Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Mark Fahey (our resident North Korea specialist) who shares the following comment regarding our recent post about the re-activation of the North Korean Numbers station:
The Pyongyang numbers (designated V15) have either become less regular or changed their schedule since March. Its been a few months since I have personally received them – but I also haven’t been specifically tuning in for them lately so maybe I have simply missed noticing a timing change.
If you want to find the North Korean numbers, they are read out in a block between songs within the regular programing of the Pyongyang Pangsong radio station.
The choice of music immediately before the number block seems to indicate which recipient agent the transmission is directed to.
For Agent 27 “We Will Go Together with a Song Of Joy” is played, whereas Agent 21’s song is “Spring of my Hometown.”
The announcements typically take between 5 to 10 minutes to read dependent on the number of digits passed. The transmission schedule is variable; in early 2017 the broadcast alternated with a cycle of one week on Thursday night at 12:45AM Pyongyang Time (1615 UTC) and the following week on Saturday night at 11:45PM Pyongyang Time (1515 UTC).??
Pyongyang Pangsong can be heard on these shortwave band frequencies (it is also on MF & FM on the Korean peninsular):
- 3250 kHz, Pyongyang 100KW Transmitter
- 3320 kHz, Pyongyang 50KW Transmitter
- 6400 kHz, Kanggye 50KW Transmitter
Mark followed up this morning with a off-air recording of V15 on 3250kHz. Mark comments, “I will leave the decrypted message content to your imagination!”
Mark: thank you for taking the time to write up this V15 tutorial and sharing this recording!
I see that North Korea has a seaport called Sinpo. [• Chos?n’g?l: ? ? ? • Hancha: ? ? ? •]
“North Korea’s fortunately failed launch of a ballistic missile from near Sinpo, on its eastern coast early Sunday morning (April 16, 2017) is the fifth missile launch by North Korea this year. ”
This is not SINPO, an acronym for signal, interference, noise, propagation, and overall, which is a Signal Reporting Codes used to describe the quality of radio transmissions
Dang, and I was going to rate their missile launch a 11111 because it failed. 🙂
Thanks for sharing, I love the station trying to jam them..I suspect the jammer is South Korea or maybe American? Awesome stuff.
From the ROK.
Just now listening to the file attached to this story I realised I made a blunder in the file I sent to Thomas. SORRY!!
I accidentally linked the WRONG file earlier – the embed file in this story is actually NOT North Korea’s number’s – it is SOUTH Korea’s numbers station broadcasting to THEIR operatives. NORTH Korea’s numbers can be heard hear in this file. It was recorded on 3250kHz on November 19th 2016 at 1515UTC. Sorry for the mix up – my ageing mind is my only defence.
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B6YX0tLgHcPpM3ZrUXZMRWtjSnM
No worries, Mark! I corrected the post.