The law and your radio

This page is general information, not legal advice. Laws change, and the rules where you are may differ from what is written here. If in doubt, ask a lawyer or your national radio regulator.

Is it legal to listen?

It depends on where you are and what you are listening to, and the rules differ more than most people expect. Almost everywhere you may listen to broadcasters, radio amateurs and signals meant for everyone, such as weather satellites and ship and aircraft position beacons. Many other transmissions are private even though anyone can receive them: pager messages, phone calls, encrypted calls, and often police, fire, taxi and business radio. In some countries, including Germany and Italy, listening to these is a crime. In others, such as Canada, Japan and New Zealand, the offence is using what you heard or telling anyone. In nearly every country, publishing or passing on a private message is the riskiest step. The app cannot know your local law and does not stop you tuning to a frequency. You are responsible for what you receive, record and share. The page The law and your radio on this site has notes by country.

The short version

Universal SDR is a general-purpose receiver. What you do with it is your responsibility.

• Usually fine: broadcast radio, amateur radio, weather satellite pictures, aircraft and ship position beacons, and your own devices.
• Check first: aircraft and ship voice, text messages between aircraft and the ground, police, fire, taxi and business radio, other people's wireless sensors, and network information from emergency-service radio systems.
• Treat as off limits unless you are the person it is meant for, or the system's owner has said yes: pager messages, phone calls, encrypted calls, and military traffic.
• Never publish, forward or use what you heard from a private transmission. That includes posting screenshots, feeding a website, sharing recordings, and sending recordings to us.
• Never try to get round encryption.
• Transmitting needs more than this app. See Transmitting below.

Pager messages

Pager messages are private in many countries, even though anyone can receive them. They often hold names, addresses and medical details. In the United States, messages carried by a paging company are protected by federal law unless they are tone-only. In Germany and several other countries, listening to them is itself an offence. Decode only amateur paging or your own system, unless you are sure your local law allows more. Never publish or share them.

Country notes

United States

Federal law allows you to listen to broadcasts, amateur, citizens band and general mobile radio, marine and aircraft radio, and police, fire and business radio that is not encrypted. It is a federal crime to intercept encrypted or scrambled radio, phone calls, and pager messages carried by a paging company, other than tone-only pagers. Separately, you may not publish or use most radio messages you overhear, unless they are broadcast for the public, come from amateur or citizens band stations, or concern a ship, aircraft or person in distress. Receivers that tune the mobile phone bands are restricted. Several states restrict police-band receivers in vehicles, including New York, Florida, Kentucky, Minnesota and Indiana, and a laptop with a software radio may count; some allow licensed amateurs an exception.

Source: 18 U.S.C. 2511, 47 U.S.C. 605, 47 CFR 15.121

Canada

You may not intercept a radio communication and then use it or tell anyone, unless it is a broadcast, or the sender or intended recipient agrees, with narrow exceptions such as emergencies. Radio-based telephone calls have extra protection.

Source: Radiocommunication Act, section 9

United Kingdom

You may receive broadcasting and hobby radio. It is an offence to use radio equipment to learn the contents, sender or addressee of a message not meant for you, and to tell anyone what such a message said. Ofcom gives no case-by-case guidance. Recording can count as interception.

Source: Wireless Telegraphy Act 2006, section 48, Ofcom

Netherlands

Ordinary reception with a radio receiver is generally outside the criminal offence of tapping, unless you made a special effort to receive it, such as defeating encryption, or used equipment that is not allowed. Publishing personal details from what you hear can break privacy law. The government has said that privacy-sensitive details of emergency alerts should not be published.

Source: Wetboek van Strafrecht, article 139c

Germany

With a radio you may only listen to messages meant for you, for radio amateurs, for the general public or for an unspecified group. Everything else is off limits, even if you only read it on a screen, and you may not tell anyone about it even if you received it by accident. The penalty can be up to two years in prison.

Source: TDDDG, section 5, TDDDG, section 27

France

Intercepting, using or disclosing electronic correspondence in bad faith is a crime. Equipment able to listen outside the broadcast, amateur, free-use and citizens band frequencies has been subject to a government authorisation. Check before you use this app there.

Belgium

Intercepting or recording a private communication you are not part of, without everyone's consent, is a crime.

Italy

Courts have treated installing a receiver to pick up police radio as a crime, even for journalists and even when the traffic was not encrypted.

Spain

Intercepting another person's communications to discover their secrets or invade their privacy is a crime.

Sweden

Unlawfully accessing a message being carried by a telecom operator is a crime. Do not pass on what you hear.

Australia

Intercepting communications passing over a telecommunications system is a crime. Whether some radio systems, such as emergency pagers, count is not settled, so do not use or share what you hear from them.

New Zealand

If you know a radio message was not meant for you, you may not use it, reproduce it, or tell anyone it exists.

Japan

You may not intercept a radio communication addressed to a particular party and then reveal or misuse it. Decoding an encrypted communication in order to reveal or misuse it is a separate offence.

Source: Radio Act, article 59

Anywhere else

Do not assume it is allowed. Rules in other countries can be stricter than any of these.

Transmitting

Transmitting is off until you turn it on, and needs a radio that can transmit, such as a HackRF. Without a licence the app sends only short data bursts on 433.05 to 434.79 MHz in CEPT countries (most of Europe), at most 10 percent of any hour and never voice; elsewhere it does not transmit. One transmission lasts at most 180 seconds. Replaying a captured fixed-code remote is not limited by region: it sends on the frequency the remote was heard on, and that is your responsibility.

That is a technical limit, not a legal permission. In nearly every country you need a licence for the frequency, or equipment approved for that band, and a general-purpose software radio is not approved equipment, so a band that is licence-free for approved devices may not be free for it. If you are not a licensed radio amateur, or do not hold another licence that covers it, assume you may not transmit at all. The app cannot measure your power or check that your signal is clean. Use replay only for your own devices, and never jam or transmit on police, aircraft, marine or emergency frequencies. Fines and seizure of equipment are real, and they are your responsibility.

Using public receivers

Public receivers are run by volunteers. You connect through someone else's equipment, and they can see who is connected. Their rules, and the law where the receiver is and where you are, can all apply. Do not use a public receiver for anything private, and do not leave one tied up for long.

Sharing your radio

When you share your receiver in a web browser, whoever connects hears what it hears. Passing on a private transmission to someone else is an offence in many countries, even within your household or club. Share only signals meant for the public.

Recording

You can record what you receive, but in some countries recording is restricted in its own right, and a recording you share is a passing-on. Keep recordings of anything private off the internet and delete them.

What Universal SDR does not do

It does not search for, guess or break encryption keys. It does not decode mobile phone calls or pay television. Encrypted calls are marked as encrypted and played only with a key you enter and are entitled to use.

Trade marks

Names of radios, systems and companies are trademarks of their owners and are used only to say what the app works with. Universal SDR is not connected with or endorsed by any of them. Meshtastic is a registered trademark of Meshtastic LLC.