Recently spotted this article:
http://news.scotsman.com/latestnews/Dozens-injured-as-boy-wreaks.3662874.jp
Talks about a 14 year boy (apparently an electronics genius) who used a TV remote that he modified himself, to control the switching between tram tracks..
Not sure whether to laugh at it or feel mortified! Some kids are really geeky... Don't know whether it bodes well for society or not!
Put in your opinions here... What's worrying is that the designers didn't pick this up as a major and particularly irresponsible design flaw!
This boy must be an electronics genius. But you don't want to think of could have happened if one would really try to hurt people. If a 14 year old boy can do it don't think of what a terrorist could do if he wanted to. We should consider ourselfs lucky that there are only some people wounded.
don;t know whether to give the kid a medal or a kick up the backside!
He's obviously v brilliant but I think the designers of the switching system are the ones that need the kick up the backside! certainly hope this is not possible in London!
First thing I thought of when I read this was the Live Free or Die Hard movie...
And what idiots set up a tram system that can be controlled by a universal tv remote?
That would've been hilarious if one of those universal tv turn-off-ers would screw with the system too. (There's devices you can buy that are basically a tv remote with one button, and it cycles through about every single known IR code to turn off a tv.)
Well, if the switches are operated by IR from the trains, then it should be (relatively) easy to reprogram a TV remote (also IR) to make the right signals, especially if you had a way to record those signals.
You all are deriding the designers a lot, but it would be difficult to build the system in such a way that one couldn't record the signals and then play them back for your own purposes. It would require far more complex signals (that changed constantly) and far more expensive switches (all connected to the same network to have their signals updated regularly ($$))
Wow, now that's incredible.
Yet also freaky. I will never feel the same about mass transit again.
| Agent ME wrote: |
And what idiots set up a tram system that can be controlled by a universal tv remote?
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Luckily it's not that bad. You do not only need a remote, but also more than average intelligence and 'inside' information.
| Quote: |
"He studied the trams and the tracks for a long time and then built a device that looked like a TV remote control and used it to manoeuvre the trams and the tracks," said Miroslaw Micor, a spokesman for Lodz police.
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(http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/01/11/tram_hack/)Not everyone is out to destroy and kill everyone. Funny how scared people are. This kid was obviously a little mental, but that doesn't make him a terrorist 
