
TV detector van - rishabhd
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TV_detector_van
======
agurk
I lived in a flat in England in the early 2000s which kept getting letters
from the BBC saying we didn't have a TV licence. The letters were sometimes
more threatening for a period, then sometimes more reconciliatory.

They were also running TV adverts at the time claiming they had detector vans
about, and if you didn't have a licence you'd be caught. I did some research
at the time, and it seemed that evidence from a detector van had never been
submitted as evidence in court cases for those without a licence.

It didn't take long to realise in the age of databases, it's easier just to
send out scary letters to all address without a registered licence and hope
there will be some 'conversion rate'. The effort required to actually chase on
this seemed disproportional to the benefits.

And for those wondering, I did have a licence, it's just the address the BBC
had for the flat was subtly different to the one on the bit of paper. I had
hoped that they would follow up with a more detailed investigation, so I could
see how it worked and ask about the vans, but they never did.

~~~
monkeynotes
The ads were hugely dystopian:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NmdUcmLFkw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8NmdUcmLFkw)

I am an ex-pat and as an adult I am have become quite disillusioned with the
UK and glad to have gotten out a decade ago. I miss nothing about England
except my friends, and I'd feel sorry for them, but they all seem mostly happy
with life.

Paying a license to have a TV (and it's assumed you must watch TV), opt in
porn on the internet, CCTV everywhere, braying in parliament, not to mention
the whole Brexit shit-show, I find little to admire about the UK.

~~~
soneil
I don't begrudge the TV licence too much. I used to, and then I moved to
Ireland - where I pay a roughly equivalent amount for a roughly equivalent
licence, which funds RTÉ (and tg4? unclear) with nowhere near the same
results. And still ads.

It turns out the better half of Europe has TV licences in one form or another
- but for some reason, we never hear about them. When the UK has to fund a
state broadcaster, it's dystopian. When everyone else does it, it's business
as usual.

(
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_licence](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_licence)
)

~~~
raverbashing
The enforcement actions and publicizing of the license in the UK seem to be
the most dystopian, in Ireland it's a bit over the top as well

But you're right, it is present in multiple countries, I think Germany and
France just turned it into a household fee

~~~
toyg
In Italy it has been merged into electricity bills. I kid you not. And of
course, the state broadcaster (RAI) is still chock-full of ads on all its
channels. This is because it's not a media organisation as much as a cash-
machine for aides and cronies of the government du-jour, with each channel
literally _allocated_ informally to each major party. You can imagine the
average production quality.

~~~
milankragujevic
Same for RTS in Serbia, worse even because not only do we HAVE to pay the TV
license via power bill, or get sued and have power cut off (I kid you not,
because of the TV license fee!) (happened to me), RTS also has 8 commercial
channels that are funded from the public's money, which are only available on
select cable networks.

It's RTS 1, RTS 2, RTS 3, RTS HD (which is redundant since the 3 channels are
already in Full HD), and then RTS 24/7, RTS Drama, RTS Archive, RTS Music, RTS
Life, RTS Kids, RTS Music 2, RTS VOD and RTS SVOD, RTS [something I can't
translate] (all names are translated from Serbian).

The TV service is the only one with HD terrestrial broadcasting, and yet it's
production quality is absolute garbage (I mean literally, the video quality is
absolutely terrible, I'm not even talking about the topics they deal with).

Basically, a money sink and waste of time. People who have SBB (United Group)
watch N1 (CNN affiliate) in Full HD (with 30 Mbps bitrate, compared to 4 Mbps
for RTS 1 HD).

People who don't have SBB cable, are stuck with the low level garbage channels
from our state broadcaster.

------
dsr_
The warrant revealed that a BBC contractor had used an "optical detector" to
reveal the possible presence of a TV.[10] The warrant stated that: "the
optical detector in the detector van uses a large lens to collect that light
and focus it on to an especially sensitive device, which converts fluctuating
light signals into electrical signals, which can be electronically analysed.
If a receiver is being used to watch broadcast programmes then a positive
reading is returned." [10] The BBC stated that this was strong evidence that a
set was "receiving a possible broadcast".

According to The Comptroller and Auditor General of the National Audit Office,
"where the BBC still suspects that an occupier is watching live television but
not paying for a licence, it can send a detection van to check whether this is
the case. TVL detection vans can identify viewing on a non‐TV device in the
same way that they can detect viewing on a television set. BBC staff were able
to demonstrate this to my staff in controlled conditions sufficient for us to
be confident that they could detect viewing on a range of non‐TV devices."

\---

That device description is entirely consistent with a video camera, perhaps
with a telescope in front of it, used for peering through people's windows.

Does this put the BBC at risk of violating anti-peeping-Tom legislation?

~~~
jarvist
No, it sounds like a telescope focusing onto a single pixel (i.e. just the
back of the curtains), and then using the output from this pixel with a lock-
in amplifier tied to the broadcast signal. The sensitivity would be enormous
due to the lock-in.

With a CRT you would be able to do this with <microsecond resolution as the
scan lines went across.

In today's LCD world, I guess something similar could be done for a whole
pixel-average of a whole frame, and then look at the time-series of that to
correct for lag in digital television / internet etc..

~~~
henryfjordan
So it's using a telescope and a camera to see what's going on in your house
(albeit hopefully in a very limited way)...

In the US that'd be an illegal search without a warrant.

~~~
FireBeyond
To look in your open window, even with a telescope? I don't think that is
considered illegal.

~~~
dsr_
In California, Penal Code 647(j):

(1) A person who looks through a hole or opening, into, or otherwise views, by
means of any instrumentality, including, but not limited to, a periscope,
telescope, binoculars, camera, motion picture camera, camcorder, or mobile
phone, the interior of a bedroom, bathroom, changing room, fitting room,
dressing room, or tanning booth, or the interior of any other area in which
the occupant has a reasonable expectation of privacy, with the intent to
invade the privacy of a person or persons inside. This subdivision does not
apply to those areas of a private business used to count currency or other
negotiable instruments.

~~~
otterley
Attorney here! (Not providing legal advice - consult a licensed attorney in
your jurisdiction.)

You're trying to leverage a "peeping Tom" law to frustrate law enforcement,
and that is unlikely to succeed.

The key qualifier here is "with the intent to invade the privacy of a person
or persons inside." Law enforcement activities are unlikely to satisfy this
prong.

~~~
t0astbread
Does that mean the police are allowed to invade my privacy like that if
they're just "checking for potential illegal activity"?

~~~
henryfjordan
No, just that you cannot use a statute like the peeping tom one against Law
Enforcement in the same way you'd use it against an average joe.

But also, yes, the police can do basically anything and receive "Qualified
Immunity" as actors of the state. Under the current interpretation of
qualified immunity unless the police know what they are specifically doing
isn't allowed then they have immunity, and the court system gets SUPER
specific with the facts to the point that pretty much any action gets
immunity. The state itself might be in trouble but that's a whole other mess
of immunity.

I'm not a lawyer though and I'm almost certainly messing up some of the nuance
here.

~~~
otterley
Qualified immunity is a creature of federal Constitutional law; it exists to
immunize law enforcement from civil suits alleging that they violated
someone's Constitutional rights. The doctrine does not immunize officers
against criminal charges, particularly crimes against the laws of the States.

"Privacy" isn't (yet) a Federal civil or constitutional right so I'm not sure
that qualified immunity would apply. The intent qualifier in the Peeping Tom
law is probably sufficient since the intent is not to violate someone's
privacy but to follow up on some sort of reasonable suspicion of criminal
activity.

Also if people can see through your window doing ordinary (non-
traditionally-"private") activities, there's the "plain view" doctrine --
although that's related to admission of evidence and not a prima facie
criminal law violation. Nevertheless a Court is probably going to use similar
reasoning when divining intent.

~~~
henryfjordan
Thanks for clarifying! My knowledge of the law is second-hand. Comments like
this help a lot!

------
LandR
I currently have no TV licence. I cancelled it over a year ago as I don't
receive a TV signal in my flat. The TV is used for netflix, Amazon Prime,
Youtube and the Playstation.

I filled out the form to get my refund and you have to choose an option for
why you don't need a TV. e.g. you are moving, you are in the military, gone
blind or something etc etc. Not an option to tick "I don't watch TV".

Anyway, I got the refund and within a week I was getting threatening letters
from them saying I don't have a TV licence!

Great joined up IT guys. The letters have continued at a rate of one or two a
month ever since.

I could probably make them stop by calling them, but I already filled out the
form, I got my refund... I don't see why I should waste more of time helping
them out.

I expect at some point someone is going to come to my flat and request to see
in the flat to check I'm not watching TV without a licence. If they do they
won't be getting let in.

It's the tone of the letters that is most annoying, they are quite threatening
and they try to be intimidating. I can laugh it off and just bin there
nonsense and ignore it, but I could see some people getting upset / intimated
into paying, which is sad.

~~~
wlkr
I get these letters regularly. On principle I refuse to deal with
Capita/BBC/TVL and would rather they waste the money trying to contact me.
There is no obligation to deal with them unless they get a warrant. Only once
have they visited and left a calling card but fortunately I was out.

------
djmobley
Watching television without a licence in the UK is actually a criminal (rather
than civil) offence, and hundreds of thousands of purple are convicted each
year of the offence.

[https://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/sep/24/in-court-
non...](https://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/sep/24/in-court-non-payment-
tv-licence-television-desperate-cases)

~~~
_-___________-_
To be clear, this only applies to television that is paid for by the license
(BBC etc, including streaming via iPlayer). I have a television and use it
only to watch Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, and am thus not required to pay
the license. Which goes to show how ridiculous these vans are, since they
can't tell where you're getting the content you're watching.

~~~
djmobley
This is incorrect advice that could get someone convicted.

A licence is required if you watch live TV on any channel.

See:
[https://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/faqs/FAQ95](https://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/faqs/FAQ95)

~~~
mytailorisrich
Netflix and Amazon prime are not TV and don't require a TV licence.

[https://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/faqs/FAQ104](https://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/faqs/FAQ104)

But indeed, watching any channel on TV (not just the BBC) requires a licence.

~~~
heavenlyblue
I think they make it incredibly clear in their message though:

If you’re watching live TV, you need to be covered by a TV Licence:

    
    
       a. if you’re watching on TV or on an online TV service 
       b. for all channels, not just the BBC
       c. ...

~~~
amiga-workbench
Incredibly vague, does a live stream fall afoul of that rule?

~~~
fmj
I believe it specifically refers to services that provide simulcast streams of
traditional TV networks. Like Playstation Vue or Youtube TV.

------
coldtea
How about a small flat fee everybody pays to sustain the national broadcaster?

Whether they watch it or not is not relevant. It's a nation-wide service at
their disposal.

Either it's worth it to have, like a dam or a highway system or whatever, and
it's ok for people to pay for it in taxes, or it's not, and it should close.

~~~
yjftsjthsd-h
Because now you're proposing that people be charged for something even if they
don't use it and don't want it.

~~~
coldtea
Yes. In many countries that's how nation-wide infrastructure, services, art
programs, and so on are funded. Not on a person per person basis.

Not everywhere it's all about the individual and their whims. If the majority
(well, through elected representatives) wishes to have and sustain a public
good (whether a public broadcaster, or national health service, or arts
grants, or whatever), individuals have no other say on the matter.

Some countries believe in public goods, and in maintaining through taxes
infrastructure to make citizens more educated, informed, cultivated, etc. If
someone is a brut and could not care less, they don't get to dictate to the
nation not to have those services.

E.g. the German example of the tax for the national broadcaster a fellow
commenter mentions:

"Any household in Germany is legally obliged to pay this quarterly fee,
regardless of whether or not you watch the TV channels or listen to the radio
stations covered by it. It also covers media consumption online via on-demand
services such as media players, streaming services accessed online via
computer or smartphone, as well as in-car audio. Shared households are only
required to pay this per household, so 4 students living together for example
would only be liable for paying the fee once."

~~~
yjftsjthsd-h
I don't mind that for infrastructure (roads, power grid) and core services
(police, fire dept), but TV is not a _requirement_. Or rather, _entertainment_
is not a requirement for life. If they want public funding for a channel for
emergency broadcasts then I wouldn't object too loudly (other than questioning
value vs radio and web).

~~~
dragonsngoblins
By that logic though you should be able to only contribute for the specific
programming you watch. As in "I agree with paying for BBC news, but not kid's
programming".

In Australia we fund the ABC and SBS through tax, which have charters
requiring a certain amount of locally produced programming, and serve as
publicly owned news media (which I think is in the public interest so long as
the government isn't exerting too much in the way of influence), as well as
programming that could be considered too niche to be profitable otherwise.

When I was a teenager SBS was how I was exposed to some really good stuff I
wouldn't have been able to see otherwise because it was anime or foreign
language films.

~~~
yjftsjthsd-h
Yes please! I 100% support unbundling and buying exactly what I actually want

Edit: It took a reread for me to realize that you were actually arguing in
favor of it. I do see your point about positive externalities, but I'm still
not convinced it's a good trade off overall.

------
tomxor
You might think these vans were crazy then, what's more crazy _today_ is how
they continue to force their opt-out licensing upon everyone like it's still
1946 and they are the only broadcasters in town.

If you live in the UK and own a TV you must pay the BBC whether you want the
BBC or not!

I'm one of the minority who don't own a TV in the UK and even then they make
it their business to inform me every two years about all the different ways
they can invade my home, fine me extortionate sums and send me to prison for
the crime of being caught owning television signal receiving equipment without
paying them.

Given how nasty all the smart TVs are these days, when I eventually want such
luxuries I plan to eventually get a huge monitor and just play netflix or
whatever on it... it would be interesting to see their response to that.

~~~
djmobley
To be clear, a licence is required to watch live TV on any channel, not just
the BBC.

~~~
tomxor
I wonder how they define "live TV"? If i watch a live video stream over the
internet does it count?

I suspect they basically mean the reception of any terrestrial RF TV signal
not really caring about it being live, but due to not wanting to go to the
trouble of differentiating between BBC and freeview?

~~~
stordoff
It would count - the definition is deliberately broad ("by any means"):

> In this regulation, any reference to receiving a television programme
> service includes a reference to receiving by any means any programme
> included in that service, where that programme is received at the same time
> (or virtually the same time) as it is received by members of the public by
> virtue of its being broadcast or distributed as part of that service.

[http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2004/692/regulation/9/mad...](http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2004/692/regulation/9/made)

------
wyldfire
While reading I thought, "for sure we will get to the part of the article
where the British realized their folly and discontinued the licensing." But
that part never came. Brits: is this for real, does this still exist? Do you
pay a license to use your TV? Is it only for OTA programming or using the
device in general?

~~~
oxidising
We pay the licence fee to fund the BBC. They make some amazing documentaries
(Planet Earth, Blue Planet etc). They also have radio stations, all advert
free. Being advert free is rare these days.

~~~
rtkwe
That's fine, a well funded public broadcaster is a great idea. The question is
why in the world is it done as a license fee instead of as a much simpler to
implement tax or a subscription where the OTA broadcasts are encrypted and a
fee is paid to maintain the ability to decrypt.

~~~
usrusr
A similar system in Germany (where we are constantly amazed at how much better
content the BBC produces) is not a tax to minimize government influence. The
goal is to make it public, but not government controlled.

Personally I think that it should be organized like a tax nonetheless, because
_if_ a public broadcaster is a benefit to society, it's a benefit to those who
watch just as much as to those who don't watch, similar to how those who don't
enter medical school will still enjoy the availability of doctors. A
precedence exists, in Germany the Finanzamt is happily collecting a tax-like
thing on behalf of the established churches from their members, without that
ever having led anyone to suggest that the churches were controlled by the
government. The investure controversy isn't exactly still lingering.

------
noodlesUK
This is such nonsense. In my opinion the BBC should be paid for by a proper
tax, as an informed public benefits everyone, or they should just give up on
calling it a license. The people going around houses just send threatening
letters, and act as though they have some right to enter your home and inspect
it (they don't). They go around terrorising people who don't know their
rights, but don't watch TV anyway. I routinely get threatening letters from
them despite not having a TV on the premises.

~~~
groundlogic
Swedish public service transitioned from a per-household fee (for households
that held devices capable of showing RF broadcast TV) to a per citizen tax
January 1st this year. Of course, they go to great lengths to avoid calling it
a tax, but... well, it is a tax.

I don't really like it. There's no opt-out any longer. And the content is
predictably all-consuming leftist.

~~~
notvplez
Norway is doing the same thing starting next year, and I really like it, even
though the content is increasingly getting predictably all-consuming right
wing as each year goes by. ;)

I actually bought my very first TV (since I discovered I was able to download
South Park and The Simpsons and watch it on my computer in the early 2000s) a
few months ago hoping to make the cut off so I would be able to say I'd paid
the old license at least once in my lifetime (the license is divided into two
payments per year), but it seems like the webshop I bought it from was nice
enough to not supply my address info to the licensing office in time as I
haven't received any bill. Oh well.

~~~
djsumdog
A Norwegian friend told me this a few years back; how the licensing people can
just go into your homes when they show up and check for the presence of TVs.
Crazy.

~~~
notvplez
Well your Norwegian friend was wrong about that. All they could do was knock
on your door and ask you if you had a TV, and you could more or less politely
tell them you didn't and that would be the end of it, even if you did own one
and it was on and both you and the license guy was able to hear it playing in
the background. :)

------
rtkwe
The interesting thing is the Operation section sounds a lot like they're using
the same principal behind TEMPEST [0] and van Eck phreaking where leaked
emanations from electronic devices can be used to spy on the computation being
done and data being displayed. Flat panel displays can be spyed on using this
method [1] so it's not completely out of bound of reality that these vans
could work as detectors.

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tempest_(codename)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tempest_\(codename\))

[1]
[https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/pet2004-fpd.pdf](https://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~mgk25/pet2004-fpd.pdf)

~~~
bcaa7f3a8bbc
It's very likely that those vans were used in the 1970s to capture the RF
leakage from the local oscillator and other driving circuitry of the CRT TVs.
But while it's still technically possible to detect RF leakage from modern LCD
TVs, I'm not sure BBC has the capabilities to deploy those _and_ achieve
reliable detection. Many people would say these vans became hoaxes at some
point in history.

~~~
rtkwe
Maybe, it would be easier to detect the presence though than to read the
actual contents being displayed in theory though.

------
sb057
Relevant: [http://bbctvlicence.com/](http://bbctvlicence.com/)

~~~
rwmj
Very relevant. To be honest I'm surprised that TV licensing haven't worked out
how this fellow is and added a special exception so he doesn't receive their
silly letters.

------
jdofaz
On the upside BBC viewers don't have to fast forward through pledge drives
like on PBS.

This topic reminds me of when The Simpsons had Betty White and PBS pledge
enforcement chase down Homer for not paying his pledge.

------
tlb
"...it was thought that they operated by detecting electromagnetic radiation
given off by a TV. The most common suggested method was the detection of a
signal from the TV's local oscillator."

This seems extremely tricky to do, and it wouldn't be very directional. Why
not just look for the flickering light pattern from a TV coming out people's
windows? You could correlate the brightness changes with the broadcast signals
on each channel to know what people are watching.

~~~
woodrowbarlow
that's exactly how it works, apparently:

"the optical detector in the detector van uses a large lens to collect that
light and focus it on to an especially sensitive device, which converts
fluctuating light signals into electrical signals, which can be electronically
analysed"

------
aarong11
In response a BBC spokeswoman rejected claims that the vans are a hoax:
"Detector vans are an important part of our enforcement of the licence fee. We
don't go into detail about how many there are or how they work as this
information might be useful to people trying to evade the fee." AKA they do
nothing other than scare people who wouldn't otherwise pay the license fee
into paying it.

~~~
toby-
AKA nothing. As the article mentions, a warrant goes into detail about how the
vans function:
[https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/statements_involving_...](https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/statements_involving_tv_detector)

The idea they're empty and "just to scare people" is a myth. They are
functioning devices.

------
hprotagonist
“Ministry of oooowsinge?”

“it was spelt like that on ‘t van!”

“what van?”

“the cat detector van.”

“you _are_ a loony. “

~~~
gumby
My immediate thought too! I'm glad someone else got the reference.

~~~
mshobe
I am so relieved to find this specific thread.

------
JackFr
It seems like it would be so much easier to tax the TV's.

------
rolph
we are looking at an iceberg there is more to it:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tempest_(codename)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tempest_\(codename\))

i know this is about optical side channeling, and tempest is a US effort, but
there is a method that was developed and when you can tune in to the synching
signal of a TV, CRT, or even an LCD, you can translate the reflected light and
reveal much more than presence of a device, You Can Actually Watch what The
Suspect Is Watching!

A suffieciently motivated attacker with easily fabbed equipment and patience
of a ham radio Dx er kinda guy, will know a lot more than presence and use of
a "TV" display

------
Nas808
The entire concept of being charged a fee for broadcast TV, going as far as
having enforcers driving around in vans seems very strange to me. But on the
other hand, I am very impressed with the quality of programming the BBC puts
out.

------
YeGoblynQueenne
>> The warrant stated that: "the optical detector in the detector van uses a
large lens to collect that light and focus it on to an especially sensitive
device, which converts fluctuating light signals into electrical signals,
which can be electronically analysed.

This "especially sensitive device, which converts fluctuating light signals
into electrical signals" sounds remarkably like the human eye.

Those signals, of course "can be electronically analysed". Emphasis on "can".
Equivalently, "could".

------
blunte
Reminds me of the cat detector van.
[http://www.montypython.net/scripts/fishlic.php](http://www.montypython.net/scripts/fishlic.php)

------
djsumdog
This kinda makes me thing back to scrambled channels and how companies
detected the use of illegal decoder boxes. A lot of them used equipment could
detect the demodulation used by a decode and checked to see if you were paying
the fee.

An easy way around it was just using two VCRs, one before the decode and one
after, to stabilize the RF signal.

~~~
aidenn0
I remember a satelite TV company put a message to call a particular number,
and then filtered out the message in their official smart cards. Everyone who
called the number was pirating their signal.

~~~
sokoloff
Satellite TV company arranges to "brick" pirate cards across the US days
before the Superbowl: [https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-
xpm-2001-jan-27-mn-17728...](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-
xpm-2001-jan-27-mn-17728-story.html)

[https://blog.codinghorror.com/revisiting-the-black-sunday-
ha...](https://blog.codinghorror.com/revisiting-the-black-sunday-hack/)

~~~
djsumdog
huh .. but the Superbowl is always on a broadcast network too, so people could
always just get out the ole rabbit ears (unless they had really bad signal
from their local state)

~~~
aidenn0
Satellite is most popular where cable does not exist which also tends to be
the places with access to the fewest networks.

------
pyman
Why drive thousands of vans around the UK, hire contractors and spend tax
payers money, when the government can ask Sky and Virgin to provide them with
a long list of households that are paying for cable tv (~30 million)? It makes
you wonder, doesn't it?

------
Emma_Goldman
The BBC also claims to be able to detect when anyone uses their online
streaming service, IPlayer, though I suspect this may be a ruse to scare
people away from watching without a licence.

Curiously, the TV licence is a third of the price if you have a black and
white television set.

~~~
NeedMoreTea
Not so curious. When the colour licence was introduced, a colour TV was an
expensive luxury, and a 12" b&w TV was standard fare for impoverished
students. I think the relative differential has increased over the years as
students came to rely on the portable telly being the cheap option.

At the same time as introducing the colour licence, they abolished the radio
licence.

btw, as you have to sign in to view iPlayer these days - annoyingly even for
radio, I am sure they can detect when people use it. It's not even a bit
challenging. :)

------
boobePhuu7iet7i
I never paid for a license. It's insane to be forced to subscribe to a handful
of channels you may or may not be interested in.

The "inspectors" have no legal right to enter your property, so you can simply
tell them to fuck off.

------
dewey
I just spend some time trying to dig up the old TV ads for the licensing fee
we had in Austria where they also had some kind of detector van with antennas.
Unfortunately I wasn't able to find it.

I was always curious how that might work.

~~~
m0xte
AFAIK they detected the emissions from the IF strip on old televisions with a
directional yagi antenna mounted on top of the van. This possibility
disappeared when the IC based IF sets were developed in the 70s and 80s.

~~~
dewey
I still remember that van having an antenna like that on top. Might be the
case.

------
saagarjha
How do these work? Is a TV somehow different than a large monitor?

~~~
ungzd
> The most common suggested method was the detection of a signal from the TV's
> local oscillator.

See: superheterodyne receiver. Most modern radio receivers generate high-
frequency signal for tuning, which leaks as radio signal (receiver becomes in
some way a transmitter). However, it's not confirmed if these vans had working
detectors, or were just for intimidation.

There were also stories about:

\- Radar detector detectors (in places where radar detection devices in cars
were illegal)

\- Broadcast radio receivers detectors installed near roads to measure
popularity of radio stations among drivers

------
trhway
interesting that England is the country where they stopped require dog
licensing because people would just ignore it.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_licence#United_Kingdom](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog_licence#United_Kingdom)

One would think that identifying an unlicensed dog is much simpler than
detecting a TV behind the walls.

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zzo38computer
I hope somone can figure out how the detection is working, perhaps by making
experiments and see what is found to do.

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jhallenworld
The TV license reminds me of the Church Tax that some countries have. This
would not fly in the US at all..

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tehlike
Another way this could be possible is embedding inaudible-to-human-ears audio
cues into the stream.

~~~
tom_mellior
There was a story going around a while back that claimed that one of the big
Silicon Valley companies was doing this: Bought TV ads that had such audio
clues, then eavesdropped on you to detect them. I don't recall if it was
Facebook's mobile app or Alexa that supposedly did the listening.

A very quick web search didn't uncover anything concrete, but I'm somewhat
certain I didn't dream this.

~~~
tehlike
You didnt. It is a real thing. Solid way to do tv ads conversion tracking.

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octosphere
Such an archaic thing to have when the masses have largely adopted smartphone
and tablets and are subscribers of things like NowTV, Netflix, Amazon Prime
Video, or even paid YouTube subscriptions (among other less popular services
which I am leaving out).

~~~
notyourwork
I doubt cable companies would invest in such things if they weren't finding
consumers abusing their services. We are not in a point where cable
subscriptions are a minority so I think depending on demographic your argument
is valid but for total population there are lots still paying for and watching
cable.

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petercooper
Have to laugh at all the Americans saying this is crazy or nonsensical when
it's legal to carry _guns_ in much of your country :-D

That aside, lest anyone think TV detector vans are all over the place, in my
almost 40 years of living in the UK I've never seen or had interactions with
one. They may as well be the Loch Ness monster for how mythical they are.

~~~
corndoge
> Have to laugh at all the Americans saying this is crazy or nonsensical when
> it's legal to carry guns in much of your country :-D

Not making the connection here, care to elaborate?

~~~
jdietrich
The TV license is an admittedly odd way of funding a state broadcaster, but it
works well enough that nobody has bothered to change it. _One_ mass shooting
on the scale of El Paso was enough to prompt a systematic overhaul of British
firearms legislation; we just can't understand how so many American citizens
can comfortably reconcile your extraordinarily high rate of gun violence with
your exceptionally lax gun regulations.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firearms_(Amendment)_Act_1988](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firearms_\(Amendment\)_Act_1988)

~~~
petercooper
_" The TV license is an admittedly odd way of funding a state broadcaster, but
it works well enough that nobody has bothered to change it."_

I think the concept of the license is rather alien to people in countries
where all civic amenities are subject to the whims of democracy and the
government. This is very much not true of many things in the UK (the BBC, the
Army, numerous universities and schools, guilds and societies) which would
formally exist even if the government were to disappear.

I know you probably know all this, so this is really for everyone else's
benefit.. but the BBC's entire basis is defined by a Royal Charter which is
independent of politics. If the government of the day (or, say, a Trump-esque
character) hates the BBC, they can't suddenly defund or destroy it. This is
why we do not pay for it in a tax (which the government could adjust) but via
a license defined by Royal Charter.

I think the British way of having government merely being one more institution
amongst many (rather than _the_ institution) is a rather powerful advantage.

~~~
noneeeed
It's a bit of legal fiction really. A government with a sufficient majority
that felt like taking on one of the more respected/loved institutions in the
UK could absolutely abolish the BBC if it wanted to, and can set the budget of
the BBC and set the license fee. The current conservative government forced
the BBC to cut its budget while taking on additional costs, e.g. the over 75s
free license, and the cost of running the World Service (previously funded by
the Foreign Office),

In reality Parliament cannot create any institution that it cannot also
eliminate or change if it wanted to. It's why QANGO stands for "Quasi-
Automimous Non Governmental Organisation", and isn't "ANGO". These sorts of
arrangements are just there to put the organisation at arms length and make it
clearer when the government or Parliament are exerting their authority (which
they have done many times with the BBC, such as forcing out the director
general).

The quasi-independent model is actually pretty common in many countries,
including as someone else mentioned the German public service broadcaster.

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ropiwqefjnpoa
Now that's just silly.

