Radio Amateurs of Canada Announces a New Section

Posted on by VA3DBJ

The number of Sections needed for a clean sweep in the ARRL November Sweepstakes (SS) will rise to 84 in 2020, with the addition of a new Prince Edward Island (PE) Section. Radio Amateurs of Canada (RAC) announced this week that the new Section will become effective on April 1.

RAC said its Prince Edward Island members have been working for some time to create a separate Section for RAC ARES activities there. The provinces of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick will continue to be in the Maritimes (MAR) Section. In addition to Field Day and Sweepstakes, the new Section in Canada will affect the ARRL 160-Meter Contest but not the ARRL 10-Meter Contest, which uses states/provinces for US and Canadian multipliers.

The change will mean that logging software developers will have to update their software to include the PE Section as a valid exchange element for any affected operating events.

RAC also announced an adjustment in two of its Ontario Sections. Effective April 1, radio amateurs in the City of Hamilton and in the Regional Municipality of Niagara will shift to the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) Section from the Ontario South (ONS) Section.

Site Maintenance

Posted on by VA3DBJ

This site will be in and out of maintenance from late evening Monday (October 28th) night till the morning hours of Tuesday (October 29th). The maintenance is back-end and it may not effect the website itself.

AMSAT Announces 2019 Board Election Results

Posted on by VA3DBJ

As a result of the 2019 AMSAT Board of Directors election, Jerry Buxton, N0JY; Drew Glasbrenner, KO4MA; Patrick Stoddard, WD9EWK; and Michelle Thompson, W5NYV, were elected by the AMSAT membership to serve for 2 years. The First Alternate is Brennan Price, N4QX. The Second Alternate is Howie Defelice, AB2S. Both will serve 1-year terms.

Total number of votes cast was 1,052 (892 electronic plus 160 paper), with the tally as follows:

  • Michelle Thompson, W5NYV, 675 votes
  • Patrick Stoddard, WD9EWK, 585 votes
  • Jerry Buxton, N0JY, 526 votes
  • Drew Glasbrenner, KO4MA, 515 votes
  • Brennan Price, N4QX, 480 votes
  • Howie Defelice, AB2S, 435 votes
  • Paul Stoetzer, N8HM, 399 votes
  • Johns, WE4B, 366 votes.

— Thanks to AMSAT Secretary Clayton Coleman, W5PFG

Amateur Radio Resources Ready as Dorian Poised to Become a Major Hurricane

Posted on by VA3DBJ

— From ARRL

Amateur Radio resources organized this week as Hurricane Dorian threatened Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands and worked its way through the Caribbean. A change in direction spared Puerto Rico — still recovering from hurricanes Irma and Maria in 2017 — from taking a direct hit; the Virgin Islands suffered downed trees and widespread power outages. As of August 29, Dorian was a Category 1 storm with maximum sustained winds near 85 MPH with higher gusts. According to the National Hurricane Center (NHC), Dorian was expected to become a major hurricane on Friday and remain an extremely dangerous hurricane through the weekend, reaching Category 3 or 4 by September 1. Heavy rainfall generated by Dorian could cause flash flooding, the NHC said.

“The risk of devastating hurricane-force winds along the Florida east coast and peninsula late this weekend and early next week continues to increase,” the NHC said on August 29.

“We are standing by in a ready-to-respond state, once a more definitive track is known,” Southern Florida Section Manager Barry Porter, KB1PA, told ARRL Headquarters on August 29. “We will be holding a tri-Section conference call tonight to firm up any plans.” Porter said Florida Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster and Red Cross were in preparation mode.

On Wednesday, the Hurricane Watch Net (HWN), activated for about 9 hours on 14.325 MHz and 7.268 MHz, working in conjunction with WX4NHC at the NHC in Miami to provide “ground truth” weather data to forecasters. The VoIP Hurricane Net also activated.

The HWN has continued to closely monitor Dorian’s progress. HWN Manager Bobby Graves, KB5HAV, said the HWN tentatively plans reactivate on August 30 at 2100 UTC.

The ARRL Headquarters Emergency Response Team is also monitoring the situation closely. ARRL officials are in regular communication with partner agencies, particularly FEMA and the Department of Homeland Security. In addition, ARRL HQ remains in close contact with Field Organization officials in the affected region, where some ARRL Ham Aid equipment was previously positioned.

W1AW, which had already planned to be in operation for the Hiram Percy Maxim 150th Birthday special event this weekend, will remain ready to assist with emergency communications.

ARRL HF Band Planning Committee Reactivated to Address Spectrum Issues

Posted on by VA3DBJ

— From ARRL

In an effort to more effectively address HF digital technology issues, ARRL President Rick Roderick, K5UR, has reactivated the ARRL Board of Directors’ HF Band Planning Committee. The six-member panel, chaired by First Vice President Greg Widin, K0GW, will primarily focus on spectrum allocation issues that have gained increased visibility with discussions on accommodating automatically controlled digital stations (ACDS) — many employing Winlink email. The committee will also discuss operating frequencies for FT4, FT8, and other digital modes. Widin says the committee will meet next week to chart its course. Reactivation of the HF Band Planning Committee came out of discussions during the July 2019 ARRL Board meeting.

“ARRL is not trying to shut down digital communication or shut down Winlink in particular,” Widin said, adding that ARRL recognizes Winlink’s proven track record in emergency communication. His committee also will consider Winlink supporters’ calls for the expansion of the ACDS segments spelled out in §97.221(b) of the amateur rules.

“This is not an easy task by any means,” Widin allowed. “They’re not making more bandwidth.” He said this is especially a problem on 40 meters.

“We’re well aware that Winlink is the de facto standard supporting emergency communications in many parts of the country, but we have to figure out how it can operate with other modes, so that everybody can communicate,” Widin said, “without having one mode overrun any other mode.” The committee will not address data encryption questions at this point, however.

In response to ARRL’s 2013 petition to delete the so-called “symbol rate” limit and replace it with a maximum bandwidth for data emissions of 2.8 kHz below 29.7 MHz, the FCC proposed to eliminate symbol rate (baud rate) limitations for data transmissions but declined to propose a bandwidth limitation.

At its July meeting, the ARRL Board of Directors called for ARRL’s Washington Counsel to obtain FCC approval for several Part 97 rule changes. The Board asked for a rulemaking petition to remove the current 300 baud rate limitation; authorize all ACDS below 30 MHz, regardless of bandwidth, to operate only within the ACDS bands designated in §97.221(b); require digital stations operating with a bandwidth greater than 500 Hz to operate within the ACDS bands, whether or not automatically controlled, and limit the maximum bandwidth of digital signals below 29 MHz to 2.8 kHz.

ARRL-initiated mediation efforts for rival parties to reach consensus on all or some of the issues raised in the “symbol rate” proceeding ended a few days prior to the July Board meeting. While those discussion were useful, no consensus among parties was reached for FCC consideration. Widin said some positions may have been too divergent to find viable middle ground.

“We still want to change the symbol rate limitation into a bandwidth limitation, which makes a lot more sense in terms of current and future modes,” Widin said. The panel also hopes to work with the WSJT-X Development Group to establish FT4 frequencies compatible with existing band plans.

Widin further suggested that his committee will have to look beyond the current landscape of HF digital modes into what might lie ahead. 

144 – 146 MHz Removed from French Proposal for Additional Aeronautical Applications

Posted on by VA3DBJ

— From IARU

The 144 – 146 MHz Amateur Radio segment has been removed from a French proposal to study spectrum additional for Aeronautical Mobile Service (AMS) applications. France had included the band, which comprises the entire 2 meter band in ITU Region 1, for consideration as a European Conference of Telecommunications and Postal Administrations (CEPT) position for World Radiocommunication Conference 2019 (WRC-19). Heading into a just-ended CEPT Conference Preparatory Group (CPG) meeting in Turkey this past week, France was holding firm on the proposal to have AMS share 144 – 146 MHz with Amateur Radio. The CPG meeting considered CEPT ECC positions on this and other issues for WRC-19.

The International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) had called the French proposal for 144 – 146 MHz “unsound” and contended that sharing of the current amateur allocation with AMS radio systems would not be possible “without a significant likelihood of mutual interference.”

The French spectrum study proposal would have had to gain approval from at least 10 CEPT countries at the CPG meeting — with not more than 6 opposing — to appear on the agendas of WRC-19 and WRC-23, where a final decision would be made.

Also at the CEPT meeting, at the insistence of the European Commission, a WRC-23 agenda item was considered necessary to address world-wide protection of Regional Navigational Satellite Systems (RNSS) from amateur emissions in the 23 centimeter band, 1240 – 1300 MHz. Delegates agreed to a draft WRC Resolution that stresses the importance of the band to the Amateur Service and explicitly excludes the removal of existing allocations as part of the proposed agenda item. The issue stems from reported incidents of interference to the Galileo GPS E6 signal on 1278.750 MHz.

Other Amateur Radio-related issues addressed at the CEPT CPG included:

  • Agreement to a European Common Proposal (ECP) on allocating 50 – 52 MHz to the Amateur Service in Region 1 (Europe, Africa, and the Middle East) on a secondary basis, with a footnote listing those countries where the Amateur Service will have a primary allocation in the band 50 – 50.5 MHz (WRC-19 Agenda Item 1.1).
  • Agreement to an ECP on spectrum to be considered for International Mobile Telecommunications (IMT), which does not now include the primary Amateur Radio band at 47 – 47.2 GHz (WRC Agenda Item 1.13).
  • Agreement to an ECP that retains the current regulatory position in the 5725 – 5850 MHz band that includes secondary Amateur Radio and Amateur Satellite allocations (WRC Agenda Item 1.16).
  • No change to an already agreed upon CEPT position on wireless power transmission (WRC Agenda item 9.1.6). This calls for no change in the Radio Regulations to address the question of operating frequency for wireless power transmission for electric vehicle charging (WPT-EV), but leaves open the question of spurious emissions from WPT-EV.

IARU Region 1 President Don Beattie, G3BJ, said that the IARU team at Ankara — the only representatives of the Amateur Service at the meeting — had presented clear and convincing arguments for Amateur Radio positions and that he was pleased that regulators had recognized the strength of the amateur case. He expressed his thanks to everyone who contributed to the outcome at CPG.

CEPT is one of the six regional telecommunications organizations but viewed as the most influential. The issues now move to WRC-19 in Egypt this fall for final resolution. IARU will be represented at the international gathering, which gets under way in late October.

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Posted on by VA3DBJ

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Millions of users data leaked by browser extensions

Posted on by VA3DBJ

From: Geekbots

Now, a research report reveals that some popular browser extensions are collecting and even selling users data including a list of visited sites and photos that users have looked at.

Most recently, security researchers found that a number of popular extensions were harvesting user data without consent. Not only their browsing histories but also exposing tax returns, medical records, credit card information and other sensitive data to a database. The exposed data also include vehicle identification, numbers of recently bought automobiles along with the names and addresses of the buyers.

Security researcher Sam Jadali discussed the presence of some data-harvesting extensions available on the Chrome and Firefox app stores. Once the extensions installed in the system, it started tracking your browsing and spending habits and also harvesting sensitive data to sell online.

The report said,

This non-stop flow of sensitive data over the past seven months has resulted in the publication of links to home and business surveillance videos hosted on Nest and other security services.

Tax returns, billing invoices, business documents, and presentation slides posted to, or hosted on, Microsoft OneDrive, Intuit.com, and other online services” have been exposed.

Reports also showed that the affected extensions were used by millions of people, including HoverZoom, SpeakIt!, SuperZoom, SaveFrom.net Helper, Branded Surveys, Panel Community Surveys, FairShare Unlock, and PanelMeasurement.

Google and Firefox both said,

The extensions have been remotely removed or disabled in consumers’ browsers and are no longer available for download.

That’s why Google is trying to make Chrome extensions safer to use. Later this year, the company is rolling out a change that’ll restrict extensions from intercepting and modifying sensitive data flowing through the Chrome browser.

Mozilla is also aware of the changing security landscape and told that they have created a list of  “Recommended Extensions” that are editorially vetted, security-reviewed, and monitored for safety and privacy.

A Mozilla spokesperson said,

Mozilla has blocked all of the extensions that were found to be in violation of our policies. We looked into these extensions and found them to be in violation of our Distribution Agreement and Review Policies. As a result, they have been blocked from Firefox.

If you make use of extensions on Chrome or Firefox, you’ll want to make sure that your browser wasn’t affected by this catastrophic data breach.

California Earthquakes Disrupted HF Propagation on West Coast

Posted on by VA3DBJ

From: ARRL.org

British Columbia radio amateur Alex Schwarz, VE7DXW, said that an Independence Day magnitude 6.4 earthquake in California’s Mojave Desert and multiple aftershocks negatively affected HF propagation on the US west coast. Schwarz, who maintains the “RF Seismograph” and has drawn a correlation between earthquake activity and HF band conditions, said the radio disruption began at around 1600 UTC on July 4, and continued into July 5. He said that on July 4, the blackout was total except for 20 meters, where conditions were “severely attenuated,” Schwarz said. The RF Seismograph also detected the magnitude 7.1 earthquake on July 6 in the same vicinity, Schwarz reported. The distance between the monitoring station in Vancouver, British Columbia, and that quake’s epicenter is 1,240 miles.

“Things are back to normal after the strong quake, as far as the ionosphere is concerned, but the unrest has not stopped yet,” Schwarz told ARRL on July 8. “There were over 7,000 mostly small quakes, and these do not seem to have the energy to effect the ionosphere. We all hope that this will settle down soon.” Schwarz said the RF Seismometer detected a magnitude 6.9 earthquake in Indonesia.

Over the holiday weekend, Schwarz had reported “a massive short-wave radio blackout” on the west coast. “It is not caused by the sun (the sun is quiet), but the field lines of the ’quakes themselves,” he said. A magnitude 6.2 earthquake took place off Vancouver Island, British Columbia, on July 4.

On July 6, Schwarz said, the RF Seismograph showed an increase in noise on 80 meters some 13 hours beforehand, as well as some propagation changes on 40 and 30 meters — low before the quake and increasing in its wake. Increases in noise on 15 and 10 meters were detected some 10 hours before the earthquake, diminishing about 3 hours afterward. In addition, noise level and propagation changes on 20 meters some 3 hours before the earthquake.

Schwarz said larger quakes spur longer periods of 80-meter noise which cross the day/night boundary. “The difficulty is the 80 meter noise difference between day and night, which is hard to subtract from the graphs,” he added. With earthquakes of lesser magnitude (4.0 to 5.9), the RF Seismograph displays the rise and fall typically within daytime or nighttime propagation, making it more obvious. “The measurement on the other bands is more consistent, and the quake can have either an amplifying or attenuating effect on propagation,” Schwarz told ARRL.

All of the earthquakes of the past few days occurred within a 4-square-mile area in and around Ridgecrest in San Bernardino County. Several injuries were reported, along with property damage. ARES and the Sierra Amateur Radio Club (SARC) have actively supported communications during the earthquake swarm and magnitude 7.1 quake in and around Ridgecrest, in the Mojave Desert. “Many club members are busy collecting information, running an emergency net, as well as staffing a back-up communication van,” Mike Herr, WA6ARA, told ARRL on July 7. 

The RF Seismograph propagation tool employs an omnidirectional multiband antenna to monitor JT65 frequencies (±10 kHz) on 80, 40, 30, 20, 15, and 10 meters. Recorders monitor the background noise and display the result in six color-coded, long-duration graphs displaying 6 hours of scans. When signals are present on a band, its graph trace starts to resemble a series of vertical bars. 

The RF Seismograph recorded the magnitude 7.5 earthquake in Ecuador on February 22. Schwarz recounted that noise on 15 meters began to be visible about 1 hour before the quake; then, 2 hours after the quake released, 15 meters started to recover. It did not affect 80 meters. “The earthquakes show up as RF noise because of the electric field lines, now scientifically confirmed to change the way the ionosphere reflects RF,” Schwarz said.

Schwarz has cited an article in the October 2018 edition of Scientific American, which, he says, explains the phenomenon. (See Erik Vance’s “Earthquakes in the sky,” Scientific American, October 2018, p. 44.)

The Scientific American article explores measurements in Japan and how earthquakes can create electric field lines that extend into the atmosphere. Schwarz said 171 earthquakes — all magnitude 6.0 events or greater — were studied, and only 15 of them had no RF noise associated with them. 

RF Seismograph is now a project on Scistarter.com, facilitated through Arizona State University. Contact Schwarz for additional information.

Restraint Urged in Response to 2-Meter Reallocation Proposal

Posted on by VA3DBJ

From: ARRL.org

Representatives of International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) member-societies in Europe are advising restraint in the wake of a proposal to consider the allocation of 146 – 148 MHz to the Aeronautical Mobile Service (AMS) at World Radiocommunication Conference 2023 (WRC-23). France recently raised the prospect during a European Conference of Postal and Telecommunications Administrations (CEPT) meeting in Prague, held in advance of WRC-19. A WRC-19 agenda item would call for studying a range of frequencies for AMS applications, including 144 – 146 MHz, and a decision could be made at WRC-23.

The French draft resolution seeks studies of possible new AMS primary allocations in several bands in the range from 144 MHz to 22.2 GHz on a primary basis, “while ensuring the protection of existing services in those bands and, as appropriate, adjacent bands, and not constraining future development of these services.”

The Radio Society of Great Britain (RSGB) released a statement this week, in part pointing that as proposed, the French resolution “is not an eviction or re-allocation of amateurs, but nonetheless is unwelcome and presents significant challenges. Unlike some other bands where amateurs do share, aeronautical applications are amongst the most difficult due to the altitudes and long free-space distances involved.”

Any consideration to allocate additional services in a band that’s already allocated on a primary basis to an incumbent service — Amateur Radio, in this case — must begin with a sharing/compatibility study. The IARU has expressed “grave concern” to any proposal that would include 144 – 146 MHz in a WRC agenda item and has pledged to make every effort to fully protect Amateur Radio interests and seek the support of regulators.

At the Prague meeting, only Germany opposed the proposal, which has been carried forward to the higher-level CEPT Conference Preparatory Group (CPG) meeting in August. Support from at least 10 CEPT administrations and fewer than six in opposition would move the issue forward as a CEPT resolution, making it highly likely that it would appear on the agendas of WRC-19 and WRC-23.

In a post to the Moon-Net news group, Deutscher (German) Amateur Radio Club (DARC) Frequency Manager Bernd Mischlewski, DF2ZC, stressed the importance that Amateur Radio speak with a single voice and asked the Amateur Radio community to refrain from contacting individual administrations or the EU.

“This would weaken our position and take away power and vigor from the systematic approach by IARU and country Amateur Radio societies,” Mischlewski said. “This particularly applies [to] online petitions.” One frantic petition that’s collecting both signatures and donations calls on hams to “Stop the 2 Meter Band (144 – 146 MHz) being taken away from Radio Amateurs,” which is not what the draft French resolution would do. Mischlewski speculated that the primary reason for the scant opposition at Prague was the revised French proposal’s last-minute arrival. “Consequently, most other European countries had no time for internal discussions, let alone formulating their position,” Mischlewski said.

With the support of regulatory experts among its member-societies, IARU “is intensively working on executing their influence within the current process and trying to keep the 2-meter band as it is now,” Mischlewski said. He pointed out that funding for these activities comes from IARU member-societies. “So, those who left their country’s Amateur Radio society should perhaps reconsider their decision,” he added. “Without the commitment and the funds, the Amateur Radio community would have little influence in that process, let alone could be present at the relevant meetings.”

RSGB VHF Manager John Regnault, G4SWX, in a related Moon-Net post, said the flood of “fake news” on the issue propagated via social media and online petitions does not help Amateur Radio’s position.

“All IARU member societies have been briefed on a common position and messages for Amateur Radio,” Regnault said. “This message is not helped by the many wrong messages abounding on social media. IARU represents Amateur Radio in the various CEPT forums and ITU, and [it] will fight to maintain the best position it can for Amateur Radio. Progress will be slow, but I am hopeful that, in the end we will get a good result.”