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Alert About Missile Bound for Hawaii Was Sent in Error, Officials Say

nytimes.com

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Re: Alert About Missile Bound for Hawaii Was Sent in Error, Officials Say

#91

Post by JumpCrisscross »

intopieces wrote: post #80

If I were going to erode public trust in emergency broadcast systems in order to increase the amount of damage I would do by launching an actual missile, this is how I would do it. A series of false alarms. A similar, if obviously much smaller and less disastrous example, happens at my apartment about 4 times a week: the fire alarms for entire floors of my apartment building are easily triggered by people smoking in…

These systems are being revisited for the first time in a generation. Honest mistake is far more likely.

Re: Alert About Missile Bound for Hawaii Was Sent in Error, Officials Say

#92

Post by nodesocket »

nightski wrote: post #67
nodesocket wrote: post #51

This should not happen, yet time after time we see that critical American infrastructure and systems are run worse than a pre-revenue bay area chat startup. American infrastructure needs to invest and hire/pay for the same quality that bay area startups do. Let four people go that are inept and less qualified and pay a single solid person market salary. Besides the fear and chaos potentially caused to people in Hawai…

Throw more money at it, the bay area solution. Right. It's just the lazy inept workers you say! Pay someone twice as much and surely they will be more competent! In my mind the focus should be on the process for sending such an alert and how it could of gotten through by accident.

I'd say take a look at Reed Hastings model at Netflix. Capitalism works. Netflix treat's their company like a professional sports team. Pay for the best available talent you can. Fire fast if you don't perform.

Re: Alert About Missile Bound for Hawaii Was Sent in Error, Officials Say

#93

Post by maxerickson »

Hasz wrote: post #58
f- wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is actually reasonably well-established - check out this: http://static3.businessinsider.com/image/58cc34b9112f7043268... Not common knowledge, though, in part because nuclear hazards have been painted in an exaggerated light by Hollywood (basically, no point in trying to survive, because everybody is going to die and what's going to be left is a 1,000-year lethal nuclear wasteland), and in part because we stopp…

Off topic, but the same guy (Michal Zalewski) has an absolutely amazing guide to his CNC work. http://lcamtuf.coredump.cx/gcnc/ For something a bit less depressing.

Note the "I maintain a handy guide" in the comment you replied to.

Re: Alert About Missile Bound for Hawaii Was Sent in Error, Officials Say

#95

Post by [deleted] »

paulie_a wrote: post #59

I will go out on a limb and say someone hacked the system and decided to prank an entire state. Fun fact, in my small hometown you could and possibly still activate the tornado warning system using DTMF and a transmitter on some frequency in the 149mhz range. To clarify, I never actually attempted it but I had a uniden radio scanner in my teens and noticed the pattern for the 12:00 test.

[deleted]

Re: Alert About Missile Bound for Hawaii Was Sent in Error, Officials Say

#96

Post by uabstraction »

tensor wrote: post #79
uabstraction wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll go right ahead and call you a conspiracy theorist. If you think The US intelligence community would go out of their way to stir up a panic like this just because CoIntelPro was a thing 50 years ago, with no other evidence or reasonable motives, you must be a UFO chasing loon. If there is anything nefarious here (seems like it), this is the work of a foreign state actor probing our infrastructure for exploitable…

You say he's a conspiracy theorist and then jump to Russia gaining access to the emergency alert system? Seriously? Both these scenarios sound equally probably or improbable to me.

It follows a clear pattern of behavior which has been escalating for years. If this wasn't a boneheaded mistake, it was an attack.

Or it was "just a prank, bro!"

Re: Alert About Missile Bound for Hawaii Was Sent in Error, Officials Say

#97

Post by FLUX-YOU »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #81
runesoerensen wrote: post #65

So it took 38 minutes to send out a new message informing this was a false alert. How is that possible if this was simply a human error during a "shift change"? You'd think the people who "pressed the wrong button" would be able to press the same button again?

> You'd think the people who "pressed the wrong button" would be able to press the same button again? Absolutely not. Once you say “fire” you need official confirmation to say “no fire”. That means certification from the military. The official needed being in a meeting or tending to something of greater importance could easily introduce delays. In any case, I presume the system’s designers didn’t build in an “oops, f…

>In any case, I presume the system’s designers didn’t build in an “oops, fat finger” notification.

Yeah, but imagine getting a legit alert, and then someone fat-fingering the "fat finger" notification. Or someone installing malware that sends that notification for all military related threats.

Re: Alert About Missile Bound for Hawaii Was Sent in Error, Officials Say

#98

Post by gizmo686 »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #81
runesoerensen wrote: post #65

So it took 38 minutes to send out a new message informing this was a false alert. How is that possible if this was simply a human error during a "shift change"? You'd think the people who "pressed the wrong button" would be able to press the same button again?

> You'd think the people who "pressed the wrong button" would be able to press the same button again? Absolutely not. Once you say “fire” you need official confirmation to say “no fire”. That means certification from the military. The official needed being in a meeting or tending to something of greater importance could easily introduce delays. In any case, I presume the system’s designers didn’t build in an “oops, f…

I would assume the system supports arbitrary messages. During a real emergency, I doubt they would want to need to get coders in order to send an unexpected message.

Re: Alert About Missile Bound for Hawaii Was Sent in Error, Officials Say

#99

Post by maxerickson »

tensor wrote: post #79
uabstraction wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll go right ahead and call you a conspiracy theorist. If you think The US intelligence community would go out of their way to stir up a panic like this just because CoIntelPro was a thing 50 years ago, with no other evidence or reasonable motives, you must be a UFO chasing loon. If there is anything nefarious here (seems like it), this is the work of a foreign state actor probing our infrastructure for exploitable…

You say he's a conspiracy theorist and then jump to Russia gaining access to the emergency alert system? Seriously? Both these scenarios sound equally probably or improbable to me.

Pranksters hack the emergency alert system on a semi-regular basis.

So the plausibility of Russia doing it would be based on whether they would bother or not.

Re: Alert About Missile Bound for Hawaii Was Sent in Error, Officials Say

#100

Post by vtail »

davidp wrote: post #82
vtail wrote: post #49

I’m in Hawaii and received it this morning. First thought: there is probably no shelter close by anyway, and if they would send a missile they would probably target Honolulu (I’m in Kauai).

I know this isn't a comforting thought, but: Missiles from the most likely source (North Korea) are not thought to have very good accuracy. They may be as likely to hit Kauai or the big island (or the ocean nearby) as Honolulu. I hope this event wasn't too stressful for you and your family.

Funny - my gf had the same idea. We basically decided it’s most likely a mistake, so were not particularly worried.
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