^ Yeah, it's so tough for me to keep track of the state laws that I am afraid to bring my scanning ham radios to the U.S., nevermind my "pure" scanners. In Canada, the law is that the airwaves are public domain/property, so anybody can listen to anything i.e. it's up to the source to encrypt if they don't want people to hear...seems fair enough. What can be illegal is disclosing what you hear to a third party, but you can use the info for yourself. So listening to cell phones is allowed, if you can, but most get over that quickly enough.

There are still plenty of interesting and useful "plain analog" things to listen to, at least here. Taxis and towtrucks are a good source of info. EMT, lots of Fire and Police still. All sorts of businesses, etc. The hams and the aircraft, (marine) weather channels. Well, that's just some of what I have programmed in for locally.