On Thu, 18 Feb 2010, James Delancy wrote: > Then it is a federal matter .... and not that I am much good with this > legal stuff ... but no matter where you are, it is illegal to divulge > what you hear to a 3rd party ... that would include a re-broadcast via > IP or radio anyway?? So with that, aren't all the scanner sites > illegal?
Four points: 1) No station outside of Shortwave, TV, FM, or AM services are legally authorized to "broadcast". 2) The Communications Act of 1934 and The Telecommunications Act of 1996 govern this. RF is the FCC's domains, unless someone really wants to rehash "States Rights" during this administration. 3) The use of the internet is governed by the FCC, through the divisions the telcos use, under the name they use: Common Carrier. 4) Interference with a common carrier is a FEDERAL offense, punishable by fine and/or jail time. On the point of #4, if a police officer pulls over a legally operated and authorized semi-trailer carrying a sealed load across state lines and tells the driver to break the seal on the trailer, that officer is interfering with interstate commerce and may be be arrested by the US Marshals. My advice? Don't test this law. If you do test this law and officers show up to arrest you, immediately call the US Marshals office. Oh -- get a good lawyer, and make him a rich man. And further -- it is impossible to "broadcast" over the internet or IP. There are mechanisms which work similar to the common-sense concept of broadcasting, but properly designed networks do not allow such packets to traverse the networks or the edges of the networks. Multicast, which is a "broadcast" like IP-based system has not been deployed on large scale basis by most providers. Like 99.999% of them. And they charge good money if your packets need to be in all places at one time -- that's "X" amount of bandwidth taken from ALL of thier pipes that service your points of interest. It's time for a repeal of that law, and a recall election to remove that member of the legislature from office. -- Kris Kirby, KE4AHR Disinformation Analyst
