7
SCANNING LEGALLY
Your scanner covers frequencies used by many dierent
groups, including police and re departments, ambulance
services, government agencies, private companies, amateur
radio services, military operations, pager services, and wire-line
(telephone and telegraph) service providers. It is legal to listen to
almost every transmission your scanner can receive.
However, there are some transmissions that you should never
intentionally listen to. These include:
• Telephone conversations (cellular, cordless, or other private
means of telephone signal transmission)
• Pager transmissions
• Any scrambled or encrypted transmissions
According to the Electronic Communications Privacy Act
(ECPA), you are subject to nes and possible imprisonment
for intentionally listening to, using, or divulging the contents
of such a conversation unless you have the consent of a party
to the conversation (unless such activity is otherwise illegal).
This scanner has been designed to prevent the reception of
cellular telephone transmissions and the decoding of scrambled
transmissions. This is done to comply with the legal requirement
that scanners be manufactured so they are not easy to modify
to pick up these transmissions. Do not open your scanner’s
case to make any modications that could allow it to pick up
transmissions that are illegal to monitor. Modifying or tampering
with your scanner’s internal components or using it in a way
other than as described in this manual could invalidate your
warranty and void your FCC authorization to operate it.
