How we check

For each county, we look at three things: police, fire and EMS.

• We read the official record. Agency announcements, county briefings and local news reports of when encryption started.
• We read the radio database. For each system, we look at which channels and talkgroups are listed as analog, digital or encrypted, and when the listing was last updated.
• We look at live feeds. We check whether public feeds for the county are still running or have been retired.
• We date everything. Each status shows the date we last checked it and links its sources.
• We flag conflicts. When sources disagree, we say “being rechecked.” We don't guess.

What we don't do: we don't listen to every channel live, and we can't predict when an agency will switch. Agencies change things.