slag@charm.UUCP (Peter Rosenthal) (05/16/84)
############################################## Does anyone out there in netland know how cable tv is scrambled and descrambled? Do they play with the sync pulses?
ron@brl-vgr.ARPA (Ron Natalie <ron>) (05/17/84)
I know of at least three. Two involve doing things with the sync and are easily defeated. The third involves something less trivial. Our cable company has three premium channels. HBO is patched in a little locked junction box at the telephone pole and not scrambled at all. Showtime is sync screwed and you see the picture all wavy. It is trivial to open up the converter box and jumper the sync back in. Playboy has some interesting type of scrambling. All I see on that channel is a wavy black and white pattern and the sound is a wierd beeping noise. -Ron