John Oliver exposes how butt-clenchingly vulnerable we all are to ransomware attacks
Seriously, the suspicious email is coming from inside your butt
TV News Ransomware
Partway through his main story on Sunday, John Oliver quoted that old cliché, “Assholes are like opinions—letting the internet be in charge of yours is a really bad idea.” You know, that old saying. Now, Oliver was just using an extreme, all-too-real example of scatological nonsense to prove a point, but the Last Week Tonight host did effectively hammer home the point that our over-reliance on internet-enabled technology has left us all ridiculously vulnerable to ransomware attacks.
And, sure, not everybody is going to insert a Japanese-manufactured, remotely controlled, expanding animal-tail butt plug into themselves (and nobody here is kink-shaming those brave souls who are). But, as Oliver noted in his typically alarming fashion, we’re all in continual danger of getting involuntarily screwed by our favorite gadgets. Take thermostats, whose smart home capabilities have been hijacked up to sweltering temperatures. Or a major U.S. gas pipeline, whose data was held for ransom by some nefarious hacker types, leading to long gas lines throughout the Southeast until the corporation involved (Colonial Pipeline Company) paid an exorbitant ransom. Oh, and don’t get Oliver started on hospitals, as he scolded one cybersecurity expert for phrasing her assessment of the state of medical facilities’ lax computer security in the most hacker-baiting way possible.
As Oliver noted, there are some major factors at play in the alarming rise of ransomware attacks (which reaped a no-doubt underreported $350 million for internet scammers last year alone). Cryptocurrency isn’t just the least sufferable topic favored by the least sufferable people you know—it makes it ridiculously easy for users of crypto like monero to hide their identities along with your purloined (actual) money. Those ransomware companies that make locking up a target’s data as easy as setting up your Sliders fan fiction blog aren’t helping, either. Especially since they traditionally have better customer service that the legitimate internet companies they’re targeting. (Oliver shows how one grandmother was helpfully walked through the process of converting the $500 ransom for her laptop’s files into Bitcoin, for crying out loud.) And then there’s Russia, a country so friendly to hackers of all stripes (as long as they do their business outside of Russia) that ransomware pirates there flaunt everything from their camo-painted Lamborghinis to their pet lion cubs without fear of retribution.
Enlisting the most trusted yet subtly menacing voice in advertising to urge viewers to start taking their personal cybersecurity seriously, Oliver then threw to J.K. Simmons in a commercial instructing everybody on some easy steps to thwart this nonsense. Two- (or more-)factor authentication, people. Keep your computers updated, as companies are constantly attempting to close vulnerabilities as soon as they’re discovered. And, hey, maybe don’t open any suspicious emails, lest your precious information is locked up by some douchebag overseas who announces his presence with a Saw GIF. Because, as Oliver shows convincingly, Jigsaw’s little Rube Goldberg murder contraptions aren’t nearly as scary.
26 Comments
I never got the point of these shows. They all seem rather…prescriptive.
Well, there’s the butt plugs.
at the beginning of the season JO really seemed to be leaning into “the whole world sucks and we’re all gonna die” stuff super hard, to the point that I questioned whether it was better for my mental health to not watch it (especially as a pandemic seemed to fade and then reappear thanks to humanity’s ignorance), but he has refocused on stuff like church-based HMOs and it’s better now.
This is the same struggle my wife and I have every Sunday: do we watch because we enjoy Oliver’s humor, or do we pass because we know his main subject is going to add to the existential dread we have for America and the world and humanity? So far, Oliver’s charm has won each week… but the margin of victory is becoming slimmer each week…
I *hope* returning to a live audience will make him lighten up a little.
The rather ugly silver lining to this is that Oliver has enough recognition to be able to enlighten some of the population on to how systematically crude the US and its governments are. Those with ill intent and in power rely on the public’s ignorance by a large margin.
so a butt plug actually opens up like that inside you? HFS I just thought it vibrated or whatever. Definitely would not want Pavel in Russia controlling that.
In Russia . . . eh, shoot, I can’t think of anything. It’s pretty fucked up.
…butt plugs sit on you?
Sure, why not?
A butt went to the St. Petersburg Hospital and tried to explain how this Russian guy got stuck up in there?
at first I didn’t get this and then when I read it in my mind’s “Pam Poovee from Archer” voice, “in Soviet Russia…”, then it was hilarious.
That thing didn’t just open. It looked like the fucking Graboids from Tremors.
That’s not a butt plug. That’s a god damned pear of anguish!
LOL if anyone asked why I am less and less a fan of capitalism as I get older–hearing how companies that cater to and enable cyberassholes like this really takes the cake.
you can’t blame ALL the world’s problems on rapacious profit-only capitalism. You can also blame idiot humans.
While ransomware was the subject at hand, I though Oliver’s take down of 8th generation, (slave owning) North Carolinian Madison Cawthorn, was scorching
watching these fucking assholes passionately argue for their right to NOT have to wear a fucking face mask, and thus put themselves and others at greater risk of contracting Covid during a pandemic, because it’s their “God-given right as an American”…I just have no words any more, only disbelief. I’ll never deny someone their right to make stupid fucking decisions that may even cost them their lives but when it might affect my life or my family’s lives…nah, sorry dude, wear the fucking mask or leave.
This is one of the reasons why I use a Chromebook. I’d rather be spied on by Google than assfucked by Russians.
Until you realize corporations don’t really have national loyalty and will always cater to the highest bidder.
I got a Sliders notification for this?
Was that the brand name of the butt plug?
Crypto can go away now. Thanks.
any idea why they put a card at the beginning stating that the show was recorded Saturday Aug 14th? I knew they generally film these shows on Sat and edit Sat/Sun but have never noticed something like that before.
I suspect it’s because his update on Afghanistan was out-of-date by the time it aired. He stated half the country was under Taliban control, but by Sunday night the whole country had fallen.
Ha! Jokes on the ransomware assholes! Ain’t nothin’ on my computer I wouldn’t happily delete. Ha ha ha!!!
Well, I’m sold. Especially since I’ve been getting multiple emails from mysterious strangers threatening to release videos of me masturbating.Which, points for accuracy, phishing ransomer scammers, but I assure you, I would be the person LEAST harmed by releasing such material.