ADS-B Taylor Swift

[A64Pilot]

12 hours ago, Hank said:

What's much more worrisome is that I can type an N number into any search engine and get the owner's full name and address . . . . 

This worries / bothers me quite a lot, I went so far as to create a Montana LLC that “owns” my Mooney. It’s cheap and easy. Apparently it was created as a tax dodge for primarily expensive motorhomes but they register aircraft too, supposedly they do not and won’t disclose who owns the LLC at least to the public, one assumes they will to LEO’s. At least in Fl it won’t work as a tax dodge for aircraft but will for motorhomes, Fl will make you pay a use tax for your airplane if it’s in Fl for three weeks, but your motorhome or Yacht can stay as long as you want without being taxed.

Aviation doesn’t get to play on the same fields as Yachts and motorhomes for some reason?

https://www.49dollarmontanaregisteredagent.com

https://www.49dollarmontanaregisteredagent.com/montana-vehicle-registration/aircraft

[Schllc]

26 minutes ago, A64Pilot said:

This worries / bothers me quite a lot, I went so far as to create a Montana LLC that “owns” my Mooney. It’s cheap and easy. Apparently it was created as a tax dodge for primarily expensive motorhomes but they register aircraft too, supposedly they do not and won’t disclose who owns the LLC at least to the public, one assumes they will to LEO’s. At least in Fl it won’t work as a tax dodge for aircraft but will for motorhomes, Fl will make you pay a use tax for your airplane if it’s in Fl for three weeks, but your motorhome or Yacht can stay as long as you want without being taxed.

Aviation doesn’t get to play on the same fields as Yachts and motorhomes for some reason?

https://www.49dollarmontanaregisteredagent.com

https://www.49dollarmontanaregisteredagent.com/montana-vehicle-registration/aircraft

You can create an LLC in Florida and name a registered agent who would appear as the manager with the Secretary of State, keeping you identity  private. Usually this is an attorney and they serve no purpose other than being a name and address. 
If tou do this, you avoid the 6% sales tax but you do have to pay a usage sales tax based on the hours you are “renting the plane” from the entity that owns it.   it it’s far cheaper than paying the straight sales tax on the purchase. 
I think my usage tax last year was a little over $500. 
I am not sure how the usage tax works if you do not depreciate and deduct the expenses of the plane.
But you could have created a Florida LLC and shielded your identity. 
I know because I have done it before, several times. 
 

Speaking to an attorney or CPA who specializes in aircraft tax law is immensely helpful. The average attorney or accountant really doesn’t understand this narrow segment of the law. 

[A64Pilot]

Yeah, I didn’t know any of that and wanted an easy way out to “hide” my identity. Aircraft was in a Ga LLC and I was offered that LLC for free when I bought it, but the catch 22 I think is the number of days a non Fl registered aircraft is allowed in Fl before use tax is due, but apparently this use tax is only applicable to aircraft?

I depreciated the Maule because one of the hats I wore working was as a Test Pilot and used the Maule for currency etc.

Now I’m Retired and have no Company I don’t think I could depreciate the Mooney anyway.

Idea behind the Montana LLC is that I don’t have to do anything, my Ga Corporation that I had the farm in was a PIA with Officers, meetings, yearly filings etc. 

Co-incidentally I got this email today.

 

 

 

[EricJ]

14 hours ago, GeeBee said:

In the state of GA it is illegal for law enforcement to access a state data base (i.e. license plate records) unless it is for three reasons. One is an felony act. Two is a misdemeanor which means the officer has to observe the act and three is for officer's safety. For instance, my registration expires upon my birthdate on the 5th. I was pulled over on the 15th for an expired tag, even though I paid the fee and had the tag. The officer explained it was 50-50 on the 15th so he ran my plate. That is violation of the law as there was no observable misdemeanor only a supposition (no observable misdemeanor). It got pretty testy in court and I appealed out of municipal court to Superior court where the City Attorney begged me not to go forward.  I agreed to plead no contest if the City Attorney agreed to explain to the rookie officer how he broke the law and next time might not turn out so well. I shook hands with the officer and told him I just wanted him to understand how he broke the law as much as I did. 

In AZ you can hire a licensed Private Detective to get the details from the database if you give them a license plate number if there is a legal justification for doing so.  Private citizens can't access it, but law enforcement can (perhaps under restricted circumstances like what you mention), and PIs can.    

[slowflyin]

18 hours ago, GeeBee said:

There is no law against taking a picture of a license plate. There are laws against taking pictures and storing them in a data base which varies from stay to state

Yes Sir, I'm tracking.    The main feature of these fairly new, off the shelf cameras is logging.   It isolates the plate and stores it with a date and time stamp.   If I can set it up to delete data after 30 days, I may be able to stay between the lines.   Also, the last thing I want to do is violate someone's privacy.   Thanks again for the heads up.  Just the nudge I needed to consider all angles.   

[A64Pilot]

On 2/7/2024 at 7:21 PM, NotarPilot said:

I have mixed feelings about this. While I think it’s an incredibly d*****bag thing to do, I don’t necessarily think he’s doing anything illegal or that he can be sued for if he’s simply republishing open source data. Perhaps if someone committed some nefarious act against one of these “celebrities” and it could be proven that the published racking data facilitated that act then maybe he could have some legal liability. However, I’m not a lawyer but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express las night.

I’m no Lawyer either and haven’t stayed in a Motel in months.

However comma my belief without knowing what the laws are, couldn’t this fall under “stalking”? Example I believe I can’t follow someone wherever they go even if I never set foot off of public property, and for example I don’t even think I can maintain surveillance on someone from the air. Even following their activities on line I think constitutes stalking. I believe but again I’m no lawyer but key to being stalking is does the activity cause emotional distress or fear?

My guess is they could get him as a Stalker, she can certainly afford a whole team of Lawyers, while I doubt he can afford one. I know justice is supposed to be blind, but often the truth is the deeper pockets win.

I would hope but know better that this free and public dissemination of aircraft related data that would never be allowed for automobiles will be stopped. Then I wouldn’t have to maintain an LLC that while it’s not real expensive it I’d guess a couple hundred a year that I’d rather not spend

AIS for boats pre dates ADSB by years and is very similar in it reports position, and that data is also publicly available

 

[Fly Boomer]

9 minutes ago, A64Pilot said:

I would hope but know better that this free and public dissemination of aircraft related data that would never be allowed for automobiles will be stopped.

AIS for boats pre dates ADSB by years and is very similar in it reports position, and that data is also publicly available

At this point I think privacy is a fantasy.  Even if there were some extreme habits you might adopt to avoid detection, it just isn't very likely that anyone could keep it up for long.

[N201MKTurbo]

23 minutes ago, slowflyin said:

Yes Sir, I'm tracking.    The main feature of these fairly new, off the shelf cameras is logging.   It isolates the plate and stores it with a date and time stamp.   If I can set it up to delete data after 30 days, I may be able to stay between the lines.   Also, the last thing I want to do is violate someone's privacy.   Thanks again for the heads up.  Just the nudge I needed to consider all angles.   

I was at Photonics West last week and some of the big government contractors were showing off some scary image analysis and people tracking technology.

[Bob E]

Very few celebrities actually own their own jets.  They get more privacy and far more flexibility by using NetJets (which is essentially a huge private airline) or some other private jet service that guarantees them the right-size jet for the flights they need for the number of people they want to bring along.  So in most cases, actually tracking a celebrity would require knowing which private jet they are boarding and when.  Such info is almost impossible to find, since NetJets never discloses passenger info.

[A64Pilot]

3 minutes ago, Fly Boomer said:

At this point I think privacy is a fantasy.  Even if there were some extreme habits you might adopt to avoid detection, it just isn't very likely that anyone could keep it up for long.

I know you can’t protect from someone determined or willing to spend some money.

It was I’d guess maybe 15 years ago at Sun-N-Fun in camping I noticed some guy wandering around obviously writing down tail numbers, as he was writing mine down I asked him what he was doing, his response was he was an airplane spotter and it was his hobby, apparently a bunch of these idiots write down tail numbers and report the location to each other?

Todays world is nuts. Been I’d guess a month or two ago I entered mid field Right downwind at an airport that only had one side traffic, right after I did I head this guy calling a “tear drop” entry into the opposite traffic, well I could see him in front of me on downwind, he did a left 180 and now we are facing each other on a collision course, so I asked him if he had ADSB in, his response was I use my eyes to see where I’m going, so I told him to look in front of him, that the airplane he will see with the landing light on is me, and his course reversal in downwind put us on a collision course, by that time I had dropped to 500 ft so I could keep an eye on him

Long story short this guy went ballistic telling me he had my tail number and was going to find out where I lived call the FAA etc. I told him please call that I had a screen shot of his ground track 

Nearly every day on the news I hear about how someone got cut off in traffic or something and responds by shooting.

I’d just as soon this idiot that was threatening me couldn’t find out my Address, who knows just how stupid people are now.

 

[Fly Boomer]

1 minute ago, A64Pilot said:

I’d just as soon this idiot that was threatening me couldn’t find out my Address, who knows just how stupid people are now.

Unfortunately, the answer to your last question is "very".  I live in a semi-affluent area, but I still wonder every time I leave the house if this will be the day.  In times gone by, I never gave it a thought.

[A64Pilot]

14 minutes ago, Bob E said:

Very few celebrities actually own their own jets.  They get more privacy and far more flexibility by using NetJets (which is essentially a huge private airline) or some other private jet service that guarantees them the right-size jet for the flights they need for the number of people they want to bring along.  So in most cases, actually tracking a celebrity would require knowing which private jet they are boarding and when.  Such info is almost impossible to find, since NetJets never discloses passenger info.

Neighbor flies for Netjets, flies the big Citation, the X maybe?

Anyway as was posted it’s not that hard really all it takes is follow the directions that are posted by ADSB stack exchange to build your own receiver with a Rasberry Pi and the nut that followed them to the airport can now track them. I’m sure posting this data will make them a celebrity on that website.

I don’t know what a Rasberry Pi is really but apparently they aren’t expensive, and can be easily bought

Apparently even flight aware is in on it, so you can feed data directly to flight aware, so much for the FAA request to be not reported, flight aware even incentivizes it, giving away free accounts etc that you normally pay for

https://www.flightaware.com/adsb/piaware/build/

[A64Pilot]

As I was Retiring “blue force” tracking was being installed on my units AH-64D’s. It broadcast precise position data and other information so that the Commander can see all his assets in real time on a terrain map.

Of course they were being told that the “enemy” couldn’t receive this data. I guess I retired in time because there was no way that I would go down range transmitting position data.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_force_tracking

We already had every aircraft we were flying with in an integrated net so that I could see where they were on a digital map, where they were looking if the had a weapon selected, how much fuel they had, ammo load etc.

[Fly Boomer]

5 hours ago, A64Pilot said:

I guess I retired in time because there was no way that I would go down range transmitting position data.

Sure.  Let's pump out a radio broadcast of position, weapons status, and fuel.  We just won't tell the enemy what frequency we are using.  What could go wrong?  This whole ADS-B thing is starting to give me the creeps.

[DCarlton]

16 minutes ago, Fly Boomer said:

Sure.  Let's pump out a radio broadcast of position, weapons status, and fuel.  We just won't tell the enemy what frequency we are using.  What could go wrong?  This whole ADS-B thing is starting to give me the creeps.

Gotta have complete faith in your encryption.  :> 

[Fly Boomer]

39 minutes ago, DCarlton said:

Gotta have complete faith in your encryption.  :> 

I have trust issues.

[Ragsf15e]

1 hour ago, DCarlton said:

Gotta have complete faith in your encryption.  :> 

The benefits of coordinating all the Blue Force assets in one network very much outweigh the risks of someone breaking the encryption… unless of course someone actually does it.  I sat on the ground hundreds of miles from a battle in iraq in 2003 and could see all the aircraft, callsigns, frequencies, weapons, fuel, targets, etc. before I even took off.  It is like the difference between flying a P-51 in WW2 and flying a radar equipped jet fighter with guided missiles.

I wish we had registration privacy and adsb privacy as well.  Even some simple encryption would be helpful.

[DCarlton]

3 hours ago, Ragsf15e said:

The benefits of coordinating all the Blue Force assets in one network very much outweigh the risks of someone breaking the encryption… unless of course someone actually does it.  I sat on the ground hundreds of miles from a battle in iraq in 2003 and could see all the aircraft, callsigns, frequencies, weapons, fuel, targets, etc. before I even took off.  It is like the difference between flying a P-51 in WW2 and flying a radar equipped jet fighter with guided missiles.

I wish we had registration privacy and adsb privacy as well.  Even some simple encryption would be helpful.

Wonder if AOPA is beating the privacy drum.  Enough pilots seem to have concerns.  Or maybe it’s a battle they don’t want to pick.  

[NotarPilot]

On 2/9/2024 at 9:49 AM, A64Pilot said:

I’m no Lawyer either and haven’t stayed in a Motel in months.

However comma my belief without knowing what the laws are, couldn’t this fall under “stalking”? Example I believe I can’t follow someone wherever they go even if I never set foot off of public property, and for example I don’t even think I can maintain surveillance on someone from the air. Even following their activities on line I think constitutes stalking. I believe but again I’m no lawyer but key to being stalking is does the activity cause emotional distress or fear?

My guess is they could get him as a Stalker, she can certainly afford a whole team of Lawyers, while I doubt he can afford one. I know justice is supposed to be blind, but often the truth is the deeper pockets win.

I would hope but know better that this free and public dissemination of aircraft related data that would never be allowed for automobiles will be stopped. Then I wouldn’t have to maintain an LLC that while it’s not real expensive it I’d guess a couple hundred a year that I’d rather not spend

AIS for boats pre dates ADSB by years and is very similar in it reports position, and that data is also publicly available

 

I think you described “active stalking” and “passive stalking.” Active stalking could be interpreted more of a threat than passive stalking. I dislike both. I too value my privacy which is why I did the LLC thing too. It’s cheap privacy, in my mind. I don’t understand how someone at the FAA thought making registration information public was a good idea. Do they not see the potential problems here?

In 1989, a star obsessed fan named Robert Bardo shot and killed actress Rebecca Schaeffer at her home in West Hollywood. He found out where she lived by paying a private investigator $250 to find out where she lived. The PI was able to get those records through the California DMV by making a simple request and paying a small fee, which was legal, at the time.. The murder resulted in federal legislation called the Driver’s Privacy Protection Act which barred DMVs from disclosing personal information. As most people know, many policies and laws are written in blood and unfortunately, that’s likely what it will take to have this asinine law changed. 

With the advent of so many YouTubers, many being young, attractive females, I fear it’s only a matter of time someone does something stupid and tries to harm one of these young women. All YouTubers would be wise to register their aircraft under some LLC that’s not registered to their home address before publishing any videos online. There is just far too much mental illness out there these days. 

[A64Pilot]

On 2/9/2024 at 6:52 PM, DCarlton said:

Gotta have complete faith in your encryption.  :> 

Ask the Nazis who had complete trust in Enigma how that worked out, the Poles if memory serves had it cracked way in advance of WWII, years.

I believe it was actually the poles who gave up all their data to the Brits before being invaded is why the Brits could carry on with the work. Even after the Nazis added the fourth rotor supposedly making it mathematically impossible to break, it was broken by a brilliant Brit mathematician in short order.

History has shown us over and over that “unbreakable” codes are always broken.

But it’s deeper than that, anything that broadcasts can both be tracked and targeted. The A model back in the 80’s when I flew it had a Doppler nav system four legs if you will were constantly being broadcasted and they sensed movement based on frequency shifts, this dipper system updated the inertial nav system on movement, plus we had a radar altimeter.

Any even moderately advanced air defense system could use that and shoot you down in several different ways, and trust me the Russians even back in the 80’s have extraordinarily advanced systems, way more advanced than we do.

The A model we could turn both off and fly in a degraded mode, the D model got GPS of course a dual ring laser INU’s so no more Doppler.

If nothing else I’m sure blue force tracker, can be tracked, even though I’m sure they are very short data bursts. All the data on our internal network was transmitted in a single click over our Singcars com radio, if you listened and there was no noise you could hear a tick sound every now and again. 

Even our helmet microphones were tempest shielded, it seems that even from a significant distance the RF that leaks from a microphone can be intercepted and every word you say can be heard even without any radio transmissions.

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

‘What can be done is WAY beyond science fiction, trust me.

[DCarlton]

15 minutes ago, A64Pilot said:

Ask the Nazis who had complete trust in Enigma how that worked out, the Poles if memory serves had it cracked way in advance of WWII, years.

I believe it was actually the poles who gave up all their data to the Brits before being invaded is why the Brits could carry on with the work. Even after the Nazis added the fourth rotor supposedly making it mathematically impossible to break, it was broken by a brilliant Brit mathematician in short order.

History has shown us over and over that “unbreakable” codes are always broken.

Would be incredibly damaging if that happened today.  I pray NSA knows what they are doing.  

[amillet]

New federal regulations require all us companies to report beneficial ownership information.  https://www.fincen.gov/boi
 

 

 

[N201MKTurbo]

18 hours ago, A64Pilot said:

Ask the Nazis who had complete trust in Enigma how that worked out, the Poles if memory serves had it cracked way in advance of WWII, years.

I believe it was actually the poles who gave up all their data to the Brits before being invaded is why the Brits could carry on with the work. Even after the Nazis added the fourth rotor supposedly making it mathematically impossible to break, it was broken by a brilliant Brit mathematician in short order.

History has shown us over and over that “unbreakable” codes are always broken.

But it’s deeper than that, anything that broadcasts can both be tracked and targeted. The A model back in the 80’s when I flew it had a Doppler nav system four legs if you will were constantly being broadcasted and they sensed movement based on frequency shifts, this dipper system updated the inertial nav system on movement, plus we had a radar altimeter.

Any even moderately advanced air defense system could use that and shoot you down in several different ways, and trust me the Russians even back in the 80’s have extraordinarily advanced systems, way more advanced than we do.

The A model we could turn both off and fly in a degraded mode, the D model got GPS of course a dual ring laser INU’s so no more Doppler.

If nothing else I’m sure blue force tracker, can be tracked, even though I’m sure they are very short data bursts. All the data on our internal network was transmitted in a single click over our Singcars com radio, if you listened and there was no noise you could hear a tick sound every now and again. 

Even our helmet microphones were tempest shielded, it seems that even from a significant distance the RF that leaks from a microphone can be intercepted and every word you say can be heard even without any radio transmissions.

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

‘What can be done is WAY beyond science fiction, trust me.

When I worked for Raytheon Data Systems back in the 80s I was certified to work on our TEMPEST word processor. It got me into some very bizarre places…

[Fly Boomer]

21 hours ago, A64Pilot said:

History has shown us over and over that “unbreakable” codes are always broken.

True.  And rules or laws prohibiting dissemination of sensitive data are a joke.  My father told me when I was a kid that the only thing locks do is help protect honest people from a lapse in judgement.

[Fly Boomer]

21 hours ago, A64Pilot said:

Even our helmet microphones were tempest shielded, it seems that even from a significant distance the RF that leaks from a microphone can be intercepted and every word you say can be heard even without any radio transmissions.

Interestingly, the electrical impulses generated by typing on your keyboard can be detected and interpreted.