Slashdot Mirror
Fourth US Navy Collision This Year Raises Suspicion of Cyber-Attacks (thenextweb.com)
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.
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.
Cost free eBook I read (by iBook/Kobo/Amazon/ObookO/Gutenberg etc.): "The Green Odyssey" by Philip Jose Farmer.
The tanker ran into the warship. Coming into port the water can get crowded, with two-way, large-ship traffic. The warship was hit on the port side, which is a strong indication it had the right of way.
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.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
The admiral's response was essentially "not a chance, but I don't want to waste my time explaining it to you"
US Navy ships are not auto-guided by GPS or radar. Computers are not in the loop on the actuation of the rudders. The crew is supposed to use things like radar and GPS like they can use a sextant or bathymetry - as a supplement to th good ol' Mk I Eyeball.
The crew seriously screwed up. Period. Another capain who got his command under Obama and his idiot SecNav Mr Mabus has just forfeited his carreer through sheer incompetence. I'm sure he and his crew know all they need to know about "tolerance", transgenderism, the use of over-priced biofuels, and being "a global force for good" - but they appear to be completely incompetent in navigation, seamanship, situational awareness, and the most basic naval operations.
In each of these recent incidents, the crews only needed to do what American sailors have been doing for about two nd a half centuries: LOOK around with their eyeballs, and steer their vessel and adjust its speed accordingly. No computers are even involved in these basics.
signed,
a saddened Navy vet
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.
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.
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.
On top of all that, the US Navy does all kinds of dumb stuff no one else does. First, they use English units for stuff, so when they're communicating with other ships, they'll give them distances in yards instead of meters. They also give bearings in a completely different way: absolute instead of relative like everyone else. Also, merchant ships have something called AIS so they can see where other ships are. The Navy routinely turns theirs off so people can't see where their ships are on ship-tracking websites. Merchant ships have a small crew and short chain of command, and captains can just call each other on the radio and discuss their intentions, but the Navy has a long chain of command between the captain and the helmsman and the captain never talks to other captains on the radio. Finally, merchant captains mainly just worry about navigation and such, and don't have to deal with stuff like discipline problems for a crew of hundreds. Navy captains don't have that much time actually running a ship, and frequently do it for a short time before being shuffled off to desk duty somewhere.
Basically, the US Navy's entire structure for managing a ship is optimized for war-fighting with young recruits, and not at all for navigating a ship in crowded channels with merchant vessels. And the people who become merchant captains are people who have sea-going and captaining a ship in their blood and dedicate their lives to it. The people who become US Navy captains are there because being a military officer is a stable career and it's a stepping stone to a cushy desk job as an admiral or at least a cushy retirement package after only 20 years in the service.
There was a really good opinion piece about this recently by a some captain I think, but I can't seem to find it now.