OPD’s decision to encrypt its radio feed takes away a crucial reporting tool

For decades, the Oakland Police Department’s radio communications were open for anyone to listen to.

All that was required was a piece of off-the-shelf radio equipment, a scanner . And for years, the popular website Broadcastify.com livestreamed OPD’s radio transmissions (and hundreds of other public safety agency feeds), and offered an archive of recordings.

Tuning in, the public could listen in real time as officers and dispatchers handled welfare checks, shootings, car crashes, missing persons, downed power lines, robberies — any incident called into 911.

Listening to police scanners has been a staple of newsroom activity since police radios were invented . Reporters tune in to get a sense of how their city’s police department is operating or to cover emergencies like fires, ea