I have never claimed it to be illegal to recieve the messages (although that would be an interesting area of law, given the retransmission of messages is usually illegal), but that is not the reason I give that we shouldn't publish them.

Crew send those messages knowing that whilst they are probably not entirely confidential, they do not expect them to end up on a spotting website for the world to read.

To those who say that removing the person's name gives privacy...

That is a lot of information given that would enable people to know who the person is, if they wanted to.

I stick with my claim that while we are technologically able to intercept the messages, we are NOT the intended recipient and have no business publishing the content.

I can tell you that the few "non spotting" aircrew I have talked to about this issue were not impressed at all that someone is putting their messages on the internet.

I guess for me I'd just like us to hold the moral high ground and not do something that could potentially damage the standing of spotters in the aviation community.

If they wanted to being the key. The data is public and in this case the poster has IMO hidden it enough to put in on a public board.

and anyone who could readily look up that information probably has access to the ACARS transmissions anyway...

No, the data is NOT public. Just because it is not encrypted does not make it so.

When crew or a company send a message on ACARS, you are not the intended recipient. You are evesdropping. Sometimes ACARS is used to send information that is best not transmitted over the radio. There is no urgent need to prevent someone, if they are interested, from reading it, and obviously some here have the ability at home to do so, and that isn't something that is going to be stopped.

Publishing that information on a board that represents the interests of the spotting group is an entirely different thing which, I believe, (As detailed in my previous post) works contrary to the intent of most here to be an accepted part of the aviation community.

For example, a lot of work seems to have been done in making good relations with the airlines, with Virgin acknowledging the group for the arrival of its first aircraft. I wonder what their ops control/security departments would say if they find their company confidential transmissions and flight attendants details turning up on the spotting website? At the very least I'm sure that it wouldn't do the image of the group much good.

Feel free to disagree, but if you are going to attack my ideas, please make the effort to construct something other than "but the personal details have been removed", as that is not my point.

Light hearted but respectful balance needed
 

It's a fair point to make, Owen.

I'd say the test is whether anyone is going to be embarrassed by something on the board. Grahame is pretty good at sanitising and extracting but your views might require the sanitising to be a little more stringent where someone is identifiable by name or aircraft id or flight number.

Apart from that I think most of what we read is harmless fun and no-one would think that we have any malicious motives. In many ways our being peers and/or supporters of the message senders gives us a degree of legitimacy beyond that of total strangers but given that the board is crawled by search engine robots as well as by journalists from time to time your comments are a timely reminder that we do need to be circumspect and thoughtful if we want to continue to enjoy what is an indulgence not always accommodated in many countries.

Absolutely Philip, I agree 100%. A nice balanced view from you as always!

I should make it clear I am not attacking Grahame for posting what he believes is a fair thing on the board, as I know many wish to read the messages. Aviation is one of those things that gets into your blood and you just want to find out more!

I agree that in most cases Grahame does quite a good job of sanitising messages, however since the ability for some airlines to send personal emails through the ACARS system has come about, we are seeing more and more personal (if sanitised) information coming through.

I know I am not alone in my views about not publishing ACARS, but not being a particulally "close knit" member means I am slightly more free in airing something that could make others unpopular, as I know seeing the ACARS messages is a popular thing. I just hope to start a bit of debate if this is the way the group wants to go into the future. Do we need to be more circumspect in what is published and make it highly sanitised, or remove it altogether? That is a decision for the group and the moderators, not me.

The risk here, as you point out Philip, is not the use of the information by members of the board, who are most likely aviation enthusiasts who read it for entertainment. It is the fact that it is a public board, most likely frequented by the Authorities and the Media, who can make what they want of what is written. Another avenue is a disgruntled passenger. Airlines are forbidden from revealing passenger lists, however some of the messages on the board mean that passengers names and seat numbers have been revealed. Im not sure the airlines would like that very much.

At the moment Spotters in this country are treated relatively well with a good relationship with the airport authorities and police. I'd hate to see what I think is a questionable practice of publishing private communications (intercepting emails as well) potentially ruin those good relationships.

If they are sending via the airways, unencrypted then what ever is said is quite clearly in the public domain, regardless of weather we are the intended recipient or not. It is no different to making a radio call over the public airways or a phone call for that matter.

They are not company confidential if sent over public airways. They are after all broadcast over the public airways unencrypted, then routed via a third party company (often SITA) so they can hardly be called confidential in any way shape or form.

Well I think you have your knickers in a knot over nothing. The OP did enough to protect the identity of the crew member and posted something which gives us an insight into how airlines and the authorities are treating what is a very serious subject. Graham should be congratulated for doing that. It is whinges like this that discourage people from Graham contributing to this board.

Pratique from a QF B747

ACARS mode: S Aircraft reg: .VH-OEE
Message label: 86 Block id: 0 Msg. no: M24A
Flight id: QF0094
Message content:-
ARI
ETAB 2120YMML
WHLCHR 05 / MED
ASST MINORS PAX
SICK N
SI NO SICKNESS ON BOARD CAPTS NAME C????????? BAY PLSE
-------------------------------------[04/05/2009 06:37]

Owen, I presume the SICK N in the above ACARS transmission is what you are refering to above. I see this on many ACARS transmissions from a variety of aircraft.

Side Note: I have a pretty good relationship with airline staff and tech crews, having had email contact with an Air New Zealand A320 crew about the email feature the airline has implemented (I used the email address in the ACARS message for the initial contact and they were cool about the whole thing, and provided me with some good background), and have also supplied ACARS logs to a Virgin Blue tech crew member responsible for the ACARS implementation on the E Jets.

G'day Grahame, yes the N is the one I'm talking about. It is on a few different aircraft, but not on all ACARS equipt aircraft like the 767. At the moment I imagine we'll see a few people sending it when not required, and forgetting to send it when it is, but I'm sure that the company will be right onto it!

For the side - Yes you're right that many crew will be fine with it, but conversely a lot don't know that people read their messages. Most crew couldn't care less that somebody listens in or reads what they say, but I'm not so sure they'd be keen to have all of it published on the internet, where those who are not enthusiasts, but the media, and who knows who else can freely read it. If those people really wanted to, yes they could monitor ACARS, but they won't do that, but they might run with something from a web forum (Media frequently quote PpRuNe and other websites as gospel).

Most of the things that you post are completely harmless, and some are rather amusing (I didn't know we had so many comedians flying haha), but personally I'd rather not see messages that are not aviation related, such as personal emails, or emails regarding crewmembers or the public.

Thats my 2c worth anyway :D

Ash W - Again, and you don't seem to grasp this - my "request" has nothing to do with legality. It is to do with morality. As an aside, unencrypted information is not automatically public domain. And, by the way, don't go listening to telephone calls which you liken to making radio calls. Telephone communications are private, and there are very strong penalties for people intercepting them.

I was talking about the morals of it too. I just do not see it is an issue, especially when the identity of the individual was masked.

As for phone calls, you might want to double check the laws. It is indeed illegal to tap into the (wired) phone network, but listening into the mobile network isn't illegal per se as the signals are in the public domain. That is why Government security agencies like ASIO need warrants to tap someone phones but DSD on the other hand who's role is to intercept radio signals does not need the same warrants.