Philips PNVX | |
Secure Crypto Phone PNVX was a series of secure telephone units, developed by Philips Crypto around 1988. It was intended for the professional market, such as the Police, the Department of Justice, the Department of Defence (DoD), Foreign Affairs, etc. It was Philips Crypto's first attempt to expand their market, after dealing exclusively with the DoD for many years. PNVX was also sold by Siemens as the Crypset 100 [8], and by Mils in Austria. It is also known as SPENDEX 9600. |
The first generation of secure phones was the PNVX-20xx
series, which was introduced around 1991. Depending on the
required features, users had a choice between the PNVX-2015,
PNVX-2017 and the PNVX-2019. The latter two (2017 and 2019) also
featured a V.24 data-interface, allowing secure PC connections
(data) in addition to speech. The image on the right, shows a typical PNVX-6317 secure crypto phone. The images below show some of its characteristics, such as the crypto and plain buttons in close-up. |
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The PNVX-series allowed secure voice communication over standard insecure telephone lines (PSTN). Unlike older and less advanced systems that used (analog) voice scrambling, the PNVX employed advanced digital encryption. The analog voice signal from the microphone was first digitised with a vocoder (LPC-10) and then enciphered with a built-in crypto unit. Deciphering was possible only if the person at the other end had a compatible crypto phone and the correct key. At the beginning of each secure sessions, both ends had to synchronise (12 to 24 seconds) and advanced authentication protocols were used to exchange the keys and authenticate the user's identity. |