History Main / EverythingIsOnline

* In Franchise/TheMatrix, everything is the result of being plugged into a computer simulation.

* Also averted in ''Film/MissionImpossible'', where [[Creator/TomCruise Ethan]] recruits computer expert [[Creator/VingRhames Luther Stickell]] and explains his plan to get access to the computer that holds the [[McGuffin NOC list]]. Luther chuckles and starts to explain to the "computer illiterate" the aversion to this trope, pointing out that this particular system is "what is called a 'stand-alone'". After a few seconds, Ethan reveals that he's not as computer illiterate as Luther thinks and describes the top-notch security around the machine. And yes, this means physically going in and getting the data onto a disk.

* Irregularities with voting machines in the 2006 American election were blamed on [=McAfee=] anti-virus software by the company that made them. Why voting machines would ''need'' anti-virus software - or to be hooked up to the internet at all -is a troubling concept, as [[http://xkcd.com/463/ this xkcd strip points out]].

* Ed in ''Anime/CowboyBebop'' retaliates against a pair of policemen who try to apprehend her by hacking into their ship's autopilot and taking it for a joy ride, accidentally crashing it. (Fortunately for them, she's a PlayfulHacker and does it while it's parked outside with no one in it).

* Satsuki, the [[TheCracker hacker]] in ''Manga/{{X1999}}'', has a computer that is not only sentient and can hack into anything online, but it can actually electrically manipulate the power cords themselves to attack people. Even disconnecting the computer from the network doesn't help once she's got her claws in it.
** {{Lampshaded}} when Satsuki steals Nataku's life support data. "We're being hacked and we aren't even on a network!"

* In one particularly nonsensical episode of ''Series/SevenDays'', an [[AIIsACrapshoot evil]] lovesick program manages to ''manipulate the knobs on a gas burner stove'' in an elaborate MurderTheHypotenuse.
** She also manages to disable ''every single nuclear weapon'' in the world. Apparently, not only are missile silos hooked up to the 'Net, but also every nuclear submarine and good old-fashioned plane-dropped bombs. Also, don't forget all those terrorist cells who somehow manage to build/steal a nuke. Apparently, the first thing they do is set up a wifi receiver.

* ''Film/Terminator3RiseOfTheMachines'' is an example of the evil computer version — in this case, Skynet. Many of the electronic things it spreads through, like cash registers, aren't even supposed to be online, so the Terminator infects stuff with remote-control {{Nanomachines}}.

* A frequently DefiedTrope for the Wiki/SCPFoundation. Any SCP that is an artificially intelligent computer programs must never be run on a computer with any kind of network connection. Most of the Foundation's own site equipment is on its own network separate from the main Internet, and those few computers that ''do'' have Internet access are extremely tightly monitored and controlled, with even the bases' own staff having highly limited rights to access them.

* Sites like [[https://www.wikidata.org Wikidata]], [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quaero Quaero]], the Website/InternetArchive and of course, Website/{{Wikipedia}} are vast repositories of knowledge that are entirely online, and are arguably the closest expressions to the idea of the GreatBigLibraryOfEverything (aka the “[[https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/segments/enduring-allure-library-alexandria universal library]]”).

* ''TabletopGame/{{Cyberpunk}}'': UnbuiltTrope. One of the things that made Rache Bartmoss decide to destroy the Internet was the sheer number of things that were accessible online but had no business being online. Things he found that he could control from home included airlocks on orbital stations and the mass driver the ESA used to send spaceships from the Moon to Earth, so he had a point. Just for reference, this game was published a mere years after the first appliance was connected to a computer (a bunch of nerds at Carnegie-Mellon hooked up their vending machine with sensors that could check available beverages and their temperature, and connected those to the computer lab via ARPANET) and three years before the term "ubiquitous computing" was coined.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Cyberpunk}}'': Deconstructed. One of the things that made Rache Bartmoss decide to destroy the Internet was the sheer number of things that were accessible online but had no business being online. Things he found that he could control from home included airlocks on orbital stations and the mass driver the ESA used to send spaceships from the Moon to Earth, so he had a point.

** That's kinda reasonable if you accept that the robots were rooting for Neo at that point (as their only hope against Smith), and you really, really don't think about it.

Compare: ItsASmallNetAfterAll, PlugNPlayTechnology. Wiki/TheOtherWiki calls the real-life version of this the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_of_Things "Internet of Things"]] (no, not the [[BuffySpeak Internet of Stuff]]).

* In one episode of the 1980s animated ''ComicBook/IncredibleHulk'', an evil computer starts taking over the world through the electric power lines. All manner of small appliances, including electric razors and pop-up toasters, start flying around and attacking people.

* Enforced in ''Anime/YureiDeco'': Tom Sawyer Island is covered by an AugmentedReality, and participation through an AR interface known as a 'Deco' is mandatory for all citizens.

* Carried to a ridiculous extreme in ''Film/GhostInTheMachine'' (not to be confused with the [[GhostInTheMachine trope of the same name]]): in a freak accident, a serial killer has his mind (or soul, or whatever) transferred into {{Cyberspace}}. Not only is he able to hack computers, but he can also control electrical appliances, including electrocuting his victims, and in one particular scene [[spoiler:causes a microwave oven to cook someone to death. ''In mere seconds. From several feet across an open room!'' Apparently by turning it UpToEleven, despite the fact most magnetrons only have one power level (pseudo-levels achieved through duty cycles).]] Though it does [[RuleOfCool look cool]].

* ''VideoGame/SplinterCell: Double Agent'' has a sequence where a character hacks into some slot machines and makes them start spewing money as a distraction. To make it worse, those slot machines are on a cruise ship at sea.

** In the first four games, this software standardization is utilized by the MMO, The World, to facilitate an ever-growing database of [[InstantAIJustAddWater human personality observations designed to create the Ultimate AI]], cutting into real-world systems to allocate memory and processing power. As the controlling software - [[SlidingScaleOfRobotIntelligence Morganna Gone Mode]] - suffers from its own LogicBomb, fragments itself into eight components, and then each of those components is destroyed, the systems it has hacked into begin breaking down and can not be recovered due to the nature of the overriding program. The stress is relieved when Aura, the [[MagicalComputer Ultimate AI]], is finally completed and she re-stabilizes the whole of the system. Then ''[[UpToEleven improves]]'' the system.

* In an episode of the old ''WesternAnimation/MegaMan'' cartoon, a virus causes ''everything'' to work for Dr. Wily. Even phone cords. And toasters. And sofas. In fact, the objects he controls act in ways they couldn't possibly in normal life, like street lamps strangling people. Half of the objects didn't even use electricity, like a push lawnmower and an exercise bike and he controlled all those appliances all at the same time with ''just a joystick''.

* ''ComicBook/MsMarvelVol4'': Doc.X is a sapient computer virus whose main schtick is its ability to download itself into anything and everything. In addition to computers, tablets, phones and the like, it can enter and control cars and construction equipment -- some do have built-in computers, but these never control their actual moving parts -- and [[spoiler:even human brains]].

* ''ComicBook/MsMarvel2014'': Doc.X is a sapient computer virus whose main schtick is its ability to download itself into anything and everything. In addition to computers, tablets, phones and the like, it can enter and control cars and construction equipment -- some do have built-in computers, but these never control their actual moving parts -- and [[spoiler:even human brains]].

** There was also controversy over this issue in 2020 as Trump claimed a security vulnerability in Dominion voting machines was used to tamper with election results. However, the supposed security vulnerability was for a [[https://www.njspotlightnews.org/2020/12/he-did-breakthrough-work-on-hacking-voting-machines-now-hes-beloved-by-conspiracy-trolls/ different machine]] made by the same manufacturer and even then required physical access to the machine to perform. And later audits of paper ballots (kept precisely for this purpose) demonstrated there was no widespread fraud.

** There was also controversy over this issue in 2020 as Trump drew attention to potential security vulnerabilities in the Dominion voting machines used in the election. However, the security vulnerabilities highlighted were for a different machine made by the same manufacturer and even then required direct individual access to the machine to perform. And later audits of paper ballots (kept precisely for this purpose) demonstrated there was no widespread fraud.
** Voting machines in general have poor security. Several voting machine manufacturers, including Dominion, have acknowledged that at least some of their machines have built in modems which are connected to cell phone networks which can connect to the internet. And though voting machines are not designed to be connected to the internet, independent security researchers have found [[https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/online-vulnerable-experts-find-nearly-three-dozen-u-s-voting-n1112436 several cases]] where voting systems were indeed connected to the internet.

** Turned up to eleven in 2020 during the US presidential election when it was proven that any Dominion voting machine connected to the internet could be surreptitiously monitored ''and the vote totals changed in real-time'' using techniques so trivial that anybody reading this is theoretically capable of doing it using standard features built into the Windows operating system. That this caused "irregularities" would be an understatement.

[[folder:Film — Animated]]

[[folder:Film — Live-Action]]

[[folder:Fan Works]]
* Averted in ''Fanfic/AeonEntelechyEvangelion'', where the Grid is heavily regionally segmented, and the connection between these segmented parts is only allowed in specific timeslots under very heavy surveillance, all in the name of protection from the Migou, who can put any human master hacker to shame.
[[/folder]]

* Max Gladstone's ''Literature/EmpressOfForever'' takes this to its logical extreme, with a virtual Cloud encompassing literally everything in the galaxy, up to and including the laws of physics. Souls are real because they're your digital presence in the Cloud, which persists after your death. Faster-than-light travel is possible because causality propagates instantly in the Cloud, so ships (and sometimes people) cross interstellar distances by turning into data and calculating themselves into new locations. If you want to move a planet around, you tell the Cloud the planet should move, and it will.

* Exploited by the ChildSoldiers in WebOriginal/TheInnocent, to take control over airplanes, buses, trains, drones, self-driving cars and basically everything else

* ''TabletopGame/{{Cyberpunk}}'': Deconstructed. One of the things that made Rache Bartmoss decide to destroy the Internet was the sheer number of things that were accessible online but had no business being online. Things he found that he could control from home included airlocks on orbital stations and the ESA lunar mass driver, so he had a point.

* ''Franchise/GhostInTheShell'' justifies this trope as making sense in a world where almost everyone you meet has a cybernetic implant connecting their brain wirelessly to the internet. Shown most prominently when the Laughing Man, on more than one occasion, hacks not only cameras but people's visual inputs to replace his face with his two-dimensional logo. In a MindScrew moment, people will even remember and swear that the logo is the ''real'' face.

* If ''Franchise/{{Batman}}'' needs anything, ever, somehow the Batcomputer can ''always'' find it, and on the very rare occasions it can't if Bats asks her nicely enough ComicBook/{{Oracle}} can.

* Averted in ''FanFic/AeonEntelechyEvangelion'', where the Grid is heavily regionally segmented, and the connection between these segmented parts is only allowed in specific timeslots under very heavy surveillance, all in the name of protection from the Migou, who can put any human master hacker to shame.