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Confused Governor Says Looking at Webpage's HTML is Criminal Hacking

posted by FatPhil on Monday October 18 2021, @08:42AM   Printer-friendly
from the don't-even-think-about-editing-the-URL dept.

upstart writes:

Confused governor says looking at webpage's HTML is criminal hacking:

Gov. Mike Parson is sick and tired of all these sophisticated, no-good hackers and he's not going to take it any more. It's too bad the Missouri Republican has no idea what he's talking about.

During a Thursday press conference, the confused elected official lashed out at a journalist who reported a vulnerability in an official Department of Elementary and Secondary Education website. The reporter, notably, waited until officials fixed the error before publishing the story. The flaw? The website apparently included teachers' Social Security numbers in the HTML.

"Though no private information was clearly visible nor searchable on any of the web pages, the newspaper found that teachers' Social Security numbers were contained in the HTML source code of the pages involved," reported the St. Louis Post Dispatch.

Parson, who apparently has never heard of "view source," obliquely threatened the Post reporter with prosecution.

"The state is committing to bring to justice anyone who hacked our system and anyone who aided or encouraged them to do so — in accordance with what Missouri law allows AND requires," wrote Parson.

[... - plenty snipped - ...] Parson, in other words, has no idea what he's talking about.

canopic jug augments that with the following other sources:

Governor Mike Parson wishes that ctrl-u or f12 will become illegal. This was actually a breach of personal information, including SSANs, for over 100,000 people.

https://text.npr.org/1046124278
https://www.salon.com/2021/10/14/missouri-governor-threatens-criminal-prosecution-of-reporter-found-security-flaw-in-state-site_partner/
https://itwire.com/security/missouri-goes-after-man-who-looked-at-source-code-on-state-site.html
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/missouri-governor-teacher-data-hacking-1242493/
https://coldstreams.com/2021/10/14/no-it-isnt-missouri-governor-says-viewing-html-source-code-containing-private-data-the-state-published-on-every-page-is-a-crime/
https://abc17news.com/news/missouri/2021/10/14/gov-parson-threatens-legal-action-against-reporter-who-exposed-flaw-on-state-education-departments-website/
https://heavy.com/news/gov-mike-parson-html-source-code-decoded-ssn/

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  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by deimtee on Tuesday October 19 2021, @01:44AM (4 children)

    by deimtee (3272) on Tuesday October 19 2021, @01:44AM (#1188256) Journal

    I watched that speech. My understanding of what he actually meant was "Wouldn't it be nice if we could find something that would kill this virus (inside the lungs) the same way bleach or UV does (outside the lungs)."

    A reasonable sentiment, if not the sort of statement you should be making in a supposedly factual press conference.

    The TDS is that the media took the absolute worst possible interpretation of what his rambling statement meant and endlessly hyped it without quoting it until people believed that he actually said "you should inject bleach into your veins".

    --
    No problem is insoluble, but at Ksp = 2.943×10−25 Mercury Sulphide comes close.
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +2  
       Insightful=1, Informative=1, Total=2
    Extra 'Insightful' Modifier   0  
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  
    Total Score:   4  

  • (Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday October 19 2021, @10:02AM

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday October 19 2021, @10:02AM (#1188362) Homepage Journal

    Bingo. The man acted stupid in front of the cameras, and his enemies multiplied that stupid by a couple orders of magnitude. This certainly isn't the first time that Trump would have done better just to STFU, and let the adults talk.

    --
    Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 19 2021, @12:26PM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 19 2021, @12:26PM (#1188381)

    The TDS is that the media took the absolute worst possible interpretation of what his rambling statement meant and endlessly hyped it without quoting it until people believed that he actually said "you should inject bleach into your veins".

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33QdTOyXz3w [youtube.com]

    Do you need a fucking transcript or is your brain not listening to the BULLSHIT he talks about? You wish it was something he didn't say? Here, you can read the wise man's words.

    supposing we hit the body with a
    tremendous whether it's ultraviolet or
    just very powerful light and I think you
    said that hasn't been checked but you're
    gonna test it and then I said supposing
    you brought the light inside the body
    you can which you can do either through
    the skin or in some other way and I
    think you said you're gonna test that
    too sounds interesting
    right and then I see the disinfectant
    where it knocks it out in a minute one
    minute
    and is there way we can do something
    like that by injection inside     or almost
    a cleaning because you see it gets in
    the lungs and it does a tremendous
    number long so it'd be interesting to
    check that so that you're gonna have to
    use medical doctors with but it sounds
    it sounds interesting to me the new
    headline is trumpets people to go
    outside that's dangerous here we go same
    old group you ready I hope people enjoy
    the Sun and if it has an impact that's
    great I'm just hearing this not really
    for the first time I mean there's been a
    rumor that you know a very nice room or
    that you go outside of the zone or you
    have heat and it does have an effect on
    other viruses but now we get it from one
    of the great laboratories of the world I
    have to say covers a lot more territory

    • (Score: 2) by deimtee on Tuesday October 19 2021, @01:45PM

      by deimtee (3272) on Tuesday October 19 2021, @01:45PM (#1188396) Journal

      and then I see the disinfectant where it knocks it out in a minute one minute and is there way we can do something like that by injection inside

      The difference is in what is meant by an ambiguous two word phrase in that ramble. "like that"
      If he is referring to the disinfectant then he would be an idiot.
      If he is referring to the effect of the disinfectant it is a reasonable, if overly hopeful, statement.

      If anyone other than Trump said "wouldn't it be great if we could find a medicine that would kill it as fast as bleach does" you would just agree. You might think it was wishful thinking, but you wouldn't accuse them of being worse than Hitler.

      --
      No problem is insoluble, but at Ksp = 2.943×10−25 Mercury Sulphide comes close.

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 19 2021, @01:29PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 19 2021, @01:29PM (#1188391)

    your mechanism for understanding things is probably broken.
    I watched the same thing, and he was looking at the lady doctor, and he was pretty obviously asking whether a "cleansing" with bleach can be done. He's so incoherent in general that you can claim all kind of misunderstandings if you want to, and I'm pretty sure in that moment he was more concerned with what he looked like on camera and being delighted with how important he was.
    but believe whatever you want.