Philzone.org Discussion Board: Archive 2004: Music Talk Archive 2004: “Numbers Stations” on shortwave radio

Anybody heard about this shit? Seemingly random strings of numbers or music clips broadcasted on shortwave radio for the last 30-40 years?

The UK gov't has admitted that the broadcasts are codes sent to spies! Really. This is crazy shit! Sounds Cold War era, but it's still going on now...

NPR had a story on it today that was very cool, and very trippy...





"For more than 30 years the Shortwave radio spectrum has been used by the worlds intelligence agencies to transmit secret messages. These messages are transmitted by hundreds of “Numbers Stations”.


Shortwave Numbers Stations are a perfect method of anonymous, one way communication. Spies located anywhere in the world can be communicated to by their masters via small, locally available, and unmodified Shortwave receivers. The encryption system used by Numbers Stations, known as a “one time pad” is unbreakable. Combine this with the fact that it is almost impossible to track down the message recipients once they are inserted into the enemy country, it becomes clear just how powerful the Numbers Station system is.

These stations use very rigid schedules, and transmit in many different languages, employing male and female voices repeating strings of numbers or phonetic letters day and night, all year round.

The voices are of varying pitches and intonation; there is even a German station (The Swedish Rhapsody) that transmits a female child's voice!

One might think that these espionage activities should have wound down considerably since the official “end of the cold war”, but nothing could be further from the truth. Numbers Stations (and by inference, spies) are as busy as ever, with many new and bizarre stations appearing since the fall of the Berlin wall.


Why is it that in over 30 years, the phenomenon of Numbers Stations has gone almost totally unreported? What are the agencies behind the Numbers Stations, and why are the eastern European stations still on the air? Why does the Czech republic operate a Numbers Station 24 hours a day? How is it that Numbers Stations are allowed to interfere with essential radio services like air traffic control and shipping without having to answer to anybody? Why does the “Swedish Rhapsody” Numbers Station use a small girls voice?"


"Spy Numbers"
http://www.spynumbers.com/
"Short Wave Espionage"
http://www.simonmason.karoo.net/page30.html
"Spooks in the Wire"
http://slashdot.org/articles/99/09/16/0055245.shtml
"Shortwave and the Calling"
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A35647-2004Aug2.html
"Irdial Discs"
http://www.irdial.com/new_index.html

Yeah, I was listening to NPR yesterday when that was broadcast. Twas damn neat. I liked how they discussed teh otherworldly feeling it presents. Pretty psychedelic. I can't see buying a 4 CD boax set of this stuff but it would be neat to put in segues between songs on a mix CD

There are some mp3s and real audio clips online I guess...I found this one:

http://home.freeuk.com/spook007/

And this one has mp3s..

http://www.ryan-silva.com/numbers.htm


Wilco used some of this shit on their "Yankee Hotel Foxtrot" album, and the title is from a numbers station too...pretty cool.