WA Radio Scanner Users' Group

Saw this news article online today and it made me smile...

Police training exercise sparks public panic

* Police pretend gunman on loose
* Even local police respond
* Scanner eavesdroppers blamed

A POLICE training exercise involving a gunman in a suburban Hobart shopping centre has sparked widespread public panic.

{SNIP}

Inspector Robert Bonde said a number of transmissions were made on a police radio channel as part of a training exercise at the Tasmania Police Academy at Rokeby.

{SNIP}

It is not known how so many Tasmanians heard about the apparent gunman in such a short time.

However, the incident raises questions about the number of Tasmanians who use police scanners to eavesdrop on police operations.

This is the reason why when we're doing SES excercises we regularly say Excercise Only. That way people don't think they slept through an earthquake 5 minutes ago, or come to assist in a search that's going on.

Guess it just boosts the Pro's list - for why all Emergency Services etc should be on a Digital Encrypted Network...

G

I suppose it's not really a secret that the crims used to use scanners to dodge the police before encryption. I'm not sure why all essential government and enforcement services aren't encrypted...

Question has to be asked - why didn't the local coppers know about the 'training exercise' ? Why not use fictional names instead of real placenames? Prudent to let the left hand know what the right is doing...

The Police Academy in Rokeby is quite a distance away from the shopping centre in question (other side of the river and then some).

TasPol is encrypted.. must've been using an older unencrypted Analogue frequency.

Tyranus wrote:This is the reason why when we're doing SES excercises we regularly say Excercise Only. That way people don't think they slept through an earthquake 5 minutes ago, or come to assist in a search that's going on.

And with that said, one must wonder what the eavesdroppers were thinking ringing the police about a gunman that they heard on a police frequency.. one would assume that if the eavesdropper had that frequency programmed in that they were aware that it was the police they were listening to, and more obviously that they were aware of the situation/exercise.