A letting agent was sufficiently disturbed by a tenant's diagrams of a video game, that he called the police.
A British games developer’s letting agency called the police after mistaking diagrams of his new game for a planned thermonuclear attack on Washington.
Henry Smith is a software engineer from Bristol working on a game called “Global Thermonuclear War”, which uses Google Maps to simulate an atomic conflict between nations. Smith was planning out the game using whiteboards in his home when his letting agent made a pre-arranged visit.
A few days later, the agent rang, Smith says, and told him that “the person who did the inspection did have some concerns about one thing. There were some … whiteboards? And some … drawings on them?”
Although Smith believed he assuaged the agents’ fears by explaining that the sketches were plans for a game, he received a follow-up email the next week informing him that the matter had been referred to the local police.
(Score: 4, Funny) by e_armadillo on Wednesday August 27 2014, @04:51PM
"Thank you very much, yes I know that the police like to play war games, but I am not looking for early testers of the game just yet . . . "
"How are we gonna get out of here?" ... "We'll dig our way out!" ... "No, no, dig UP stupid!"
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 27 2014, @05:04PM
PEEK A BOOM!
(Score: 2) by Alfred on Wednesday August 27 2014, @05:09PM
that is a really good cover story
;-)
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bob_super on Wednesday August 27 2014, @05:17PM
I like the part where the potential nuclear terrorist is informed that the police is looking into his case.
What could possibly go wrong?
(Score: 2) by nyder on Wednesday August 27 2014, @11:51PM
Ya, that struck me as funny.
In America the guy would of been probably killed by a swat team, but in the UK, they email you that the matter has been forwarded to the police. And I thought Canadians were nice!!!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by dyingtolive on Wednesday August 27 2014, @05:10PM
Seriously, look at that diagram in the article. I'm struggling to see how that could that be useful to someone planning an attack. His biggest concern is MGM coming after him for ripping off Wargames. I had things in notebooks in high school 15 years ago that would have been more believably misconstrued as attack plans.
I mean, I'm still looking forward to the game. A computer game version of Wargames? Sign me the fuck up.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 4, Informative) by gman003 on Wednesday August 27 2014, @05:13PM
There's already a game called "DEFCON", which is very Wargames-y. I never really got the hang of it though.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Gaaark on Wednesday August 27 2014, @05:25PM
Of course, the obligatory statement:
"The only way to win is not to play."
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 4, Funny) by TK on Wednesday August 27 2014, @06:35PM
Menu > Exit to Desktop > You Win!!
The fleas have smaller fleas, upon their backs to bite them, and those fleas have lesser fleas, and so ad infinitum
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:46AM
Sounds like you're (talking about) MAD. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutual_assured_destruction [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 28 2014, @07:54AM
He's talking about War Games. [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 27 2014, @05:59PM
If your high school notebooks were shared with the wrong person at the wrong time, they likely could have earned you some jail time while people sorted things out.
There's right and wrong, and there's the way things are... if someone is "concerned" enough to call the police, the police are obligated to investigate. If the police's initial investigation is inconclusive, they're obligated to take precautionary measures... especially where guys with whiteboards planning the end of the world are concerned, because, you know, how embarrassing would it be if it were a cover story?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 28 2014, @02:35AM
> if someone is "concerned" enough to call the police, the police are obligated to investigate
That's false. At least in the US.
If the police don't have to enforce a restraining order, [nytimes.com] they certainly don't have to investigate jack shit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 27 2014, @10:21PM
I'm struggling to see how that could that be useful to someone planning an attack.
And I'm struggling to see how that could that be useful to someone planning a game.
(Score: 4, Funny) by dublet on Wednesday August 27 2014, @05:16PM
Wouldn't you prefer a nice game of chess?
"If anyone needs me, I'm in the angry dome. [dublet.org]"
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 27 2014, @05:55PM
(1) This event is the logical conclusion of the "if see something, say something" approach. Schneier has said it many times - if you rely on amateur security you will get amateur results.
(2) It isn't just a problem with amateurs. Total surveillance encourages false positives. Systems that scan everyone's "metadata" for suspicious patterns can't tell the difference between someone doing research to write a novel about terrorism and someone plotting a terrorist attack. The only difference is that the writer won't try to conceal their actions so they are more likely to set off the alarms than someone with actual nefarious aims.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by tibman on Wednesday August 27 2014, @06:04PM
He has probably already been checked out by "them" anyways. His online research into nuclear fallout and how the weapons work has no doubt triggered someone to look in on him. Depending on how much information sharing there is, it could have been several different organizations. Speculation is fun! Someone should buy him some uranium: https://unitednuclear.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=16_17_69&products_id=211 [unitednuclear.com]
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by The Archon V2.0 on Wednesday August 27 2014, @06:36PM
So, lemme get this straight, someone thinks they have a potential nuclear terrorist on their hands.
Step 1: Call the guy up and talk to him about the plans he left on view.
Step 2: Inform him a week later that you decided to call the cops.
So, were they sure he was harmless and CYAing all the way up the chain, or were they THAT bloody stupid?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by present_arms on Wednesday August 27 2014, @06:58PM
This is Britain where everyone from the PM to the local manager is retarded. I am using that word in the very correct sense.
http://trinity.mypclinuxos.com/
(Score: 4, Informative) by LoRdTAW on Wednesday August 27 2014, @07:18PM
If anyone is confused about the term "letting agent" it is the equivalent of a person who works for a property management company. I had to look it up myself.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by zafiro17 on Wednesday August 27 2014, @07:31PM
Or, in New Yorkese, "real estate agent." They do rentals too, ya know.
Back on track, face it: this is the future. Everyone is so scared of the terra-rists these days, and are being trained to "say something if you see something," that this is the future. Planning on giving your kid a chemistry set for Christmas? Save a little extra cash to bail him out of jail when he gets picked up for suspicion of creating a bio-hazard, never mind the fact his little experiment isn't going to generate anything more harmful than CO2.
Dad always thought laughter was the best medicine, which I guess is why several of us died of tuberculosis - Jack Handey
(Score: 2) by LoRdTAW on Thursday August 28 2014, @01:55PM
There is a big difference. A real estate agent can bring tenants and landlords together and broker a deal. BUT they do not manage the tenant, they only take a small cut of a few months rent or a finders fee and you part ways with them right after the deal. A letting agent or property management firm acts as a middleman for the tenant and landlord.
If I own 20 residential units and wanted to manage them myself I would be the person who collects the rent, fields calls for repairs/problems/complaints, arrange for repairs, maintain property (landscaping, snow removal etc). Basically everything is my responsibility. If I have a tenant who won't pay I have to personally hound them by phone, listen to their sob stories, bang on their door or take legal action. It becomes a stressful full time job.
If I just wanted to sit on my butt and let someone else do the dirty work I would hire a property management firm. They deal with the tenants directly and handle all complaints, problems, collect the rent and connect with real estate agents to fill units. They can also do the dirty work of chasing down dead beats for rent and hire lawyers to evict them. I would still have control over what goes on but no tenant calls me directly nor do I receive rent directly from them. I just let the money roll in and speak with the management firm about issues that need my approval.
(Score: 2) by Daiv on Wednesday August 27 2014, @09:12PM
Thank you!
(Score: 2) by arslan on Wednesday August 27 2014, @10:21PM
Ahhh... thanks.. I had thought that was some kind of agency that lets the pet out to potty..
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 28 2014, @05:52AM
BLOOOD!
(Score: 1) by lolococo on Wednesday August 27 2014, @07:33PM
(Score: 2, Informative) by cl0secall on Wednesday August 27 2014, @08:11PM
this may sound like trope, but there is some truth to it. There has been some research indicating that as people have less adversity in their lives, it is harder for them to be happy. I think it was called "the happiness curve" or something similar. It seems reasonable to extrapolate this to peoples sense of safety and/or security as well. In that, the more safe people are, the less easy it is for them to feel safe. Thus, the safer we are, the more likely people will be to be locked up on the flimsiest of pretenses in the name of safety.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by aclarke on Wednesday August 27 2014, @08:19PM
Another way to look at this is that there's a constant in the equation of how we react to perceived threats upon our safety. In other words, the more safe we are, the more likely we are to blow out of proportion insignificant, remotely unlikely, or perceived-yet-nonexistent threats to our safety.
I think this is the basis for much of the terrorism-related overreaction at the moment. We've erased many of the real dangers in our society, but we haven't sufficiently scaled down the strength of our approach even though the dangers are almost inconceivably remote.
(Score: 2) by khallow on Wednesday August 27 2014, @11:06PM
I figure it's like what we think immune responses are like. The human mind has evolved in an environment with a certain rather high level of violence, tragedy, and bad luck and has as a result a bunch of reactive and proactive machinery for dealing with that stuff. You can take most of the bad stuff away, but you still have that machinery working to fight threats, even if those threats no longer exist.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 28 2014, @07:14PM
Especially in a world where for-profit prisons are an actual thing. How are they supposed to make money if people aren't being locked up?
(Score: 5, Interesting) by aclarke on Wednesday August 27 2014, @08:13PM
I had a similar experience as a 17 year old in Zambia in the early '90s. I lived there at the time, and was going to spend the last few days of my vacation backpacking the 140km or so from Lusaka to a friend's house. The first night I asked permission to camp on a field near a school. I shared my supper with some folks at the school, and went out to pitch my tent. While I was setting up, two very drunk men came up and started harassing me. Please bear in mind that I was a very cocky 17 year old, rather than the very cocky 4x year old I am now. They claimed to be police officers, and they were hassling me because I was camped about 4km from a microwave dish installation and they claimed I was a South African spy there to spy on their satellite dishes. I countered that it's unlikely that the South Africans would be using a Canadian teenager as a spy, and if they were so interested in a bunch of satellite dishes in the middle of nowhere, why wouldn't they just pull up a satellite photograph instead of sending me out there. This incensed them further, until finally I called their bluff and said if they were really policemen, let me see their IDs.
Turns out they were policemen. They arrested me, gathered up my belongings, went through everything, and hauled me into their boss. Compounding my problem were two details. One was that I had an old broken camera with me. It happened to be my only timepiece at the time, so I had it with me. It had no film in it because it was broken. They claimed I'd seen them coming and had disposed of the film. More damning though was the paperwork for the wargame simulation I was working on for my next term's CS course. I had a stack of paperwork on me detailing how far different types of planes could travel, what their payload was, how far a platoon of soldiers could march in a day or how far tanks could travel, how many soldiers a tank could destroy, etc. etc. These guys at the time had never seen a computer, let alone understood what a computer game was, so this pretty much made me look like the stereotypical apartheid-era white South African spy they just knew was out there.
The guy in the local police station didn't know what to do with me, so he sent me back to Lusaka, where they didn't know what to do with me, so they threw me in jail. Fortunately the next morning, I got sent high enough in the chain of command that the people were willing to admit that a 17 year old Zambian resident with a Canadian passport on him was very very unlikely to be a spy. They let me go, only telling me that I'd better take the bus and not try walking again. So I took the bus.
(Score: 2) by Dunbal on Wednesday August 27 2014, @10:08PM
Assuming this isn't a publicity stunt, the moral of this story is "yes, they can come visit but first they have to sign this NDA..."
(Score: 2) by SGT CAPSLOCK on Wednesday August 27 2014, @11:03PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday August 29 2014, @12:11PM
Goddamn Japanese weirdos...