I found a number station a few years back. Tracked it down with a yagi antenna, triangulating its position, as I got closer and closer, reducing the 'cocked hat' error zone until I pinpointed it. It was being run from the radio mic of a local bingo hall 😂 It closed down 3 years later. Coincidence?... I. Don't. Think. So.
At my old job, I set up the outdoor public address system to play numbers stations at various times throughout the night. I had recordings for The Lincolnshire Poacher, The Squeaky Wheel, The Buzzer, The Cuban Lady, and I don't remember what else. The idea was to scare away robbers, and on one occasion I'm positive that it worked. Someone broke a window but didn't take anything. Imagine a burglar running for his life at the sound of The Lincolnshire Poacher.
Nasty deterrent! To the (probably) uninitiated robber it must have sounded straight from a horror movie. As for what gives me the creeps personally, it is the Swedish Rhapsody!
The first time I saw a video about numbers stations it was night time and the voices and melodies creeped me out like nothing before. I can tolerate them now but any robber would probably be creeped out too, feeling unsafe and anxious and leaving the area. Good thinking!
@@colorsofsound4782 That East German one with the worn-out tape of the church bells would do it for me. At night while keyed up from trying to do crimes already? Noooo thank you!
@@ZGryphonah, G03, The Gong Station. I got tears in my eyes just at the thought of the scenario you described. I find this station extremely unnerving, it's just SO haunting and simply feels cursed.
Yes, I'd like to hear more about this subject. It has been speculated, probably correctly, that at least some of those stations were used to transmit gibberish, purely in an attempt to waste the time of codebreakers, while the real messages were being sent by various other means.
@@stargazer7644 that's true, but the jammers trying to stop the message getting recieved could be fooled by false stations.... It's also a good way to see who is trying to track them down as a counter espionage technique
@@stargazer7644 Yes, but if you need to send daily messages you run into issues with the key length. For some channels using fixed codebook numbers is fine, but for others even the change between ID:"no message today" and any other message can be important information. One way to combat both issues is to use a short OTP for the whole message and fill the (very short) "no message" message up to length with random data so it looks like any other message. The same is true for the number of messages you send out---an attacker can guess the number of recipients from it, or even just changes to the number if you run them together and the message length is unknown. So padding your whole message block with random garbage makes sense. In the extreme, this can mean that your whole transmission can contain no real data at all---only filler garbage---if you have nothing to send.
@@Joe_VanCleave Except it doesn't work on OTPs since the key material necessarily is so long and cannot be derived. Nobody can remember thousands of numbers for a single message. So you put the OTPs on flammable paper and when they break down your door, woosh, gone. Torture can't extract that. This is in contrast to conventional key systems where you memorize a password and use that to come up with a few hundred bits of key.
Im a Aussie and when I was about 15 years 1975. I was given a large broken portable radio with lots of switches and stations I'd never seen before . I got it up and running with some messing about and it picked up local radio stations.."local meaning 3oo miles away" with ease. I was living out bush NSW and one night climbed a broken wind mill about 30 feet off the ground with the radio.. I was receiving these number stations with some speaking in foreign languages reciting numbers and tones quite regularly... What a buzz for young bloke bored outta his mind.
The strangest numbers station I heard as a kid in the 70s was a man who was reading Spanish numbers off of a page and he was using an AM push-to-talk transmitter. After he finished reading a group, the carrier disappeared for a second or two and it came back when he started reading the next group. The amateurism of this station made me think it was run by a South American drug cartel.
Numbers stations - creepy as, and utterly fascinating. Some years ago when in Cyprus I tuned our shortwave radio onto E03's frequency a couple of times (the infamous Lincolnshire Poacher) and can confirm that had the radio been equipped with a signal meter, its needle would most likely have been quickly wrapped around the endstop, so strong was the signal. Shame it disappeared - I miss it(!) On the subject of B-roll/stock/illustrative footage, I'd just leave a caption up throughout saying 'images for illustrative purposes only' or similar. That should satisfy those who don't get it.. Great stuff as always - nice work. :)
During the playback of the DFD21 error, I keep picturing some hapless 18-year-old Bundeswehr conscript, left alone in the control booth while his superior goes to the john, stabbing frantically at buttons and trying everything he can think of in a steadily rising panic while the computer voice lady goes completely off the rails and the tone generator has a total meltdown. In my head, it has the same comedic energy as the scene in _Modern Times_ where Charlie Chaplin can't keep up with the pace of the assembly line.
As a student you could have great fun freaking out housemates and girlfriends by having them 'overhear' this for you to hurriedly hide a notebook and some massive book such as the NATO handbook...
I’ve been fascinated and kind of freaked out by number stations for years! I think I’ve watched every UA-cam video that features them. I’d love a long form video with your thoughts and/or experiences!
Someone may have mentioned it already: once the famous UVB-76 aka The Buzzer failed so badly that internal communications were aired. First, the buzzing tone went out, then there was something that seemed like a phone call where a person said "generator failed". For an hour or so all internal communications were aired, including names, ranks, and all inner workings. There is a recording of it online.
I would be interested in a video about civilian enthusiasts' attempts to decode number stations. I have seen online groups who publish daily LISTSERVs of the previous night's transmissions, then try to solve them like puzzles... without using one time pads. I don't know how successful they are, but it's interesting to watch them try.
There’s an interview with Jack Barsky, former KGB spy on Koncrete podcast (number #130). Also on the Lex Fridman podcast he talks all about being taught how to use a SW radio to listen and decode the messages sent using a one-time pad. I think it was when he was living in Germany or something, he said, when he would receive messages this way. Instructions on what to do etc.
Ignore the NPC comments from those who post the most obvious predictable criticisms. You have found your niche and we enjoy your hard work. Seriously almost 600 comments several hours is excellent engagement.
My grandfather was a radio guy in the RAAF during WWII and had all kinds of SW radio stuff laying about. He built me one from parts and I had a really good areal. As a kid of about 12 or so back in the early 1970's I'd listen most nights and on good nights I'd get hams speaking languages I couldn't understand and among it all were these radio numbers stations. I knew they were spies because I was told they were but it was almost impossible to believe that I was listening in on what was intended for them as easily as I was. Couldn't understand it of course but it was fascinating.
Great video, thanks! Your videos on numbers stations are wonderful and I always enjoy them. As a child who was passionate about SW radio, I first encountered these stations long before I'd read or heard anything about them. It was that passion that eventually got me into amateur radio. It still amazes me that some of these stations are still out there, though it's easy to understand why. It really is a relatively foolproof system for conveying clandestine messages - or disinformation, as the case may be. Cheers!
Thanks for doing this video! Normally I wouldn't explore things like number stations but your videos have often introduced me to a new dimension in radio.
But what you expect to be in it - there aren't even any actual pictures of real number statuions in this video. By the very nature of number stations likely being operated by military and shadow state, there isn't much information publicly available. So you can get some nice audio footage of German Fräuleins repeating numbers. But that basically is it. And this video has plenty of that already. If there was someone who would actually investigate, like triangulating sources and getting actual visual footage of the sites of origin - that would be interesting. But you would have to drive around, maybe even travel, and risk getting on some watchlists for that. That sort of investigative stuff is professional journalist territory.
I love this, thanks, it's kicked the old 8k memory up. Back in the 1970's I used to lodge with a guy who was working pretty much at the cutting edge of defense technology. Man the shit he'd tell me, I could go on all night. But one of his faves was tuning into all this stuff late at night, after many beers and hot knives ( sure it's rocky it's the 70's), and the Iron Curtain was very real, so it felt sort of sinister and a bit unsettling, listening to this sort of stuff. So thanks for the memory, my god it was colder in those days though war or not. Sorry I forgot to say how much I enjoy your channel, it's unique which is quite a feat on YT. Cheers Gov.
Another great video Lewis, it would be good if you made a long in depth video from the early years right up to now, it's fascinating to think that all this went on and that people are still trying to jam them in this day and age
A great uncle of mine spent a fair bit of time in the 1970s doing contract work for British intelligence on Cyprus as an electrical engineer. I had a chance to ask him if he was familiar with the Lincolnshire Poacher a few years ago, and I played a bit of it for him. He denied all knowledge, but perhaps he was being a consummate professional to the end.
I remember it like it was yesterday, when I heard my first number station. It was in the early 80s when I played with my dad's Grundig Satellit short wave radio. Of course it was in the middle of the night. I was eleven or twelve years old and when I heard that faint, distorted, interference-laden voice I was scared sh*tless. It haunted me for weeks with shivers and nightmares. It was the same when I listened to the Deutsche Welle on long or short wave and the east german jammers kicked in. Those super strange sounds were also perfect food for nightmares.
I remember listening to number stations as a schoolkid on my comms receiver, always sounded sinister. if people are confused about your antenna footage matching your dialogue then you might need to show the teletubbies then it will become clear.
I listened to Lincolnshire Poacher back in the mid 00's, before it fell off the air (same Joshua R. on the Simon Mason site). I heard it a few times in a week break up and stop transmitting through messages, as well as oddities and mistakes (cutouts on the Poacher identifier) and the last inflected number would end prematurely. As far as i'm aware, these were some of it's last transmissions, before it fell off the air. I assume hardware failure was largely to blame for the Poachers demise.
Given their likely purpose, they would have been kept running until all associated secret missions were over, otherwise some powerful agencies would have gotten really angry. But once an end day was scheduled maintenance on equipment may have become less thorough with failures becoming more frequent. I think modern missions hide similar transmissions in digital broadcast media like UA-cam comments or copy protected digital TV, requiring just a secret computer program on a machine with certain standard connections. Another place to hide messages would be in global paper newspapers that publish daily like the stations but would be easily picked up in target areas. Invention hiding schemes is itself an exercise in inventiveness. Overall the idea is that the delivery is done blindly with nobody but the agent and their command office knowing exactly where and what to look for, and with a huge number of innocent recipients ignoring the hidden message while acting as unwitting smoke screens for the one agent looking for specific codes.
I just assumed that you were not including footage of numbers station because, well, they're "secret" for a given value of secret, and that, blow ke down, you might not actually know where they emanate from. Very interesting videos/essays. Thank you.
DFD21 and DFC37 are ITU conforming calls, too. Allegedly they were even listed in callbooks in DL. Don't think the QSLed, though. Another nice one, Lewis! And yes, follow up(s) on the topic would be great!
I did hear once that number stations could also have been used for transmissions to commercial ships during the 70's and 80's. But it might not be true. However even commercial shipping has always been competitive and anything that can improve the profit margins could be a viable avenue. Today with digital encrypted satellite communication it's no longer necessary to run the number stations.
It makes sense for a station to register with the ITU, for the simple reason that it prevents communications authorities from suspecting it as a rogue pirate transmission (because the station is classified) and trying to locate it. It's a form of hiding in plain sight.
I can confirm that DFC37 and DFD10 were indeed registered with the ITU. They were listed in the ITU's white book, although often not in "amateur" lists such as Klingenfuss. Location was given as Bonames, which is a suburb of Frankfurt. I think the power was given as 15kW. The responsible authority was listed as the German PTT - I guess they were operating the transmitter, though were probably not responsible for the actual contents. The two-letter stations - Papa November etc - were not listed.
@@ehsnils Probably was more to fishing fleets, those are competitive. There was a big fuss over the mandate for AIS anti-collision transmitters, that allow a vessel to be tracked even from space.
Surprised you didn't mention HM01 (AKA: The Cuban Numbers Lady). Arguably the new replacement for the Lincolnshire Poacher in popularity; This station typically broadcasts to the east coast of the US. I've heard them broadcast on the same frequency as Radio Havana Cuba, which is atypical. Also, I've heard people say they've heard the log in/out sounds of Windows XP.
Yep there's proof of that, lots of people have heard it happening and captured it on websdl etc, I've caught it playing over Havana Cuba once or twice and it's pretty astounding
Great stuff - I and a friend used to listen to these number stations in the early '80s on his dad's Yaesu FRG7 receiver with a long wire down the garden. No internet then but I seem to remember he was subscribed to a fanzine that listed many interesting "scanner" frequencies to listen to - with Number Stations probably being the most reliable HF ones. We never heard any go wrong though, like this, but we always looked forward to hearing "The Gongs" which played a really sinister tune on bells before giving out its numbers which sounded like it was coming off a tape that had stretched (badly) as there was so much wow on the audio. All the ones we used to listen to are now long gone - but there are still plenty of them out there, much easier to find now as there are a few web sites dedicated to providing timetables for frequencies and times. "The Russian Buzzer" got interesting around about the time the Russian invasion of Ukraine started earlier on this year as people started playing music over it (I guess either as a protest or to jam it). Funny thing about that though is that it hardly ever gives out any meaningful messages, coded or otherwise.
The Buzzer jamming is done for views. Probably a low powered device set up close to the receiver of whoever's making those live video feeds. I sampled a few web SDRs around the world and none had those "jammings".
I've loved listening to numbers stations since I was a kid. I think that webSDR has given them a resurgence. When your internet is good but radio is bad you can just log on and find a location that can pick up the signal. When you have no internet you can break out your portable and tune in the old way.
It's my understanding that it's part of a one-time pad message encryption system. With one physically passes a sheet of random numbers to an operative while having a copy themselves. Encrypted messages are then able to be broadcast in the blind and intended recipients need only tune in and listen and use their sheet of numbers to decrypt the message. As long as the encryption sheet is kept secret, never reused, and destroyed after use, the message is absolutely indecipherable. And the system is really very, very simple. The flaw lies only in that the one-time pad sheets have to be physically transferred and must never be leaked or reused.
I'd put my transceivers and antennae in the closet, a few years back. Then today, i stumble across this channel. Well friend, i guess i'm dragging that equipment back out, annoying the hell out of my landlord by hanging antennae out the windows, and re-learning things i shouldn't have let slip. Thanks for reviving an old man's curiosity.
I think number stations are absolutely fascinating...im not afraid of much but number stations have always freaked me out. I guess it's the creepy voices and bad audio.. Thanks for the video and yes more please!!
I think not knowing what they are saying can make your mind think of things they could be saying and those thoughts can make it quite sinister as a result.
The low-quality monophonic melodies and the computer voice are definitely creepy-sounding. I can take it during the daytime but I've learnt from experience never to watch these videos at night.
Funny story, during my internship at Rohde und Schwarz I was asked to take down a 1KW shortwave antenna with my colleague from a military owned dune in Katwijk (NL) and rebuild it on a military compound in De Lier (20K) away. And when we tested it after the move the army actually played a tape messaging digits, similar to this one set verbally and a set that actually modulated the transmitter in CW we could the see the S meter toggle when we heard a little pulse in the audio tape. Perhaps the same set of digits. I always assumed that that shortwave coms was used for the war in Yugoslavia back then. But I am not sure. Now almost 30 years on, I am curious what they are 😂At that moment after 4 days of intensive work we were happy we were done and could go home. And care for our burned faces - it was extremely sunny that first two days tearing it down. And the other two days, in true Dutch summer tradition soaking wet and muddy 😅 Oh and as treat I got to build a second one that Rohde und Schwarz NL had for themselves. And it was on top of that company roof until the building was torn down 4 years ago. Everybody called it the “oversized, clothes drying rack” here in town. It was always fun when I explained that I helped assemble that eye soar 😂
@@trespire it’s just undoing lots of bolts! 😆Let me put it that way, I didn’t need to have studied EE for 3 years to do it. But as an internship I couldn’t complain! Most just wished keyboard and mice balls (90s reference). I got to move antennas and build automated CMT-50 calibration in Rohde und Schwarz basic. And before that I had an internship on university where I worked on the Dutch Open Tower Telescope. Frankly my internships were more exciting than all my jobs since 😆
I remember a numbers station real strong here in Arizona USA in the late 60s near 7Mhz was a live female voice and in the middle of saying the numbers started coughing never did turn off her mike. It was kind of funny. I always wondered how many number stations were on military boast out in the sea. Made it hard to locate.
It must have been around the late 1970s, I remember hearing an eerie distant female voice reading numbers once when I was playing with my Parents radio, I loved the weird sounds I used to pick up. This though scared the hell out of me. I know now that it was a numbers station.
Another fab video Lewis! The great thing about Numbers Stations is that it makes your enemy think they have your agents operating within their territory even if you don’t.
In several of our transmitter sites we had leased rooms and antennas attached to our main tower. Each room had its own secure metal door and its own power panel with its own meter and the coax going out to their own antennas We had no idea who they are or what frequencies they use or what they transmit We didn't even have keys to those doors and the rooms were pretty small they could house maybe two racks and each had their own AC unit on the roof One of the rooms was rented by a local college for their low power radio station and another was rented by XM Satellite Radio and another was rented by a public access radio station but the others we have no idea who they are. I'm sure their government agencies As long as they didn't interfere with any other transmissions from The towers there was no problem
@@absalomdraconis Exactly. No secret government agency needs domestic VHF city coverage. Private radio systems for utilities, hospitals, school buses. Local or state government trunked systems for police, ambulance, fire, city workers. FM broadcast and TV repeaters. Paging networks. Railroad systems, there was a big deployment in the past few years with the positive train control anti-collision system mandate. You could look up their frequencies and powers from FCC ULS doing a location search.
I have always believed Numbers Stations are a backup if comms go down from a nuclear EMP or NEMP. I was lucky in 1988-89 i was in the Army Cadet Force every 4 years you could spent 12 days with with the British Army I went to West Germany and stayed with 14 signal regiment Ironside Barracks, in Scheuen, north of Celle. One night we tuned into a Numbers Station not knowing at the time what why and who was broadcasting so we asked the soldier looking after us what we had found he told us at set times they test comms making sure its working with a clear signal but who knows they must be important for it to still be around
That Lincolnshire melody and the voice is somehow familiar. I know nothing about these things at all but we lived on RAF Conningsby in the 70's. Just stumbled upon this video and it brought back memories for some reason.
I remember reading that there are examples where The Spanish Lady will accidentally start broadcasting Radio Habana kinda giving away who is running it.
Another good video Lewis...always been fascinated by numbers stations...I was posted to Germany in 76..had a SW/VHF radio..used to tune round the bands..got numbers stations a few times..even the G 16.. Keep the content going mate
I used my money from shoveling snow and mowing yards to buy a JVC "boom box" in the mid 80s that had shortwave radio too. It's nice hearing about the weird things I heard especially at night on antennas a friend and I rigged up a tall tree.
About the antenna's... They are.... beautiful shots ;-) Number stations, received a few in 'the wild' and they remain creepy for sure. Thanks for sharing!
Another excellent video. I grew up listening to the number stations and still listen to them now! I particularly ike the English Man E07. Also E11 and that emphatic female voice! 73
I remember listening to a programme about them years ago, I think from BBC Radio 4, and found it all a little bit sinister but fascinating at the same time. To think such a simple technology would be so effective at sending coded messages without identifying the recipient.
Nostalgia! I picked these up on a wee radio I got in a scout jumble sale in the late 80s. The woodpecker radar too. Never had a clue until youtube what they were. There was also a station that broadcast birdsong for hours - presumably testing for new radio stations
I understand what appeared to be just varying melodic tones where actually codes themselves. A bit like Amatuer Data Modes using varying audio tones to transmit information.
This reminds me of the game Fallout. Post nuclear war and there are these towers that you can activate, and it lets you pick up secret military signals, usually hijacked by people looking for help. Cool video!
Somewhere there's a nervous agent waiting for the next set of numbers telling them when and where they'll be extracted......only to find some other station broadcasting over the frequency.
Big mistake on my part watching one of your early videos on number stations. Years ago I picked one up on a prc320 in Germany and wondered what it was about. Now I am hooked!
Number stations are incredible, we have no idea who the messages are or who they are for. Yet the most modern sophisticated computer is hacked by kids down the street. is our technology that advanced.
I was US Military stationed in Europe during the Cold War. Radio Jamming was a favorite past-time for the Eastern Forces. We had workarounds for these, band jumping, frequency hopping. The Military did develope a pretty good radio to avoid this finally, SYNGARDS or something.
@@stevenmiller3337 I was M1 tank commander. I did not mess with radio, other than to talk on it, or the GPS thing. I didn’t even know how to turn the thing on. I was a late comer to the tank scene, so my crew really helped…
I have two short recordings of G02 swedish rhapsody accidentally transmitting with the unaltered standard Stasi Sprach-Morse Machine voice, the same voice as G06 and a few other stations, rather than the infamous pitched up voice it normally used.
I remember watching a show called The Americans which was about a couple who were soviet spies in the US. they had a radio and a code book hidden in the basement and would decode messages
As a young boy in Sweden we used to sit in the basement and listen to these stations prepping for war. Now I have to teach my kids to prepare. It is a sad world….
What is interesting is the fact they are still being used today and can be heard on shortwave when there are so many other digital ways to send messages without the use of shortwave frequencies.
As a kid I had an old ww2 shortwave radio from a bomber. id listen to weird stuff, including people reading numbers. now I know what to call them, number stations. thanks
Why do I feel the engineers of these numbers stations did things like include eerie melodies and other features just for the fun of it, to deliberately make them seem intimidating to people who stumbled across the transmissions.
Never heard of a number station till I watched the Nick Frost series on Amazon Prime "Truth Seekers" were they used the Lincolnshire Poacher jingle for their numbers station. This made me google number stations and I've been fascinated ever since.
HM01 Regularly has transmission problems. Windows XP sounds have been recorded a few times and some times the transmission will cut off randomly and start again after a few minutes. I personally have seen it drift between frequencies on a few occasions.
I found a number station a few years back. Tracked it down with a yagi antenna, triangulating its position, as I got closer and closer, reducing the 'cocked hat' error zone until I pinpointed it.
It was being run from the radio mic of a local bingo hall 😂
It closed down 3 years later. Coincidence?... I. Don't. Think. So.
😂
CIA black site confirmed!
3 years later? likely unrelated. and how did they know you tracked it down anyway?
@@dieselguy62 They know 👽
@@dieselguy62 ...that's the joke.
Former East German spies watching this remembering these bloopers fondly
At my old job, I set up the outdoor public address system to play numbers stations at various times throughout the night.
I had recordings for The Lincolnshire Poacher, The Squeaky Wheel, The Buzzer, The Cuban Lady, and I don't remember what else. The idea was to scare away robbers, and on one occasion I'm positive that it worked. Someone broke a window but didn't take anything. Imagine a burglar running for his life at the sound of The Lincolnshire Poacher.
Nasty deterrent! To the (probably) uninitiated robber it must have sounded straight from a horror movie. As for what gives me the creeps personally, it is the Swedish Rhapsody!
The first time I saw a video about numbers stations it was night time and the voices and melodies creeped me out like nothing before. I can tolerate them now but any robber would probably be creeped out too, feeling unsafe and anxious and leaving the area. Good thinking!
@@colorsofsound4782 That East German one with the worn-out tape of the church bells would do it for me. At night while keyed up from trying to do crimes already? Noooo thank you!
@@ZGryphonah, G03, The Gong Station. I got tears in my eyes just at the thought of the scenario you described. I find this station extremely unnerving, it's just SO haunting and simply feels cursed.
Yes, I'd like to hear more about this subject. It has been speculated, probably correctly, that at least some of those stations were used to transmit gibberish, purely in an attempt to waste the time of codebreakers, while the real messages were being sent by various other means.
Distracting ones adveseries is SOP. All part of the game.
@@stargazer7644 that's true, but the jammers trying to stop the message getting recieved could be fooled by false stations....
It's also a good way to see who is trying to track them down as a counter espionage technique
@@stargazer7644 Yes, but if you need to send daily messages you run into issues with the key length. For some channels using fixed codebook numbers is fine, but for others even the change between ID:"no message today" and any other message can be important information. One way to combat both issues is to use a short OTP for the whole message and fill the (very short) "no message" message up to length with random data so it looks like any other message.
The same is true for the number of messages you send out---an attacker can guess the number of recipients from it, or even just changes to the number if you run them together and the message length is unknown. So padding your whole message block with random garbage makes sense.
In the extreme, this can mean that your whole transmission can contain no real data at all---only filler garbage---if you have nothing to send.
Except by “rubber hose cryptography “!
@@Joe_VanCleave Except it doesn't work on OTPs since the key material necessarily is so long and cannot be derived. Nobody can remember thousands of numbers for a single message. So you put the OTPs on flammable paper and when they break down your door, woosh, gone. Torture can't extract that. This is in contrast to conventional key systems where you memorize a password and use that to come up with a few hundred bits of key.
Im a Aussie and when I was about 15 years 1975. I was given a large broken portable radio with lots of switches and stations I'd never seen before .
I got it up and running with some messing about and it picked up local radio stations.."local meaning 3oo miles away" with ease.
I was living out bush NSW and one night climbed a broken wind mill about 30 feet off the ground with the radio..
I was receiving these number stations with some speaking in foreign languages reciting numbers and tones quite regularly...
What a buzz for young bloke bored outta his mind.
The strangest numbers station I heard as a kid in the 70s was a man who was reading Spanish numbers off of a page and he was using an AM push-to-talk transmitter. After he finished reading a group, the carrier disappeared for a second or two and it came back when he started reading the next group. The amateurism of this station made me think it was run by a South American drug cartel.
Numbers stations - creepy as, and utterly fascinating. Some years ago when in Cyprus I tuned our shortwave radio onto E03's frequency a couple of times (the infamous Lincolnshire Poacher) and can confirm that had the radio been equipped with a signal meter, its needle would most likely have been quickly wrapped around the endstop, so strong was the signal.
Shame it disappeared - I miss it(!)
On the subject of B-roll/stock/illustrative footage, I'd just leave a caption up throughout saying 'images for illustrative purposes only' or similar. That should satisfy those who don't get it..
Great stuff as always - nice work. :)
"Creepy as" New Zealander? Took a gap year there a lifetime ago.
Yeah, transmitted from RAF Acritiri base on Cyprus.
What are number stations? I couldn't make sense of this video
@@Alex632 google and UA-cam will tell you
@@DjornNorthfield those sheep shaggers are pretty creepy, especially with all the weird birds on that island.
During the playback of the DFD21 error, I keep picturing some hapless 18-year-old Bundeswehr conscript, left alone in the control booth while his superior goes to the john, stabbing frantically at buttons and trying everything he can think of in a steadily rising panic while the computer voice lady goes completely off the rails and the tone generator has a total meltdown. In my head, it has the same comedic energy as the scene in _Modern Times_ where Charlie Chaplin can't keep up with the pace of the assembly line.
As a student you could have great fun freaking out housemates and girlfriends by having them 'overhear' this for you to hurriedly hide a notebook and some massive book such as the NATO handbook...
DON’T DO THAT IN THE AGE OF SEE AND TELL.
YOU WANNA GET SWATTED!?!?
They overhear you listening to the buzzer as you hurriedly hide a book of one-time pads and a notepad and try to switch to a different channel 💀
Imagine if they hear your aphex twin record during the day, they could think that they are coded signals too 😂
Offering QSL cards was a great way of checking their range.
I’ve been fascinated and kind of freaked out by number stations for years! I think I’ve watched every UA-cam video that features them. I’d love a long form video with your thoughts and/or experiences!
Agreed, what he said mate ☝🏻☝🏻☝🏻☝🏻
I have too! I wish there was more out there 😍
A ‘deep dive’, if you will.
Someone may have mentioned it already: once the famous UVB-76 aka The Buzzer failed so badly that internal communications were aired. First, the buzzing tone went out, then there was something that seemed like a phone call where a person said "generator failed". For an hour or so all internal communications were aired, including names, ranks, and all inner workings. There is a recording of it online.
I would be interested in a video about civilian enthusiasts' attempts to decode number stations. I have seen online groups who publish daily LISTSERVs of the previous night's transmissions, then try to solve them like puzzles... without using one time pads. I don't know how successful they are, but it's interesting to watch them try.
It is literally impossible to decode one time pad coded messages.
@@mfbfreak Unless you steal the spy's pad! ;)
@@mfbfreak Yep. You might as well make up your own message.
One-time pads are unbreakable
@@bryanpassifiume8255 Only when used perfectly.
There’s an interview with Jack Barsky, former KGB spy on Koncrete podcast (number #130). Also on the Lex Fridman podcast he talks all about being taught how to use a SW radio to listen and decode the messages sent using a one-time pad.
I think it was when he was living in Germany or something, he said, when he would receive messages this way. Instructions on what to do etc.
“THE NUMBERS, MASON. WHAT DO THEY MEAN?”
Ignore the NPC comments from those who post the most obvious predictable criticisms. You have found your niche and we enjoy your hard work. Seriously almost 600 comments several hours is excellent engagement.
My grandfather was a radio guy in the RAAF during WWII and had all kinds of SW radio stuff laying about. He built me one from parts and I had a really good areal. As a kid of about 12 or so back in the early 1970's I'd listen most nights and on good nights I'd get hams speaking languages I couldn't understand and among it all were these radio numbers stations. I knew they were spies because I was told they were but it was almost impossible to believe that I was listening in on what was intended for them as easily as I was. Couldn't understand it of course but it was fascinating.
Great video, thanks! Your videos on numbers stations are wonderful and I always enjoy them. As a child who was passionate about SW radio, I first encountered these stations long before I'd read or heard anything about them. It was that passion that eventually got me into amateur radio. It still amazes me that some of these stations are still out there, though it's easy to understand why. It really is a relatively foolproof system for conveying clandestine messages - or disinformation, as the case may be. Cheers!
Thanks for doing this video! Normally I wouldn't explore things like number stations but your videos have often introduced me to a new dimension in radio.
Would love a long format deep dive in number stations 👌
I thought this as I put it on the end 😂
@@RingwayManchester there isn't many good ones on UA-cam, love your videos bro keep the work up 👊
Agree
But what you expect to be in it - there aren't even any actual pictures of real number statuions in this video. By the very nature of number stations likely being operated by military and shadow state, there isn't much information publicly available. So you can get some nice audio footage of German Fräuleins repeating numbers. But that basically is it. And this video has plenty of that already.
If there was someone who would actually investigate, like triangulating sources and getting actual visual footage of the sites of origin - that would be interesting. But you would have to drive around, maybe even travel, and risk getting on some watchlists for that. That sort of investigative stuff is professional journalist territory.
I love this, thanks, it's kicked the old 8k memory up. Back in the 1970's I used to lodge with a guy who was working pretty much at the cutting edge of defense technology. Man the shit he'd tell me, I could go on all night. But one of his faves was tuning into all this stuff late at night, after many beers and hot knives ( sure it's rocky it's the 70's), and the Iron Curtain was very real, so it felt sort of sinister and a bit unsettling, listening to this sort of stuff. So thanks for the memory, my god it was colder in those days though war or not. Sorry I forgot to say how much I enjoy your channel, it's unique which is quite a feat on YT. Cheers Gov.
You should tell some stories 😊
Another great video Lewis, it would be good if you made a long in depth video from the early years right up to now, it's fascinating to think that all this went on and that people are still trying to jam them in this day and age
A great uncle of mine spent a fair bit of time in the 1970s doing contract work for British intelligence on Cyprus as an electrical engineer. I had a chance to ask him if he was familiar with the Lincolnshire Poacher a few years ago, and I played a bit of it for him. He denied all knowledge, but perhaps he was being a consummate professional to the end.
You need to do a bit more research buddy!
@@PaulStrickland ???
@@PaulStrickland And you need to tell people wtf you're talking about buddy!
@@lecrapface5270 why don't you keep your pokey nose out of it?
@@PaulStrickland You should have asked yourself that question before
I remember it like it was yesterday, when I heard my first number station. It was in the early 80s when I played with my dad's Grundig Satellit short wave radio. Of course it was in the middle of the night. I was eleven or twelve years old and when I heard that faint, distorted, interference-laden voice I was scared sh*tless. It haunted me for weeks with shivers and nightmares. It was the same when I listened to the Deutsche Welle on long or short wave and the east german jammers kicked in. Those super strange sounds were also perfect food for nightmares.
Did you ever listen to Radio Tirana in the 80s?
Love your videos! Those pre-recorded automated messages and accompanying eerie melodies, are creepy, but fascinating
I remember listening to number stations as a schoolkid on my comms receiver, always sounded sinister. if people are confused about your antenna footage matching your dialogue then you might need to show the teletubbies then it will become clear.
Teletubbies, I m f a o!!!
I listened to Lincolnshire Poacher back in the mid 00's, before it fell off the air (same Joshua R. on the Simon Mason site). I heard it a few times in a week break up and stop transmitting through messages, as well as oddities and mistakes (cutouts on the Poacher identifier) and the last inflected number would end prematurely. As far as i'm aware, these were some of it's last transmissions, before it fell off the air. I assume hardware failure was largely to blame for the Poachers demise.
Given their likely purpose, they would have been kept running until all associated secret missions were over, otherwise some powerful agencies would have gotten really angry. But once an end day was scheduled maintenance on equipment may have become less thorough with failures becoming more frequent.
I think modern missions hide similar transmissions in digital broadcast media like UA-cam comments or copy protected digital TV, requiring just a secret computer program on a machine with certain standard connections. Another place to hide messages would be in global paper newspapers that publish daily like the stations but would be easily picked up in target areas. Invention hiding schemes is itself an exercise in inventiveness. Overall the idea is that the delivery is done blindly with nobody but the agent and their command office knowing exactly where and what to look for, and with a huge number of innocent recipients ignoring the hidden message while acting as unwitting smoke screens for the one agent looking for specific codes.
I belive it was traced to RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus
I just assumed that you were not including footage of numbers station because, well, they're "secret" for a given value of secret, and that, blow ke down, you might not actually know where they emanate from.
Very interesting videos/essays. Thank you.
DFD21 and DFC37 are ITU conforming calls, too. Allegedly they were even listed in callbooks in DL. Don't think the QSLed, though. Another nice one, Lewis! And yes, follow up(s) on the topic would be great!
I did hear once that number stations could also have been used for transmissions to commercial ships during the 70's and 80's. But it might not be true. However even commercial shipping has always been competitive and anything that can improve the profit margins could be a viable avenue.
Today with digital encrypted satellite communication it's no longer necessary to run the number stations.
For what it’s worth, it’s in Hoch Deutsch, not the accent used in the GDR.
It makes sense for a station to register with the ITU, for the simple reason that it prevents communications authorities from suspecting it as a rogue pirate transmission (because the station is classified) and trying to locate it. It's a form of hiding in plain sight.
I can confirm that DFC37 and DFD10 were indeed registered with the ITU. They were listed in the ITU's white book, although often not in "amateur" lists such as Klingenfuss. Location was given as Bonames, which is a suburb of Frankfurt. I think the power was given as 15kW. The responsible authority was listed as the German PTT - I guess they were operating the transmitter, though were probably not responsible for the actual contents.
The two-letter stations - Papa November etc - were not listed.
@@ehsnils Probably was more to fishing fleets, those are competitive. There was a big fuss over the mandate for AIS anti-collision transmitters, that allow a vessel to be tracked even from space.
Surprised you didn't mention HM01 (AKA: The Cuban Numbers Lady). Arguably the new replacement for the Lincolnshire Poacher in popularity; This station typically broadcasts to the east coast of the US. I've heard them broadcast on the same frequency as Radio Havana Cuba, which is atypical. Also, I've heard people say they've heard the log in/out sounds of Windows XP.
Yep there's proof of that, lots of people have heard it happening and captured it on websdl etc, I've caught it playing over Havana Cuba once or twice and it's pretty astounding
Imagine if one of those viruses that spread like wildfire in the XP days had included sound... 😆
Great stuff - I and a friend used to listen to these number stations in the early '80s on his dad's Yaesu FRG7 receiver with a long wire down the garden. No internet then but I seem to remember he was subscribed to a fanzine that listed many interesting "scanner" frequencies to listen to - with Number Stations probably being the most reliable HF ones.
We never heard any go wrong though, like this, but we always looked forward to hearing "The Gongs" which played a really sinister tune on bells before giving out its numbers which sounded like it was coming off a tape that had stretched (badly) as there was so much wow on the audio. All the ones we used to listen to are now long gone - but there are still plenty of them out there, much easier to find now as there are a few web sites dedicated to providing timetables for frequencies and times.
"The Russian Buzzer" got interesting around about the time the Russian invasion of Ukraine started earlier on this year as people started playing music over it (I guess either as a protest or to jam it). Funny thing about that though is that it hardly ever gives out any meaningful messages, coded or otherwise.
The Buzzer jamming is done for views. Probably a low powered device set up close to the receiver of whoever's making those live video feeds.
I sampled a few web SDRs around the world and none had those "jammings".
I've loved listening to numbers stations since I was a kid. I think that webSDR has given them a resurgence. When your internet is good but radio is bad you can just log on and find a location that can pick up the signal. When you have no internet you can break out your portable and tune in the old way.
Any videos on number stations will always get a watch from me. Been fascinated by these since I stumbled across them online about 6 years ago.
It's my understanding that it's part of a one-time pad message encryption system. With one physically passes a sheet of random numbers to an operative while having a copy themselves. Encrypted messages are then able to be broadcast in the blind and intended recipients need only tune in and listen and use their sheet of numbers to decrypt the message. As long as the encryption sheet is kept secret, never reused, and destroyed after use, the message is absolutely indecipherable. And the system is really very, very simple. The flaw lies only in that the one-time pad sheets have to be physically transferred and must never be leaked or reused.
I'd put my transceivers and antennae in the closet, a few years back. Then today, i stumble across this channel. Well friend, i guess i'm dragging that equipment back out, annoying the hell out of my landlord by hanging antennae out the windows, and re-learning things i shouldn't have let slip. Thanks for reviving an old man's curiosity.
I think number stations are absolutely fascinating...im not afraid of much but number stations have always freaked me out. I guess it's the creepy voices and bad audio..
Thanks for the video and yes more please!!
I think not knowing what they are saying can make your mind think of things they could be saying and those thoughts can make it quite sinister as a result.
The low-quality monophonic melodies and the computer voice are definitely creepy-sounding. I can take it during the daytime but I've learnt from experience never to watch these videos at night.
Funny story, during my internship at Rohde und Schwarz I was asked to take down a 1KW shortwave antenna with my colleague from a military owned dune in Katwijk (NL) and rebuild it on a military compound in De Lier (20K) away.
And when we tested it after the move the army actually played a tape messaging digits, similar to this one set verbally and a set that actually modulated the transmitter in CW we could the see the S meter toggle when we heard a little pulse in the audio tape.
Perhaps the same set of digits.
I always assumed that that shortwave coms was used for the war in Yugoslavia back then. But I am not sure.
Now almost 30 years on, I am curious what they are 😂At that moment after 4 days of intensive work we were happy we were done and could go home.
And care for our burned faces - it was extremely sunny that first two days tearing it down. And the other two days, in true Dutch summer tradition soaking wet and muddy 😅
Oh and as treat I got to build a second one that Rohde und Schwarz NL had for themselves. And it was on top of that company roof until the building was torn down 4 years ago. Everybody called it the “oversized, clothes drying rack” here in town.
It was always fun when I explained that I helped assemble that eye soar 😂
@CallousCoder Good work mate !
@@trespire it’s just undoing lots of bolts! 😆Let me put it that way, I didn’t need to have studied EE for 3 years to do it. But as an internship I couldn’t complain! Most just wished keyboard and mice balls (90s reference).
I got to move antennas and build automated CMT-50 calibration in Rohde und Schwarz basic. And before that I had an internship on university where I worked on the Dutch Open Tower Telescope. Frankly my internships were more exciting than all my jobs since 😆
*eyesore
@@mousermind That's your takeaway from the story? :')
I'd love to hear more about these! Numbers stations are so fascinating and creepy...I wish that I had a shortwave radio setup.
You can also look at WebSDR sites who allow guests to stream.
I remember a numbers station real strong here in Arizona USA in the late 60s near 7Mhz was a live female voice and in the middle of saying the numbers started coughing never did turn off her mike. It was kind of funny. I always wondered how many number stations were on military boast out in the sea. Made it hard to locate.
My favorite radio channel! I've recommended your videos to a bunch of people and they loved your content.
It must have been around the late 1970s, I remember hearing an eerie distant female voice reading numbers once when I was playing with my Parents radio, I loved the weird sounds I used to pick up. This though scared the hell out of me. I know now that it was a numbers station.
Another fab video Lewis! The great thing about Numbers Stations is that it makes your enemy think they have your agents operating within their territory even if you don’t.
Well now I know what it sounds like when two numbers stations have an argument.
In several of our transmitter sites we had leased rooms and antennas attached to our main tower.
Each room had its own secure metal door and its own power panel with its own meter and the coax going out to their own antennas
We had no idea who they are or what frequencies they use or what they transmit
We didn't even have keys to those doors and the rooms were pretty small they could house maybe two racks and each had their own AC unit on the roof
One of the rooms was rented by a local college for their low power radio station and another was rented by XM Satellite Radio and another was rented by a public access radio station but the others we have no idea who they are.
I'm sure their government agencies
As long as they didn't interfere with any other transmissions from The towers there was no problem
You might be surprised about the others, there will often be a variety of operators that just aren't conspicuous.
@@absalomdraconis Exactly. No secret government agency needs domestic VHF city coverage. Private radio systems for utilities, hospitals, school buses. Local or state government trunked systems for police, ambulance, fire, city workers. FM broadcast and TV repeaters. Paging networks. Railroad systems, there was a big deployment in the past few years with the positive train control anti-collision system mandate. You could look up their frequencies and powers from FCC ULS doing a location search.
Thanks for these historic recordings ... brings back so many memories from listening to HF in the late 70s and early 80s.
I have always believed Numbers Stations are a backup if comms go down from a nuclear EMP or NEMP. I was lucky in 1988-89 i was in the Army Cadet Force every 4 years you could spent 12 days with with the British Army I went to West Germany and stayed with 14 signal regiment Ironside Barracks, in Scheuen, north of Celle. One night we tuned into a Numbers Station not knowing at the time what why and who was broadcasting so we asked the soldier looking after us what we had found he told us at set times they test comms making sure its working with a clear signal but who knows they must be important for it to still be around
yes, would love to hear more - this is a fascinating subject - Good Work Ringway!
That Lincolnshire melody and the voice is somehow familiar. I know nothing about these things at all but we lived on RAF Conningsby in the 70's. Just stumbled upon this video and it brought back memories for some reason.
I remember reading that there are examples where The Spanish Lady will accidentally start broadcasting Radio Habana kinda giving away who is running it.
2:20 " US b mode" I couldn't help but picture someone just lobbing pen drives off the top of an antenna 🤷🏻♂️🤦🤣
Another good video Lewis...always been fascinated by numbers stations...I was posted to Germany in 76..had a SW/VHF radio..used to tune round the bands..got numbers stations a few times..even the G 16..
Keep the content going mate
I used my money from shoveling snow and mowing yards to buy a JVC "boom box" in the mid 80s that had shortwave radio too. It's nice hearing about the weird things I heard especially at night on antennas a friend and I rigged up a tall tree.
About the antenna's... They are.... beautiful shots ;-)
Number stations, received a few in 'the wild' and they remain creepy for sure.
Thanks for sharing!
I've been hearing a lot of talk recently about NATO and USAF shortwave EAMs recently. Would love to hear your take on that.
Love it. I'm 45 and have been listening to stuff since childhood and it fascinates me to this day.
Visible error conditions always reveal information about the underlying architecture
Brings back memories Lewis, although I had never heard of QSL cards being issued by a numbers station, that is gold.
Being a kid in the 60s my family had a hallcrafters short wave with tubes.
We always listened to the numbers station! Oh yeah too, in California
I love the idea of a numbers station sending out QSL cards.
Yes, be great to hear more.
73 M7TUD
Reminds me of Futurama "Wow, you guys run numbers?" "Well, nothing fancy. You know, ones and zeros mostly"
"This video includes stock footage unrelated to numbers stations" seems like a pretty clear-cut statement to me.
There are a lot of mongs out there.. Some people need it demonstrated in picture format
I want to create my own number station just to troll everyone.
In the 1980 s They used childern voices to call the numbers. The transmitters were blow torches.
Another excellent video. I grew up listening to the number stations and still listen to them now! I particularly ike the English Man E07. Also E11 and that emphatic female voice! 73
Do not try to listen to one of these videos while you're dozing off. My dreams were, well, disconcerting. 🤣🤣🤣
Great video. Thanks. Not only am I interested in number stations gone wrong - but anything about number stations.
I was stationed in West Germany when I got my first shortwave, and discovered my first number station. It had the voice of a little girl.
Ohhhh....THAT would have been creepy!
Its nice to know the video imagery is just there to rest one’s eyes on. Thanks for letting us know that, and it IS interesting in any case.
I remember listening to a programme about them years ago, I think from BBC Radio 4, and found it all a little bit sinister but fascinating at the same time. To think such a simple technology would be so effective at sending coded messages without identifying the recipient.
The first German one sounded like a pixie on a flute! 😊 I wonder if these stations were the influence for the "hatch" in the TV series lost?
Nostalgia! I picked these up on a wee radio I got in a scout jumble sale in the late 80s. The woodpecker radar too. Never had a clue until youtube what they were. There was also a station that broadcast birdsong for hours - presumably testing for new radio stations
I understand what appeared to be just varying melodic tones where actually codes themselves.
A bit like Amatuer Data Modes using varying audio tones to transmit information.
If you listen long enough, eventually you'll hear these stations say, "That's NumberWang!"
This reminds me of the game Fallout. Post nuclear war and there are these towers that you can activate, and it lets you pick up secret military signals, usually hijacked by people looking for help.
Cool video!
The very idea that people can't recognize stock footage as a visual placeholder is testament to the pedantry that is encouraged on the Internet.
I heard a numbers station on FM radio driving thru Connecticut, was surprised because only heard of them recently on UA-cam
Something about the cryptic messages going through the air with weird sounds gives me the creeps, not sure what it is about It
Somewhere there's a nervous agent waiting for the next set of numbers telling them when and where they'll be extracted......only to find some other station broadcasting over the frequency.
Big mistake on my part watching one of your early videos on number stations. Years ago I picked one up on a prc320 in Germany and wondered what it was about. Now I am hooked!
One way to make a spooky thing even spookier.
Almost like hearing baby’s laugh at 3AM… when you alone in the house… and have no children.
Number stations are incredible, we have no idea who the messages are or who they are for. Yet the most modern sophisticated computer is hacked by kids down the street. is our technology that advanced.
Yes please it’s very interesting to learn about the operating of number stations and how they can go wrong
I was US Military stationed in Europe during the Cold War. Radio Jamming was a favorite past-time for the Eastern Forces. We had workarounds for these, band jumping, frequency hopping. The Military did develope a pretty good radio to avoid this finally, SYNGARDS or something.
Sincgars, it is VHF frequency hopping to a crypto key. Replaced the vrc-46.
@@stevenmiller3337 I was M1 tank commander. I did not mess with radio, other than to talk on it, or the GPS thing. I didn’t even know how to turn the thing on. I was a late comer to the tank scene, so my crew really helped…
Time to start up random number stations across the globe. That would mix it up a bit.
Yes, more number stations. Thanks again for another great video.
I have two short recordings of G02 swedish rhapsody accidentally transmitting with the unaltered standard Stasi Sprach-Morse Machine voice, the same voice as G06 and a few other stations, rather than the infamous pitched up voice it normally used.
I love this topic. Very intriguing.
I remember watching a show called The Americans which was about a couple who were soviet spies in the US. they had a radio and a code book hidden in the basement and would decode messages
As a young boy in Sweden we used to sit in the basement and listen to these stations prepping for war. Now I have to teach my kids to prepare. It is a sad world….
I love to see the pictures I just love all the ,mast's, dish's ,and shortwave transmitters' and antenna's of all types.Please keep it up.
Brilliantly informative love to hear more
Also just an idea maybe for a future bideo
'Is it still possible to hear number stations today"
I used to hear lots of number stations but all I ever hear these days is the Japanese Slot Machine (XSL). Plus lots of over-the-horizon radar.
What is interesting is the fact they are still being used today and can be heard on shortwave when there are so many other digital ways to send messages without the use of shortwave frequencies.
As a kid I had an old ww2 shortwave radio from a bomber. id listen to weird stuff, including people reading numbers. now I know what to call them, number stations.
thanks
Yes, more please. One of my favourite topics.
Excellent. More on number stations going wrong please. Top watch.
Why do I feel the engineers of these numbers stations did things like include eerie melodies and other features just for the fun of it, to deliberately make them seem intimidating to people who stumbled across the transmissions.
Never heard of a number station till I watched the Nick Frost series on Amazon Prime "Truth Seekers" were they used the Lincolnshire Poacher jingle for their numbers station. This made me google number stations and I've been fascinated ever since.
HM01 Regularly has transmission problems. Windows XP sounds have been recorded a few times and some times the transmission will cut off randomly and start again after a few minutes. I personally have seen it drift between frequencies on a few occasions.