XKCD: It's more than a comic

Everything there's clinical evidence one way on, there's evidence the other too.

Par for the course, that

And don't get me started on WhatsApp chat groups.

On the other hand, if television really is trying to kill us, it's not doing a very good job, now is it?

Well, they gotta try harder. Survival of the least gullible.

Refresh Types.

I've heard of a turbo switch, but not a hyper key.

Are those keys made up, or just very obscure?

A Harder refresh is actually possible if the website in question has poorly coded inputs that makes it vulnerable to SQL injection (basically inserting admin commands into things like search windows), since a restart command could be injected.

There's no keyboard shortcut and basically any website that's worth anything has very simple countermeasures in place that render it invulnerable to this particular type of cyberattack. But it is a legitimate concept.

A Hardest refresh is of course only possible in the sense that it doesn't technically break the laws of the universe. We could dismantle the existing internet and rebuild Arpanet if we really wanted to, but I don't see enough people really wanting to.

Looks like hyper keys are a real thing.

A reasonably set up server neither the web server nor the database server run as root user, so even with an SQL injection the worst you can do is to wipe all data. Rebooting the server would require finding a vulnerability in the kernel itself, or a really poor setup where, for example, the SQL server user has SSH keys for root access. But yeah, it is not unreasonable to find a site where you can do a harder reset, but it will require more than an obscure key combination.

Unless you set up a macro.

Though come to think of it a more reliable way to do a harder reset would be to simply call up the datacenter, pretend to be someone in a position of authority and tell them to reset the database server.

It won't work 100% of the time, but social engineering attacks can sometimes be far more effective then it seems like they should be.

What's the Arpanet?

Precursor to the modern internet.

Google's grandpa.

Suddenly I feel very, very old.

I'm going to Don't Explain the Joke a bit here, just to be a party pooper.

ARPANET dates back to 1969 (before I was born) when the government agency DARPA was tasked to develop a system for electronic communications between military sites. Most of the technology that underpins the modern Internet comes directly from that project. After military sites, the next major adopters were universities, as a way to distribute scientific research. When their student bodies started getting access to the system (the early World Wide Web and Usenet started to be a thing in the mid to late eighties), the idea spread like wildfire (due in no small part to The Rule of First Adopters), was commercialized in the nineties, and now we can stream HD porn basically for free.

The idea of a "hardest reset" is not entirely whimsical: there are many parts of the Internet that are severely dated in terms of their technology, particularly as relates to security, and many proposals have been floated about an "Internet 2.0" that would address the problems. Of course, the technology is so ubiquitous today that overhauling it completely would face monumental resistance — note the lackluster adoption of IPv6 as just one example.

edited 25th Jun '17 8:22:47 AM by Fighteer

I remember Robin mentioning that in that one episode of Batman: The Animated Series.

Alternately, you've all forgotten the most reliable (if difficult) way to reboot a server: Actually be the person in charge of that server, log in using legitimate credentials and reboot it. This method works for at least one person on nearly 100% of servers, no matter how secure.

Note that this fact is part of why social engineering is such an effective hacking technique.

#1855: Telephoto

I have some friends who are into photography that would probably be very amused by this one.

edited 26th Jun '17 8:17:50 AM by Fighteer

Must make astronomy photography a bit challenging. And impressive.

I imagine the webcam gets in the way of the camera, though.

I think the point is that the webcam is connected to the base camera digitally.

Alternatively, you'd think the exit mirror would block the primary mirror of a reflective telescope, but they find a way.

edited 26th Jun '17 4:09:31 PM by TParadox

Well, considering there's a wire running all the way from the webcam to the camera, I'm assuming the webcam is the thing that's taking the pictures, and is just being fed into the camera's storage.

Is that an actual feature of digital cameras now, though?