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Comment by nightpool | Hacker News Reader

Which country, if you don't mind me asking?

(the idea of the FCC breaking someone's door down and taking their equipment is pretty funny to me, although I can't say for sure it's never happened)

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The FCC is pretty good about cracking down on illegal transmitters--I had a friend in high school who thought it would be a funny idea to set up an FM transmitter with one or more orders of magnitude Tx power than is allowed, and it only took the FCC a couple of days to come and seize his equipment, with a very stern warning. I would imagine if we had been older, he'd have been looking at a multi-thousand dollar fine, for good reason. The FCC really is not to be taken lightly.

The FCC does possess, and has exercised in the past, these powers.

The legal argument is that by using the public spectrum to transmit, you have agreed to FCC enforcement of such. Thus, you have tacitly agreed that the FCC in fact does not need a warrant to investigate, or seize your equipment, if they determine that that is an appropriate action.

I think this is beyond a flimsy argument, but it is the argument. It needs more looking over in courts, frankly. Seems like it could be easily abused.

It's happened, actually. Look at the history of pirate radio - there were armed raids done in cooperation and under the auspices of the FCC.

That was mostly because the were (perceived to be) an economic threat to some very big industries, it had very little to do with electro-magnetic radiation.

The man in the Ministry of Housinge cat detector van can pinpoint a purr at 400 yards, but he didn't have the right form. [1]

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M5MnyRZLd8A

I don't know about the breaking down the door part, but the FCC does conduct spectrum surveillance and they do look for illegal stations and troublesome operations.

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