Is it legal to send/transmit one-way signals to space?

Question

Before you tell me about how all Radio,TV, satellite transmissions/signals are unwittingly sent (leaked) to space as well, let me clarify my question. ... What I am asking is: Can you "legally" transmit signals to deep space without them being meant to be picked up on Earth by a receiver (i.e. a TV, a radio, a satellite, etc.)? Or is there a law against a one-way transmission to space? ... Also, do you need an FCC license of sorts to transmit signals to deep space? Serious answers only please. In other words, kindly refrain from cute, "ET call home" commentaries :-)

Answer 1

The radio spectrum is shared among nations of the world and there are certain frequency allocations agreed to by all the countries. Subsequently, each country allocates those frequencies to their people based on the initial shared agreements across the world.

In the US, the frequencies are allocated to users via FCC licensing. To do any transmitting here, you need a valid license except for some experimenters bands around 1750 kHz (limit .1 watts) plus a few others and of course for personal communications devices like portable phones and cell phones and some hobbies but once again the power is very limited there...

The FCC doesn't care where you think you're transmitting energy. It's the frequency they worry about and even with the most sophisticated of antennas, you will always leak radio signals in every direction. If they catch you transmitting (they have a pretty broad monitoring system) they may warn you or if you're interfering with commercial or emergency communications they may go straight for litigation and impose fine up to tens of thousands of dollars.and possible jail sentence if you lose the case.

Anyways to get any decent signal out, you need a few million watts, and an array of dish antennas and even if you have a sophisticated receiver on the other end, your signal will be corrupted by galactic noises and signal attenuation and the only way someone can pull your signal out of the noise it to know exactly what pattern you are sending and precisely on what frequency.

Answer 2

It would depend what part of the radio frequency spectrum you use in the U.S. Most of it is regulated by the FCC; an unlicensed operator or one who is in violation of FCC regulations is at some risk of having his transmitter confiscated IF he interferes with the authorized use of band on which he's transmitting. That being said, lots of "ham" operators are into "moon-bounce" transmissions, where they literally use the earth's moon as their communications satellite (it takes a LOT of power). Ham operators are generally limited to 1500 watts of power. That may not sound like much, but my own handheld tranceiver only requires 5 watts of power, so 1500 can be a lot. It's not a question of whether you intend the signals to be received, but whether you interfere with the legally-assigned usage of the frequency you've chosen that really matters, and most transmissions of any real power do require some sort of license to produce, except in an emergency situation.

I'm including a link to the FCC's frequency allocation chart to give you a better idea of what's going on out there in the "ether" ;-)

Answer 3

If you transmit from a normal transmitter its going to be picked up on earth. How much of earth will pick it up depends on the strenght of your signal. Any transmitter from a ham radio on up you need a liscense from the FCC. Aside from that if you find a transmitter strong enough and get a liscense to transmit on a specific frequency then yes you can legally transmit. No law against trying to send a message. Ive thought about trying to do that myself. Going to be expensive though. A 100k watt radio station has a limited range.

Answer 4

I think, if you are using a transmitter powerful enough to send a one way signal into space, the FCC may require you to have a license as there is no way to contain the signal from being heard by anyone else here on Earth.

Answer 5

yes ,and some people use light as well, and all and all people do it all the time and some trying to here somethink back the big ear that was in ohio did some of this, you way go on line and look up .

Answer 6

That redio waves are of some special type and huge such that satellites or tv do not catch it. ( they are huge) if it is catched by any satellite, it ignores it bcoz there are no settings in that satellite where to transmit that wave....
the radio waves cannot reach at any specific place because of dark matter..
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/dark matter

Answer 7

Its so way legal.

Answer 8

Its illegal.