For those who don't get it, this is the reason for the
second amendment.
Ken Potter
w3kmp
NRA Life Member
CRA 1401
ECARS 3779
-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of
Donald Chester
Sent: Tuesday, July 23, 2002 2:31 PM
To: amradio@mailman.qth.net
Subject: [AMRadio] Radio Polizania
>From last week's Telecom Digest and DX Listener's
Digest (forwarded to me by
e-mail):
** U S A. House Radio Bill
http://www.mail-archive.com/cypherpunks-moderated%40min
der.net/msg01671.html
Dave Emery (N1PRE)'s outstanding review of the radio
reception provisions in
the Cyber Electronic Security Act passed by the House
on Monday, July 15.
"In effect this removes a safe harbor created during
the negotiations over
the ECPA back in 1985-86 which ensured that first
offenses for hobby radio
listening were only treated as minor crimes - after
this law is passed
SIMPLY INTENTIONALLY TUNING A COMMON SCANNER to the
(non-blocked) cordless
phone frequencies could be prosecuted as a
felony for which one could serve 5 years in jail. ..."
And there's more, including changed provisions related
to the publication of
material heard by radio.
http://www.newsignals.com http://www.spectrumfinder.net
(Benn Kobb, July 17, DX LISTENING DIGEST)
** U S A. [WUN] MAJOR CHANGE TO THE ECPA THAT IMPACTS
EVERYONE...
Date: Wed, 17 Jul 2002 11:46:01 -0400
From: Dave Emery [EMAIL PROTECTED]
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Something of enormous importance to radio hobbyists has
just happened in
Washington, and so far I haven't seen any mention or
discussion of it on any
scanner or ham lists I follow. I hope this message
will alert others to
what has just happened and get people thinking about
the consequences...
The House just passed the Cyber Security Enhancement
Act (HR3482) last night
(7/15/02) by an overwhelming margin of 385-3. Buried
in an otherwise
draconian bill that raises penalties for computer
hacking that causes death
or serious injury to life in prison and allows
government monitoring of
communications and email without warrants in even more
circumstances is the
following seeming obscure language:
: SEC. 108. PROTECTING PRIVACY.
:
: (a) Section 2511- Section 2511(4) of title 18, United
: States Code, is amended--
:
: (1) by striking paragraph (b); and
:
: (2) by redesignating paragraph (c) as paragraph (b).
For those of you who don't realize what this means
USC Section 2511 subsection 4 of title 18 (the ECPA)
currently reads as
foilows the CSEA will strike part (b) of this
language.
Penalties..
: (a)
:
: Except as provided in paragraph (b) of this
subsection
: or in subsection (5), whoever violates subsection
(1)
: of this section shall be fined under this title or
: imprisoned not more than five years, or both.
:
:
[The following section will be eliminated by the new
law...]
: (b)
:
: If the offense is a first offense under paragraph
(a)
: of this subsection and is not for a tortious or
illegal
: purpose or for purposes of direct or indirect
commercial
: advantage or private commercial gain, and the wire
or
: electronic communication with respect to which the
: offense under paragraph (a) is a radio communication
that
: is not scrambled, encrypted, or transmitted using
: modulation techniques the essential parameters of
: which have been withheld from the public with the
: intention of preserving the privacy of such
communication,
: then -
:
: (i)
:
: if the communication is not the radio portion of a
: cellular telephone communication, a cordless
telephone
: communication that is transmitted between the
cordless
: telephone handset and the base unit, a public land
: mobile radio service communication or a paging
service
: communication, and the conduct is not that
described
: in subsection (5), the offender shall be fined
under
: this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or
: both; and
:
: (ii)
:
: if the communication is the radio portion of a
: cellular telephone communication, a cordless
telephone
: communication that is transmitted between the
cordless
: telephone handset and the base unit, a public land
: mobile radio service communication or a paging
service
: communication, the offender shall be fined under
this
: title.
What this does is change the penalty for the first
offense of intercepting
an unscrambled and unencrypted radio communication that
is not supposed to
be listened to (e.g. AMPS cellular calls, commercial
pagers, cordless
phones, common carrier communications) for hobby
purposes (eg not a tortuous
or illegal purpose or for direct or indirect commercial
advantage or private
commercial gain) from a
misdemeanour (one year or less prison time) to a
federal FELONY (5 years
prison time).
And further this changes the status of the specific
offense of listening to
a cell call, cordless call, a pager, or a public land
mobile radio se
