This station was the very first numbers station I ever heard. I must say it really intrigued me at the time since I didn't know what it was, and neither did anyone else in my unit. Unfortunately nobody spoke Chinese so we couldn't get a translation of the announcement at the beginning of the broadcast, let alone the number groups. The carrier on 8300 stayed up 24 hours a day with transmissions beginning at 00 and 30 minutes past the hour.

8300 kHz is not the only frequency in use by New Star. It is the most widely heard & reported, and is the only frequency on which I've logged New Star. According to ENIGMA, the current frequencies in use are 8300, 8375, 9725, 11430, 13750, and 15388. I can hear it on 8300 around 1200 UTC here in the central U.S., although the signal is usually very weak. Monitors on the west coast will probably have much better luck hearing it on all frequencies. I have made a decent recording of New Star when I was in England of all places.

Each transmission begun by playing a tune on an Oriental flute, which was followed by a female voice with an announcement in Chinese. This was followed by a second female voice with another announcement which was in turn followed by the 4F groups. Each group is sent twice. According to an article by Jerod Pore in the July 1991 issue of The Numbers Factsheet compiled by the late Havana Moon, this announcement contains the station ID of "New Star Broadcasting Station." According to the article, broadcast times are also given in the announcement, but this has been in dispute. One problem is the lack of knowledge of the Chinese language by most SWL's to be able to understand exactly what is being said.

There has been some speculation as to the operating agency and purpose of New Star. Once again, according to the article in The Numbers Factsheet, part of the announcement at the beginning of the broadcast refers to sending "telegrams." In the Far East, telegrams are sent using a four-digit number standing for each character, or ideogram, of the Chinese language. The numbers are then decoded at the receiving end. This gives a cover of legitimacy to the operation of New Star, except that the four-digit numbers never make any sense when converted to ideograms. It's obvious that four-digit cipher groups are being sent.

It has been suggested that the whole New Star operation is simply a disinformation scheme by Taiwan to make the mainland Chinese government believe that there are Taiwanese agents operating inside China. This very well could be, as with all numbers stations, but there are a few clues to suggest that there are people using New Star for communications purposes. One is the fact that some broadcasts have become computerized with the numbers being inserted by computer. If this were a simple disinformation operation, this wouldn't be necessary. Secondly, judging from the frequencies used, the operators want to ensure coverage into China. During the daylight hours, higher frequencies have to be used due to D-layer absorption of radio signals below 10 mHz or so. What I find odd is the lack of frequencies used below 8 mHz. This would give excellent short-range coverage to China from Taiwan during the night hours. There may be some lower frequencies in use, but they have never been logged by SWL's.

New Star has always held a certain fascination for me. It will always be special to me as the first numbers station I ever heard, but I believe it intrigued me enough to become interested in numbers stations in general. It is certainly an interesting numbers station.