purposes outside the license. Even if you know who it is, you don't know what they're doing.

The temptation to use up the limited spectrum for reasons outside the spirit of the license will undoubtedly be taken by some, we know how bad it can be already when you can clearly identify it.

It’s not crippled; It’s the opposite. Its the only radio service where when you want to do something new with it, you are supposed to publish how. If you want to do something different, use a different band where it’s permitted. The amateur bands continue to have a valid purpose the way they are.

I would advocate strongly for additional spectrum becoming available for public use as it is evacuated as an alternative to the fcc reselling it. I have zero problems with /new bands/ being made available on potentially /new services/ that would allow for what you want.

CBRS in USA is a good example of a new band that allows new things to be done.

I'm rather jealous of the ease of it for standing up a proper private 5G network for experimentation and learning.

Unlike GSM almost none of the modern cellular standards can be configured to run without encryption, so hambands are out of the queation sadly.

I see these takes pop up all the time but I have yet to hear of a legitimate use case that wouldn't be solved with digital signatures which are allowed under current rules

The most common case people run into: I want to be able to interface with literally any other communication technology in common use without having to strip TLS.

The basic case: Alice wants to talk to Bob and would rather not have their crazy neighbor listen in and threaten violence because psychosis (Don't believe me? Hang out on the fun parts of the HF spectrum).

The public service use case: a disaster occurred, I need to send medical information to a known recipient. Other countries have allowances for this but the US does not.

The because it's literally unenforceable anyway case: yeah, go after noise sources that don't have an ID but prove to me my shitty CW transmitter with a trillion ppm of phase noise isn't actually broadcasting encrypted PSK within pulses.

> a disaster occurred

In the case of emergency, the restrictions on your license no longer apply. You can use whatever means necessary to establish the desired communications.

Cool, so a central component of a disaster response is preparation. How do you practice for that when you can't do real key enrollment/management outside of a real disaster?

There is a difference between disaster and emergency. The emergency exception is for immediately saving a life. It is basically that if need to call 911 and can’t, you can break rules on radio.

There are lots of people who think the rules are suspended during disaster. That is only true if actively saving a life during a disaster.

Eh yeah I've heard these. The important bit to remember is Part 97.113 on prohibited transmissions: "Communications, on a regular basis, which could reasonably be furnished alternatively through other radio services." That's the bit that trips these up rather than the encryption prohibition.

The common case: this is vague and probably falls under the above. What's an example?

The basic case: use phones. All of us that have spent time on HF are well aware of the antisocial behavior sometimes found there. I don't think you'll run into any ham that's against stricter enforcement in this area.

Public service: SHARES is probably the move here. I think I would support waivers similar to how they were previously allowing PACTOR 4 though. Despite what the ARRL says I'm a little dubious of our utility in disasters these days in any case.

I mean sure you can come up with any number of ways to get away with it but that doesn't mean we should endorse that behavior.

Re common case, it's typically an accidental thing. Lots of people are standing up things like ham mesh networks and similar but anything internet proximal has a very high likelihood of leaking cypher text over the air.

Re basic case, I should refine my statement a bit, HF is currently populated enough that having more traffic there is probably not advisable yet. If I was given a magic pen, I'd probably allow encryption on the lesser used HF bands and 6m on up.

As far as public service/phones/other services, I don't really buy into the disaster prepper stuff that's been popular as of late, but there's an opportunity for amateur radio to remain relevant. Rather than trying to prevent encryption and keep all that stuff on other ISM type bands, putting some of it under the ham umbrella could be very positive development.

> all other modern radio systems are encrypted

So, what's stopping you from using _those_, then?

They're used on the ham bands all the time, you just don't notice.

How is a lack of encryption “crippling “ the hobby?

DMR is used without encryption as are other commercial modes.

The point if the experimental nature is that it is open.

For experimentation you should be able to use those protocols with the cipher replaced with a null cipher. The aspects of the protocols that are radio-related should not be affected.

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