"John S." wrote in message
oups.com...
Isn't POCSAG used for pagers? Is there any interesting traffic that
would have something like text messages - diplo traffic and similar?

Yes, for pagers. I understand its very surprising the things that get
transmitted
via POCSAG/FLEX.

To answer your second question, probably

An anecdote:
A friend worked at an Internet Service Provider, and had his scanner/decoder
setup running constantly. One fine summer day, a tractor dug up a major
fiber
cable that knocked out half of the Eastern US Seaboard. A regional pager
service
sent out pages to that backbone providers engineers with the details.
Needless
to say, when the ISP customers called in and said they couldnt reach
hotmail,
yahoo, and microsoft (at the time, remember this was -almost- 10 years ago),
he had the answer for his customers hours before it was prominently featured
on the news.

Also were transmitted via POCSAG were voice bridges for the technicians
to work together to route around the problems. Searching the interceptions
for
similar 'capcodes' (individual pager unit identifiers) would clue the
potential listener
for updates on the situation as they were made available to the engineers.

Another anecdote:
A friend, at the same ISP, witnessed a page about a certain famous CNN
reporter,
including personal cellphone information. ("Hey, call Mr. XXX at CNN, on his
cell
at xxx-xxx-xxxx about the on-air thingy we are doing tomorrow at 5pm.")

Dont forget, as we move along in complicating life with gadgets in an
attempt to make
things easier, these devices become all-in-one. Text Messaging into
stand-alone messaging
devices is treated much like shorthand email.

Interesting? Yes. Diplomatic stuff? Eventually, I am sure. But it certainly
sounds illegal
to intercept, doesnt it? I am sure usernames and passwords have been
transmitted via
these protocols.

Searching a database of capcodes could provide an interesting history of
usage.
Putting 2 and 2 together could cause a big problem for someone who isnt
quite savvy on
the weaknesses of this technology!