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Child Tweets Gibberish From US Nuclear-Agency Account (bbc.com) 108

A young child inadvertently sparked confusion over the weekend by posting an unintelligible tweet to the official account of US Strategic Command. The BBC reports: The agency is responsible for safeguarding America's nuclear weapons. Some social-media users feared the account may have been hacked. But it has since been revealed a young member of the account's social-media manager's family was responsible for posting the tweet, ";l;;gmlxzssaw," which was then deleted within minutes.
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Child Tweets Gibberish From US Nuclear-Agency Account

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  • by Megahard ( 1053072 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2021 @07:23PM (#61218866)

    and not press the big red button.

    • It's not apart of the U.S. defense system. The account can't affect any kind of national system. Laugh, and move on, nothing here.

      • by rudy_wayne ( 414635 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2021 @08:19PM (#61219050)

        "A young child inadvertently sparked confusion over the weekend by posting an unintelligible tweet"

        Donald Trump did that every day for 4 years.

        • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

          by tomhath ( 637240 )
          ...and he still lives in your head 24/7
          • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

            by LenKagetsu ( 6196102 )

            Another place where the Trump doesn't pay the rent.

          • by luis_a_espinal ( 1810296 ) on Wednesday March 31, 2021 @08:56AM (#61220286)

            ...and he still lives in your head 24/7

            And 550K people do not. We inherited a trillion dollar deficit with no infrastructure or defense bill or nothing for that matter to show for it, an idiotically unwinnable pre-cold War Era trade war *that we lost* and that has cost us billions (us taxpayers bailing out farmers many of them who voted for this shit, yay me taxpayer yay!), zero legislation passed while the GOP controlled congress, and a bunch of idiotic executive orders for rolling back environmental regulations.

            Actions. Reactions. Someone took a dump on a bucket, then poured red wine and burn motor oil on the bucket, then stirred it into a slush to then drop it on your carpet (which already needed cleaning) continuously for four years without giving you a chance to clean it up.

            Now he's gone, leaving your carpet into a mess, and with the bucket which you need to find a way to dispose of it. So as you complain trying to decide whether to scrub the carpet or to get a new one, some jerk comes saying "hurr durr the shit-wine-oil bucket guy lives in your head, move on yolo lolz."

            That's you.

            • And 550K people do not. We inherited a trillion ....

              Time to bring Truth to another fools life. Buffoon didn't kill 550,000 people. That was the direct fault of the Idiots in charge of the states that did that. Buffoon inherited a trillion dollar deficit from his predecessor. Who, in time, will be regarded as a far worse president that Buffoon ever was. The lack of infrastructure bills fall squarely on the shoulders of the fools in the democratic controlled congress. If Buffoon was right about anything it was calling China out of its trade policies.

              • The truth hurts them. I realized that the moment the exact same people screaming "free Hong Kong" immediately shifted to "stop attacking China you racist" the moment covid-19 hit. Now it's just crickets. Weird how the masses of immigrants Biden invited to a border his party gutted are a crisis but literal slaves and genocide not so much....

      • yeh it can only cause chaos, imagine if a child messaged something and enuff idiots went on a hoarding rampage.
    • by sjames ( 1099 )

      There's a reason the plastic cover over important buttons is called a Molly guard...

      • by v1 ( 525388 )

        haha.... nice! I did not know that. looks like it dates back to old big iron of the IBM variety.

        Though it's just as funny that a computer would require a kill-switch, as if it were nuclear powered and might need to SCRAM the reactor, or they were afraid it was going to get out of control and go all skynet on them...

        • by sjames ( 1099 )

          Data centers still have that button, sometimes behind glass with a little hammer mounted next to it, labled EPO (Emergency Power Off). It's not in case of skynet (though it wouldn't surprise me much if some also have that label under them), it's in case of fire or severe electrical fault. Some are also wired to the fire suppression system so a halon discharge (which is not actually halon anymore) will also cause power off.

          • by v1 ( 525388 )

            Yeah I suppose especially in the case of a center that runs on lower DC voltage. (there are 48vdc rack setups) Then it'd be a safety thing, nobody wants to touch a 48v rack that's got a short in it.

            • by sjames ( 1099 )

              Nobody wants to go near a 408 volt 3 phase 50 amp circuit that might short any time now either!

        • "Though it's just as funny that a computer would require a kill-switch"

          Computers in those days had spinning hardrives that weighed hundreds of pounds and circuitry with hundreds of volts of current. If somebody got crossways of that, yeah, you needed to shut it down NOW. Not to mention the fire hazards.

          • by v1 ( 525388 )

            I'm familiar with the really old ones - think "washing machine on spin cycle" when running - both the sound, and the energy. They DO have a bake, but the purpose is to stop it from moving during transport and while turned off. The brake isn't even remotely strong enough to stop it while it's spinning. Turning those off they just let them spin down on their own.

            Good stories online though tell about what happens when the brake "accidentally engages". The energy from the spinning platter array is enough th

    • Hackers get younger and younger

  • You can drone some third world fuck from an app sitting in your pjs at home, so what's the big deal?

  • by Flexagon ( 740643 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2021 @07:31PM (#61218894)
    Everybody come on ;l;;gmlxzssaw.
  • Lock your keyboard when you go to the bathroom, It only takes a minute. The kid could have posted something from your URL history.
  • Your tax dollars and security at work!

    'Hey, sure, let the baby play with the phone with the nuclear codes.'
    • by Darinbob ( 1142669 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2021 @07:45PM (#61218930)

      I think the story is overblown. The twitter account was used from a normal computer. The child did not have to pass by 12 different security guards, use 7 different biometric scans, and then sit down to type gibberish next to the big red button. This was a PR person working at home twittering out stuff of interest.

      Now if the social media employee actually happened to be the same person that was responsible for launching nukes then there would need to be some serious questions. If this were possible to do from home, then we're all doomed anyway if that person ever gets a cat.

      • Didn't you hear? Since 2017, it's been possible for the President to order a nuclear strike via a specially-constructed Tweet.

      • Fortunately it was a small child who typed random characters.
        So just funny.

        If it had been a mischievous eight year old who thought it would be funny to put something like "NK BOOM", that would have been more - interesting.

        • by Anonymous Coward

          Turns out their Twitter manager left his computer unattended

          That kind of "unattended" had to be against policy. Of course it's a fucking manager who's more likely to get promoted than a wrist slap.

      • by Teun ( 17872 )
        It is indeed overblown and for a good reason.
        These kind of organisations have their own website to publish important messages, using commercial 'social' media for anything but laughs is just plain stupid.
        • by dcw3 ( 649211 )

          Really? What kind of important messages do you image any of them ever publish? No, it's about PR, and it is social.

      • by Syberz ( 1170343 )
        Guess that it all depends on what was on the phone, but still, letting a small child play with your work phone is not a good idea. If the work phone was left unlocked and the kid played with it, that's even worse...
    • Why do governments in the U.S. use inane Twitter to communicate?

    • by kenh ( 9056 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2021 @10:54PM (#61219380) Homepage Journal

      Oh p!ease!

      Its a Twitter account, not "The Football" - stop acting like the soldiers around the world are sitting around waiting for coded messages to be passes over a public Twitter account... I'm pretty sure the military has a command and control infrastructure that doesn't rely on a public Twitter account.

      • I'm pretty sure the military has a command and control infrastructure that doesn't rely on a public Twitter account.

        Not so sure. Biden had to reward Jack somehow for censoring the Hunter Biden fiasco which likely won him the election.

    • Its a PR/Press Release Twitter account, stop pretending it means anything to anyone outside the news media or other military PR departments.

  • not gibberish (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymouse Cowtard ( 6211666 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2021 @07:42PM (#61218916) Homepage
    It's the password for the launch codes which is kept on the clipboard for quick access.
    • by kubajz ( 964091 )
      Funny, but it also shows how important this incident is. No harm meant, obviously - but what if the kid was a bit older and tweeted "bombs away!" just for fun? What if there are algoritms analysing this official PR account, and reacting to its content? And how much time does the USSR have before they must decide whether to retaliate to a perceived attack before they know it's too late? Maybe I'm just too pessimistic but I would not dismiss this as "only a PR account, only from a home computer, only an overs
      • by dcw3 ( 649211 )

        That would have been hilarious! Nobody in Russia would have taken it seriously, though communications would have occurred to say WTF. They don't have the snowflakes that we have here.

  • Ctrl-Alt-Delete before you leave your seat.
    • by Anonymous Coward
      Windows + L is quicker.
      • by stooo ( 2202012 )

        no, a hammer is quicker.

        • no, a hammer is quicker.

          Only in Hollywood does smashing the screen with a hammer turn off the computer...

          For that matter, you could batter away at the case of my desktop with a hammer for quite some time without ever shutting it off. It's a fairly thick gauge of steel.

  • by swell ( 195815 ) <jabberwock@poetic.com> on Tuesday March 30, 2021 @07:52PM (#61218950)

    This is the War Room!!!

    It was disturbing to see the prestigious White House occupant tweeting nonsense for four years. It may be even more disturbing to know that our military has a social media account. For what? Don't they have a public-facing web site to communicate with citizens? Why would they dirty themselve in the same sewer where Trump played?

    • by dcw3 ( 649211 )

      For the same reason that virtually every large organization has those very same type of accounts. Do you imagine that Biden isn't in that sewer? He is https://twitter.com/joebiden?l... [twitter.com] but his handlers won't allow him to get near it for the same reason they won't allow him to have press conferences his mind is shot.

      Off topic: SLASHDOT, Fix your fucking ASCII art filter. It's wrong half the time anyone tries to post a link.

  • I had hoped that with Trump out of office, that we'd stop paying attention to Twitter as if it's an official communications tool for any government department.

  • Are they sure it wasn't the Chinese? They get the blame for everything these days.

  • by iikkakeranen ( 6279982 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2021 @07:58PM (#61218986)

    Is a coded message from Q confirming that Trump is really still in charge.

  • Isn't that just the origin story of Freakazoid, maybe mixed with Weird Science?

    Ryan Fenton

  • Sorry, couldn't resist.

  • by Orgasmatron ( 8103 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2021 @09:26PM (#61219218)

    Skyking Skyking Skyking ;l;;gmlxzssaw
    Skyking Skyking Skyking ;l;;gmlxzssaw

    (if you don't get it - it wasn't for you)

  • by clovis ( 4684 ) on Tuesday March 30, 2021 @10:36PM (#61219360)

    GREETINGS PROFESSOR FALKEN
    SHALL WE PLAY A GAME?

    “;l;;gmlxzssaw"

    (double flash)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]

  • Here, take a look - its for distributing press releases to the media and the public, nothing more... Why does every seem to think its tied to the Nuclear Football? [wikipedia.org]

    @USStratCom

    • The Twitter account is @US_StratCom [twitter.com]

    • We know it isn't, but it is fun to make fun of incompetence where there should be absolutely none.

      I repeat. None. Something like this makes the public facing account for such a government organization look very bad and insecure. It looks untrustworthy at worst and run by monkeys at best. They should have an approval process in place. Someone needs to be replaced.
      • We know it isn't, but it is fun to make fun of incompetence where there should be absolutely none.

        Seriously? It's some PR guy running a twitter account for the government. I can't imagine anything but incompetence.

  • At that point you have to assume a mindset, so batshit insane, that really, anything else doesn't matter anymore.

    Something's gonna blow up in a nuclear explosion anytime soon, either way. Or worse.

  • From the older CPE1704TKS, seems to me...
  • This is the real question.

Elliptic paraboloids for sale.

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