Mobile repeaters and mobilesignal.co.uk: a warning

Tuesday, December 11th, 2012

Those living in mobile reception blackspots may well be tempted by one of the dozens of websites offering to sell you a signal repeater. These devices promise to improve your mobile reception by capturing weak signals through a high-gain aerial and boosting them through an amplifier. There’s only one problem: they’re often illegal.

Our Real World Computing wireless expert, Paul Ockenden, has warned readers off these questionable repeater devices in the past, and suggested legal ways to boost your mobile reception.  Telecoms regulator Ofcom has revised its advice on mobile repeaters since Paul wrote that column in 2010, but the core guidance remains the same: installing or using a repeater is a criminal offence unless it is CE marked and specifically authorised for use in the UK, because they can cause interference.

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