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Child tweets gibberish from US nuclear-agency account

bbc.com

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Re: Child tweets gibberish from US nuclear-agency account

#171

Post by asdff »

kiddico wrote: post #165
asdff wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nothing would happen. Hawaii sent out an alert to every single cellphone in the state that an ICBM was imminently approaching Honolulu a few years back, and no one outside of Hawaii remembers that anymore today.

That is certainly not true. The absurdity of the situation burned the event into my mind at least, and I’ve never even been to Hawaii.

No one here is hyperbole. Clearly you and me remember it. That being said, it's not like it was some 9/11 type event where everyone remembers where they were (unless you were in Hawaii I'm sure). In 10 years it's out of the public sphere. Like that plane that crashed into the ocean (which I'm willing to bet if you asked Gen Z about they would wonder if you were talking about Lost on Netflix rather than MH370), or all the other similarly-oddball incidents from the 70s, 80s, and 90s that we no longer ever mention in public discourse today.

Re: Child tweets gibberish from US nuclear-agency account

#172

Post by 29athrowaway »

whack wrote: post #148

The responsible agency is rightfully embarrassed by this oversight, and has now taken stringent measures to ensure something like this never happens again - Henceforth, all tweets can only ever be sent from a remote-desktop server that has to be hosted in a security-clearance-5 site - In order to access the remote-desktop, 2 government employees, who both have 10+ years of government experience, will need to jointly…

The room where the tweeting designated computer is located is painted with anti wifi paint. No communication devices are allowed in the room and is protected by armed guards disguised as plants.

Submitting the tweet requires turning two keys at the same time, the keys are reissued every 24 hours.

The password to unlock the computer is written with invisible ink in a microfilm contained inside a spy coin in a fake book which can only be found in a public library in Alaska corresponding to the volume #25 of the 1951 Encyclopedia Britannica, an encyclopedia that only had 24 volumes originally.

The password is punched into cards in reverse order. Then, these punched cards are used as an stencil that can be scanned with a fake Android barcode app that returns thingiverse url which can be used to 3d print a key that will unlock the chest where the actual password is contained.

The second key is obtained by calling the phone number found in the tag of a XXXL Harambe t-shirt from a specific vendor on Amazon.

The phone number will emit a fake busy tone for 5 minutes and then an operator will pick up and answer in the Klingon language.

Re: Child tweets gibberish from US nuclear-agency account

#173

Post by pbourke »

airhead969 wrote: post #130
pbourke wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What a wholesome response! FWIW the @CAFinUS account is a good follow, with a mix of history, humor, etc. Pretty good for a government account.

Canadians are generally sensible, chill folks. Remember the Michael Moore thing about testing whether people locked their front doors?

> Canadians are generally sensible, chill folks.

I see you’ve never lived in a Canadian city that has lost the Stanley Cup. Or in the case of Montreal, won it.

Re: Child tweets gibberish from US nuclear-agency account

#174

Post by JamisonM »

Lots of comments here about locking workstations, etc. I think the answer to this sort of stuff is if you have a high-profile and important twitter account shouldn't the content actually be running through a CMS that has some sort of gated publishing system? It just takes one other person to double-check a post to makes sure that gibberish/crazy/genuinely bad stuff doesn't get published, right?

So then one actual human has the credentials for the actual twitter account in question. That's possible??

Re: Child tweets gibberish from US nuclear-agency account

#175

Post by deathanatos »

airhead969 wrote: post #17
ziddoap wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Isn't the automatic reaction of a Windows desktop/laptop user to lock their workstation Having attempted to encourage this as a habit for my users for about a year, and not a single one doing it, I've had to come up with other solutions that takes it out of their hands. (It's not business-critical for us, however we try to encourage good security habits all around). So no, I don't think it is an automatic reaction f…

IIRC, the trick is practical jokes! Change desktop backgrounds, move icons around, leave goofy/giant text Word documents, etc.

At my high school, it was to create a folder with an… incriminating name. Then, screenshot the desktop, delete the folder, and then set the background to the screenshot.

When the …mark… sits down, inevitably with several… "witnesses" behind them, who then point out in "astonishment" the folder on their desktop, they try (in vain) to highlight it to delete it.

(Not appropriate for the workplace, of course.)

Also, scotch tape is not transparent to optical mice? and blocks the sensor. Had that one pulled on me once, took a while to figure it out.

Re: Child tweets gibberish from US nuclear-agency account

#177

Post by 908B64B197 »

salawat wrote: post #162
whoisthemachine wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you mis-stated that last line: > Leave US Strategic Command Launch Portal open for child to launch missiles against Ontario, Canada: "Canada: Totally okay, these things happen."

I was 50/49.9/.1 the correction would be Canada being okay with Ontario being nuked, or the target changing to Quebec and Canada still being okay with it. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quebec_sovereignty_movement Quebec is the Texas of Canada, if I recall correctly. There was a third, though unlikely option of the target switching to Alberta, but it turning out to be okay, because it just happened to coincide with…

> Quebec is the Texas of Canada, if I recall correctly.

That's my understanding too. Or California with a more serious Calexit movement.

Re: Child tweets gibberish from US nuclear-agency account

#179

Post by adolph »

smt88 wrote: post #118
jeffreyrogers wrote: post #116

I don't see how this is as big a deal as people make it out to be. The person in charge of this account probably has nothing to do with anything that remotely matters. You wouldn't worry about your 401k if the asset manager's twitter account posted some gibberish.

What if the child were a little older and typed something related to launching missiles as a joke?

Seriously, they could fake being sick by holding the thermometer against a lightbulb when their mom isn’t looking and after being left home alone for the day dial into that modem connected to the WOPR to play that global thermonuclear war game.

Re: Child tweets gibberish from US nuclear-agency account

#180

Post by azhenley »

asdff wrote: post #158
smt88 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What if the child were a little older and typed something related to launching missiles as a joke?

Nothing would happen. Hawaii sent out an alert to every single cellphone in the state that an ICBM was imminently approaching Honolulu a few years back, and no one outside of Hawaii remembers that anymore today.

I discuss that incident every semester in my courses. Most of the students remember it and we aren't in Hawaii.
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