Baseball's Newest Anti-Cheating Technology: Encrypted Transmitters for Catchers' Signals
First Major League Baseball experimented with automated umpiring of balls and strikes in the minor leagues. Now the Verge reports they're trying a time-saving tactic that might also make it harder to cheat: Baseball has a sign stealing problem — or at least, a technological one, seeing how reading another team's pitches is technically legal, but using Apple Watches or telephoto cameras and then suspiciously banging on trash cans is very much not. But soon the MLB may try fighting fire with fire: on August 3rd, it plans to begin testing an encrypted wireless communication device that replaces the traditional flash of fingers with button taps, according to ESPN. The device, from a startup called PitchCom, will be tested in the Low-A West minor league first. As you'd expect from something that's relaying extremely basic signals, it's not a particularly complicated piece of kit: one wristband transmitter for the catcher with nine buttons to signal "desired pitch and location," which sends an encrypted audio signal to receivers that can squeeze into a pitcher's cap and a catcher's helmet. The receivers use bone-conduction technology, so they don't necessarily need to be up against an ear, and might theoretically be harder to eavesdrop on. (Bone conduction stimulates bones in your head instead of emitting audible sound.) "MLB hopes the devices will cut down on time spent by pitchers stepping off the rubber and changing signals," reports the Associated Press, noting another interesting new rule. "A team may continue to use the system if the opposing club's device malfunctions." But don't worry about that, reports ESPN: Hacking the system, the company says, is virtually impossible. PitchCom uses an industrial grade encryption algorithm and transmits minimal data digitally, making it mathematically impossible for someone to decrypt intercepted transmissions, according to the company.
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