I also suspect that they only have to make it difficult for an end user and not a technologist.
The issues here can be complex and there there is often a lot of mis-information. The above statement is basically true, but the issue of how compliance is determined is not always simple. I am a co-founder of a small company that manufactures remote monitoring systems operating in the 433MHz and 915MHz bands, and we have products that are being certified under FCC parts 15.231 and 15.247. The FCC does require that equipment be reasonably tamper-proof, but they understand that you can't make a product absolutely bullet-proof against all efforts to modify it and be able to build it in a cost effective manner. An example of this (from the hardware side) is this: Under part 15.231, the FCC places limits on radiated field strength at a given distance from the transmitter, as opposed to transmitter output power. Well, the radiated field strength will be dependent on antenna gain (among other things). The FCC therefore requires that the transmit antenna either be built into the product in a difficult-to-modify way (for example as a trace on the circuit board), or, if it attaches via a connector, the connector must be "non-standard" such that an average user cannot simply go to Radio Shack and bolt on a higher performance antenna. As an example of what the FCC considers sufficiently non-standard, a reverse-threaded antenna connector will do. So, does this keep a technologist from defeating the limits? Of course not, reverse threaded connectors are easily available from wholesale electronics distribution sources. HOWEVER, the FCC would certainly frown on a technologist who made a business going around and modifying part 15 certified equipment to violate the limits. It is neither the companies nor their "lawyers" who determine whether a product sufficiently meets the requirments to become certified. It is normally determined by an FCC-certified TCB (Telecommunications Certification Body). The FCC also maintains a mechanism whereby certification-related questions can be asked directly of them and whereby answers to previous questions can be looked up. The TCB's themselves meet regularly with each other and with FCC representatives to ensure that standards are being applied uniformly. The point if all this is that although you will not find anywhere in the FCC regulations where it says that the regulatory daemon controlling the radio *must* be binary-only, it is not possible to say (except for someone at Intel) whether it was Intel, or the certifying TCB who decided that making it binary-only would be necessary to meet the FCC requirements of being reasonably tamper-proof. Dave - To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe netdev" in the body of a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] More majordomo info at http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
