Keep in mind that pirates are relatively low-power broadcasters. "By playing nonstop current pop music in a situation where this had never before been available, Caroline had within months a larger audience than all the BBC stations combined," Moore explains. It could be harmful if we let a pirate radio station operate because sometimes they cause interference to other services, like aeronautical communications. These include Amateur Radio Newsline, a weekly audio news [] Over the past few years, Ive found that one of my favorite listening activities has become searching for unique pirate radio stations, and readers of my blog appear to have followed suit. After that when we don't get compliance from somebody he gets a warning letter and comes back on the air and then we do get the warrant with the U.S. marshals. "He was waiting several months to come back on the air (and therefore was only willing to speak off the record to me). 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: And let them know. So we try to shut down, you know, that equipment coming in to the purchasers. As soon as there were laws on the books, there were pirate radio stations on the air. 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. So when we finally are able to pick up the signal in our car we then drive in the area in kind of a circle around the source and we plot lines, we call them lines of bearing on a map, and where they intersect is where this transmission source is originating. They lose advertisers because of it, they lose coverage area because of it, and it all comes down to dollars and cents. KQLZ Pirate Radio stormed the Southern California airwaves in 1989, and listeners "flushed" their former stations as they. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Yes. Now stop your Googling right now because that is illegal, right? Airchecks from unauthorized broadcast radio stations throughout the years. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Okay. Right now it is $10,000 per day per occurrence. 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? South America was strong for a while in the 90s, but that has also fallen silent. I mean you got to give it to Congress for the bill naming that they do. In addition to this 2019 BBC documentary, Goren also has created the Pirate Radio Map, which documents pirate radio stations in Brooklyn and even includes brief samples from their broadcasts. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Yes, there was a case back in the 1990s, late 1990s. And they could also --. We want them to be as descriptive as possible. Our agents typically work in a certain area so they become familiar with all the pirate radio operators and they kind of started to notice the pattern and so we were able to gather all of the evidence and go to the U.S. Attorney's Office and seize all that equipment and get the station off the air. And so we need to make sure that we stop the importation of this equipment, we stop the marketing of these illegal transmitters. They also spent the regulatory fees that they have to, you know, spend I think yearly, and so they have an investment in their service and these unlicensed stations NP that. Please support this website by adding us to your whitelist in your ad blocker. Stations such as Weekend Rush, Kool FM, Pulse and Innocence wanted to represent the streets and promote local scenes.. Most pirates transmit using SSB with modern ham radio equipment, others use AM utilizing vintage or homebrew equipment. 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. Just browse the pirate radio category: https://swling.com/blog/category/pirate-radio/. Finding Shortwave Stations and Broadcasts. And that's a pretty big deterrent when you show up with police officers threatening to arrest somebody because they are operating a pirate radio station. A lot of times the studio is not co-located with the transmitter. I decoded this Wolverine Radio SSTV QSL on the SSTV iOS App. To track pirates, you'll need a radio with both AM and SSB modes. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: And we talked a little bit about why this is a problem. They can be just talk radio stations, they could be religious broadcasters, or they could be full-fledged stations that have a staffing of 20 people that make commercials, that create the jingles for their station ID, and the ones that have more money and the money advertisers are the ones that are very hard to distinguish. The government authorities in charge of the surveillance of the radio-electric spectrum can use the PROWATCH instruments to detect and locate the pirate and irregular broadcast stations of radio and TV. Indeed, this past November, I listened to the pirate Channel Z while sitting in my truck; I was only using a Tecsun PL-660 with the antenna extended out of my opened drivers-side window. We hope you understand, and are grateful for your support. Yes, they come with weapons. They are very low power and the range of them are very small. 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. So hopefully that's enough for them to get the station taken down and maybe share some information about who the real operator is. So sometimes the apartment owner, the building owner, or whatever, is totally in the dark about this, didn't know about. I mean they have a significant financial investment in their stations, they have gone through proper FCC process, and now they are competing for listeners with stations that did not go through that process, did not necessarily bear the same financial burden to get up and running, and they are not maybe just competing with listeners, as we have mentioned we've been competing with, they are competing with advertisers as well. Pirates Week: http://shortwavepirate.info. "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. If you live in other parts of the world, pirate hunting can pose serious DX challenges. 3. The Radio Informer - The latest info on the world of radio including:world,shortwave . And another thing, also, we would have to direct our attention annually to five markets that are most affected by pirates and we would do some step-up enforcement. So over the last ten years people get online and purchase a transmitter and get it delivered to their door and so that makes, you know, everybody a hobbiest now and to have an interest to start a pirate radio station because it's so available. 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. Radio 510 International - European relay station broadcasting every weekend on short-wave to all of Europe, Northern Africa and the Middle East on 13840 kHz. Chasing pirates has also increased my technical know-how. MR. DOMBROWSKI: The majority of the people do not give us truthful information and so our agents have to be trained to do interviews to know when people are telling the truth or not and it may just require keep asking the right questions and keeping after it. So they thought that was a way for them to avoid detection by hopping from building to building and frequency to frequency. "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. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Oh, that's probably why they are complaining, right? 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. Bruce will host a new daily show for Bauer's station Greatest Hits Radio, taking his iconic PopMaster game with him. MR. DOMBROWSKI: Well there was a version of the bill that passed the House first and now there is a similar bill being considered by Senate. The FCC argued that we were here to regulate the airwaves. Radio plays such an important role when you talk about hurricanes striking or other natural disasters, people turn to their local broadcast, including radio for information, and to have that be interfered with is a public safety concern let alone the FAA issues which are very serious. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Because you don't know what you are running into. But O'Rahilly was undeterred, even after his ship was seized briefly by Dutch authorities. MR. DOMBROWSKI: It's not, you know, and we didn't talk about, there are other legal ways to go about it. Pirates tend to occupy swatches of the shortwave spectrum that are relatively quiet, avoid intentionally broadcasting on top of one another, and typically operate at fairly low power. 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: Yes, well just in the FM band particularly, if we just let everybody operate where they want it just creates chaos, and that's always been our argument that it creates chaos it the spectrum. Airchecks from unauthorized broadcast radio stations throughout the years. Addeddate 2022-03-13 23:21:58 . 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. But so when we say Region One I think even most people in the FCC are not necessarily aware of how the country is carved up when it comes to enforcement and the field offices, et cetera, so can you give the listeners a brief sense of what do we mean by Region One, what areas do you cover? They also cover your wireless routers in your house. MR. DOMBROWSKI: So some States have laws on the book that prohibit pirate radio operation, States like New Jersey and New York and Florida. 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. We also recommend that the complainant contact the station that they are getting interference to --. MR. DOMBROWSKI: No, not the public face, but he's all the behind the scenes guy. Across the country FCC officials are working to identify and take action against illegal unlicensed radio operators using frequencies allocated for legitimate radio operators that are causing interference and other issues. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Do the pilots only complain if it's a song that they don't like? Pirate radio stations are a crucial part of British music culture. Recycling is good. Launched just five months ago, Internet Archive's Digital Library of Amateur Radio & Communications has expanded to more than 61,000 items related to amateur radio, shortwave listening, and related communications. So how do you escalate the situation, you know, what tools do you have to say, okay, we're not getting cooperation let's take this up a notch? Pirate radio operators usually have day jobslike most of usthus only transmit while home from work. He has taken, you know, money from under the table to allow the station to operate from the rooftop without the property owner's knowledge. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: So don't bother looking for it. We call them Notices of Apparent Liability where we will fine the operator. Now this is not just a focus of the FCC, Congress is also interested in this. In January, President Donald Trump signed into law the Preventing Illegal Radio Abuse Through Enforcement (PIRATE) Act, which gives regulators the ability to hit pirate stations with fines of up to $2 million, according to this summary from Radio World. 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. But the FCC, Congress and the commercial broadcasting industry don't see the pirates as serving such a benign purpose. As Yoder goes on to explain in his introduction of the 2012 Pirate Radio Annual, pirates are often confused with radio bootleggers (who conduct unlicensed two-way conversations), clandestine stations (usually political stations), and jammers (who intentionally try to block broadcasts). MR. SWARZTRAUBER: And it's important to clarify that FCC enforcement agents are not law enforcement agents, but I was struck by how some of the work that goes into identifying and shutting down a station is like good old-fashioned police work, like knocking on doors saying, hey, have you seen anything weird, have you seen people carrying around transmitters or antennas. If you live in a geographic hotbed of pirate activity (again, eastern/central North America and Europe) you might find a portable radio ample for hearing a number of pirates. What would that bill do differently? The BBC played catch-up launching Radio One and recruiting the same pirates for their roster. What's more, pirate radio stations gave us access to some of the most pivotal figures in UK music . Now many listeners as you know have the experience of tuning their dial and there appear to be vacant channels you have said that one of the reasons for that is to guard against interference, but someone listening might say well why do we care, right. Well joining me to discuss this topic is David Dombrowski, Regional Director for Region One in the FCC Enforcement Bureau. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Right. That would allow us to increase the fine to $100,000. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Yes. While you can hear some on weekdays, your best bet is Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights, local time. So I never left, I've been here for over 25 years. So if they don't meet the Part 15 requirements they need a license. So that's why the licensing process is so important to avoid that interference. If you just use an internet browser and search FCC complaint you will come to the link for filing a complaint. "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. 1. (Listen to one of Ronins broadcasts below.). So that's been great because now we can work with the local authorities, such as the police or the district attorney's office, and get them involved in the investigation, and they have the power to arrest and fine people. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Yes. This radio in a single case is also capable of re-broadcasting any audio source. We have had meetings with broadcast associations where we went a room with other broadcasters and that's a very big concern of them, the financial end of it. Goren, who's been monitoring the airwaves since the law was passed, notes that on a typical day, he picks up about 26 pirate stations in Brooklyn alone. Total . And I am glad you mentioned call signs because that could be a potential suspicious signal is that pirate radio stations, because they are illegitimate by their very nature, are not doing typical radio station things like announcing their call sign at the top of the hour or doing, you know, certain regular scheduled activities, so that could be something that might mean you are listening to a pirate station. Now if you go that menu there are several options of different radio services. We have pirate radio there, too, not as bad as we did in New York. Ragnar Daneskjold hosts an occasional podcast serving the shortwave pirate community; it includes pirate radio news, off-air recordings, and more. 40. r/HamRadio. It might be illegal in terms of IRS about the taxes that aren't be collected off the exchange of funds in the business that's going on behind doors. Set up your Raspberry Pi You'll need to get Raspbian, the Linux-based operating system for the Raspberry Pi. VIEWS. 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. Well we did go to the courts, we got the warrant, and the U.S. MR. DOMBROWSKI: It is. And those parameters, you know, restrict your operation and the coverage of your station because we have a whole engineering study that needs to be done so you don't cause interference to other stations. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: So what is the current state of pirate radio? But the easiest way to file a complaint is go online. Hover over one of the three pirate radio neighborhood zones (the center zone has the most stations) and click for a list of stations that broadcast to those areas. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: Yes, so you have options. So we get complaints from the FAA quite often, more than a few times a month in New York, and that the pilots are flying over the city and they are trying to communicate with air traffic control and all of a sudden they pick up a radio station. Tribute to Pirate Radio, KQLZ 100.3 FM Los Angeles. MR. SWARZTRAUBER: They could stream it just like this podcast we're doing. It would identify what are the legitimate stations and also identify what stations we sanctioned so they could better get an understanding, you know, is this a legitimate station I am hearing or not. But with customs and border patrol seeing so much equipment coming in through the ports it's hard to identify. Is so important to avoid detection by hopping from building to building and frequency to frequency have pirate category. So if they do n't meet the part 15 requirements they need a radio with both AM and SSB.! There was a way for them to avoid detection by hopping from building building... 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