Will a base scanner pick up these frequencies??

Question

My uncle had a portable scanner that picked up cell and cordless phone convrsations. Is this still posible? Or have they done away with this? How bout citizen band? Can a scanner pick that up?

Answer 1

Monitoring of cell phones is possible provided you have the equipment to do it. A simple scanner like before is NOT going to work for 95% of the cell phones out there. They are all digital and require special equipment to monitor the CDMA (Verizon, Alltel, Sprint, USCellular) GSM (Cingular, TMobible), iDEN (Nextel). There are very few regular or analog cell calls out there, and then you have to find a scanner that can receive the cellular band. The FCC changed the rules that block selling radios which can receive this range. If you have certain models produced before the 1984 ban then you can tune that range, or if you purchase the government models or export models. Still you need a way to decode the digital signals for 95% of the calls and for that it takes a service monitor and with the CDMA, iDEN and GSM options that going to run you about $20,000.00 to start USED.

Cordless phones are possible if they are not digital spread spectrum or DSS. Alot of the 2.4GHz and 900MHz phones are not digital and can easily be picked up by scanners that can tune that range.

Citizens band or CB in the 27MHz range can be monitored usingv some scanners and some shortwave or general receivers. Most scanners can only pick up the regular AM (just like your AM radio) mode CB. While the more advanced general receivers can pick up the Single Sideband (SSB) mode of the CB band as well.

Theres lots more and better stuff to scan and monitor in my opinion than cordless phones. I would much rather know whats going on around me police wise or where the medevac helo is going than Slutty Jane has another friend over, boring.

Answer 2

Old cellphones and cordless phones didn't bother with any kind of encoding or encryption, so yeah, a scanner could pick them up. I picked up cordless phones on my scanner when I was in college -- seems like a few kids had old hand-me-down cordless phones. You have to be fairly close (within a few hundred feet) for that to work.

Modern cordless phones work on higher frequencies, use digital encoding, and sometimes encryption. Likewise for cellphones -- analog cellphones are pretty much obsolete, and they won't even probably work at all in a few years. The frequencies they use are out of range of most scanners, too.

Some scanners can pick up citizen band. My current one does, but I'm not sure if my old one did. It depends on the frequencies and modulations supported by the device. It has to be able to pick up 26-27MHz and use AM modulation for best results. Frankly though, there doesn't appear to be a lot of CB use nowadays. You're more likely to pick up signals from ham radio operators, police and fire, etc.

Answer 3

I'll just comment. I do remember about 20 years ago the scanners were regulated by the FCC so the newer scanners would not pick up police band. Cordless phone is FM and most aren't scrambled. An old FM tuner will reach down to the cordless phones wavelength -- the modern FM tuners just think all you want is radio. CB is NO problem. Most cell phones scramble with a digital signal, scanner won't work. A cell phone is the shortest-lived device so most cell phones are out of range.

But, I'll never forget, sitting in a buddy's car, outside an apartment complex ... "Hello?" "Honey, I've got to work late..." A minute later... "Yeah?" "Hey, Sweetie! Got the night off! Wanna join us at...."

Answer 4

There are different scanners for different frequency bands. Most mobile phones and all cell phones are now in the micro wave frequencies. Radio shack has information on frequencies and their uses where you can find out what frequencies are used for what purposes in your area. Usually certain types of uses are bunched together in bands, for instance, air traffic and associated air craft information are in a band 110-135 MHz

Answer 5

Do you propose 2.4 GHz? i think of you do. i'm speculating wildly, yet possibly you're receiving some subharmonic meditated image of the cordless telephone's sign. a million/4th of the two.4 GHz sign may be six hundred MHz that ought to intrude with some police bands... So quickly, i'm proposing you're no longer listening to the main considerable sign, yet certainly one of its harmonics.