A strange numbers station is broadcasting twice daily in Persian during the US-Iran conflict, possibly from a German military base.
Böblingen: A man’s voice says “Tavajoh! Tavajoh! Tavajoh!” and then reads numbers in Persian. This happens twice a day on shortwave radio since the US-Israel attack on Iran began.
The radio broadcast plays at 02:00 and 18:00 UTC on the 7910 kHz frequency. Each broadcast lasts about two hours before stopping. Radio experts have figured out the broadcast likely comes from a US military base in Böblingen, Germany.
The broadcast is split into five or six parts. Each part starts with “Tavajoh!” meaning “Attention!” in Persian. Then numbers are read slowly. Sometimes English words are mixed in with the Persian numbers.
Five days after starting, people tried to block the radio signal. The next day, the broadcast moved to a different frequency – 7842 kHz. This kind of broadcast is called a “numbers station.”
Numbers stations send coded messages using radio. The messages are meant for spies who have special codebooks. Only people with the right codebook can understand the numbers. The same system was used during the Cold War between the US and Soviet Union.
The messages appear random to anyone who doesn’t have the codebook. This helps spies talk to their bosses without others knowing what they’re saying. Even though we know roughly where the signal comes from, we don’t know who is supposed to receive it or why they need these messages now.