priyom.org

New Page "Enigma 2000 Newsletter"

01 December 2023

ENIGMA 2000 is a UK based online group, whose aims are to bring together listeners and enthusiasts who monitor and gather information on 'Number Stations' and other related radio transmissions. Through our Group monitors can share their logs, discuss frequencies, thoughts and opinions on this most emotive subject. ENIGMA 2000 maintains the ENIGMA Control List, the definitive listing of number station identification. ENIGMA 2000 produces a two-monthly newsletter giving detail...

Read more

New page "N & O - Newsletter"

27 October 2023

"Numbers & Oddities" a.k.a. the "Spooks Newsletter" is a newsletter for the members of the Utility DXers Forum (UDXF), the Spooks mailing list, HF Underground and everyone else who is interested in Numbers Stations. "Numbers & Oddities" covers the fascinating world of Numbers Stations and other odd radio signals on shortwave. The effective flow of information in the field of "radio reconnaissance" is very important for the "Priyom" project. The monthly newsletter "News &am...

Read more

IRC chat moving to Libera, and extending to Discord

25 May 2021

Over the past week a lot has happened with the Priyom chat. First, we have decided to extend to Discord, and created our own server there where you can join us and chat: if that's what you'd like, simply follow this invitation. This is just an extension, not a move: our Discord server is bridged with our IRC channel, so it's the same chat, and not an alternative or a replacement. You don't have to leave IRC and get on Discord if you don't want to, you can keep using our IRC chat like curren...

Read more

Long-lost evidence shows G01 run by French SDECE

14 March 2020

Recently, we were approached in our chat by the author of a new blog about the origins of the ancient numbers station G01, also known as the Tyrolean Music Station. It stopped transmitting in 1975, but decades ago back when it was still active, this station used to broadcast, as its name indicates, Tyrolean music and yodeling, along with numbers and occasionally, something rather unique, even coded sentences; listen to a recording of it from The Conet Project here. Investigating past number...

Read more

Smolensk hub downsizes, German numbers down to last schedule

16 February 2020

At the turn of the new year it is not uncommon to see numbers stations schedules, that haven't sent any actual message in a long while, get definitely retired for the occasion and stop transmitting altogether.  This year again, 2020 brought us its number of inactive schedules that were taken permanently off the air: two G06 and two M14 ones, and what's peculiar about them, is that they were all transmitted from the same somewhat infamous communication hub located somewhere around Smolen...

Read more

Priyom pinpoints V07 transmissions to Khabarovsk

26 October 2018

V07 is a present-day glimpse back to past times when big numbers station families, featuring many variants in different European languages, could be heard on the air: German, Spanish, French, Polish, and even Hungarian or Bulgarian. Nowadays, apart from Cuban intelligence unsurprisingly using Spanish like in HM01, the only two remnants of those times are G06 in German, and one single schedule of the Spanish-language V07. The last numbers station variant using Spanish: that in itself gives V...

Read more

Priyom reverse-engineers North Korean DPRK-ARQ diplomatic modem

01 February 2018

Have a listen: Maybe you have heard this before. It is a sample recording of the rather common DPRK-ARQ modem, providing diplomatic communications on shortwave between North Korea and its embassy network. But one thing we didn't imagine when we started looking into this modem, was just how much prolific this North Korean diplomatic network was. Since the reactivation of V15 in June 2016, North Korea is back in the numbers station world. Probably spurred by the escalating international t...

Read more

KiwiSDR: locating numbers stations and field agents

25 July 2017

This is the second part of a previous blog post on the worldwide KiwiSDR receiver network, make sure to check it out if you haven't!   When tuning through the radio bands and coming across a mysterious signal, the same questions often come to mind... What is it? What does it mean? Actually, can this cryptic signal even carry any meaning? What is its purpose?... We've all had this feeling. In the case of numbers stations, we have to resolve to giving up on deciphering the messages, but...

Read more

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 ...

Read more

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...

Read more