Russian 'number station' UVB-76 has gone silent

uvb-76.net...

I am no expert, but apparently the last time it went silent was shortly after the annexation of Crimea.

Hoping for the thoughts of some more well-informed members.


Cheers my friends!

a reply to: soulshn

I've always thought these numbers stations / radio transmitters were a form of a dead mans switch.

IOW, there could be an arsenal of weapons, pre-targetted, waiting to automatically launch if it doesn't get a signal from one of these stations.

Maybe the pause in transmission is a 'priming' mechanism, a kind of wake up and get ready to launch in X amount of time period if no further signal is transmitted.

For how long has is been silent? There were some cases it went silent for few hours.

a reply to: MysterX

In the last thread about UVB-76 on ATS found here our own SkepticOverlord said:

We had a couple Navy Intelligence reservists in our local Ham Radio Club. It was pretty widely known that much of the "stuff" heard on number stations was meaningless to those who didn't know when to start and stop listening. The key was timing.

Your remark about priming might be right on. He also said this in response to the station going silent last time:

I was an active ham radio operator during the time of the Soviet/US "Cold War." A few number stations operated within the bands allocated to ham radio.


This is not a good thing.

I'm sure its probably nothing, but you never know, huh?

Hope everyone has a good day!

a reply to: Duby78

I'm not sure, the past 24 hour image from UVB-76.net won't display for me for some reason.

a reply to: soulshn

I'm using this: Wide-band WebSDR and there is just static on 4625 kHz... so yes, UVB is definitely silent at the moment.

I thought it went active just before the annexation of Crimea. If it has gone silent then that is a good thing, no?

a reply to: soulshn

If the last time it fell silent was during a period of action that may have drawn unwanted action from others (read: led to an attack on Russia or Russian allies or assets), namely Crimea, this might go some way to backing up the dead mans switch theory...this latest stoppage may yet herald some soon to come action by Russia...i'd guess Ukraine orientated, but if Israel keeps unilaterally attacking Syria, or perhaps even Iran..the action, in whatever form it might take, may possibly be in Israels direction instead.

Either way, Russia may be about to take some action that might be seen to be controversial enough to cause Russia to take precautionary steps with it's number station broadcasts.

Maybe they've already done it...turning off the gas for unpaid bills isn't really controversial, but it seems a lot of the world doesn't need much of an excuse to rub Russia's nose in the dirt these days, so perhaps that was it.

The buzzer is still active for me , so i dont see what you're talking about , op
and i almost constantly have it in the background.
Listening to it right now.

a reply to: AnonyWarp

Where are you getting the feed from?

a reply to: soulshn

i have the stream directly played in in VLC with www.priyom.org...
just look around the site from the stream

and when i have troubles with the stream, i listen to it with my radio.

I cant hear it either. All i find is static on the frequency.

My SDR bottoms out at 24MHZ BOOOO HISSS

I wish i had a really good receiver here but all i have is 2 meter and 11 meter capability aside from my SDR.

Maybe they ran out of numbers.

a reply to: soulshn

There were two earth directed cme's scheduled to hit yesterday and today. CME's tend to play havoc with radio and electronic signals.

The dead man switch theory does not work for me. There are many different ways the signal could stop or be blocked. To place the fate of the world on the guarantee a radio signal will be heard seems like real bad planning.

originally posted by: Joki42
a reply to: soulshn

There were two earth directed cme's scheduled to hit yesterday and today. CME's tend to play havoc with radio and electronic signals.

The dead man switch theory does not work for me. There are many different ways the signal could stop or be blocked. To place the fate of the world on the guarantee a radio signal will be heard seems like real bad planning.

I was thinking the same thing, not to mention, I'm not sure why Russia would need to communicate with their nukes via number station. Unless the implication is that Russia has stored nukes around the world with local cells operating, which detonate based on number station instruction. I'll leave it up to you to decide whether it's possible to have nukes hidden all over another nuclear power without them knowing about it, and whether Russia would see any purpose in hiding nukes all over, something if discovered, would be directly tied to Russia, no other nation on earth would have the ability to do such a thing.

The US operates number stations as well, and again I'm not sure why they would be needed to communicate about nuke launches.

The most likely purpose of the number stations still seems to be coded messages to field operatives, going silent for a period could simply be some sort of indicator "continue previous actions" or something like that without having to actually communicate anything. Basically, "if you don't hear from us, just keep doing what you're" or alternatively "put plan into action when you stop receiving the signal" although as another member pointed out such a thing would be very unreliable, as any number of things could stop the signal, and it seems like incredibly sloppy work to allow agents to execute plans based on possible random electronic issues.

Could also be that whatever time period went silent was a time period dedicated to a particular cell that had been destroyed or otherwise is no longer in operation so nothing was broadcast.

originally posted by: Cinrad
I thought it went active just before the annexation of Crimea. If it has gone silent then that is a good thing, no?

Thats what I thought.

An today it was reported Putin withdrawing his support for the est Ukraine separatists and giving back his war powers to the Russian parliament.

If thats the case the station going silent could just be Russian intelligence cutting its communications.

I read somewhere of a station which went quiet after inadvertantly broadcasting what sounded like furniture being moved around, & even audible discussion of a renovation of the building/ or upgrade of equipment. Something like that. Can't recall exactly the nature of it. The station was back after a short time, days perhaps. But it could be something really mundane, is my point.
a reply to: crazyewok

I'm absolutely no expert in shortwave, but keep in mind that propagation plays a role in how well signals are picked up. I listen to the Buzzer on this Netherlands based site. As I mentioned in a thread that was linked, The Buzzer (frequency 4625 on the site I use) tends to fade out around this time of day for me (which is currently 5am eastern) The Buzzer has faded out entirely for now, I last heard it very faintly about 45 minutes or so ago, it should begin to be picked back up again by 11am/noonish my time IIR (It's been a while since I actively listened) since daytime propagation rules reign for now over there. Anyone listening with their own receiver well enough away should be able to pick it up just fine, however (such as in the US)