priyom.org

KiwiSDR: tuning into new numbers stations

26 May 2017

If you're already familiar with the KiwiSDR project, you can check out our new receiver map and scroll down to read what else the Priyom team is doing with it!   For many including myself, discovering and listening to numbers stations live was only possible thanks to the University of Twente WebSDR. I think it's fair to say that it has been such a unique and successful receiver, it was a major milestone and became a staple of shortwave listening. Over the past year, a new generation ...

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Number stations reach FM

07 January 2017

You probably have heard about North Korea reactivating its number station broadcasts not very long ago. Well, we're glad to anounce that V15 now transmits on FM! On December 21st, 2016, North Korea decided to change some frequencies from their main broadcast stations. This includes Echo of Hope and Radio Pyongyang, among others. In the case of Radio Pyongyang, they dropped three MW frequencies (684, 729 and 1080 khz), and they started to broadcast on FM! And not only on one frequency, but f...

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Radio Pyongyang resumes its Numbers broadcasts

30 October 2016

This June North Korea has resumed its Number Station broadcasts on Radio Pyongyang. The station V15 has been defunct since 2001, but it has been reactivated! There has been a change in operation habits, scheduling and format. At the start time, they play a piece of music that varies by the agent number. Then they send the message for the agent number. The messages are now read as this:  "Page <1-999>, Number <1-100>". The station still uses the same frequencies as regular...

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Mark Bernes Song on Buzzer

25 September 2015

On Thursday 24th of September S28 has transmitted famous Mark Bernes song "Zhuravli" (Cranes). This song is about WWII soldiers and says "It seems to me sometimes that our soldiers Who were not to return from fields of gore Did not one day lie down into our land But turned into a skein (wedge) of white cranes..." Purpose of this transmisson is suspected to be test of the relay line. Recording of the transmission can be found in our Buzzer log

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Buzzer is not transmitted from Kerro anymore, new military marker on 4525 USB

09 August 2015

The Russian military network The Buzzer on 4625 kHz is not transmitted from the Kerro transmitter site ("Irtysh") anymore. It seems that the Russians are reverting to their old structure, when the frequency 4625 kHz was only used for the Moscow Military District. At present, The Buzzer appears to be broadcast only from the 69th Communication Hub in Naro Fominsk. A new military marker, similar to The Buzzer, The Pip, The Squeaky Wheel and S5292, was discovered on the frequency 4525 kHz,...

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Squeeky wheel S32 new (test?) day frequency

24 April 2015

Priyom found a new frequency for the famous Russian circular military network The Squeaky Wheel. It is 7009 kHz and operates in parallel to network's normal day frequency, 5473 kHz. You can enjoy it here.

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Buzzer adopts night frequency

24 February 2015

THIS FREQUENCY WAS TEMPORARY AND IS NOW NO LONGER IN USE   It hasn't been long since Russian military added a channel marker (B Marker mentioned in last blog post) to a channel - which sends monolith messages just like Buzzer, Pip, Wheel and so on - using frequency 5292kHz. It looks like the Western & Central military districts at least are undergoing some changes and/or upgrades, for the past few days the Buzzer has been also sending continuously on 3216kHz as well as its regular...

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B marker - 5292kHz Russian Military Marker

16 February 2015

We now have a fifth Russian military circular station with a channel marker! First there was Buzzer, then Pip, then Wheel, then R marker, well let us introduce to you the D marker! On Thursday 11th February 2015 we have found a new Russian military channel marker, akin to the buzzer! This is not something we expected to find in 2015 but rather would expect the opposite, less and less shortwave usage and more movement towards newer systems. The frequency for this new channel marker is 5292kH...

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Priyom Discovers Polish Intelligence Digital Transmissions

21 December 2014

On November 25th, 2014, we noticed a transmission made with an FSK digital mode used by Polish intelligence, which started an investigation of its internals. This system has been in use since at least 2009, and a decoder for it is already included in certain expensive software, but little of its operation habits have been documented in public sources. This system uses the baud rate of 100 bd, the shift of 740 Hz, and a custom 16-bit alphabet. POL FSK without a message (December 8th, 2...

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X06 Uses Windows XP and GRU's Transmitter

15 October 2014

The following is a description of a very interesting transmission that took place on October 14th. At about 07:20 UTC we spotted a carrier on 10755 kHz, a frequency commonly used by the Russian military intelligence agency GRU for unscheduled E06 and S06 with ID 975. The carrier had a characteristic of one of GRU's transmitters - that is, the transmitter hum present on both side bands, the actual audio on the upper, and only traces of it on the lower. Expecting E06 or S06 to start any time ...

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