Saturday, February 23, 2013

eQSL fraud?

In the last couple of weeks I have received two eQSLs for contacts that never happened. The QSLs were from made-up callsigns that are clearly SWLs, e.g. UA-123456. But the message with the card says simply: TNX For QSO TU 73! Curiously, both QSLs contained exactly the same wording.

Now I have nothing against SWLs. I started in this hobby as a broadcast SWL and I feel that all hams should have had experience as an SWL to get familiar with procedures, propagation and so on. But I am uncomfortable with receiving eQSLs from listeners as the eQSL system has no way to distinguish a listener report from an actual contact so their presence messes up my totals.

In practice it isn't a big mess-up as I have never received an SWL card from a country I haven't had a proper QSO with. So I do accept eQSLs that make it clear they are for reception of a contact I made. But TNX FOR QSO? Who do they think they are kidding, and what do they hope to gain from it?

4 comments:

Unknown said...

Hmmmm.

Now that you mention it. I think I confirmed one of these on eQSL a few nights ago.

I don't use eQSL for awards etc, but I do upload automatically from my logging software for those who use it.

I was skimming through the cards to see if there were any nice images and had some weird SWL ones.. I just clicked confirm and moved on.

Might have to check em.

Anonymous said...

having trouble signing in, pardon if double posted-

Hi I am an SWL (WA5055) and I think I can offer an opinion as to why you're receiving QSOs from SWLs, eQSL has QSO as the *only* option for logs! I am a member of eQSL and it does not appear to have the option for a mere reception report, but only QSOs - which is unfortunate. Regarding the repeated wordings in separate QSOs many logging software programs such as Ham Radio Deluxe have templates that do this very thing (how much work could it be to just type out a simple greeting...) for what it's worth I joined eQSL as a shortwave listener just in the rare case I wanted to send a reception report to a particularly interesting station for a remarkable DX- not for *my* benefit, but for the stations. I personally would not expect nor demand acknowledgment.

I have not used the eQSL site YET but upon logging in, I see no option for mere reception reports? I hope I am wrong! Either way, eQSL would be wise to make a change to the site to accommodate SWLs if they are to allow them the option of using the site for it's intended purpose. SWLs need to learn that QSO means CONTACT not "I heard you over here".

as I said I am currently on the eQSL site page and do not yet see an option for reception reports but only QSOs.. they need to create the option or make it easier to find on the site. I can see how this could become a great annoyance to amateurs to have to deal with nonsense "QSO"s!

love your blog and appreciate your solar reports, thank you- or should I say TU For QSO TU 73! lol

Unknown said...

You are right there is no option for SWL reports. It would be great if eQSL would add this capability but I'm not going to hold my breath - I remember making this suggestion in their forum years ago.

Julian, G4ILO

Unknown said...

If you actually display a card from an SWL it says "Confirming SWL reception" instead of "This confirms our 2-way QSO". This is done automatically, SWL accounts are treated differently in the eQSL database. All the ones I have received give me the signal report, plus in the comments field they say who I was working.

73, Dave VA3KAB