Graffiti vandals are causing mayhem on Melbourne's rail network by tampering with signals and train braking systems, breaking into driver's cabs and tagging windscreens while riding on the backs of trains.



The trail of destruction has been revealed by a small posse of tech-savvy trainspotters, who hack into Metro's internal radio network to expose raw and sometimes startling details about the daily disruptions to the rail network.



The group's publishing of radio communication between train drivers and controllers reveals the scale of Metro's problems with vandalised and defective trains, trespassers on tracks and close calls at level crossings.

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hacking into the radio network?

It would be an interesting project for someone studying psychology, to try to work out what motivates these idiots.  What do they hope to achieve by wrecking or defacing?  Are they waiting (hoping?) for someone to be killed?

The underlying cause of the Craigieburn collision, as I understand it, was a vandalised departure signal.  Probably "fun" to do at the time, but with absolutely no comprehension of the consequences which could (and did) flow on.

Not hacking into, but rather listening to.

To me, he is giving a bad name to transport enthusiasts.

I believe he is not allowed to publish conversations he heard on a scanner.

You shouldn't be listening to private conversation anyway.
I wonder if anyone from that other group's site has had a go at the Australian government for spying on other countries, saying that the Australian government should not be spying?

Not sure how much scanner laws have changed in recent years but the official line used to be "it's not illegal to listen with a scanner but it's illegal to use anything you hear to your advantage". So there's nothing to stop you listening to security guards talking to each other on a handheld but if you used their conversations to work out the optimum time to burgle somewhere, you would be prosecuted for that.

Because anything broadcast goes into the public domain many organisations have started encrypting their tranmissions to preserve confidentiality. When the article talks about hacking, I think they really mean the guys have had to develop their own decryption software seeing as that sort of stuff isn't commercially available.

Why not scramble the comms

It would be an interesting project for someone studying psychology, to try to work out what motivates these idiots.  What do they hope to achieve by wrecking or defacing?  Are they waiting (hoping?) for someone to be killed?

The underlying cause of the Craigieburn collision, as I understand it, was a vandalised departure signal.  Probably "fun" to do at the time, but with absolutely no comprehension of the consequences which could (and did) flow on.

It's the same sort of motivation that leads people to join ANY sort of a club; they want acceptance and friendship with the main group of other mini-terrorists.

Many of these people are not children by any measure of the stick; we are talking about 30-something and in some cases even 40-something men who really, at this developmental stage of their lives, should be finding something better to do that trying to destroy the rail system or 'tag' things.  There was the famous prosecution of two guys who called themselves 'Stan' and 'Bonez' a few years ago (occasionally you still see their tags around Melbourne) and I was astonished to see in the media that they were actually sad-looking balding middle-aged men - for some reason you always expect to see pimply teens but no - they're even more tragic as human beings than you can possibly imagine.  Kinda sad really, like when you see middle-aged men still skate-boarding down the street with their caps on backwards... you're not that rebellious 20 year-old any more mate, let it go!

As a regular network user I find there's nothing more annoying than disruptions caused by someone wreaking the train you're supposed to be catching.  Do these people actually use trains? Because if they did they would find it just as annoying as I do. The smashing of equipment and deliberate disabling of safety measures is also a very disturbing development; how long before they actually kill someone in this way?

this still does not answer the critical question of why listening to the radio comms is linked to vandalism and graffiti?

I think the thrust of the article was saying that Metro don't publish specific details of why there are service disruptions - just that some services are cancelled or delayed. But these guys have been eavesdropping to find out what the actual reasons are - with a high proportion being due to vandals / graffiti.

Seems pretty obvious that the people who run this site really need to get lives. Taking it in turns to eavesdrop in on private conversations around Melbournes train network then post it on the net for the world to see? Man, that's pretty pathetic.