No one knows what their origin is. Or what is it for. What does it say. Nor does anyone (any government or organization) claim that it is yours. The station UVB-76aka ‘The Buzzer’, is one of the enigmas that has generated more hours of debate among the theorists of the conspiracy over the last years. Basically it is a short wave station that has been (It is said that decades) emitting a buzzing dotted from time to time by names and figures in Russian.
Enough to give pábulo to all kinds of stories. Stories that They have sounded again With force now that the Kremlin and the West have tensed their relationship.
A name: ‘The Buzzer’. In the world there are many stations. Many. Few however have awakened the fascination of ‘The Buzzer’ (“The buzzer”, in English), also known as UVB-76. And the reason is very simple: it is not known who is responsible for issuing its signal for decades, just as its content is unknown or what is the succession of noise, names and codes that interspersed every so often. Something is only known: it is a paid terrain for the conspiracy.
What exactly? UVB-76 is the call indicative of a short wave station that transmits on the frequency 4625 kHzsupposedly from Russia. What it emits is a buzz, a monotonous and repetitive sound that very occasionally (without anyone knowing the reasons) is interrupted by the voice of people who read names and figures in Russian. It is said that at least forty years operatingwhich would overcome its origins to the time of the USSR. In fact, in 2017 The BBC assured He had been with his peculiar salmodia for 35 years “24 hours a day.”
If curiosity stings to you, on YouTube there are people who is dedicated to sharing supposed emissions of ‘The Buzzer’, just like In networks. And there are also those who do follow-up of its history and broadcasts, day by day, throughout the year.
Who doesn’t like a good mystery? If you are looking in Google you will find dozens and dozens of articles on UVB-76, some of years agoothers of last week. Even in media like Wired, Popular Mechanics, Newsweek either The BBC They have dedicated articles. The reality is that if something is ‘The Buzzer’ is a huge mystery that has known in time, shaking the ingenuity of many conspiracy theorists … and the occasional academic.
Last year David StuppleProfessor of Electronic and Radio Engineering at the City University of London, I recognized that to know “the whole truth and nothing more than the truth” of UVB-76 would need to pronounce the Russian Federation, but with everything it was thrown with its own prediction: “It is almost certain that it is the Russian government who is using it. If it is the Russian government, it would not be for peaceful purposes.”
Going back to the 70s. The chronicles about ‘The Buzzer’ usually go back to at least The 1970swhen it is believed that their transmissions began. As Remember Wiredthe first thing that caught the attention was his great reach. The second, its content, a buzz that occasionally gave way to tones and men reading messages in Russian. All unintelligible. In the 90s he used the indicative зб-76 (badly translated as UVB-76), a name that has endured.
In the history of UVB-76 it is difficult to separate myth of contrasted facts. It is said that in origin the main signal came from a military position located not far from Moscow. Some versions They talk about Povarovo. Others of a site Something fartherabout 80 kilometers north of the Russian capital. In any case, the broadcasting station seems to have not been still during these decades.
Popular Mechanics points That since 2010 the signal is more difficult to follow, which explains that there are those who associate it with St. Petersburg, Moscow or PSKOV. When In 2011 Some researchers visited what was supposedly the base on which the signal arose only found a radio team and record books.
What does that mean? That if a merit has UVB-76 is its ability to stay for decades as a mystery full of rumors and theories very difficult to confirm, something that also extends to its broadcasts. Popular Mechanics account that at first it issued only beeps and in the 90s I change for a buzz mixed with something similar to a siren and (each or two weeks) the reading of names, words and numbers. The big surprise for his followers arrived 15 years ago, in 2010, when cuts were recorded in the transmission.
Why did he? Another mystery. Popular assures That during those days there were those who heard an unusual retransmission, similar to people moving, in addition to an alleged message in Morse and even fragments of ‘The Swan Lake’. Since then his legend has continued to gain weightly, at the blow of news difficult to contrast. Some media They ensure that in 2022, before the invasion of Ukraine, he issued a code series. Or even that in May, after a telephone conversation between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, the famous station He began to spit A retahíla of names that were part of a code.
Theories to bore. Of course, over the last decades there have been no lacked people willing to theorize about the nature of UVB-76, who is behind or what is their purpose. Some are boring. Others would fit in the script of the last ‘007’ movie and they have earned him The nickname of “the radio of the end of the world”.
Stuples Slide For example, it can be an alternative to guarantee communications in case of a disaster that affects the rest of the media. If so, he speculates, his purpose would be to “reserve” the channel. “Maybe they are only reserving it for air defense or some type of defense,” he reflects. “If someone does not use it. The band is so congested that people seek their opportunity to get their own channel. They keep it available saying: ‘This is ours'”.
Are there more theories? Of course. And Stuples also quotes them. In recent years there are who has associated The Russian station with an assumption System ‘Dead Hand’also known as ‘perimeter’, a mechanism inherited from the Cold War with which in theory the USSR guaranteed that it would respond to a nuclear attack, even in the event that it was catastrophic for its territory or affects its dome of leaders. In other words: retaliation and guaranteed mutual destruction.
Recently RTVE interviewed to an expert in radiocommunications that fully discard that theory. Others They hold That ‘The Buzzer’ is only dedicated to trying atmospheric changes in the ionosphere, They speculate with which it serves a world spying network or even (in another twist) that is looking for UFOs.
The reality is that ‘The Buzzer’ is a historical curiosity full of unknowns that has served (and still serving today) of inspirian conspiracy and all kinds of theories without contrast. “It’s always entertaining, right?” Ironiza in 2024 Stuples. “You never know, one of those crazy opinions could be right and then we would have to swallow our own words.”
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