PRESENTER OPINION : The Hobby That Trusts Too Much: Ham Radio's Data Protection Crisis

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PRESENTER OPINION : The Hobby That Trusts Too Much: Ham Radio's Data Protection Crisis

There is a quiet irony at the heart of amateur radio. Ours is a hobby built on the principle of communication — of reaching out across continents, of connecting with strangers in the ether, of broadcasting our presence to the world. We accept, willingly and openly, that our callsigns are public. Our names and addresses are registered with national regulators. Anyone with internet access and a passing curiosity can look us up. That is the deal we sign when we get our licence, and most of us are perfectly comfortable with it.

But there is a world of difference between information that is publicly available and information that is actively handed to someone without our consent. And that distinction — painfully obvious in law, in ethics, and in plain common sense — appears to be one that our national organisations are struggling to grasp.

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STEM On and Off the Air

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STEM On and Off the Air

The Garden School Amateur Radio Club in Jackson Heights, New York, K2GSG, was started in September 2016 as a way to implement the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) standard at the school.

Currently, the Club has 13 members ranging from 4th graders to 12th graders and is an Affiliated Club of the ARRL, The National Association for Amateur Radio®.

Well, last week they got a big surprise...they were on television...in Chicago!! CBS News in Chicago aired a short feature that showed the students using amateur radio to make contacts and then transmitting weather reports on the air to a SKYWARN training net!

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Award Recognises Dxpeditions with Remote Operations

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Two recent DXpeditions that featured remote radio operations have been recognised by the Northern California DX Foundation, which is presenting both activations with the DXcellence Award, now in its fifth year.

The criteria included the DXpedition's complexity, its impact on its "Most Wanted" ranking on ClubLog and, of course, overall performance.

The foundation's board of directors chose the KP5/NP3VI Desecheo DXpedition and the PJ6Y Youth DXpedition to Saba Island. Both adventures included remote radio operations. The KP5 operation was 100 per cent remote, as well as being solar powered. The team's media officer, Steve N2AJ, said in a press release that having the first fully solar-powered, fully remote DXpedition was a "groundbreaking achievement", adding that "advanced technology and careful planning can deliver world-class results while maintaining an exceptionally low environmental footprint." The team of operators was required to follow strict guidelines from the US Fish & Wildlife Service to ensure a minimal impact on the environment. That means no generators, no amplifiers and no traditional beam antennas.

The PJ6Y Youth DXpedition was chosen for its involvement of young operators from around the world who spent two weeks on the island of Saba. This more traditional style activation featured some first-time DXpeditioners. It was supplemented with radios operated remotely by as many as 30 young amateurs from around the world. The technically complex arrangement was considered a success on many levels, most especially as an investment in the future of amateur radio for the next generation.