The "Numbers Stations" of the internet?

[madfranks]

Watch some of the videos, are they broadcasting encoded information?

http://kotaku.com/nobody-knows-what-these-mysterious-youtube-videos-are-1577645061

Thousands and thousands of videos, uploaded nearly every day. Each one is the same, structure-wise: 10 slides of shapes, shown over 11 seconds, over various random tones. Nobody has a clue what the videos are supposed to be, much less who is uploading them or why.


Just today, the channel has uploaded over a dozen bizarre videos. It's the type of randomness that almost makes the YouTube channel, called "Webdriver Torso," seem like the horse_ebooks of YouTube. But the eeriness of the videos means they might feel closer to "numbers stations," radio frequencies that carried spy codes during the cold war.

Attempts to contact the creator have proven useless. At one point, the internet even thought they nailed what was happening: supposedly, the videos were being uploaded by a company that wanted to test video stuff out...but even that proved to be a dead end.


Everyone has theories, of course. Some are even outlandish: maybe the videos are someone's attempts to communicate with aliens? It doesn't help that among the 77,000+ videos uploaded by Webdriver Torso, there will occasionally be abnormalities. For example, there is one video of the Eiffel Tower amidst the thousands of videos of random blue and red shapes. The YouTube channel has even commented once: "Matei is highly intelligent."


...nobody knows what the crap that means, either. Watching the tons of videos uploaded by the station doesn't really help.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mz6IsE7uvv8

[madfranks]

http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2014/05/05/weird-and-wonderful-the-webdriver-torso-mystery-videos-explained-and-remystified/

[Dogman]

Back in the day, and maybe today on the international radio bands, there were voices reading off groups of numbers, and if you could receive and translate teletype signals, the same nothing but number groups.

[Glass]

There are still a couple of numbers stations out there. I've seen some YT videos that Amateur Radio guys have posted. definitely code.

[madfranks]

Bump - I'd like to see what others think about this. Secret codes, or something else?

[Dogman]

Bump - I'd like to see what others think about this. Secret codes, or something else? This is old tech, that works, has been proven for many years. On HF the stations move bands (frequency's) depending of conditions of the ionosphere and target area. The sender cannot care a hoot, of who and were they are. But the target ] needs to lay low, so number stations broadcast on multiple frequency's to get the message across. Most number stations rely on a book or common text, which still today is the hardest to crack, even in this day of supercomputers. With a key of the page and where to start, it works.

Internet,not so much, everything on the net can be traced, despite what many believe. Photos, with imbedded text, easy to decode, e-mails most will relate to both having a common book agreed on, and then the message coded. But e-mails have a track.

Radio, if the sender does not give a crap, because of triangulation,they can be traced. The ones the message is for can not be. One can only be traced it one transmits.

So the net is a very bad choice, or a second best. Posting on a blog/web page with coded info, is second grade, because the ones that log on that page, can be traced back. There is a computer/router/ that will have a history of what is what.

Numbers stations are the best, broadcast from a place that nothing can touch, and the broadcaster is safe. The only thing is the high frequency bands are fickle, some times of the year depending on the frequency (band) used, and atmospheric conditions depending how close or far the transmitter is. It is a hit or miss, for critical stuff, but for missions and assignments , nothing better. Have had a few ham transceivers that were ham only confined to their cages. But my early separate receiver and transmitters and later transceivers I favored the open ones that could receive everything from dc to light. Bunch of strange crap transmitted. It is a hoot,

Number stations, are the best for the ones in the field as far as orders go in a one way communication only!

Just a rambling thought, from a radio nut, that likes to scan the radio spectrum.

[govcheetos]

Communicates information between different Bomber Scannner squadrons.