Fourth US Navy Collision This Year Raises Suspicion of Cyber-Attacks (thenextweb.com) 397
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Next Web: Early Monday morning a U.S. Navy Destroyer collided with a merchant vessel off the coast of Singapore. The U.S. Navy initially reported that 10 sailors were missing, and today found "some of the remains" in flooded compartments. While Americans mourn the loss of our brave warriors, top brass is looking for answers. Monday's crash involving the USS John McCain is the fourth in the area, and possibly the most difficult to understand. So far this year 17 U.S. sailors have died in the Pacific southeast due to seemingly accidental collisions with civilian vessels.
Should four collisions in the same geographical area be chalked up to coincidence? Could a military vessel be hacked? In essence, what if GPS spoofing or administrative lockout caused personnel to be unaware of any imminent danger or unable to respond? The Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) says there's no reason to think it was a cyber-attack, but they're looking into it: "2 clarify Re: possibility of cyber intrusion or sabotage, no indications right now...but review will consider all possibilities," tweeted Adm. John Richardson. The obvious suspects -- if a sovereign nation is behind any alleged attacks -- would be Russia, China, and North Korea, all of whom have reasonable access to the location of all four incidents. It may be chilling to imagine such a bold risk, but it's not outlandish to think a government might be testing cyber-attack capabilities in the field.
Should four collisions in the same geographical area be chalked up to coincidence? Could a military vessel be hacked? In essence, what if GPS spoofing or administrative lockout caused personnel to be unaware of any imminent danger or unable to respond? The Chief of Naval Operations (CNO) says there's no reason to think it was a cyber-attack, but they're looking into it: "2 clarify Re: possibility of cyber intrusion or sabotage, no indications right now...but review will consider all possibilities," tweeted Adm. John Richardson. The obvious suspects -- if a sovereign nation is behind any alleged attacks -- would be Russia, China, and North Korea, all of whom have reasonable access to the location of all four incidents. It may be chilling to imagine such a bold risk, but it's not outlandish to think a government might be testing cyber-attack capabilities in the field.
Bring it! (Score:2)
Conspiracy theories activate!
MH370 - paging CNN (Score:2)
Also, NEVER let a Senator drive the submarine!
Re:MH370 - paging CNN (Score:4, Informative)
A good conspiracy theorist would not squander his credibilty by getting basic facts wrong, like saying a collision occurred in the "Pacific southeast" when it actually occurred north of the equator in the Western Pacific. The Southeastern Pacific is off the coast of Chile, about 16,000 km away, or roughly halfway around the world.
Re: (Score:3)
Well, we know it has to be an American conspiracy if the geography is so blatantly wrong.
Re:Bring it! (Score:5, Funny)
tesla autopilot is to blame
google map update caused the issue
Trump whined to Putin after McCain blocked the health bill
China warns US of what will happen if they don't get more islands/territory
India/Micorosoft windows 10 update/virus mishap
North Korea... err ummm they did something that caused something because they are highly capable
well its a start.
Re:Bring it! (Score:4, Funny)
Trump whined to Putin after McCain blocked the health bill
"You saw what happened to that ship named 'McCain'? Be a shame if the same thing happened to you..."
Arrogant and ill trained US navy crew. (Score:2, Interesting)
Remember the US carrier fleet commander who got into an argument about who should change course with a lighthouse?
I figure it's much more likely that the captain demanded the traffic (driven by or for nignogs, clearly, it's the middle east) change course and played chicken with a tanker that has no chance of complying due to their massive size.
Re: (Score:3)
That was a joke, reworded many times and debunked even more times.
Re:Arrogant and ill trained US navy crew. (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember the US carrier fleet commander who got into an argument about who should change course with a lighthouse?
That was a joke which never actually took place. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org] & http://www.navy.mil/navydata/q... [navy.mil]
I figure it's much more likely that the captain demanded the traffic (driven by or for nignogs, clearly, it's the middle east) change course and played chicken with a tanker that has no chance of complying due to their massive size.
The accident took place in the straits of Malacca which is hardly the middle east. If the Captain was so arrogant as to play chicken he could've just sunk the merchant ship when it got to close.
It'd take an awfully crazy Navy captain to sink a foreign flagged ship in a public shipping channel.
Most likely cause was probably weather reducing visibility (heavy fog/mist is quite common in that area) so they didn't see the ship until it was to late.
That might be a valid excuse if either vessel was a 20 ft sailboat, but a 2 billion dollar Arleigh Class destroyer has 6MW worth of radar. Even my friend's 30 foot boat has a 4KW radar system than can see ships miles away through heavy fog and rain.
If it can't see a 500 ft tanker approaching, what chance does it have in wartime?
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Maybe it was a stealth tanker.
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"If it can't see a 500 ft tanker approaching, what chance does it have in wartime?"
What will it do in wartime? From the pictures it doesn't appear their weapons capability was effected by the collision so they could fire off every weapon it has before the ship went under. And that one ship has enough fire power to level a small country all by itself.
Getting rammed by a slow moving civilian tanker and then firing off every weapon it has before sinking doesn't sound like a great wartime strategy.
The main land-attack weapons load for an Arleigh Class Destroyer is 56 tomahawk missiles with a high explosive or cluster-bomb warhead. The 100 kiloton nuclear warhead option has (supposedly) been retired. Most of the rest of the weapons are for air or sea defense, not much help in a land attack.
While it could take out a small city (or more usefully, key militar
Re: Bring it! (Score:2)
They have that covered in spades.
Maybe the biggest threat to the US is... The US.
There is no hack that should work (Score:5, Informative)
There is no single hack that should work to cause an accident like this. It doesn't matter if GPS is hacked or even off. It doesn't matter if your navigation system is faulty or given the wrong information. It doesn't matter if your radars are down. The fact of the matter is, ships have been navigating in congested waters at night for hundreds of years and there is no hack that should serve to cause a collision.
Bridge watchkeepers are supposed to be trained in heads up visual navigation. GPS, ECPINS, AIS, navigation radars - they are all useful tools, but a watchkeeper is supposed to be trained to know when those tools are lying to to them. Because it really isn't a matter of if, but when something will happen to cause one or more of those tools to lie to you. This is especially true of warship watchkeepers who are supposed to be trained to operate in places where there may be denial of service for GPS or where AIS is being spoofed.
I wrote about something like this before [slashdot.org] - almost two years ago. American warships have a reputation in NATO as being driven by amateurs. During fleet manoeuvers, the rest of us actively plot wider safety bubbles around American ships because they are erratic and have a tendency to simply go the wrong direction and just not care.
This isn't a cyber attack. There is no attack on anything on the American ship that should have defeated the watchkeeper's mark 1 eyeball, and hacking a container ship to hit a warship with is like hacking a semi truck and thinking you are going to use it to ram a dirt bike on an open field. It's simply not possible to hit a warship with a container vessel if the warship has a watchkeeper that is awake.
Re:There is no hack that should work (Score:5, Insightful)
American warships have a reputation in NATO as being driven by amateurs. During fleet manoeuvers, the rest of us actively plot wider safety bubbles around American ships because they are erratic and have a tendency to simply go the wrong direction and just not care.
That's because the *are* piloted by amateurs (relatively speaking).
A merchant marine captain will spend his entire life in the same career track, building on and enhancing his skills. A Navy captain will have gone through extensive training in school, then work his way through various specialties (engineering, communications, weapons, etc) before he finally gets his command, so he's got much less experience as a merchant marine captain. And even when in command, he's responsible for hundreds of sailors instead of the dozen or two that a merchant vessel would have.
Re:There is no hack that should work (Score:5, Informative)
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From where I stand, McDonalds register operators and WalMart shelf stockers perform some of the most important service for our country. Without the people driving the trucks and maintaining the roads and power service, the military would collapse in a week--right behind the collapse of America as a whole.
Re: (Score:3)
Oh there are some fantastic engineers in the military; there just aren't enough of them to run the whole damned thing. They're reliant on being able to source parts, which come from a company which sources materials. Those are all predicated on having a population that can actually eat and live.
It's been said that, at current technology, a nation's military can be as much as 10% of its population before the nation can't keep up and collapses under the strain. That number may be higher with constantly-a
Why (Score:4, Insightful)
Isn't there someone on the deck looking for other ships in the vicinity?
Just saying??
Re:Why (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, without further evidence, it sounds to me more like incompetence than an attack. Why was someone not watching out for any approaching ships, and able to manually take control to avoid them? Reminds me of the old joke about the navy captain and the lighthouse.
Furthermore, while the possibility of GPS spoofing makes sense, if a cyber attack on the boat itself is even possible, then that's a problem. The Internet of Things is a bad idea for toasters and refrigerators; it manages to be an even worse idea for warships.
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Or a radar running continuously and when there is a blip on the screen alerting someone? I would imagine that a rogue sub willing to attack the navy ship is not going to be broadcasting its coordinates...
Paul B.
Re:Why (Score:5, Informative)
Comment removed (Score:4, Informative)
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A lot of ELINT and SIGINT in the area?
Computer issues don't alter the role of people been on duty and having to look around.
A testing phase should have found most computer related work that needed to be corrected.
Re:Why (Score:5, Insightful)
Bull Shit!
It's boring is no excuse.
Get your lazy ass on deck and watch for trouble, or go back to land and fuck off.
Aren't these ships running.... (Score:2)
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Re:Aren't these ships running.... (Score:5, Funny)
They may have been stuck in a forced upgrade to Windows 10, and were in the process of rebooting when the collisions occurred. Could Microsoft have ignored the Navy's desires not to upgrade to Windows 10, i.e., taken the Navy's dismissal as an OK to do so?
"Ready fire control! Bogies off the port bow!"
"I can't, sir. All the screens say 'Hi. We're setting things up for you'".
Other possibilities (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Could it be Larry Ellison? Has his yacht been seen in the vicinity, or is it docked inside his inactive volcano base?
You know what's really chilling and a bold risk? (Score:5, Insightful)
Any military power using anything from Microsoft.
Re: (Score:3)
The problem with INTEGRITY is that there's almost no one left who still knows how to work with it. It's only used in the military anyway, and even there it's been dying out. You can't use people skilled in Linux to work with it, because companies only want to hire people who already are experts at something, so the talent pool is now nearly elderly and retiring. All the young engineers are familiar with Linux so that's what ends up getting used even if it isn't the greatest choice.
I'd say it's a good theory (Score:2)
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Well, I would think it's easier to hack a civilian ship than a warship - so I'd imagine they're considering that possibility as well.
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No no no, it's not hacking the ship itself. That's hard. You hack the wetware, because that's easier.
You cyberattack the crew instead - perhaps sending messages to their phones that their girlfriend is about to break up with them. Or you invent some new addictive game so their eyes ar
If so... (Score:2)
More likely it is lazyness (Score:4, Interesting)
On a big ship no one is relying on GPS alone.
Every ship has a magnetic compass.
A helmsman should realize if the compass heading ans speed versus the GPS position makes any sense.
Then again: during daytime a big civilian (freight!) vessel is like a mountain. It is extremely hard to overlook it.
During night time, the whole deck of big ocean going vessles is illuminated by flood lights.
Unless in fog, IT IS COMPLETELY IMPOSSIBLE TO OVERSEE IT
And then we have radar .... so if the ship got "hacked" the only option are hacked bandanas on the eyes of the watch and a hacked radar system.
The latter would be a story, though.
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It takes some getting used to how giant ships can appear "out of nowhere" in good visibility with an attentive watch.
It is really challenging to navigate through congested areas, even with good equipment. I would expect the navy to have the best procedures, training, and personnel but
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I would expect the navy to have the best procedures, training, and personnel but in several cases lately they have fallen short.
You left out "equipment," and if you only read the headline you'd know that it is one of the suspects.
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I was waiting for the moron to come out and blame Obama, but I was hoping they'd at least have the courage to put their name by it. I guess the "nationalists" haven't got quite that brave yet.
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Let's also remember that accidents do cluster like a lot of events and there is statistical theory that covers it.
No, there's no statistical theory that says accidents or other events tend to cluster. Statistics just says that clusters do happen sometimes. Human intuition (AKA common sense) says that rare random events should always be widely separated in time, but that's because common sense sucks at understanding randomness.
Common sense tells us that if a rare event has just happened, the probability that it's going to happen again is decreased because it just happened. But random events don't work that way. The fa
Definitely not (Score:5, Insightful)
Any nation-state with the ability to hack software that would influence the most powerful warships in the world would not be doing so for farts and giggles over the course of months to cause a few (in the scheme of things) relatively minor collisions during peace time. They would reserve this cyber weapon for use when it really counted. If this was the result of a lone wolf hacker they would have sold this weapon for a huge amount of money to any of the countries that would want them to use against the US when needed, not risking its discovery messing around with it just for fun.
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FWIW there were also reports of ships in the Black Sea being "out of position" for several days. I didn't read of any accidents, but GPS hacking was suspected.
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If some large nation has the ability to confuse US Navy ship navigation for an advantage in a war then would they not want to test it before, you know, having their own navy sunk in an all out war?
If this is the action of a "lone wolf" that wants to sell this to such a powerful nation, to get an advantage in a war, then would they not have to demonstrate it to sell it?
This was something of a tactic used by the USA to remove all doubts of their military and technological capability, they'd show off once, the
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If you're smart enough not to be planning open war with the US, then ramming cargo ships during peace time might be the most damage you could hope to do with it.
I know it sounds smart, "Gosh there is a better use for that, just ask me." But your analysis leaves out numerous obvious considerations. Hacking the navigation of warships during wartime just gets the automatics turned off, and they're navigating manually. During wartime, they're also not navigating close to civilian vessels, or any other vessels,
never attribute to malice that which is incompeten (Score:2, Informative)
does anyone else remember the "flagship US airforce carrier" that, back in the mid 1990s, had to be TOWED into harbour... because it was running Window NT 4.0 systems... which had just crashed across the *entire* ship? and does anyone else remember soldiers running Sony BMG Root-kitted CDs which then illegally sent out a listing of CLASSIFIED FILENAMES OFF TO SONY'S SERVERS?? do we not remember these things??
there is a *really good reason* why the NSA refuses to permit windows systems on its premises. why
Re:never attribute to malice that which is incompe (Score:4, Informative)
It's a shame that you only remember the rumors and myths instead of finding out the facts. The aircraft carrier you're referring to is the USS Yorktown, which did suffer computer-related problems around 1997. But if the problem was just that the OS crashed, they could have just rebooted the damn thing!
The actual problem was a crew member entered a 0 into a field in a network database, causing all of the software using the database to fail after attempting to divide by 0. The ship was dead in the water for under three hours and returned to port under its own power.
In other words, this was a problem with the software running the ship, not the OS! Considering that most bugs are in the software running on the OS and not the OS itself, this should not be a surprise.
dom
Re: (Score:2)
You're thinking of a different incident.
It was a battleship, not a carrier.
And yes, it did indeed require towage back to port.
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You're thinking of a different incident.
It was a battleship, not a carrier.
No, the USS Yorktown, CG-48, is a Ticonderoga-class cruiser. The US doesn't have any battleships in service, and didn't in 1997 when the incident occurred. The previous USS Yorktown, CV-10, was an Essex-class carrier, which is probably the source of the confusion about CV-48's ship type.
And yes, it did indeed require towage back to port.
So claims Government Computer News. According to Atlantic Fleet, the captain and the contractor who was the source of the GCN story, it did not. The contractor said the reporter altered his statements.
https://en.wikipedia.
Re: (Score:2)
WannaCry now?
Re: (Score:3)
a crew member entered a 0 into a field in a network database
The first time the Navy has had a ship disabled by a zero [navalofficer.com.au] since WWII.
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... running an OS that's been cost-shaved by a company that REFUSES TO LET ITS SECURITY TEAM MAKE CRITICAL CHANGES because the Security Director is told, every single fucking time "your proposed security improvement will cost us money. get lost and come back when you have a quotes security quotes fix that actually makes us some money".
...
Not off-topic here...
That is what I think of every time I boot into Windows 8.1, which insists on telling me that I am exposing myself to danger (my fault) if I turn off the Microsoft-written and integrated "Windows Virus Defender" (or whatever it's called) from scanning and updating whenever it feels like doing so.
I mean, really... Come on... The "antivirus protection" comes WITH the OS that I installed, and was written by the same company! It's basically a tacit admission that "we write bug-riddled cod
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does anyone else remember the "flagship US airforce carrier"
Wow, the Air Force has carriers now? I'll bet the Navy is really pissed about that.
Wait, I've seen this movie before (Score:3)
This sounds like the basic plot from a half-dozen or so of the James Bond movies.
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Yeah, right (Score:2)
It's pretty tough to "hack" the sonar shack and operator. I suppose you might foul up communication between sonar and the bridge, but the Navy has a backup for that, too, including runners if necessary. And BTW, do they still have voice-powered phones on board?
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"Updated: May 9, 2017" (Score:2)
Early Monday, Indeed.
The fishing vessel with no working GPS or radio, hit the navy ship mid port side. Oo
Suspicions from whom? (Score:2)
There's absolutely no evidence there was a cyber-attack.
All we've had is a bunch of people speculating "cyber-attack" because it's a popular topic right now.
The Navy isn't denying because they haven't finished investigating the accident and don't want to start publicly ruling things out. Maybe it will turn out to be a cyber-attack, but the currently available information is completely consistent with a dozen other scenarios that have nothing to do with a cyber attack.
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The Navy isn't denying because they haven't finished investigating the accident and don't want to start publicly ruling things out.
The military isn't the DMV, so that analysis falls short. Even after they finish an investigation, what they say to the public will be whatever they think is to the military benefit of the United States; they have no requirement to communicate openly or to hold public meetings, and they have no institutional theories telling them to be open and honest with information.
Have you ever heard that carrots improve night vision? I did, all through school. Why? Was it because of science? No, it was because the mili
So let me get this straight (Score:5, Insightful)
A foreign state actor hacked into a US Naval Destroyer and with precision knocked out the steering to the ship at a critical moment where by it couldn't maneuver and was rammed by merchant vessel. And then moments later restored the steering to a working condition. Is that it? Do I have it right?
As opposed to some mechanical/electrical malfunction happening at a critical moment causing said accident and the systems being manually reset after the fact.
Yeah, right. Anyone who has ever worked with complex mechanical/electrical equipment knows that shit happens and that you don't need external actors to screw things up for you. And that goes without saying that the tropics are not an area that is conducive to nice, neat operations of equipment (consider the British destroyers that can't operate in the warm waters of the Middle East)
So may I present exhibit "A". It's this sharp piece of metal in the form of a razor. Once owned by a chap named Occam.
Re: (Score:2)
A foreign state actor hacked into a US Naval Destroyer and with precision knocked out the steering to the ship at a critical moment where by it couldn't maneuver and was rammed by merchant vessel. And then moments later restored the steering to a working condition. Is that it? Do I have it right?
No, but if you could read you'd know that no technical details are being discussed, only high level causality. Only an idiot would even be willing to make an exclusive list of potential exploit types, much less narrow it down one weak theory to use as a straw man.
If you apply Occam's Razor, the explanation that accounts for everything you said with the least assumptions is that you're ignorant of the details, and yet you jumped to conclusions anyways. It seems to actually account for it without any assumpti
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A foreign state actor hacked into a US Naval Destroyer and with precision knocked out the steering to the ship at a critical moment where by it couldn't maneuver and was rammed by merchant vessel. And then moments later restored the steering to a working condition. Is that it? Do I have it right?
No, but if you could read you'd know that no technical details are being discussed, only high level causality.
It was reported elsewhere earlier to day that the steering was lost and then regained.
Huh (Score:2)
I take naming rights for the malware
Cockup not conspiracy (Score:3)
Should four collisions in the same geographical area be chalked up to coincidence? Could a military vessel be hacked?
Coincidence? No.
Could the boats have been hacked? yes - but it's incredibly unlikely.
What other possibilities are there? The 99% reason is stupidity. Either some idiot doesn't know how to drive a boat ( x4) or the standard naval tactics to "dominate" any given situation have been taken to extremes - beyond the capabilities of the people and equipment in use.
Exhaustion (Score:5, Interesting)
There is a culture of overwork that results in severe sleep deprivation in the US Navy, and many people standing watch are impaired at an equivalent level to beign legally drunk. It's been the confirmed cause of other incidents before, and it seems a far more likely explanation than cyber attacks. Unfortunately, the Navy does not appear to be doing much to solve the problem.
Re:Exhaustion (Score:5, Insightful)
Ding! Ding! Ding!
We have a winner. I don't give a damn about any stupid GPS spoofing, you don't run ships into each other unless the crew is so absurdly tired that they're literally sleeping on watch.
This is well known, and a cultural issue through all the services, especially more recently. It has nothing to do with funding or politics or any other bullshit.
Bad Link (Score:2)
The first link in the Slashdot description is to a story about an incident from May (the wrong collision).
Unblocked porn sites/unlimited bandwidth (Score:2)
All a hacker would have to do is hijack the ship's wifi, and provide unlimited bandwidth to unblocked porn sites.
It's the only explanation for nobody noticing those huge cargo ships...
Fairy tale vs Sea Story ... (Score:2)
A fairy tale starts with. "Once upon a time."
A sea story starts with, "Hey, this ain't no shit."
So hey ... this ain't no shit from a 9-year naval vet:
Naval ships have collision warning systems.
There's a "ding, ding, ding" to alert crew.
That's when eyeballs gather around radar, and secret guy stuff.
Also, the watch scans the horizon with binoculars.
If collision systems are "frozen" or spoofed, it could be a "drunk walk" algorithm that increases the probability of a collision.
My shipmates were never comfortabl
Chain of Command (Score:3, Funny)
The buck stops at one of the 16 White House staff members who have been fired. But it definitely doesn't stop at the top. Trump's Navy has the most spectacular crashes. Big, beautiful crashes that we can all be proud of.
If you can't stand the heat, stay off the golf course.
Bad bug most likely in radar /navigation system. (Score:2)
My bet is on the navigation system/ radar system has a bug in which big ship under the right conditions just disappears from radar or the navigation system incorrectly plots the other ships vector.
can we stike North Korea back or will be seen as (Score:2)
can we strike North Korea back or will be seen as an 1st strike and chain be forced to help nk?
Easy to diagnose. (Score:2)
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Except that INS need to be recalibrated ever so often, and the rougher the conditions, the more frequently it has to be recalibrated. So you never rely on INS for your primary navigation system either.
Not invented here culture plus carelessness (Score:2)
My guess is that while the combat systems on these ships are awesome and they're probably also capable of awesome electronic navigation, but some kind of "not the Navy Way" mindset causes them to do things the old fashioned way and not rely on modern navigation systems when they're not feeling vulnerable.
The combat radars are turned off and the information sections are probably lightly staffed at 3 AM in friendly waters. The rest of the crew is doing business as usual and navigating the old fashioned way
Cyberattack? (Score:4, Insightful)
"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity"
These are warships, supposedly capable of detecting supersonic enemy planes on attack vectors as well as missiles, hundred of miles away and they are unable to detect a fucking container-ship as big as a skyscraper 50 yards away?
There is some weird stuff going on (Score:2)
Here is a related article from one of the other collisions: http://www.reuters.com/article... [reuters.com]
q[... the ship's commanding officer, executive officer and master chief, would be removed from the vessel because "we've lost trust and confidence in their ability to lead."]
Hmm, maybe the sailors were in a rush (Score:2)
This is Singapore and there's a lot of "activities" that sailors can partake in. They totally want some of those famous chili crabs and barley drinks. Maybe a walk along Orchard Road before taking in the bountiful and beautiful views from Orchard Tower.
Coincidence (Score:2)
Twice is coincidence.
The third time itâ(TM)s enemy action.
- Goldfinger
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The spending cuts didn't help, but the odds of a mid sea T-bone collision are extremely low to start with. There is clearly guidance (probably spoofed GPS) to line up these big tankers on a collision course and some form of electronic warfare to blind the naval ships radar to the approaching cargo ships.
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Military ships work off of separate encrypted GPS signals. So yes, one could spoof just the commercial signals, just the military signals, or both to create the collision conditions.
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"The accuracy of the GPS signal is identical for both the civilian GPS service (SPS) and the military GPS service (PPS). Civilian SPS broadcasts on only one frequency 1575.42 MHz, while military PPS uses two 1575.42 MHz and 1227.60 MHz."
"Once upon a time, the unencrypted signal included a random error factor that would make the civilian GPS randomly wrong in a different direction each day. I believe it started with errors up to 400 meters, which was still plenty accurate for general ocean navigation. The po
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Well, yes, and no.. The higher chipping frequency of the P(Y) code (the military signal) makes it more resistant to jamming. Also, being able to decode both signals allows the receiver to calculate the density of the ionosphere, and thus be far more accurate. The biggest source of error is signal delay induced by the (variable) ionosphere. This delay is partially dependent on frequency, so by measuring the delta between the civilian and military signals, you can thus factor the ionosphere out. It's a really
Re:A better theory (Score:5, Interesting)
Sort of.
Navy funds have generally been more available for new ship construction with training and operations spending coming under financial stress in recent years. This makes administrations look good, and politicians of all stripes love the shipbuilding financial spending that flows into a great many districts. Yet it can leave operational readiness stretched.
Add the gender integration of the service. For whatever reason (likely a high operational tempo and longer deployments by the USN compared to some navies) a significant number of deployed female naval personnel are becoming pregnant; in 2016, 16/100 female sailors deployed had to be transferred back to shore. No one wants to talk about this, understandably so, as there are no easy answers.
There is no additional funding for this; it cost the Navy $110m last year, and places huge stresses on those remaining -- both male and female -- who often have to step in without adequate backup and training. Even simply providing additional funding won't magically solve the problem, as a loss rate of 16/100 is quite high, and it can occur somewhat unpredictably, hitting certain commands harder.
It's speculation but I'd guess that many collisions are down to watchkeeping errors and/or one or more people falling asleep on watch. Terrible, but possibly comprehensible given the stresses many crews are under.
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Seriously! Moar military spending is the solution to, well... pretty much everything, or so I've been told.
To be fair it's about as credible as:
Seriously! Moar (sic) social spending is the solution to, well... pretty much everything, or so I've been told.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
If any vehicle was hacked here, it was the tanker. While GPS jamming/spoofing is possible, getting it to reroute into a specific other ship is not an easy hack.
Re:A better theory (Score:4, Informative)
Except that the merchant ships were in a TSS, and the destroyer apparently tried to cross behind one cargo ship, ahead of another, and got hit by the third, that had been obstructed by the first cargo ship.
The Fitzgerald also ran across a TSS
Re:A better theory (Score:5, Informative)
Here's a reference video of the AIS tracks for the cargo vessels, collision handles shortly after the 50s mark.
.
https://youtu.be/vlrA36GzHNs [youtu.be]
Alnic MC is in a cluster of ships together with Team Oslo, Guang Zhou, Hyundai Global and a bit behind them was the Long Hu San
Observe the evasive maneuver that first the Guang Zhou undertakes, and then the sharp turn to port the Alnic MC tries to perform, to avoid the collision.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
That's a really sharp left turn at 0:55. ;-)
Can a tanker do that, or is this a clue the AIS might have been on something smaller?
( Which would indicate a deliberate attack. )
Or more likely, the navy 'helped' the ship with the turn
The navy really should publish a video with their track along with these.
For unfortunately, all these collisions.
It's hard to understand how the navy's lookouts for visual, ais, and radar could have not seen this.
This should not be a human fatigue issue.
If they were
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Modern cargo ships can do fairly sharp emergency turns, but it was also helped by the destroyer. Fortunately for the McCain, the cargo ship was ballasted, so not running full cargo, and it was going fairly slowly(around 9-10kts only, IIRC).
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The warship was hit on the port side, which is a strong indication it had the right of way.
Actually it is a strong indicator that the warship had no right of way.
The trade vessels are in a "sea water street". That is either an imaginary "road" in the water or a "road" that is marked with buoys.
The traffic in the sea water street has priority and right of way. As the war ship was hit in the side, it obviously crossed said street. And hence had the duty to give way to any other vessel in the street.
But that
Re: A better theory (Score:2)
There is no "right-of-way" on the water. Either you are the give-way vessel, or the stand on. It is entirely possible for both vessels to be give-way. If the tanker was confined to its lane due to the local traffic scheme, then by definition it is the stand-on vessel, as its maneuvering is constrained. If you are the stand on vessel, you are actually not supposed to change course or speed so as to be predictable to the other vessel. Of course if there is a chance of imminent collision, you do what you can.
A
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There is no "right-of-way" on the water.
Are we nitpicking again?
What is the difference between "right of way" and "stand-on vessel"?
For a layman there is none ... and actually as I have a diploma in nautics, I really wonder at what you are aiming, because for me there is none, too.
Anyhow, if the warship in question was crossing a charted traffic scheme, it is by definition at fault. .... it is an american war ship ... cough, cough.
Correct. But on the other hand
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A stand-on vessel that treats it as being right-of-way can still be given the lion's share of blame in the case of a collision, for failing to undertake evasive maneuvers, or for violating other parts of Colreg. In this case, the McCain was nominally the stand-on, but they were crossing a TSS in an unsafe manner, while the cargo ship was in the TSS lane, the JSM will most likely be given the majority of the blame. Despite nominally being the stand-on. If stand-on equalled right of way, the JSM wouldn't even
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Once is a tragedy.
Twice is a coincidence.
Thrice is an attack....
...It is clear that there is some form of electronic warfare
I don't think that anything is "clear" at this point, but in place of your (what I assume is a quote) I suggest Hanlon's razor: "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity". I can't imagine the level of sophistication it would take to get two vessels to run into each other. Negligence seems like a far more likely explanation. But as I said, nothing is clear at this point.
Re: (Score:2)
I suggest Hanlon's razor: "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity". I can't imagine the level of sophistication it would take to get two vessels to run into each other.
OK, you can't imagine what the technical details would be, that means you're not going to be able to measure the adequacy required for it have likely been stupidity.
Applying Hanlon's Razor to your comment, it is more likely that you just didn't understand Hanlon's Razor than that you intentionally impersonated an idiot.
Re: (Score:2)
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