# digital tv descramblers
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/digital-tv-descramblers/166043
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [April 2, 2003, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/digital-tv-descramblers/166043 "2003-04-02T20:31:43Z")
**Posts on this page:** 4
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@wdstockjc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wdstockjc)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2003, 8:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/digital-tv-descramblers/166043/1 "2003-04-02T20:31:43Z")
Recently I have received a rash of spam about digital tv descramblers. They look like a small filter that screws onto the coax cable before it is connected to the tv set . According to the advertisement they descramble all gigital programming. I know that there have been analog descrambler in use for many years. I thought that it wasn’t possible to descramble a digital signal. Is this just an other cyber con game to extract upwards of $200 from the greedy unscrupulous?
Just for the record I don’t have cable.
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### Author:  [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2003, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/digital-tv-descramblers/166043/2 "2003-04-02T21:00:07Z")
It’s a con. You get to watch pay-per-view for a short while, the box logs all you watch, can’t report back to the cable company, eventually cuts off. You report back to the cable co. (or remove the device) and presto, instant large bill.
Keep in mind that people in the business of “helping” people cheat are quite likely to be cheaters themselves.
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### Author:  [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2003, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/digital-tv-descramblers/166043/3 "2003-04-02T21:05:15Z")
This recent article might interest you:
[Would-be cable pirates conned](http://www.msnbc.com/news/884359.asp)
> [@](#):
>
> The filters temporarily delay billing of pay-per-view selections because they block two-way communication with the cable company. […] But only for a few days. Every two or three weeks, cable firms ?poll? the boxes, and if they don?t reply, they are shut off.
>
> ?And (cable firms) know where the box is,? [Nilda Cid, assistant director of the Office of Cable Signal Theft at the National Cable & Telecommunications Association] said.
>
> Making matters worse, the box also stores all pay-per-view orders that haven?t been transmitted. So some customers end up with very large cable bills, she said.
Sounds like a real bargain, uh huh.
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### Author:  [@John\_Kentzel-Griffin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Kentzel-Griffin)
#### Post date: [April 2, 2003, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/digital-tv-descramblers/166043/4 "2003-04-02T21:44:23Z")
It also sounds illegal.
We don’t discuss ways to break the law on this board. I’m going to close this before someone posts a link that I’ll have to edit out.
Closed.
**DrMatrix** - GQ Moderator