xerohour
19 HN mentions · mentioned in 19 months, 2012–2026
0:15 · 3.5M views · Apr 27, 2009
A short CSI clip in which characters try to track a killer's IP address by writing a Visual Basic GUI. It is a famous example of absurd TV hacking.
Used as a running joke whenever HN discusses Hollywood hacking or nonsense technical jargon.
19 comments from Hacker News
> Most non-technical business stakeholders don't really understand what we do. You don't see shows about awesome devs doing awesome shit, like you do for lawyers, doctors, business people, etc. All they know about us is that we're nerds who work like two hours a day and can't be bothered to go into the office. You do, but it's even more ridiculous nonsense fantasy than a typical doctor or a lawyer show (e.g. all the hacker girl scenes like this video , [LINK] ).
I don't want to be confrontational, but I really don't understand the point you're trying to make. Why a neural network, why VLC? I understand that you are suggesting it would be possible to strip the watermark, but the way you've said it sounds a lot like "create a GUI interface using visual basic, see if I can track an IP address"[0]. Which is to say, you've not said what you would do to defeat it, but how you think it would be implemented... which doesn't really tell us anything about HOW you think it could be defeated. >You just can't effectively watermark data intended for human consumption, our tolerance for intentionally induced noise is too high. If this were true, steganography[1] would be useless in practice (it isn't). I would suggest reading up on digital watermarking[2]. [0] this video [1] [LINK] [2] [LINK]
Honestly, the only reason I watched the episode (just now) was that I got linked this clip [0] earlier today. Didn't know it was this show back then, recognized it now. But I have to agree, the lingo is acceptable, although not really perfect or good. I.e. Tor is unsecure because apparently if you control the exit node you can track the origin, which is obviously not true. But hey, they talk about Tor and exit nodes in one sentence that almost makes sense, so that's pretty good, apart from me feeling that claiming Tor isn't secure in a TV show is kind of a campaign... Between creating a GUI in visual basic to track an IP address [1] and reality I'd say it's kind of in the middle. But it's not "BEEP BEEP COMPUTER THINGS ARE HAPPENING". [0] [LINK] [1] this video
I think that ship's already sailed. There's a confusion in the mind of the general public between "someone who knows programming" and "someone who specializes in breaking into computer systems." In case you haven't watched any TV or movies in the last 20 years, here's the news: Any computer expert, regardless of whether they're a good guy or bad guy, can defeat any security system within a matter of minutes, even (or perhaps especially?) those belonging to police/intelligence/military/shadowy evil organization bent on world domination. As we all know, that kind stuff is really just a matter of coding up a GUI in Visual Basic to track the IP address. [1] [1] this video
This feels like a weird "Mainframes are making a comeback", submarine article[1] targeted at people likely to buy stock, especially the "Mainframes Today" section. There also seems to be a (legally obligated?) disclaimer at the top that they're a stock holder, quickly moving on to why you should buy IBM stock, with enough "build a GUI in visual basic to track their IP address"[2] tech-speak gobbledygook to confuse/convince the average investor. That's the only sense I can make of it... [1] [LINK] [2] this video