how to find pirate radio stationshow to find pirate radio stations

I will put in the show notes a link to the FCC complaint page and the phone number if you would like to get involved. Now when we talk about enforcement actions, you know, I'd like to kind of paint a picture for our listeners. We have had cases where we have gone in on in rem seizures and found drug paraphernalia inside the building and so that becomes now a law enforcement issue and they take care of that, they handle that situation. Finding Shortwave Stations and Broadcasts. Additionally, pirate broadcasters don't have to deal with all the legal complexities of setting up and running a streaming internet service, such as writing terms of service or meeting contractual obligations, he notes. While debunking myths about pirates, I can say that in my years of pirate radio listening Ive never heard a pirate intentionally jam a legal broadcaster. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Oh, yes. The most popular frequency is arguably 6,925 kHz, but I often log pirates on 6,935 and 6,950 kHz. VIEWS. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Yes. All you need is a location to host the antenna and access to electricity unless you've got batteries, then just the location.". MR. DOMBROWSKI: A lot of these stations are streaming at the same time so it really boggles my mind why an FM station that's unlicensed, you know, has its stream content and then also it's broadcasting over the airwaves. The reason is, no matter what time of the year it is, no matter what the space weather (yes, I said space weather) or conditions of the ionosphere are--FM stations are relatively few, local, and always broadcast in the same spots on the FM dial. Enter the dawn of pirate radio. So it's not just that a pirate radio station might be harming other radio stations, which is bad in and of itself and could pose a public safety risk with emergency communications, but we're talking serious stuff when we talk about FAA and air traffic control. Now, of course, my favorite thing that I want to ask you is what are some fun examples, maybe not fun, but interesting examples of cases that you have closed where maybe the circumstances were a bit bizarre or interesting that might help a listener understand just how weird some of this stuff can get and just how interesting some of these operations can be. I asked him why he would still take the risk to go back on air and he said he wanted to reach the homeless, the shut-ins, the elderly who couldn't access the internet.". I apologize to the listeners in advance if I make any horrible, corny jokes throughout the course of this podcast, but it would probably help to start with a definition, right. We do a field strength measurement to see if their power exceeds that threshold and if they meet the Part 15 requirements or not. It could be harmful if we let a pirate radio station operate because sometimes they cause interference to other services, like aeronautical communications. So you couldn't be blamed for assuming that it depicts a long-vanished phenomenon, like Nehru jackets with iridescent scarves and psychedelic-patterned paper mini dresses. MR. DOMBROWSKI: And so they said well because we were here before it was colonized our federal laws don't apply to us. Please support this website by adding us to your whitelist in your ad blocker. For his new show, Bruce promises "me and my musings and all the great . "To enforce the law and protect American radio listeners and lawful businesses, the Federal Communications Commission has made a concerted effort in recent years to step up our enforcement efforts against pirate radio stations.". But if you are buying something off of the dark web or whatever and it's coming into the U.S. you don't know, and when we talked before the show you mentioned that a lot of times with these FAA complaints it's a malfunctioning transmitter. I was still a teenager. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Well that's what I went up with. Shortwave DX Blog - A blog with loggings and information relating to shortwave pirate radio in Europe. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes, it may not start to cause interference as soon as you open up and out of the box and operate it, but over time with the heating up of the electronics inside it starts to malfunction and cause what we call spurius emissions where signals are operating outside your intended band and cause interference to other radio services. And so, yes, we may -- We have a warrant for the property. We also would be required to file a report to Congress annually on our enforcement activities in pirate radio. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Yes, in those dense urban areas because the FM band is already pretty clogged up with legitimate stations that might be one of the reasons that people throw up their hands and say, well, I guess I'm just do an illegal station because I am frustrated by the legal process for getting a station, but that is not a justification in any sense of the word. I mean are there tell-tale signs or are some of these stations so sophisticated that it's really hard for the average person to distinguish? Across the country, FCC officials are working to identify and take action against unlicensed radio operators that illegally use the frequencies allocated for legitimate radio operators. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: There is not a sign on the box that says illegal pirate radio transmitters. Searching for an FM radio station on your car radio is quite easy. The Radio Informer - The latest info on the world of radio including:world,shortwave . Pirate cards are among the most unusual of QSL cards, that often incorporate obscure or vintage imageryhumor, horror, or other graphic oddityor cast the pirate in a unique character representation. MR. DOMBROWSKI: No, it doesn't have -- It's not marked with pizza delivery guy either. Addeddate 2022-03-13 23:21:58 . So they thought that was a way for them to avoid detection by hopping from building to building and frequency to frequency. Radio Caroline. It will also help to have some sort of adjustable bandwidth filter (wide/narrow). Very old school, and cheap enough for anyone's budget. I was glad to be here, it was a great opportunity. Set up your Raspberry Pi You'll need to get Raspbian, the Linux-based operating system for the Raspberry Pi. If they have some skin in the game, an operator or a landlord or a property owner that let somebody put a station up on their rooftop, you know, it's illegal for them to have that station there. Radio Caroline founder Ronan O'Rahilly had another claim to fame, in that he influenced actor George Lazenby to give up the role of James Bond after playing in just one film, "On Her Majesty's Secret Service," in 1969. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Well at least you are recycling. I mean stream --. He anchored the ship in international waters in the North Sea, just off Frinton, Essex, and hired a crew of DJs to play music around the clock at the time, a revolutionary concept. So what is pirate radio? MR. SWARZTRAUBER: And then just out of those four offices you then have to dispatch agents to 20 different States, so it's quite a big chunk of the country in terms of population. MR. DOMBROWSKI: So this equipment helps us track us down. That was particularly true on the other side of the Atlantic, where the U.K. allowed only state-controlled radio from the 1920s through the mid-1960s. "How Pirate Radio Rocked the 1960s Airwaves and Still Exists Today" It's a very calm, peaceful, that's what our agents are trained to do, because it works a lot more in getting the truth of what's going on rather than being threatening and forceful. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Yes. They can be highly entertaining or thought-provoking, and thus are, themselves, a unique art form. Ive had great results in the past with an old Icom IC-735 and a 40-meter dipole antenna. (Disclaimer). We do that with every pirate station. PROMAX designs several monitoring and spectrum surveillance systems. An excellent and active pirate radio forum hosted by Chris Smolinski. The BBC played catch-up launching Radio One and recruiting the same pirates for their roster. Ive also been encouraged by pirates to hone my weak-signal DXing using exalted carrier reception (ECR)zero-beating an AM signal in SSBin an attempt to hear weak AM pirate stations. And so that impedes the investigation a little bit because it is difficult to find where that studio is located, but we do, we do a lot of interviews. Open up the transmitter Locate the seam on the transmitter's case and pry it open with a putty knife (if your transmitter is screwed shut, you'll need a screwdriver to open it). So I have -- In terms of population I manage 20 States in the Northeast area of the United States. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes, to lease some air time off these legitimate stations. Now this is not just a focus of the FCC, Congress is also interested in this. David Goren, a veteran radio producer who's created programming for National Public Radio, has spent years studying pirate broadcasters. The result was a border-blaster that covered a wide geographical area. A lot of stations conceal their antennas, they hide behind things, they take the antennas down during they day, so they try avoid detection. And so we need to make sure that we stop the importation of this equipment, we stop the marketing of these illegal transmitters. Other times though you might have reason to suspect that they are in on it, they are getting a kickback. David, thanks so much for joining. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Yes. If you have information about a pirate radio station, you can notify the FCC by calling 888-CALLFCC or filing a complaint online at https://consumercomplaints.fcc.gov. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: So let's say that either a broadcaster or a listener files a complaint, what happens then, what tools do you, your colleagues in the FCC, have to go about finding a station, shutting it down, bringing people to justice? Marshals, Department of Justice, because we are a federal agency, but have we leveraged the resources and the knowledge of local law enforcement in working on this, are there, you know, different approaches from different States? They just twist the dial. The U.S. has had its share of pirate broadcasters over the years as well. Oh, it happens a lot, especially in these urban areas like New York. So a pirate radio by simple terms is a broadcast station operating in the FM band, 88 megahertz to 108 megahertz that you dial up on your car radio, that is operating without a license. Of course, the chaos of the radio spectrum was one of the reasons this agency was created in the first place, including our predecessor agency The Federal Radio Commission, but there are other issues that broadcasters in particular complain about. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: That's some great local cooperation right there. Thank you, too, for your support of these sites. Unlike trying to locate China Radio International, Radio Australia, or the BBC World Service, hunting pirates requires a decent-quality radio and antenna. No, not the Pirates of the Caribbean or East Africawe're talking about pirate radio. This book makes it easier for you to locate and tune in pirate stationsand tells you all about the unlicensed broadcasters who play David to broadcasting conglomerates' Goliath. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Right. "One reason I've found as to why people are still using pirate radio is that these communities have very strong cultural and historic connections to radio," Goren explains. These pirate stations pose a host of problems for public safety, including interference with emergency alerts and air traffic control. In the U.S. the most famous example of a Pirate Radio station was Mexico's XERF. And so these transmitters that they are purchasing and pirate stations are using do not go through the equipment process, the equipment authorization process, and that is a problem. They don't know how to reach us? 2022-03-13 23:21:58 Storage_size 430.7 GB (in 25,393 files) Title Pirate Radio Airchecks. Pirate stations want listeners to discover them, so they broadcast in various "watering holes." "These transmissions can interfere with licensed radio signals including broadcasters' sharing of vital public safety information with their communities," FCC chairman Ajit Pai said in a statement. These include Amateur Radio Newsline, a weekly audio news [] The plot is based loosely on the saga of an actual former pirate station, Radio Caroline, that was founded by an offbeat Irish entrepreneur named Ronan O'Rahilly, the inspiration for the character portrayed by Bill Nighy. And so it ranges from Maine down to Virginia and all the States east of Missouri, Iowa, and Minnesota. It was the strongest pirate station I have ever witnessed. Once you get a license it restricts you where you can operate, how much power you can use, what antenna you can use, and how high your antenna is. That happens a lot. MR. DOMBROWSKI: It's kind of sad to see, but --. It lasted three years there and then I had an opportunity to get to the Philadelphia Office Enforcement Bureau with the field work and that's been -- I was there for 20 years. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes. "Pirate radio continues to exist in the internet age for a variety of reasons," John Nathan Anderson, a broadcasting scholar and author who is working on a book about pirate radio, explains via email. MR. DOMBROWSKI: No, and some of these are in high crime areas where there is a lot of drugs. MR. DOMBROWSKI: So we have fines that we could issue. In the United States, the term pirate radio implies the unlicensed broadcasting use of any part of the radio spectrum that is reserved for use by governmental, public or commercial licensees by the Federal Communications Commission. Like if a pirate, you know, gets his station up and running, he finds that no one is in a channel, and he says, oh, I guess I'll set myself here, other than the law, which is obviously important to some people, most people it should be, but why should we care that they are using vacant spectrum? MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Do the pilots only complain if it's a song that they don't like? 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