!That’s why the Trump administration’s Signalgate blunder was all anyone could talk about on news shows and social media, in workplaces, even in schools, said New York University psychology professor Tessa West.
Even West’s 11-year-old son came home from school Monday and confessed that he, too, had once added the wrong person to a group chat. “Mommy I did that, I did exactly what those Trump people did,” he told her.
“For 11-year-old boys, this is the most relatable thing that the Trump administration has done, which just shows you just how ubiquitous this experience is from Slack channels to group chats,” West said. “We’ve all done this.”!<
What a trash article. It reads like propaganda. This kind of reporting is frustrating. Framing a serious security breach—like the Trump administration's Signal group chat blunder—as relatable because “even an 11-year-old has done it” feels disingenuous at best. Using a child’s anecdote to soften the impact of a significant government mistake trivializes the issue and distracts from the consequences of the breach.
We’re not talking about accidentally texting the wrong person in a school group chat. We’re talking about high-level officials mistakenly including someone in a discussion tied to sensitive military operations. That’s not “relatable”—that’s a failure in operational security, and it deserves scrutiny, not spin.
Can we fucking not add “-gate” to the end of everything that happens? It’s so overused that it diminishes the importance of actually-dangerous events like this one.
A few friends of mine used to have a sms-based group chat we used for many years. One of those friends kept losing phones and getting new numbers. At some point one of his older numbers texted something to the tune of "what the fuck is this, why are you texting me?!". It turns out the old number had been reassigned.
This article goes to great lengths to make it appear as if something hugely important really isn’t that big a deal. No, it’s not “relatable”. No, it isn’t “something we’ve all done”. This is treason.
They broke countless laws, protocols, and regulations that were put in place for good reason, by people who were clearly much more careful and intelligent than them. Still, even these stupid, arrogant assholes should have known better.
I will never read this MAGA apologist garbage again.
I actually feel like this wasn't an accident and he invited him on purpose to expose this scandal as his position is a National Security Advisor and what they are doing is outrageous from security standpoint.
All media concentrated on that a journalist was present in the chat, when the real issue is them using Signal on personal phones to communicate sensitive information.
We haven't all chosen to use an insecure app for sensitive military operations to avoid foia requests to hide future treason charges and then screwed up a text message.
Just to clarify, signal is open source and it's code has been vetted by cryptography experts. The signal protocol is secure, it's the user who screwed up.
Now that doesn't excuse the illegal action of using the app to avoid foia requests, but the app and it's protocol were not the failing here.
My understanding is that it auto deletes after a short set time. I'm not saying signal is a failure of an app for personal use, I'm saying choosing it for this purpose is a fail.
Totally relatable, I often create group chats about conducting air strikes on foreign countries for me and my colleagues, it's just so easy and efficient. I once almost invited someone from our HOA to it, but I luckily spotted her immediately and removed her again. No worries.
I'm not the first guy who fell in love with a girl he met in a restaurant...
who then turned out to be the daughter of a kidnapped scientist...
only to lose her to her childhood lover...
who she'd last seen on a deserted island...
and who turned out, 15 years later, to be the leader of the French underground.
It is relatable when it's your friends and family. When it's your work, especially secure work, there are no excuses. It's why organizations hire specialists to manage this sort of thing.
I don’t think we’ve all shared details of classified military operations in real time actually, that’s pretty much just a US government official thing.
I'm sure my company's policies are nothing special and lots of companies have similar policies. I'm not allowed to do anything work related on my personal devices, only on the company issued and managed laptop and only through the company VPN. I'm also not allowed to discuss internal information on whatever app I want, just on company approved software, which is managed by the company's IT team. All software or other type of 3rd party used in the company has to first go through infosec approval.
This is a standard tech company not working on anything particularly sensitive for anyone other than potential competition and maybe shareholders. Definitely not anything involving national security.
So no, not relatable. This is how people get fired.
There was a work chat where people would joke and vent and bitch and complain. Only the lowest level employees were invited. One of my coworkers invited one of the higher ranking employees and all the fun had to stop.
How relatable. He who hasn't ever accidentally shared classified information about military strikes with a random journalist using a commercial chat app on a private phone, let him first cast a stone at them.
(Signal isn't a commercial app. It's free as in freedom, free as in beer, and free as in "there's no data kept on you to possibly sell". The Signal Foundation is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, and the Signal app's development and running costs are funded through the Signal Foundation. Please stop using this "commercial app" line.)
That's still commercial. You looked all that up and neglected the definition of commercial and commerce. Non-profits can be commercial and they also might not be, this one however is actually involved in commerce.
I have definitely never sent a text or Signal message to the wrong person or group as well. It's actually not hard to simply look at the recipient(s) before you compose a message. You even have the opportunity to double-check the message recipient(s) before you hit Send.
I'm gonna be an age-bigot for a moment and say this is mostly a problem for Boomers and Zoomers.
Agreed. I'm in my 40's, and in my life I couldn't do anything wrong. When I was five, I took batteries from a Blockbuster on accident and cried until I returned them in fear of doing something wrong. I can't understand the idea of not being blunt/honest and spending the extra time to deceive anyone.
Except my chats are not subject to public records act laws for oversight and public information, so if I choose to keep them off record it's not illegal.
umm, no. I use work chats for work, and personal chats for personal. I might accidentally add the wrong colleague to a work chat, or wrong friend to a personal chat, but I'm never going to accidentally add a friend to a work chat because I don't mix work and personal chats.
I did once send a message to the childminder parents group that was meant for my wife. It referenced a porn movie series we watched, called Oil Overload, for which the new one had just come out. I think the message read something like 'OIL OVERLOAD 14!!! YEEHA'. No one mentioned it, but I'm sure they knew.