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Dial 00000000 To Blow Up the World

Posted by timothy on from the your-public-servants dept.

Charliemopps writes "For 20 years the password for the U.S. nuclear arsenal was '00000000.' Kennedy instituted a security system on all nuclear warheads to prevent them from being armed by someone unauthorized. It was called PAL, and promised to secure the entire US arsenal around the world. Unfortunately for Kennedy (and I guess, the whole world) U.S. military leadership was more concerned about delaying a launch than securing Armageddon. They technically obeyed the order but then set the password to 8 Zeros, or '00000000'."

53 of 306 comments (clear)

  1. Illusion shattered by Rosco+P.+Coltrane · · Score: 5, Funny

    You mean to tell me, when WOPR was busy looking for the launch code in Wargames, it was all a bunch of crap?

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    1. Re:Illusion shattered by DarkOx · · Score: 3, Funny

      Never, because bank card PINs are usually 4-digits

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    2. Re:Illusion shattered by DNS-and-BIND · · Score: 2

      00000000 is just as random as any other code. My grandfather used to play 1-2-3-4-5-6 in the lottery, and when someone would point out that that number would never come up, he'd gleefully educate that person on probability.

      Besides, the code that WOPR was trying to crack was a 12-digit alphanumeric string of the style JPE-1704-TKS.

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    3. Re:Illusion shattered by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Off-topic, but note that playing an easily remembered set of numbers (not just 1-2-3-4-5-6, any set of numbers that you'll recognize) is bad for several reasons. One reason is that numbers which are special to you have a high probability of being special to someone else. The expected result of playing those numbers in a lottery is therefore lower than for other numbers. There are probably hundreds if not thousands of smartasses like your grandfather with whom he would have had to split the jackpot in case those numbers came up. Another important reason is that, however unlikely it is to have your special numbers come up, it is not impossible. When they do come up and just that time you didn't play, you'll kick your own arse for the rest of your life. This risk is a strong motivation to keep playing, which can lead to gambling addiction. So to lower your risk of getting addicted to gambling, don't ever bet on the same numbers.

    4. Re:Illusion shattered by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

      00000000 is just as random as any other code. My grandfather used to play 1-2-3-4-5-6 in the lottery, and when someone would point out that that number would never come up, he'd gleefully educate that person on probability.

      A pity that those numbers never came; then he and thousands of other "I understand probability" blowhards might have actually learned something. The object in the lottery is not just to pick the winning numbers, but also to share the jackpot with as few others as possible. 1-2-3-4-5-6 is, in fact, the worst possible choice.

    5. Re:Illusion shattered by mrclisdue · · Score: 4, Funny

      ...as few others as possible. 1-2-3-4-5-6 is, in fact, the worst possible choice...

      That's why I always play 6-5-4-3-2-1, instead.

      I'm gonna be rich! Rich! Rich!!!!

      suckers,

    6. Re: Illusion shattered by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      Punctuation Nazi wants to say that that is a hyphen. Even on systems supporting various typographical dashes (slashdot doesn't), a hyphen would be used for "4-digit" or "four-digit".

      But you are right in that no hyphen or dash should have been used by the GP.

    7. Re:Illusion shattered by nospam007 · · Score: 2

      "If those numbers had come up, they would not have learned anything. "

      They would have learned that another 3,945,432 idiots were playing 1,2,3,4,5,6.

    8. Re:Illusion shattered by Culture20 · · Score: 2

      The object in the lottery is not just to pick the winning numbers, but also to share the jackpot with as few others as possible. 1-2-3-4-5-6 is, in fact, the worst possible choice.

      That's why you buy 100,000 tickets marked 1-2-3-4-5-6 every lottery. When it finally pays out, you'll get half of the winnings.

    9. Re:Illusion shattered by John+Allsup · · Score: 3, Informative

      The best example to be aware of in the UK Lotto, referred to here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/240734.stm

      "The remarkable draw on 14 November 1995 when 133 tickets shared the £16 million jackpot prize is a clear example of the effects the team had deduced.

      The winning numbers were 7, 17, 23, 32, 38, 42 and 48, all of which lie in central columns of the ticket, and the players won only £120,000 each. The average number of jackpot winners is five and the average amount won is £2 million."

      This illustrates the difference picking common combinations can make.  Once a presenter told you how much you'd win if you did the 1-2-3-4-5-6 thing: only a few thousand!  (While only a small minority have this 'clever' thought, it's enough to elevate the number of entries with 1-2-3-4-5-6 to significantly more than a typical combination.)

      --
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    10. Re:Illusion shattered by hey! · · Score: 5, Insightful

      This is an example of "begging the question". "Randomness" is not a property of a number, it is a property of a sequence.

      This sounds like splitting hairs, but it actually makes a lot of confusing things clearer if instead of asking "Is this number random?" you ask "Was this number produced by a process that generates a random sequence?"

      Lets take the example of a combination. "0000000" is just as random as "3115435", but "0000000" was generated by a process which spits out easily keyed-in, easy-for-humans-to-remember numbers. In other words it's generated by a process that is biased towards spitting out numbers like "0000000" and "1234567".

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    11. Re:Illusion shattered by rapiddescent · · Score: 3, Informative

      The EMV (ISO/IEC 7816-3) standard allows for a change PIN function that will take a 6 digit PIN. Some banks around the world operate with a 6-digit PIN.

    12. Re: Illusion shattered by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

      Thus proving that there is no party like a Nazi party.

    13. Re: Illusion shattered by SpaghettiPattern · · Score: 2

      So your grandfather was basically messing with simpleton brains. He must have been a character and I for one would probably have appreciated his conversation.

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    14. Re:Illusion shattered by AK+Marc · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I had some serious trouble when traveling once, and I ended up at an ATM that required a 6-digit PIN. I only had a 4-digit PIN. I tried twice, with leading or trailing 0, but neither worked.

      --
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    15. Re:Illusion shattered by runeghost · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You're neglecting to take into account the monetary value of being able to suspend your disbelief and imagine for a little while that your entire life won't be a miserable living hell of poverty. That's true for far more people in the United States than anyone is comfortable admitting. http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2013/11/05/2890091/wage-income-data/?utm_medium=referral&utm_source=pulsenews

    16. Re:Illusion shattered by Ralph+Wiggam · · Score: 2

      The generals using 00000000 was not dumb at all. The civilian leadership demanded that they create a launch code to take control away from the generals and make sure that nobody could go rogue (Jack D. Ripper style). The generals were terrified that a Soviet sneak attack could kill all of those civilians and leave the Air Force unable to retaliate against the dirty Reds. Using a non-secret code complied with the letter of the order while still keeping the control that they wanted. I'm actually impressed that they managed to hide it from the civilian leadership for so many years.

  2. I always knew by UberVegeta · · Score: 5, Funny

    that sending Snake all the way back to the blast furnance and that freezing warehouse to change the shape of the PAL override shape-memory alloy key was a waste of time. Damn it, Kojima!

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  3. When it comes to Nuclear Weapons by bobthesungeek76036 · · Score: 2

    I guess ease-of-use trumps security...

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    1. Re:When it comes to Nuclear Weapons by Ultracrepidarian · · Score: 5, Funny

      Access to the big red button should be restricted to those who can pronounce nuclear.

  4. Thankfully.. by sjwt · · Score: 5, Funny

    Thankfully this would not happen today, as after adding a captcha it is now totally undecipherable by man or machine.

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  5. Code zero zero zero. Destruct. Zero. by garlicbready · · Score: 4, Funny

    who set the code for this thing shatner?

    Code zero zero zero. Destruct. Zero.

  6. Obligatory by jones_supa · · Score: 5, Funny

    That's the combination for my luggage!

    1. Re:Obligatory by lars_boegild_thomsen · · Score: 2

      I am not sure it's wise to admit that in public these days. Someone might assume you've had a hidden agenda for obtaining launch codes.

    2. Re:Obligatory by Zocalo · · Score: 2

      Might as well post the other traditional obligatory here too. After all, we all know that the launch code isn't the most important field any more!

      --
      UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
  7. Star Trek world more secure by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The final password spoken by Kirk to the computer for destruction of The Enterprise in Wrath of Khan, and also in one of the original series' episodes, is something similar like:

    000DESTRUCT0

    But even ST had THREE passwords - one each for Captain, Chief Engineer and Second in Command.

  8. Re:Dial "1" for a Brand New World by alphatel · · Score: 5, Funny

    You mean to tell me, when WOPR was busy looking for the launch code in Wargames, it was all a bunch of crap?

    They forgot to tell you that if you dial "1" you get a brand new world.

    Actually the password might have been eight zeros, but you have to dial a 1 + area code to get the outside nuclear line.

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  9. Roman-proof by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Good thinking! If the Romans invade, they'll never be able to launch the missiles.

  10. 00000000 just as secure as 73618357 by mowchine · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I saw some idiot claim that people just do not understand probability theory and state that in effect 00000000 is just as secure as 737474757. I would call him ignorant of hacking. What does one start with when cracking password protected systems? . . . a dictionary of common crap people use, like "000000000", "1111111111", "101010101010", "007007007007".

    1. Re:00000000 just as secure as 73618357 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      00000000 is so unsafe. It would be ten times better to use 000000000.

    2. Re:00000000 just as secure as 73618357 by drinkypoo · · Score: 2

      Maybe it is. Seriously, imagine that you have just broken into a missile launch complex and are trying to guess the combo. Would 00000000 really be one of the first you would try?

      Since this isn't news (and we've discussed it here before) yes, yes I would try all zeroes. I'd also try all ones, 1-whatever, whatever-1, 0-whatever, etc. on the assumption that whoever initially implemented the password knew as much about security as you do, and due to the vagaries of government contracts it was never changed.

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    3. Re: 00000000 just as secure as 73618357 by D'Arque+Bishop · · Score: 4, Funny

      At one place I worked, the marketing director had arrived at work, but had forgotten her alarm code. So, she typed in "123456". The system seemingly disarmed, and she went to her office.

      Very shortly after, the police arrived. What she didn't know was that criminals trying that code first was so common that the alarm company dispatched police immediately when it was used, figuring that someone using it was trying to break in. Needless to say she was more than a little upset after everything was straightened out... ;-)

  11. Well... ya by Sycraft-fu · · Score: 5, Interesting

    In particular because there is no central computer control. The military has always been real big about having humans in the chain, which is why this code isn't a big deal. It still required the two guys in the silos to turn their keys. There isn't any "OMG we hax the missiles!" shit that can go on. At the end of the day, only the operators in the silos can trigger a launch, it isn't on a network.

    Same general deal in planes and so on. Like when a modern bombing mission is conducted, all the stuff is uploaded in to the computers beforehand, flight plan, targeting data, all that. The pilot is told on his HUD a countdown to when to release the bombs. Hitting the button doesn't release them either, the plane's computers decide when it is actually best to release. So what does it do? Allows the plane to release. If the pilot doesn't trigger, it can't drop, no matter if it thinks it should. The human is the final deciding factor.

    Maybe the military will change their mind some day as automation increases, but for now they are real, real big on having a human have to be the final factor.

  12. Maybe the Roaches will do better with their chance by VortexCortex · · Score: 4, Funny


    "Welcome to the U.S. nuclear arsenal hotline.
    Please listen carefully as some menu items have changed.
    Para continuar en Espanol marque numero dos.
    ...
    Main menu opti--"

    Oh damn it. I fucking hate theses things.
    Billions blown and I can't get a real human operator on the line?!


    "--mutually assured destruction press 4
    For scheduling nuclear launches press 3
    For prior launch status updates press 2
    To change a nuclear launch code press 1
    To launch all mis--"

    Aargh! Screw it. I know a trick...
    :: repeatedly presses 0 until the end of the world ::

  13. Nowhere near as safe. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

    Mashing the same button can happen because something has fallen on that button.

    Or a cat has walked on the console.

    Or you fell asleep.

    Or a short pulse is generated by a shorting circuit making a 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ... which gets to a count of 8 of them. BOOM!

    Or another code is needed and has a zero and you forgot the count of zeros.

    Even 12345678 would be SAFER because the chance of that randomly happening is really really low.

    1. Re:Nowhere near as safe. by Alex+Pennace · · Score: 2

      Or a short pulse is generated by a shorting circuit making a 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 ... which gets to a count of 8 of them. BOOM!

      This is actually far from hypothetical. Quoting Lee Earnest (http://www.stanford.edu/~learnest/gump.htm):

      In 1960, I somehow was assigned the responsibility of leading a study group to get approval for putting nuclear warheads on the second-generation BOMARC ground-to-air missiles. This involved proving to a government nuclear safety board in Albuquerque, New Mexico, that the probability of accidentally launching a missile on any given day as a result of system malfunctions was less than a certain very small number and that one person couldn't do it by himself. [...]

      The SAGE system used land lines to transmit launch commands to the missile sites and, since these lines were duplexed, a black box at each missile site was set up to detect when the primary line went bad so that it could switch to the backup. However on examination we noticed that if both lines went bad concurrently the system would remain connected to the backup line and the amplifiers would then pick up and amplify whatever noise was there and interpret it as a stream of random bits.

      [...] [a team member] did a Markov analysis to determine the expected time that it would take for a random bit stream to generate a Fire command for one of the missiles. He found that it was a little over two minutes and, when such a command was received, the missile would erect and prepare to launch. However, unless the missile also received a full set of guidance commands during the launch window of about five minutes, it would automatically abort.

      So there it is. Nothing but random noise was all that is needed to erect and ready a nuclear-tipped missile. Although it wouldn't launch, that is probably small comfort to those near these things when they do pop up.

    2. Re:Nowhere near as safe. by __aaltlg1547 · · Score: 2

      In the bad old days of pulse dialing, entering 00000000 would take 10x as long as entering 11111111.

      Maybe they were going for maximum delay.

  14. Re:Illusion restored by akboss · · Score: 2

    666-666-66

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  15. Re:So, this is what Slashdot has become? by Razgorov+Prikazka · · Score: 2

    Oh, and Jimmy Carter once sent his jacket to the dry-cleaner with a paper with the detonation codes still in one of the pockets. Just so you dont have to write a 'news article' on that in the near future...
    I got both pieces of info via QI (Quite interesting), wich is normally considered a quiz, but for the author it is probably a news show...

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  16. A systematic problem by CaptBubba · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The book Command and Control by Eric Schlosser goes into the issues of the cold war control of our nukes in a wonderful way, detailing just how messed up our control of nukes was and how we are damn lucky that we didn't have an accidental nuclear detonation at some point (there were plenty of accidental conventional detonations that by sheer luck didn't have a nuclear core in them).

    Nuclear weapons are "always/never" devices in that they should always work when you want them to and never work when you don't. The military only cared about the "always" side of the equation. So much so that they even nixed the idea of an inertial switch in fusing mechanism of the reentry vehicles of ICBMs that would only connect the detonation systems after detecting the g-forces of reentry.

    Further any suggestion of improving the control of the nukes was met with grumpy rage at civilians daring to tell the military how to run its business as well as fights between the Air Force, Army, and Navy over funding and power.

  17. Not only... by DerekLyons · · Score: 5, Informative

    Not only a dupe, but old, old news. This has been publicly and widely known for nearly a decade.

    1. Re:Not only... by DerekLyons · · Score: 2

      During the Cold War PAL's wern't intended to prevent people from starting WWIII... They were meant to prevent to use of weapons that had fallen into unfriendly hands. (Which is why the codes were set to all balls in the missile silos, and why SSBN's didn't have them.)

    2. Re:Not only... by sribe · · Score: 2

      During the Cold War PAL's wern't intended to prevent people from starting WWIII... They were meant to prevent to use of weapons that had fallen into unfriendly hands. (Which is why the codes were set to all balls in the missile silos, and why SSBN's didn't have them.)

      That's flat-out wrong. They absolutely were intended to prevent a rogue launch, and were mandated by the president of the US at the time, JFK, because he specifically wanted to prevent anyone in the military from being able to launch without his order. That the passwords were all set to "all balls", and that that code was the one that was always dialed in, was direct defiance of the order from the commander-in-chief, by military officers who resented that exercise of the president's authority.

    3. Re:Not only... by DerekLyons · · Score: 2, Informative

      That's flat-out wrong.

      Nope, it's the flat-out truth. You're just repeating what's become urban legend since the story first broke a decade ago.
       

      They absolutely were intended to prevent a rogue launch, and were mandated by the president of the US at the time, JFK, because he specifically wanted to prevent anyone in the military from being able to launch without his order.

      Have you ever actually read National Security Action Memorandum 160? (As referenced in the article.) It only applies to weapons released to NATO, not to weapons in US custody. There not one shred of evidence that JFK, or any other US President, ever mandated their use on US based missiles. (Oddly enough though, the Titan II had a use-control system that was active throughout it's service life.) The whole story that they were so mandated rests solely on an undocumented claim that Robert McNamara "saw to" the installation of the PAL systems. (It remains unclear to this day when, and by who, the systems actually were mandated.)

  18. Joke's on them by Guppy06 · · Score: 4, Funny

    The password is actually 8 Unicode capital omicrons.

    1. Re:Joke's on them by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      So you are saying /. wouldn't be able to launch then then.

  19. Re:Ooh. Look Out! by gl4ss · · Score: 2

    so the expected payout is lower - the max payout is definitely lower by order of magnitudes, therefore it is stupid to play those numbers and omgwtf stupid if you're using those numbers to educate people on probabilities and expected outcomes. if you take into account the fact that on any given lottery where you can choose the numbers 1-2-3-4-5-6.. is the most played and any big lottery would have 100 players playing those numbers then if you do the math on the expected return vs. any other number combination over several weeks then you should notice how it in fact is pretty stupid to play those numbers.

    the only good reason for him to have been playing therefore had to be just donating money to whatever the lottery in said locale was financing... not to even have a chance at striking it rich, because he forfeited it by choosing those numbers - turning a small, tiny, chance of winning big money into 0.

    now knowing that the code for the nukes was set by a human then a logical thing to test out would have been 00...

    besides, sub commanders could just launch them by themselves.......

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  20. That's crazy by rsilvergun · · Score: 2

    I have the same password on my matched luggage!

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  21. Random isn't the point by sjbe · · Score: 2

    00000000 is just as random as any other code.

    True but irrelevant. The point of having the code was so that the launch decision was not available to whoever happened to be in the hole with the missile. By setting the code to a predetermined number they effectively gave the decision regarding whether to start WWIII to some random guy out in the field. All it would have taken was one or two crazy or misinformed people.

  22. Re: Illusion restored by DarrenBaker · · Score: 3, Funny

    That's incredible! I have the same combination on my luggage!

  23. Wow.. Talk about really old, old news by Lawrence_Bird · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Must be slow time for 'news'

    2004 Reference: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/jun/17/usa.oliverburkeman1

    And for those interested in the general subject of PALS two blog posts

    http://lewis.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/3066/biscuits-cookies-and-nuclear-bombs
    http://lewis.armscontrolwonk.com/archive/2088/blair-on-the-ever-ready-misileer

  24. Re:Dial "1" for a Brand New World by FatdogHaiku · · Score: 2

    You mean to tell me, when WOPR was busy looking for the launch code in Wargames, it was all a bunch of crap?

    They forgot to tell you that if you dial "1" you get a brand new world.

    All I know is that every time I dial Avogadro's number my phone crashes...

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  25. Damn! by PPH · · Score: 3, Funny

    I've been sitting here, entering "Joshua" all this time.

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