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from the nobody-had-a-flashlight-(you'll-need-to-RTFA) dept.
FCC tries to make Miami pirate radio station walk the plank
"Pirate radio" in 2017 takes many forms, but here's one: a north Miami couple hosting a transmitter in their backyard shed while a DJ's signal is piped in over the Internet and promoted on Facebook—even after multiple warnings from the government and a gear seizure by the US Marshals. Oh—did I mention the $144,344 fine? Not that anyone's likely to pay it.
Welcome to 90.1 MHz, "Radio Touche Douce," a Haitian music station appearing to be so obviously illegal that it even has the ability to unite the current fractious set of FCC commissioners. It's not even a secret; as the Miami Herald notes, the station is "the pulse of the Haitian music industry in Miami, organizing some of the most popular big-ticket parties while promoting bands and guiding konpa music fans to the next hit." But that doesn't mean it has been easy to shut down.
Here, in statements pulled right from FCC documents, is the story of how Radio Touche Douce has operated for years right under the nose of government investigators—and how the FCC has now upped the ante.
(Score: 2) by hoeferbe on Sunday December 31 2017, @07:55PM
Maybe the story is incomplete, but the Ars Technica article doesn't mention this pirate radio station interfering with others, at all. The only mention of interference (and even he phrased it as "potential interference") is in a quote from Federal Communications Commissioner Michael O'Rielly, "for whom pirate radio crackdowns are a key issue".
His discourse reminds me of other government bureaucrats and politicians going off on how we need to get rid of strong encryption or anonymity on the Internet in order for them to protect us against drug-dealers, child-pornographers, terrorists or whoever the bad guy of the decade, is.