Some countries may limit or regulate types of amateur messaging (such as e-mail) by content, origination location, end destination, or license class of the operator.
In accordance with long standing amateur radio tradition, international guidelines and FCC rules section 97.113, hams using the Winlink system are advised that it is not appropriate to use it for business communications.
[4][5][6] PACTOR-I, WINMOR(deprecated), ARDOP, HSMM (WiFi), AX.25 packet, D-Star, TCP/IP, and ALE are non-proprietary protocols used in various RF applications to access the Winlink network systems.
In amateur radio service, AirMail, Winlink Express, and other email client programs used by the Winlink system,[7] disable the proprietary compression technology for PACTOR-II, PACTOR-III, and PACTOR-IV modems and instead relies on the open FBB protocol, also widely used worldwide by packet radio BBS forwarding systems.
The FCC granted this request in DA-95-2106 based on the ARRL's representation that it had worked with developers to ensure complete technical documentation of these codes were available to all amateur radio operators.
"[11] In 2013, the FCC ruled in Report and Order 13-1918 against the use of encryption in the US amateur radio bands for any purpose, including emergency communications.
The FCC cited the need for all amateur radio communications to be open and unobscured, to uphold the Commission's long-standing requirement that the service be able to police itself.
Such transmission encryption, once set up properly, is seamless to the end-user and requires no additional effort, but is left up to the individual operator or government agency to setup.
[13] In the Report and Order, the FCC stated, "The amateur radio community can and does play a vital role in emergency response communications, but is often unnecessarily hindered by the baud rate limitations in the rules."
In addition, American Radio Relay League (ARRL) continued to push its efforts toward this change through Congressional pathways.