Logs

03806.5 OE3XEC: Amsstetten AUT, 0754 WinLink traffic (23Oct16) (AAI)
05115.0 ---: Turkish Mil, TUR 0549 (cf) FSK 300Bd/400, KG-84C encrypted (24Oct16) (AAI)
05140.0 ---: Russian Mil (prob. AF) 0602 J3E/USB female voice comms (24Oct16) (AAI)
05182.0 ---: Unid 0722 R&S ALIS 228.65Bd/200 calling address 2190 (25Oct16) (AAI)
05210.0 BU4: Roumenian Police Bucuresti, ROU 0602 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE handshake TUL flwd by MIL 188-110A (19Oct16) (AAI)
05211.5 6GW0: Italian Mil, I 0647 J3E/USB radio-check with FB4T, 0WPF, Q77V, 3X0N, Q67Z (25Oct16) (AAI)
05258.0 J62: Moroccan Mil, MRC USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE sounding (19 Oct16) (AAI)
05316.0 K1U: Slovakian AF, SVK 0637 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling Z1V (25Oct16) (AAI)
05316.0 P1O: Slovakian AF Prezov, SVK 0637 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling Z1V (25Oct16) (AAI)
05316.0 S1L: Slovakian AF, SVK 0637 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling Z1V (25Oct16) (AAI)
05316.0 Z1V: Slovakian AF Zvolen, SVK 0637 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling S1S (25Oct16) (AAI)
05340.0 LY01: Algerian Mil, ALG 0549 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling PY01 (26Oct16) (AAI)
05352.5 HG7BHB: propagation beacon, HUN  0545 CW "VVV DE HG7BHB  QTH JN97LE 34SF PWR 50W" (24Oct16) (AAI)
05371.5 9A3WD1P: Global ALE HFnet 0630 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE sounding (22Oct16) (AAI)
05400.0 DG501D: French Navy, F 0737 USB 188-141 2G-ALE handshake DG401D flwd by STANAG-4285, KG-84C encrypted (20Oct16) (AAI)
05405.0 YK01: Algerian Mil, ALG 0551 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling PY01 (26Oct16) (AAI)
05410.0 3127: Sonatrach, ALG 0647 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE sounding (24Oct16) (AAI)
05415.5 ---: Russian Mil (prob. AF) 0710 J3E/USB female voice comms (24Oct16) (AAI)
05420.0 IU01: Algerian Mil, ALG 0634 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling JP01 (27Oct16) (AAI)
05424.0 5B: Bosnia Herzegovina Defense 5th Infantry Brigade Tuzla, BIH 0722 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE handshake 2PB flwd MIL 188-110A (24Oct16) (AAI)
05453.0 FP: prob.Italian Guardia Costiera, I 0645 J3E/USB stations: WW, EA, EB, EF, radio-checks, coded msgs as ADA,ASA,ASB,ATA,ANA,ATB using NATO phonetic, prob voice-net parallel to data-net (20Oct16) (AAI)
05455.0 RD21: Algerian Mil, ALG 0557 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE handshake PY20 flwd by 188-110A (25Oct16) (AAI)
05500.0 5555: Unid net 0610 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling 4444 [CMD AMD][/>A2001  ] (20Oct16) (AAI)
05792.0 2212: Unid net 0614 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE sounding (20Oct16) (AAI)
05813.5 DO7: Polish Mil, POL 0619 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling RA2 (26Oct16) (AAI)
05813.5 DO7: Polish Mil, POL 0621 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling PT1 (26Oct16) (AAI)
05813.5 WI5: Polish Mil, POL 0619 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE sounding (26Oct16) (AAI)
05850.0 BU4: Roumenian Police, ROU 0633 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE handshake TUL flwd by 188-110A transporting STANAG-5066 HBFTP msgs (24Oct16) (AAI)
05903.0 DO7: Polish Mil, POL 0621 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE handshake WI5 (26Oct16) (AAI)
05903.0 DO7: Polish Mil, POL 0627 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling TE6 (26Oct16) (AAI)
06450.0 ZOCCOLA: Guardia di Finanza, I 0720 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE handshake CAGLIARI, voice comms using callsigns ROSTRO549 (ALE ZOCCOLA) and SIRIO60 (ALE CAGLIARI): position, heading and speed of ROSTRO549 (27Oct16) (AAI)
06510.0 Z1V: Slovackian AF Zvolen, SVK 0633 USB 188-141 2G-ALE handshake P1O Prezov flwd by 188-110A transporting Stanag-5066 HBFTP msgs (20Oct16) (AAI)
06779.0 ---: Unid 0705 USB RFSM-8000 modem with data-masking (21Oct16) (AAI)
06806.0 ---: Unid 0845 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE using App.B Linking Protection (27Oct16) (AAI)
06905.0 BX02: Algerian Mil, ALG 0757 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling PY01 (22Oct16) (AAI)
06905.0 HN02: Unid (Algerian Military?) 0824 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE handshake BZ01, no traffic (27Oct16) (AAI)
06931.0 ---: Unid 0628 USB modified STANAG-4285 waveform (21Oct16) (AAI)
07316.0 ---: Russian Nvay, RUS 0615 (cf) CIS Navy "Akula" FSK 500Bd/1000 (25Oct16) (AAI)
07535.0 CP01: Algerian Mil, ALG 0541 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling PY01 (25Oct16) (AAI)
07656.0 ---: Russian Intel, RUS 0710 USB CIS FTM-4, MFSK-4 150Bd (effective 37.5Bd) 4000Hz modem (tones at: -6, -2, +2, +6 KHz) (26Oct16) (AAI)
07745.0 TBB: Turkish Navy Ankara, TUR 0520 USB STANAG-4285 600bps/L CARBs//TBB040I(0)/TBB041I(0)/TBB043I(0)/TBB045I(0)/TBB049I(0)/TBB050I(0)// (25Oct16) (AAI)
08950.0 83401: Turkish Emergency Net, TUR 2037 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE sounding (22Oct16) (AAI)
09095.0 ---: Unid (prob. Ukrainian net) 0522 USB 3 of 6x100Bd/120Hz VFT system (26Oct16) (AAI)
10168.0 ---: Unide 1229 USB Arcotel MAHRS-2400 ALE bursts (25Oct16) (AAI)
11155.0 RIT: Rus Navy HQ Severomorsk, RUS 0846 CW "RAL65 DE RIT QSA?" (23Oct16) (AAI)
11155.0 RIT: Rus Navy HQ Severomorsk, RUS 0857 CW "RKN64 DE RIT RIT QSA 2 QRV K" (23Oct16) (AAI)
11429.0 ---: Russian Intel, RUS 1045 (cf) MFSK-68 (34+34) + QPSK 2400Bd 10KHz wide-band inserts (25Oct16) (AAI)
11470.0 ---: Unid (prob. Russian Navy) 1315 FSK 50Bd/500, no traffic (25Oct16) (AAI)
13215.0 201067: USAF unid asset 1113 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE sounding (27Oct16) (AAI)
13220.0 ---: no call 1323 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling CHARLY46 Italian AF (46th Air Brigade) (27Oct16) (AAI)
13499.0 11021: Moroccan Civil Defence, MRC 1122 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE sounding (27Oct16) (AAI)
13499.0 2215: Moroccan Civil Defence, MRC 1108 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE sounding (27Oct16) (AAI)
13499.0 2415: Moroccan Civil Defence, MRC 1109 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE sounding (27Oct16) (AAI)
13505.0 ---: Unid 1120 USB STANAG-4538 LSU + LDL, Harris Citadel encryption (27Oct16) (AAI)
13538.0 ---: Russian Mil, RUS 1213 USB CIS-45 OFDM HDR modem v2 BPSK 40Bd 62.5Hz (23Oct16) (AAI)
13554.0 CENTR3: MAECT Bucarest Centrala3, ROU 1047 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE handshake BLJ Telaviv Embassy, flwd by 188-110A transporting STANAG-5066 messages (27Oct16) (AAI)
14493.0 RGG: Russian Mil, RUS 1134 CW "RGP RGP RGP DE RGG RGG QSY 14653 QSY 14653" (21Oct16) (AAI)
14581.5 ---: Russian Navy, RUS 1330 FSK 50Bd/40, 7-bit code 4/3 (four 1 + three 0) (23Oct16) (AAI)
14968.0 XSS: DHFCS Forest Moor, G 1337 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling XDV (22Oct16) (AAI)
16000.0 6207: Unid 1213 USB MIL 188-141 2G-ALE calling 6202 (26Oct16) (AAI)
16103.0 Russian Mil, RUS 1244 USB CIS-112 OFDM modem 22.22Bd BPSK (24Oct16) (AAI)

Turkish Mil, FSK 300Bd/400Hz KG-84C

Weak signal heard on 5115.5 KHz, central frequency, at 0549 UTC. Analysis with SA reveals an FSK signal running at 300Bd and 400 Hz shift.

fig. 1

fig. 2

Once demodulated, the presence of the KG-84C 64-bit sync pattern (fig. 3)  leads to think about a NATO partner Nation: looking at precedent posts,  most likely the signal belongs to the Turkish  FSK waveforms.

 

fig. 3

https://yadi.sk/d/QXv7FXiYxdbjH

Unid BPSK 1500Bd (prob. Chinese modem)

Unid modem (prob. Chinese origin) using BPSK modulation at 1500 Baud and 1500 Hz sub-carrier. Since the alternation of frames with different strength, this may be a duplex channel.

fig. 1

fig. 2

fig. 3

Once demodulated, the analysis of the bitstream reaveals an interesting 3 bit structure (fig. 4): my friend Karapuz suggested to try a differential (relative) decoding of the signal.

fig. 4

Differential decoding can be obtained directly by running the proper tool of  the bit-editor or by demodulating the signal using the SA demodulator with option "Diff 1" as in fig. 5

fig. 5

Results are similar and in the output bistream, visually more logical, is visible the sync bit and the two data bits (fig. 6).

fig. 6

cars, chameleons, networks, and other stories (part II)

In the first part of this post there were the cars, here are the chameleons: such name is not related to the ALE Addresses but rather to the configuration of the stations. A third part will follow in case of news or updates.
The two following networks, although they exhibit different behaviors, share some aspects which lead to think to the same source/organization or at least to the same Country. As said in the first part, the purpose is only hobbystic; sensitive and confidential messages contents, if any, are anyway not published. I'm interested on the way the "boxes" travel and NOT on their content.

AB net (5838.0 KHz, ...)

Stations and ALE addresses of this network are: ABD1, ABG6, ABF2, ABS5, ABK4, ABH3, and ABC7 that acts as net-control. Transmissions are scheduled on tuesday and thursday from about 0730 UTC and usually follow the schema link-send-terminate. Links are initiates by ABC7 and always in the same order, ie: ABD1 first then, ABG6, ABF2, ABS5, ABK4, and ABH3 as last. Other than 188-141A for ALE, STANAG-5066 is used for messaging and STANAG-4285 as HF waveform (fig. 1), settings are 1200bps and short interleaver. I monitored this net on 5838.0 KHz/USB, that seems to be the main channel, but other frequencies are also used.

fig. 1

In the firts loop, stations are contacted by ABC7 for a radio-check, then  in case the net-control has messages to send, the stations are again contacted and always in the same order. Sometimes the sending phase follows the radio-chek so that the stations are worked one time only, the sending is always preceeded by a voice-exchange of a pair of authentication keys according to the sequence diagram of fig. 2. A common phrasebook for telecommunications, in english, is strictly used.

fig. 2 - sequence diagram

The authentication keys consist of 4 numeric digits for the "my-auth-id" key and 2 numeric digits for the "auth-id" key , eg:

ABC7: alpha bravo x y this is alpha bravo charlie seven, authenticate 79
ABXY: alpha bravo charlie seven, this is alpha bravo x y, my authenticate 6843, authenticate 74
ABC7: this is alpha bravo charlie seven, my authenticate 2895
ABXY: ok send your message

A fter finishing sending the message, the net-control station asks the receiver peer to confirm the message-number then link is terminated and the next station in turn is contacted.

fig. 3 - 188-141A 3-way handshake and Auth keys exchange

The messaging system use the HBFTP protocol to deliver compressed e-mail files, COMSEC devices are not present (unclassified messages?) so, once removed STANAG-4285 and STANAG-5066 overheads, important clues and information can be drawn from an examination of the e-mail headers (fig. 4).

fig- 4

The sender and receiver stations belong to the e-mail domain 123 (point 1) and it's the common domain of all the stations of this network. The message has been received from, and by, the same host whose name is linux.site; "CROZ ESMTP/HMTP Gateway" most likely is the name of the STANAG-5066 application (point 2).  The IP address in the field "Received from" is 127.0.0.1 or localhost (not wired to a LAN ?).
The hostname and the e-mail client fingerprint (point 4) clearly reveal that they use a Linux system, specifically: SUSE Linux 3.1.14. Indeed, the mention of chameleons I adopted  just derives from the official logo of SUSE.

The use of Linux is per se an interesting and peculiar element of this network, but it's not the only one.  The email includes one attached jpeg/image file whose name is "PRILOG 5 - PRILOG ZA SLANJE E-MAILA.jpg". This language suggest a Slavic origin (google-translator), as confirmed by the system timezone at point "3" (+0200), time-zone and especially the language restrict the candidate Countries to two: HIB and HRV. Anyway, the most surprising fact is that the e-mails I decoded have that same attached filename although it refers two images, in other words  they always use the same name for the attachments (fig. 5).

fig. 5 - two e-mails, different ricipients but same attached filename

On my side I can't rebuild the original images from the received S-5066 fragments but I can see at least the upper part of such images: they are always the same (fig. 6), although the image "B" is the most used in the attachments.

fig. 6

The reasons behind such way to comunicate are obscure: test? steganography?.., difficult to state unless speculations. 

In the above fig. 2 we have seen that the net-control stations asks a confirm of the received message-number: this a progressive number and matches the subject of the corresponding e-mail. The message-number is initialized to a new initial value at each day and assigned to the subject of the e-mail sent to the first station in the calling list (ie: ABD1, user1@asdf.123) and then is incremented by one at each step (fig. 7).

fig. 7

The choice of the initial value is apparently odd: fig. 8 is an example
06 Oct: initial value 600
11 Oct: initial value 603 
13 Oct: initial value 508
18 Oct: initial value 610  

fig. 8

5054 net (5054 KHz)

I spotted a QRG, 5054.0 KHz/USB, where stations of this network do not use 188-141A before messages sending and traffic is less frequent, not to say sporadic.  STANAG-5066 HMTP protocol is used instead of HBFTP (fig. 9) and, as for the AB-net, STANAG-4285 is the transporting HF waveform. The lack of the ALE phase is quite odd since the heard transmissions are not bcasts but rather PtP messages: or links are negotiated in other channels/way or receivers are always in listening state. For sure, no 188-141A means no ALE Addresses to collect from this network.

By a quick examination of the e-mails headers (fig. 9) it's easy to see that this network belongs to the same organization/authority of the previous AB-net: same OS (Linux SUSE), same STANAG-5066 application (CROZ ESMTP/HMTP Gateway) and - above all - same attachment filename (PRILOG 5 - PRILOG ZA SLANJE E-MAILA.jpg) can't be a coincidence.

fig.9

Addresses and origin/owner of the networks
I never heard e-mail exchanges between the two nets but only e-mails sent from linux-a5kz to the other stations of AB-net and e-mails sent from linux-2o6y.site to other stations of 5054-net: this leds to think that these are the main stations of their respective networks. It's interesting to pay a look at the e-mail addresses of the two newtorks:

ALE  e-mail address
[AB-net]
ABC7 user1@asdf.123
ABD1 user1@sdfg.123
ABG6 user1@dfgh.123
ABF2 user1@fghj.123
ABS5 user1@ghjk.123
ABK4 user1@jklp.123
ABH3      ?
[5054-net]
  -  user1@aysxd.111
  -  user1@lost62.111
  -  user1@dres32.111
  -  user1@fejk8.111

As expected, the networks belong to two different e-mail domains "123" and "111": behind such choice there is surely a certain logic but unfortunately do not offer any clue for identification.
AB-net seems to use non-sense (?) alphabetical addresses (asdf, sdfg,...) while 5054-net seems to use a sort of "structured" names (lost62, dres,32, fejk8,...).  It's worth noting that the AB-net addresses, if listed in the order of the calling list,  exhibit a left-shift of 3 letters. According to this schema, ABH3 could have the address user1@klpq.123 (m,n,o seem to be not used).

 

A big help in the identification of the source is given by the examination of the collected STANAG-5066 nodes addresses:

ALE  Stanag-5066 address e-mail address
[AB-net]

ABC7 006.008.001.039     user1@asdf.123 (ncs)
ABD1 006.008.004.166     user1@sdfg.123
ABG6 006.008.004.165     user1@dfgh.123
ABF2 006.008.006.226     user1@fghj.123
ABS5 006.008.008.215     user1@ghjk.123
ABK4 006.008.002.144     user1@jklp.123
ABH3 006.008.002.055          ?
[5054-net]
  -  006.008.004.165     user1@aysxd.111 (ncs)
  -  006.008.003.033     user1@lost62.111
  -  006.008.003.036     user1@dres32.111
  -  006.008.003.037     user1@fejk8.111


About the assignments of the STANAG-5066 addresses, the global-regional blocks are defined by the 4 most-significant bits of the full length address (i.e., the first element w of the dotted-decimal form w.x.y.z): from fig. 10, 6.x.y.z is assigned to Europe. 

fig. 10

Within the global-regional blocks, specific 5066 addresses are assigned to individual Nations using the second element “x” of the dotted-decimal address form w.x.y.z.
Now, what european nation matches 6.8.y.z ?
The answer is in Table N-6 "National Address Schema" STANAG-5066 Edition 3 Annex N: 5066 is a NATO unclassified document that may circulated freely and is available on:
http://nso.nato-int/nso/zPublic/stanags/CURRENT/5066Ed03.pdf
Sadly, no part of S-5066 Edition 3 can be published but the mentioned Table N-6 matches the "proposed allocations" which are visible at page 14 (here reported in fig. 11) of  a very interesting pdf file freely downloadable from: http://www.hfindustry.com (note that NC3A, NATO C3 Agency, is now NCIA or NATO Communications and Information Agency).

fig. 11

It's worth noting that the stations dfgh.123 and aysxd.111 exhibit the same S-5066 address 006.008.004.165, i.e. the same node: as far as I know a certain S-5066 address should not be shared by two or more nodes (duplicate address) hence we face the same physical node. Looking at the "Received" headers of one e-mail sent by aysxd.111 (fig. 12) we see that the e-mail is originated (from) and received (by) the same host linux-2o6y.site: this means that the e-mail client and the S-5066 gateway application are running inside that same host. Moreover, the IP address 127.0.0.1 (which refers the sender) is the address of the localhost: this means that the host  linux-2o6y.site, i.e. the 006.008.004.165 S-5066 node, is not wired to a LAN.

fig. 12

Keeping in mind that a node is generally assumed to include the HF modem and radio (and cryptographic) equipment required for communications, a possible explanation could be the configuration in fig. 13, that also clarifies the lack of "cross-messaging" between AB-net and 5054-net: such traffic is handled "inside" the hosts. Unless they assigned the same S-5066 address to two distinct S-5066 nodes or use some other configuration that I do not know.
 

fig. 13

Rockwell-Collins HF Messenger allows a such configuration (fig. 14) in which two clients, belonging to different domains (i.e. two e-mail accounts), share the same S-5066 resource. Anyway, this is not our case since HFM only run on Windows-based pc and we face a Linux based nodes (SUSE Linux 3.1.14).

fig. 14

 

STANAG-5066 gateway application
The S-5066 application running in the Linux gateway nodes add the string "CROZ ESMTP/HMTP gateway" in the received-by header: it's a proprietary application that acts either as Extended SMTP server (on the LAN side) or as HMTP gateway (on the HF network side). Indeed they do not use a Stanag-5066 application from the most "popular" manufacturers, but rather a proprietary product developed by CROZ, an IT Company located in Zagreb and Belgrade, named CroS5066 (fig. 15). The mean features of the product can be read in their pubblication "CRO FYI" of  September 2009. CroS5066 is fully interoperable with other S-5066 systems, positive tests were made during NATO exercises Combined Endeavor 2008 (Lager Aulenbachhere, Germany and Lora Naval Base in Split, Croatia).

 

Fig. 15

CIS Navy 50Bd/200 FSK (T-600, BEE-36, CIS 36-50)

Sinchronous FSK 36-50Bd/200 system also known as CIS 36-50 and used by CIS Navy for their fleet broadcast. Transmissions start with an initial revs sequence transmitted at 36 Bd followed by traffic in 50 Bd mode. In case of more than one message, the initial 36 Bd reversals are not sent (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1

Frames (Fig. 3) are constructed from data blocks consisting of 7-bit elements: a packet of pay-load data of basically arbitrary length is surrounded by a start and an end sequence (EOM). Sometimes blocks of data already transmitted are observed to be repeated, verifying the contents by the recipient can be performed easily this way. Idle sequences of reversals, i.e. strictly alternating sequences of '0's and '1's, of 36 Bd and 50 Bd are used to introduce and to terminate a transmission or also (50 Bd only) to separate data blocks. A data block itself consists of the three sections start sequence, payload data and EOM sequence; all payload data consist of 5-bit characters coded into 7-bit sequence with a fixed ratio of '0's vs. '1's of 3 to 4 (or vice versa, depending on polarity of reception).  

The start sequence is transmitted after the last '0' bit of the idle sequence and consists of a 44 bit 42 bit sequence (usually  "100001010010111110000101001101011010101101") the ratio of three '0's to four '1's is not followed here to make the start sequence distinguishable from the actual data. The payload data is preceeded by a 70-bit Initialization Vector (ten 7-bit words) which is repeated twice. All subsequent data (arbitrary length) do not obey a special regularity anymore. The end sequence shows five equal 7-bit words "000100", again disregarding the bit ratio of the data section.

Fig. 3

Sometimes T600 is also used to forward flash messages in FSK/Morse mode as in Fig. 4 (transmitted by RDL HQ)

Fig. 4

TADIRAN AutoCall MFSK-4

signal heard on 5892.0 KHz/USB, 0758 UTC, most likely from Austrian Military. AutoCall is a proprietary ALE waveform by Israeli Tadiran/Elbit communication system. AutoCall delivers faster and more reliable link establishment and is recommended when greater tactical efficiency is critical; AutoCall is used eg in TADIRAN HF-6000 radio system. HF-6000 system is also sold by Telefunken Racoms.

model VRC-6020 (20 W)

Some characteristic elements of the signal can be observed from the sonogram:

• the 1000-Hz tuning/sync beep which preceeds all transmissions;
• the proprietary MFSK-4 Autocall system's tones centered at 2850 Hz, serving a variety of linking and communication functions;
• the four tones located at 2400, 2700, 3000 and 3300 Hz

Manipulation speed is 125 symbols/sec and the step between two tones is 300Hz. 

https://yadi.sk/d/hxuJsK-ewh7va

cars, chamaleons, networks, and other stories (I)

For some days I monitored (and I'm still monitoring) some frequencies on 5 MHz band, hearing curious MIL 188-141A  "cars" addresses such as OPELHFMREZA, VOLVOHFMREZA,... (here denoted as HFMREZA-net) as well as FORDBRTP and FORD1BRTP  (BRTP-net), and same other ones in the format 1PB, 2PB,... (PB-net) and ABC7, ABD1,... (AB-net).  This post is about the identification of the first three networks,  a second post will cover the AB network and possible updates. Maybe I will be criticized for the share of this kind of "do-it-yourself COMINT", but its purpose is only hobbystic; sensitive and confidential messages contents, if any, are anyway not published.

car-HFMREZA net (5120.0 KHz)
MIL 188-141A is used for the link setup and, after the 3-way handshake, data are sent using STANAG-5066  and MIL 188-110A as HF waveform (fig.1): a quite common 2G configuration. The prefixes used in the ALE address are some popular automotive brands as FIAT, FORD, OPEL, SKODA, and VOLVO, while GAMA is maybe the less popular "Georgia Automotive Manufacturers Association" or the GAMA Automotive Aenter, but it could be intended as the third letter of the Greek alphabet or  as "collection". As a further option, in my opinion the most interesting, GAMA was a German maker of toys, usually cars and trucks.
Anyway, at least in my logs, GAMA always initiates the ALE sessions which precede the transmissions of data, thus acting as the net-control station.

fig. 1

In some bitstreams, obtained after removing the S-5066 headers, I could find compressed files which are originated by HBFTP protocol. As known, BFTP (Basic File Transfer Protocol) is based on the ZMODEM protocol and is often used in conjunction with CFTP protocol to transfer e-mail messages from one SMTP e-mail server to another, as specified in the Annex F of S-5066 profile. The file HBFTP--3.gz is reported in this example (fig. 2).

fig. 2 - BFTP zipped file

Since BFTP is used for informal interpersonal e-mail only, it may happen that such messages are transmitted in clear-text, thereby facilitating the identification of the network through the contents and the headers added by the SMTP server that forwards the e-mail message.  As expected, and with a bit of luck, the extracted file HBFTP--3.eml offer some useful tips and clues.

fig. 3

The points indicated as 1 and 4 inform about the configuation of the station(s). The e-mail addresses wmtuser@GAMA.ok and wmtuser@VOLVO.ok reveal that the messaging system, and most likely the connected radio, are provided by Harris: wmtuser, or  WMT user, is just the default username used in Harris RF-6750W Wireless Gateway (WG) and RF-6710W Wireless Messaging Terminal (WMT). The underlaying PC run a Microsoft OS, likely Windows 2000 Professional or Windows XP Professional; Office Outlook is  the e-mail client running at GAMA, but also Outlook Express is used (eg at station VOLVO).

From the timestamp, point 3, we can get informations about the geographic area since it exposes the time-zone of the system: in this case +0200, ie GMT +2. The time-zone helps European people like me to parse the hostname osbihbutmir, visible in point 2, and the suffix HFMREZA. Indeed, the latter can be split in HF MREZA where MREŽA is a Slavic word for "network" (google-translator is your friend): the geographic area matches the time zone. About the hostname, since BiH is a well-known ISO Country Code for that area, osbihbutmir could be split in "os bih butmir". Well, now let google do the work for you: simply enter that string, hit enter, browse some results pages and you will get the HF network we're talking about.

The official site has the English version so that you can browse its pages and find many interesting informations such as HQ locations, structure, sectors, multimedia and so on.  Specifically, "Butmir" (indicated in the hostname of the station GAMA) is the AF Operational Command HQ and we have seen above that  GAMA just act as the net-control node. About the other stations (VOLVO, FIAT, OPEL,...) they belong to the "ok" e-mail domain which almost 100% stands for  Operativna Komanda, hence the HFMREZA-net could be the main radio-network. Difficult to say their locations and their role in the "structure" diagram shown in the web site.
About the HF equipment, still from the web site we learn that Harris RF-5800 was aleady owned in September 2009, just seven years ago, during their partecipation at "NATO Combined Endeavor"  as PfP country.

I do not go beyond, anyone on their own can obtain from the web all the (public!) informations he wants; moreover the e-mails contents, although interesting, are out of the scope of this blog.

PB net (5424.0 KHz)
Same origin and owner emerge also by the analysis of this newtork, even if the configuration of the nodes is a bit different: same ALE technology (118-141A) and HF waveform (188-110A) but messaging is achieved using FED-1052 rather than S-5066 (fig. 4). It's hard to say if the choice of 1052 is due to specific requirements or if the network shall be upgraded. The addresses logged during the monitoring are 5B, AB, 1PB, 1PC, 2PB, and 3PB: 5B seems to play the net-control role.

fig. 4

Once removed FED-1052 DLP protocol headers, I got files with ARX and TNEF extensions. 
Files whith the .ARX extension are known as ARX Compressed Archive files, however other file types may also use this extension. Regardless of the extensions, a "path" inside the sender host is exposed in one of the received ARX files:

TNEF (Transport Neutral Encapsulation Format) is a proprietary e-mail attachment format used by Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Exchange Server. TNEF attachments can contain security-sensitive information such as user login name and file paths from which access controls could possibly be inferred. This format is probably used since TNEF files may contain information used by only Outlook to generate a richly formatted view of the message, such as embedded (OLE) documents or Outlook-specific features such as forms, voting buttons, and meeting requests. Note also that native-mode Microsoft Exchange 2000 organizations will, in some circumstances, send entire messages as TNEF encoded raw binary independent of what is advertised by the receiving SMTP server. An interesting and complete description of TNEF can be read here.

One of the TNEF files obtained from the monitoring is shown in fig. 5.

fig. 5

Point 3 confirms the use of Harris equipment (although a confirm is not needed since the use of FED-1052), but the most relevant are the points 1 and 2 which show the stations in the play: specifically (from the cited web site) 3PB stands for 3 Pješadijski Bataljon (3rd Infantry Battalion) with headquarter in Bijeljina, and 5B stands for 5 Pješadijska Brigada (5th Infantry Brigade). By the way, all the addresses heard from this nework can be easily "humanized" through the official web site (thanks to Patrick for his hint).

About the contents, TNEF4 file consists of Outlook MAPI strings which their meaning can be retrieved from the web. I just want to point that, since:
PR_ORIGINAL_SENDER_EMAIL_ADDRESS contains the e-mail address of the sender of the first version of the message, that is, the message before it is forwarded or replied to;
PR_DISPLAY_NAME contains the message sender's display name;
most likely this message is a reply sent by 3PB to a previous message received from 5B.


BRTP net (5025.0 KHz)
For what concern FORDBRTP and FORD1BRTP addresses, belonging to the third monitored network, they probably form a two-points circuit rather than a network: so far I never logged other xxxxBRTP addresses, at least on that frequencies. 
These stations use the same configuration  of the first net (ie S-5066 + MIL 188-110A) as well as the "automotive brand" suffix in their ALE addresses. The traffic in this "circuit" seems to be less frequent and unfortunately I could not yet hear good quality transmissions. My friend Kristian successfully suggested Brigada Taktičke Podrške (Tactical Support Brigade) for BRTP.

Sumarizing 
From what seen above:

1. the three networks are operated by the same Authority;
2. HFMREZA-net and BRTP-net use STANAG-5066 and 188-110A;
3. network PB-net use FED-1052 and 188-110A;
4. all the three networks use 188-141A 2G-ALE technology, Harris equipment and Microsoft Windows systems;
5. stations, and hence the netwoks, belong to different e-mail domains.

About the different messaging systems, it's worth noting that the Harris RG-6750 Wireless Messaging Gateway software (WMG) provides mixed networks compatibility between stations with STANAG-5066 and stations with FED-1052 by running simultaneous 5066-1052 sessions.

Processing the STANAG-5066 headers, thus except the 1052 PB-net, it is possible to derive the on-air 5066 addresses of the (heard) nodes:

GAMAHFMREZA   000.000.000.001
FIATHFMREZA   000.000.000.003
FORDHFMREZA   ? (prob. 000.000.000.005) *
OPELHFMREZA   000.000.000.007           
SKODAHFMREZA  000.000.000.009      
VOLVOHFMREZA  000.000.000.011           
FORD1BRTP     000.000.000.012
FORDBRTP      000.000.000.013
*  note that when alphabetically sorted they use odd numbers in the 4th byte of the 5066 address.

Now, since:

• 5066 adresses are contiguous passing from HFMREZA-net (ending with 011) to BRTP-net (beginning with 012);   
• so far I never heard "cross" links among the three networks (eg: xHFMREZA <--> xPB) hence the ALE networks are not overlapping;
• so far I never heard traffic between two "peripheral" nodes (eg: VOLVO <--> FIAT);

they could use a "star" network topology, or rather a "tree" network topology, where traffic between two peripheral nodes, or between two net-control nodes, is routed ouside the HF network. Indeed, looking at the routing rows in the e-mail headers (fig. 6), the stations have a "radio1" asset and it could indicate the existence of a second radio (say radio2) - at the same site - that belongs to a different station which, in turn, belongs to a different network and e-mail domain... but this is another speculation.

(to be continued)