From: A1 ray arachelian (library)  <rarachel@ishara.poly.edu>
Date: Sat, 14 Aug 93 20:41:52 PDT
To: jet@netcom.com (J. Eric Townsend)
Subject: Re: Beepers can also be used to track you down!
In-Reply-To: <9308141917.AA00520@netcom2.netcom.com>
Message-ID: <9308142338.AA05358@ishara.poly.edu>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


Okay guys, I called up my friend and this is what he had to say about it:

1.  The company he works for is for one thing involved in selling beepers and
beeper service.

2.  Beepers respond to something called a "CAP" code.  Each individual beeper
has a unique CAP code.  This code is what is used to transmit a beep to that
particular beeper (as well as the ping.)

3.  The FCC supposedly has information on how to track down beepers (without
the obvious way of placing a beep and seeing if they return the call.)
Obviously, someone that is higher up in the tech dept. of a beeper co.
might provide confirmation of this if the FCC does not (and would they
if such a feature did exist?)

4.   This "ping" signal is used to disable the beeper incase it gets stolen.
What's not too clear to me is whether there is one type of ping that responds
or two, with the second one that also disables the beeper incase of
loss of theft.

5.    Supposedly, the ping is a broad band signal that has 1/4 mile acuracy
per cell, then after that a tracking gun of some sort can be used, which
looks pretty much like a radar speed gun, but has a shoulder strap or something.

Again, this description isn't mine, and I'm not familiar with any of these,
so any questions you have will take a few answers to clear up.  Also, this
could just be a case of bad info.  My friend is fairly trustworthy in his
info in general, however, it is also possible that he got faulty info
from someone else in the company.

I won't metion his name or his company for obvious reasons, but will
forward questions.

However, I did notice one message from an individual who mentioned that
in Britain, some sort of scanners were used to track down unlicensed TV's
and that his buddies used to keep their beepers in Faraday cages.  Since
I stored this message on a machine which seems to be down, I don't have
his name or quotes yet, however this was posted a few days ago 
(forgive me for not remembering your name.)  Also, (again this too
is unconfirmed) another friend of mine who is slightly familiar with
electronics and who wanted to become a piolot mentioned that AM receivers
can cause troubles in airplane sensors.  (Again, I'm not confusing this
with laptops or CD players, etc, but specifically AM receivers.  This too
is unconfirmed, so take it with or without several grains of salt.) :-)