Hacked Crosswalks In Bay Area Play Deepfake-Style Messages From Tech Billionaires 36
Several crosswalk buttons in Palo Alto and nearby cities were hacked over the weekend to play deepfake-style satirical audio clips mimicking Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg. Authorities have disabled the altered systems, but the identity of the prankster remains unknown. SFGATE reports: Videos of the altered crosswalks began circulating on social media throughout Saturday and Sunday. [...] A city employee was the first to report an issue with one of the signals at University Avenue and High Street in downtown Palo Alto, Horrigan-Taylor told SFGATE via email. Officials later discovered that as many as 12 intersections in downtown Palo Alto had been affected.
"The impact is isolated," Horrigan-Taylor said. "Signal operations are otherwise unaffected, and motorists are reminded to always exercise caution around pedestrians." Officials told the outlet they've removed any devices that were tampered with and the compromised voice-over systems have since been disabled, with footage obtained by SFGATE showing several were covered in caution tape, blinking constantly and unpressable.
"The impact is isolated," Horrigan-Taylor said. "Signal operations are otherwise unaffected, and motorists are reminded to always exercise caution around pedestrians." Officials told the outlet they've removed any devices that were tampered with and the compromised voice-over systems have since been disabled, with footage obtained by SFGATE showing several were covered in caution tape, blinking constantly and unpressable.
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That's not true. Elon has long been considered a troll who says odd things just to mess with minds.
Re: They loved Elon Musk (Score:5, Insightful)
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Used to be, though, that when someone pointed out online what a whack job he was, as many people who defend him as agree. Now, not so much. It's dog pile on the rich guy.
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a troll who says odd things just to mess with minds.
Our crosswalk buttons say "Wait" when pushed before the signal change. Which I'm sure our town hobos consider having their minds messed with. Because they just walk anyway.
Re: They loved Elon Musk (Score:2, Insightful)
Yes, because group think is totally a thing in the SF bay area, one of the most diverse places on earth.
Also, Musk used to keep much of his misguided political beliefs to himself. He didn't come out as a nazi until recent years. A lot of people from a variety of backgrounds find that objectionable.
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What he says and does isn't tolerable. It's pretty simple.
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They often have a Main Street, but it's often not a main street.
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And they renamed Main Street 80 years ago!
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Trees. It's street after street named after tree after tree
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Fun fact, 2nd street is the most common street name in the US, because so many towns took their 1st street and renamed them Main street.
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I thought you'd have Maine St to go along with Ohio Lane and Nebraska Way.
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Is that really a street name in Palo Alto or have the brits invaded?
Yes. I walked past it last week when walking down University Ave.
If the Brits had invaded.... (Score:3)
Re: high street? (Score:2)
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He also declared us all female, how woke of him
Re: high street? (Score:2)
Yea, why not something more American sounding like Rough and Ready Rd. in nearby San Jose?
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Well, in some of the most expensive zip codes in the USA, just a few miles away is the "avenue of the fleas" (Alameda de las Pulgas)
GREAT! Do more! (Score:1)
I'm frankly surprised some mayor hasn't been bribed into selling ad time on the things long ago!
"Brought to by Carl Jr" or "Brawndo the thirst mutilator"
This is the kind of fun that should be encouraged as long as it's responsibly done; such as a timeout self-restoration and not disabling functionality. Somebody should make a tool that makes it easy so they can be updated by many people but never in too bad of a way... so it only stays about 1 week. It can also retain some functionality too. I'm sure the
Re: GREAT! Do more! (Score:2)
That's because we still have laws on the books to prevent this sort of grift, and courts to enforce them. Except for POTUS, who are now kings, and can dispense with the law.
Re: GREAT! Do more! (Score:2)
Re: GREAT! Do more! (Score:3)
It's not just blind people who need to press buttons to cross the street. Many intersections in Cali are made for cars, and don't go green/white for pedestrians unless pressed. Though probably not the ones in downtown Palo Alto. Been a while since I set foot there. But this has nothing to do with the grift of selling ads at signal. DMV wanted to do this with electronic license plates. There was pushback.
Re: GREAT! Do more! (Score:2)
In not securing these devices, they are putting vulnerable people at risk.
Re: GREAT! Do more! (Score:2)
Per the article, the call buttons were non-responsive, so the functionality was diminished for everyone.
The Future Is Now (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The Future Is Now (Score:5, Informative)
Not really. It's actually quite easy when you learn how to do it.
Basically all the fancy sidewalk push buttons (the talking ones that speak to you when you push them or say stuff) is made by Polara. The buttons themselves are Bluetooth enabled (I think it's BLE) to allow for in-field configuration of each button.
You can download the Polara app from the App Store or Play Store, and you can easily scan an intersection nearby for the state of all the buttons - the name of the button, whether it's been pushed or not, etc. However, to configure it requires knowing the password to them, and therein lies the rub - some places have poor password policies and thus can be easily guessed. (You have to remember there may be hundreds of these things in the field, so they all likely have the same password). From there you can configure basically their behavior - you can have them say "Wait" when you push them, or they can stay the intersection and direction (First and Main North traveling East), a countdown when the "Don't Walk" is going to stop flashing, etc. They're all configuration options.
The files these buttons speak is basically a custom audio file - there are a bunch of defaults for things like "Wait" and the countdown (which is why they sound alike), but you can record your own sounds and have them play as well.
The system supports multi-lingual speech - if you press and hold the button, it will play the alternate language file if it was programmed with one. Usually this is what people mess with as it doesn't affect normal operation of the buttons, few people know you can press and hold the button for alternate languages, and thus your customization is likely to hang around for a long while amusing passers-by who know the secret. If you program the normal audio files then anyone using the intersection will know. So yes, when you go out on a walk and come across the button, try activating the alternate language to see if someone has hacked it and wonder how long it's been hiding in there
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Why do sidewalk push buttons have all these "features"?
Re: The Future Is Now (Score:2)
Because someone needed them, even if you don't.
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Epic (Score:2)
Epic hack!
Better look for some MIT or CalTech students hanging around somewhere in silly can valley.