Welcome to my world of Octopuses*

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I decided to get a tattoo.  Here is what the final result will look like:

Here is what it looks like today:


Next Friday, I'll have the "blue colouring" overlaid, so will provide an updated image.


What has the got to do with anything? 


A little while back I was experimenting with SDR (Software Defined Radio) USB sticks, antenna's, Raspberry Pis, UBuntu laptops and tracking planes and ships (ADB-S and AIS data)




I recently started working with some software from octo.us : just replace the . with a p & you see the serendipity of the universe!


CXEdge is of special interest ;-)





Then, earlier this week I was having a discussion about the work I did with the SDRs a year ago and how some other people/companies are just about catching up.....


Then today I was introduced to this little device:


 


They also have a TAK plugin that integrates nicely with Node-Red too: 



Now, just need to justify the cost for purchasing a device and experimenting with it:

Website review and explanation:





UPDATE:
okay, so to answer the question, "WHY?"

Go to a skim through this article: https://spectrum.ieee.org/passive-radar-with-sdr





If you cannot be bothered, think of a scenario such as this one: You are using tooling like FlightAware.com to track commercial flights where the planes are transmitting via ADB-S, so you can detect their tags & details and follow their track paths.  All standard stuff.
Now, imagine there is a plane that has switched off their transmission beacon (or it is faulty - cough cough), but they are still producing a RF signal that can be detected.








Another possibility isn't too much of a mental stretch, you have a piece of equipment that is used for cleaning pipes.  It is very expensive, let's say, £2m.  Now, fitting a GPS, GPRS(4G/5G) & battery based tracker to that device is all well and good, but the device will be quite large & will require frequent re-charging, therefore exposing where you have placed the tracking device & a dishonest person will know where to look for such a device and disable it.



Now, switch that device out for an ultra-low-power usage RF device, that can transmit using LoRa and only activates upon movement and doesn't slurp the power due to trying to get lat/lon details from GPS or burn more power connecting to cell towers to transmit data... you just have the RF signal broadcasting up to about a 20-30km range saying, "hello, I am here".  Now you've got something to track - yes, you would have needed to know the item was being removed & not stopped the removal of it, but sometimes tracking is better than apprehension.  


Now think of the motorhome that I had stolen off my driveway - they ripped that tracker out pretty sharpish, but the ANPR picked up the vehicle several times, so I knew the general "region" or location that it was spotted in - now if I the vehicle were transmitting, I could have easily used a device like this to then pan & sweep the area to detect the signal, either find and apprehend or monitor & observe.

Does it start to make some sense now?  I'll let your imagination fill in the blanks of how this could be useful elsewhere & by other intelligence agencies.


OKAY - simple nudge: now thinking of having flying drones that have an RF transmitter beacon (a simple LoRa device will do), now you can monitor / track those drones when they are out of LoS - a picture is a 1000 words, you figure it out:







Here's some extra links that maybe of interest:






According to this book, it is NOT Octopi for plural, it is indeed Octopuses*.  It's a good book, highly recommend having a read:





Don't order the calamari as a starter anymore ;-)

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