Working HPGs in the Dark Age?

[False Son]

Letting ComStar run your comm networks was the least horrible option.  Sure, it was a bad option, but at least allowing the 'neutral' ComStar run the HPGs was better than having them destroyed.  Obviously pony express courier networks were still preferable for highly sensitive info you can't afford to allow ComStar to leak.

But ComStar's playing of sides also works in your favor.  You just have to play the game that they sell you more useful info about your enemies than they sell your enemies about you.

ROM became the most potent intellegence branch in the Inner Sphere because it was combing through HPG messages and using them to hunt down targets.  The Houses didn't know that at the time, but it is foolish in the highest degree to believe a neutral party can be trusted to handle classified information for all parties.  It is a situation that can only be tolerated by having no other alternative.  Black Boxes being dug up were that alternative.

Black Boxes worked in the 4th SW because no one else knew much about them.. their rarity more than made up for their inherent security flaws.  Once the rarity goes away, the flaws are not only NOT made up for, they're pronounced.

Yes, but when the HPG net goes down from intradiction, white noise or Gray Monday, it is better than nothing.  The technology may have advanced to something able to genuinely replace HPGs had the work continued.  But, Comstar was defanged by Stone (supposedly) so the need for a HPG alternative dried up.

What will interest me is a possible situation where the Republic survives the Blackout with Buhl's Belssed Order assimilated into a civilian office.  State operated HPGs is something that hasn't been seen in a long time.

[Tai Dai Cultist]

...when the HPG net goes down from intradiction, white noise or Gray Monday, it is better than nothing.

This seems to be what we're disagreeing about.

It might be better than 'nothing', but nothing isn't the alternative to Black Boxes that the states of 3145 face.

It is fine for civilian and non-sensitive communications.  Not fine for secrets or classified info.  For those you use Pony Express and what few HPGs remain.

Extenuating circumstances might make an 'in the clear' broadcast via Black Box worth it due to extremely short timeframes involved (OMG, we're being invaded RIGHT NOW!).   But you can count on anything you broadcast, no matter how well coded, will eventually be de-coded by someone with the resources of a Successor State.

[False Son]

That Assumes there is a sufficiant amount of jumpships around to handle the traffic.  Every ship curtailed for this sort of pony express is one that isn't free to trade or traffic troops.  Many states have to dragoon their merchant marine to make due just in the ordinary movement of troops during war, with something like the Capellan jump circuit being a triumph of planning.  When you need jumpships to relay messages it has the potential to undermine your military, your civilian sector, or both.

That being said, Black Boxes are not an alternative for running a nation, or a nation in a state of war.  The powers of the Inner Sphere are making due regardless of their choices.

[Tai Dai Cultist]

That Assumes there is a sufficiant amount of jumpships around to handle the traffic.  Every ship curtailed for this sort of pony express is one that isn't free to trade or traffic troops.  Many states have to dragoon their merchant marine to make due just in the ordinary movement of troops during war, with something like the Capellan jump circuit being a triumph of planning.  When you need jumpships to relay messages it has the potential to undermine your military, your civilian sector, or both.

No, I don't assume that.  At all.

I think JumpShips being insufficient to meet demands of both logistics and communications at the same time is a defining aspect of the 3145 era.

In fact, I think one of the most intriguing gems of this era is that new aspect on the strategic fog of war.  The more action you take, the worse you can see.  The better you can see, the less options you have in taking action.

[False Son]

Okay.  Al long as we both agree things are totally jacked up I don't believe we are disagreeing as much our back and forth would suggest.

[SteveRestless]

Do we have any evidence whatsoever that black boxes still work?  I mean actual, concrete evidence of their use, not "They're different from HPGs so they must still be useful" speculation.

Yes.

From Ghost War:

Mason and Janella recieve a message that was routed to them by way of some sort of republic black box network.

Mason was also able to get word off-planet through some manner of automated system that was able to get data off-planet from a coffee shop's register system. They don't SAY its black-box based, but there really arent that many candidates, technology wise, and the HPG network is down.



From Daughter of the Dragon:

it does indicate that the combine has lost some to time, they still have black boxes, and they are mentioned as being old but functional

They're mentioned "working like a charm"

2: They're inherently unsecure.  Every Black Box that you control or don't control that is within range will pick up the signal.  They not only broadcast omnidirectionally, their limited transmission capability means only the most basic of encryption can be used.  You won't broadcast anything via Black Box that you wouldn't want to broadcast directly to enemy HQ.

The combine-controlled black boxes that they used to eavesdrop, were mentioned as being directionally shielded, to avoid being eavesdropped upon themselves. You can focus them.


As for the matter of being overheard, you could run them like a Numbers Station if you believed that they would infact be overheard. Units get a One-Time pad and there's no worry of the wrong person decoding the orders because its a one way thing. If you don't have that one time pad to decode it, its gibberish to you.

[SCC]

What Steve said, Black Boxes are only slightly less secure then radio's and that's only because radio's have more frequencies then BB's have channels, and the number is going up all the time

[False Son]

The later ones we capable of sending encrypted messages along with greater capacity messages, videos pictures, etc.

Fixed dum dum moment.

[Scotty]

Yes.

From Ghost War:

Mason and Janella recieve a message that was routed to them by way of some sort of republic black box network.

Mason was also able to get word off-planet through some manner of automated system that was able to get data off-planet from a coffee shop's register system. They don't SAY its black-box based, but there really arent that many candidates, technology wise, and the HPG network is down.



From Daughter of the Dragon:

it does indicate that the combine has lost some to time, they still have black boxes, and they are mentioned as being old but functional

They're mentioned "working like a charm"

At this point, I can't really definitively say they don't work.  I can, however, point out that both of these instances occurred well before the last of the HPG relays actually went down - the very next book from Ghost War (A Call to Arms) we have a working, fully functional HPG.  Yet, we know that they eventually stop working altogether.

[SteveRestless]

Yet, we know that they eventually stop working altogether.

No, there are still functioning HPGs. Importance was placed fairly recently on Palmyra, for the fact it held a working HPG. and presumably another HPG in range that it can communicate with. and that was as recently as 3143.

Palmyra was one of the few worlds in that region of space with
a working hyperpulse generator, which was one reason why it was
chosen as the muster site. On the morning of the nineteenth, the
HPG station was rocked by a massive explosion that took out the
generator core and cut off Palmyra from the AFFS hub at Tsamma.
The explosion also severely damaged planetary communications,
rendering it difficult for the assembled forces scattered across the
surface to talk to one another.

And given that the black boxes operate on entirely different principles than the HPG system, with their only commonality being the fact that they transmit hyperspatially, there's no reason to believe that even if the HPG network was completely black (a supposition which I can think of NO basis for) that it would matter in the slightest to the black boxes.

Furthermore, the black boxes, at least as concerns millitary communication, should have mitigated the effects of the HPG Network going down for at the very least, the republic, combine, lyrans and federated suns. According to the earlier novels, atleast half of those states were using them, but the lyrans and fedsuns apparently forgot all about them.

[serack]

That being said, Black Boxes are not an alternative for running a nation, or a nation in a state of war.  The powers of the Inner Sphere are making due regardless of their choices.

yet davion did just this under inderdiction :)

[serack]

and there are unbreakable codes out there today that without codewords, etc are unbreakable no matter how much computer power put on it :)

[roosterboy]

yet davion did just this under inderdiction :)

Briefly, not in the long term.

[Col Toda]

The Fed Com and The Dracs have back up black box communications for their Navies .  The Republic of the Sphere has a few for their Intelligence network as  the Star Seeds a former mercenary company had them and kept them when they worked for the Uncle Chandy's Coalition ; Uncle Chandy  was assassinated by the Bounty Hunter when someone else  took the mantel .  The Coalition Broke up and the biggest beneficiary of the assassination was Devin Stone . Everyone in the coalition still fought and attacked the WOB without much of if any loss of capability . This leads to me to believe that the WOB was not responsible for paying for the assassination but Devlin Stone was responsible for arranging it . One presumes that more black boxes would be made or more likely just taken out of storage for critical strategic communications . It would still be much less efficient and secure but it works .  Since it is about a brief case size it also makes sense to put them in Communication Satellites I figure a black box would cost 2-6 million to produce depending on model and quality,.