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Sometimes a crazy idea will just spontaneously infect someone and won't stop rattling around in his skull until he spreads it to others. Well, that happened to me now.

I just had this idea for using carrier pigeons in the modern worlds as a means of covert, effective communication by groups that might have issues with using normal, monitored, tappable means of communication. (Some might call these groups "criminal", others might call the same groups "the resistance".)

Basically in today's world the carrier pigeon could make a valid means of communication again as a good pigeon ought to be able to easily carry a micro SD card that can contain a staggering amount of data in an encrypted format inside a waterproof container.

Carrier or homing pigeons could be used as a slow, semi reliable means of groups of guerilla fighters or criminals to communicate over distances, possibly relaying data across considerable distances over time.

I thought this might make a decent story line idea, a group of resistance fighters using pigeons to relay data under an oppressive government's nose. Seems just possible, which makes a crazy idea even better as a plot device.

If anyone wants to use it in a rpg or a story, please have fun with it.

Or instead you could use one of the much more reliable and efficient methods of electronic communication that are even harder to intercept and don't require specialized skills and animals and training.

Pretty sure I wouldn't send important information with a pigeon, encrypted or otherwise. They can be intercepted along the way and you'd be none the wiser.

I feel like you've played assassins creed brotherhood recently!

Well, what with stuff like this going on...:
https://yro.slashdot.org/story/18/12/21/1157226/india-to-intercept-monitor-and-decrypt-citizens-computers

Memory cards and USB sticks have kept up with broadband speeds fairly well.
Copy your data to a stick, encrypt it, and strap it to a bird's leg. 'Throughput' is pretty good, and gets tested quite often.
Staying off-grid can be a good reason to put up with the smell (but the pigeons are used to it by now ).

Pigeons are neither very reliable nor covert. People were pretty good at intercepting carrier pigeons 500 years ago, modern governments will have it even easier.
Criminals should stick to the dark web and encrypted messaging and e-mail services. Safer, more reliable and instantaneous as well. And as an added bonus, the dark web does not require food, care etc.

 Skinnereal wrote:
Well, what with stuff like this going on...:
https://yro.slashdot.org/story/18/12/21/1157226/india-to-intercept-monitor-and-decrypt-citizens-computers

Memory cards and USB sticks have kept up with broadband speeds fairly well.
Copy your data to a stick, encrypt it, and strap it to a bird's leg. 'Throughput' is pretty good, and gets tested quite often.
Staying off-grid can be a good reason to put up with the smell (but the pigeons are used to it by now ).

Wow, so in India you can only get 7 years in prison for refusing to decrypt your personal files? Hell, in america you can be imprisoned forever for refusing to decrypt a file at a judges imperial decree. Just ask Francis rawls...
https://www.tripwire.com/state-of-security/latest-security-news/man-jailed-indefinitely-refusing-decrypt-hard-drives/

He's already been in lrison 3 years or more and as is nothing seems likely to stop him being there until he dies. The media has mysteriously stopped updating his case, which is a bad sign. When you bear about other countries having fixed prison terms for what seems minor stuff remember in america you can be jailed forever on a contempt charge without a trial, without due process, without a jury of your peers, etc. So far the record for contempt imprisonment without trial or evidence is 14 years.

Dark wings dark words

A version of this was proposed 28 years ago via RFC 1149, actually:

https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1149

My favorite was the updated proposal for implementing QoS.


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 Peregrine wrote:
Or instead you could use one of the much more reliable and efficient methods of electronic communication that are even harder to intercept and don't require specialized skills and animals and training.

Which ones are those?

Could use a drone to carry the SD card for a modern alternative?

The latency would be poor, but the bandwidth might actually be pretty decent considering how huge capacity memory sticks and so on have these days.

RIP Speckled Jim.

I don't see how this is all that secure. I can't hack a communications network but I can operate an air-rifle with decent-enough accuracy.

 Excommunicatus wrote:
RIP Speckled Jim.

I don't see how this is all that secure. I can't hack a communications network but I can operate an air-rifle with decent-enough accuracy.

The advantage of carrier pigeons nowdays is that its not something most people would suspect. Most cities also have large wild pigeon populations too so trying to figure out what random bird flying over head is a carrier pigeon would be very difficult even if you do know about it.

So unless you decide to commit pigeon genocide it would be pretty hard to actually completely clamp down on carrier pigeon messaging. Not to mention if you do shoot a carrier pigeon you can't exactly trace it back to where it came from.

 daedalus wrote:
Which ones are those?

Anything with properly used encryption. If the message is encrypted you can just dump it anywhere on the internet and nobody other than the intended recipient can read it.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Excommunicatus wrote:
RIP Speckled Jim.

I don't see how this is all that secure. I can't hack a communications network but I can operate an air-rifle with decent-enough accuracy.

The advantage of carrier pigeons nowdays is that its not something most people would suspect. Most cities also have large wild pigeon populations too so trying to figure out what random bird flying over head is a carrier pigeon would be very difficult even if you do know about it.

So unless you decide to commit pigeon genocide it would be pretty hard to actually completely clamp down on carrier pigeon messaging. Not to mention if you do shoot a carrier pigeon you can't exactly trace it back to where it came from.

Right, and so how long before state actors figure it out? I can't imagine it would be long. If China can hack the EU's diplomatic cables, they can figure out carrier-pigeons.

It would be super-hard to trace it back to its source, until you deciphered the communication. Or perhaps the name of the game is to simply disrupt receipt of the communication. Using a pigeon doesn't, IMO, address any of the issues that make communications insecure and in fact introduces a whole bunch of new insecurities.

 Excommunicatus wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Excommunicatus wrote:
RIP Speckled Jim.

I don't see how this is all that secure. I can't hack a communications network but I can operate an air-rifle with decent-enough accuracy.

The advantage of carrier pigeons nowdays is that its not something most people would suspect. Most cities also have large wild pigeon populations too so trying to figure out what random bird flying over head is a carrier pigeon would be very difficult even if you do know about it.

So unless you decide to commit pigeon genocide it would be pretty hard to actually completely clamp down on carrier pigeon messaging. Not to mention if you do shoot a carrier pigeon you can't exactly trace it back to where it came from.

Right, and so how long before state actors figure it out? I can't imagine it would be long. If China can hack the EU's diplomatic cables, they can figure out carrier-pigeons.

It would be super-hard to trace it back to its source, until you deciphered the communication. Or perhaps the name of the game is to simply disrupt receipt of the communication. Using a pigeon doesn't, IMO, address any of the issues that make communications insecure and in fact introduces a whole bunch of new insecurities.

There isn't much to decipher from an SD card unless the people sending the message were stupid enough to leave their address on it. The idea that you totally disconnect the delivery system from the communication itself is a sound idea. The pigeon does create a new set of issues, but the key advantage is that those issues are different from regular communications. Simply using a different channel itself is a new layer of security because you've rendered the the counter intelligence of your opponent's useless if you switch forms. Now he's got to figure out you are using pigeons and then devise a way of intercepting those pigeons.

And again, you'd maybe confuse an intelligence agency worth their salt for an hour or two before they start shooting your pigeons down.

I'm also sure it'd be really hard to figure out who was sending a message about, say, sending troops into Crimea.

Hmm. Who could do that?

I also know enough (not much, but enough) about encryption to know that different services use different methods and sometimes it is possible to identify the source of a message by the type of encryption used.

What a stupid idea. Just use a bloody radio and a one time pad, if you are worried you could be found out. If you think carrier pigeons are reliable or going to be undetectable you’re very mistaken.

Pigeons can only fly to their home which they have to be trained to remember. I’m sure some people seem to forget this and think you can give them specific directions before letting them go. This means your bases of operation are limited to where you have raised pigeons, and you have to move them around the country to restock when you run out.

It’s slow, unreliable, easily intercepted, requires significant time/cash investment and limits manoeuvrability of your operational bases. Largely hopeless unless it’s a post apocalyptic scenario.

https://www.computerworld.com/article/2597815/data-center/dead-drops-offline-p2p-file-sharing-network-goes-global.html

It seems like any resistance group would be more likely to deal in dead drops, in some sort of network like this. You could see them installed in particular seats in movie theaters, sports stadiums, certain areas of the mall, and much more easily handle passage of information. That's if, of course, you insist on operating in the physical realm and avoiding the internet.

What's wrong with you people? Pointing out flaws in this idea! Don't you WANT to live in a world where Dick Dastardly is a cutting edge cyber-interception officer?