
On the Effectiveness of Aluminium Foil Helmets: An Empirical Study - rms
http://people.csail.mit.edu/rahimi/helmet/index.html
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jacquesm
It is good to see that the MIT takes the interests of the truly paranoid so
serious. What surprises me though about the whole affair is that the
government allowed this information to be released.

In our circles the fallibility of the tinfoil hat is well known, which is why
those are only used in emergencies (an emergency is a paranoid individual
emerging from their den or dwelling).

Personally I prefer the 'whole cage' approach. This is a little more involved
than the tin-foil hat, but well worth the investment imho.

To implement it simply coat every surface of your house with chicken wire,
make sure to make solid interconnections (preferably soldered) every couple of
inches where two sections meet, and do not forget the windows (you'll get used
to it quickly enough).

I'm still a little worried about my internet connection being used to inject
radiation into my carefully constructed cage of Faraday, so I've put all my
computing gear behind grounded chicken wire as well.

The only things protruding are the mouse and the keyboard, since the
installation of the cage I sleep much better, feel much better in general and
my headaches are gone.

I can recommend it whole heartedly.

~~~
DanielBMarkham
<humor qualitylevel='poor'>

A fine copper mesh is much better.

I notice that the propeller-head tinfoil hat was not mentioned in the study --
obviously to lead us astray from its powerful abilities. Also the Cowboy
model, which as I understand it prevents cows from interfering with your
delicate private matters.

I know that only when I finally accepted the fact that aliens were talking to
me from my microwave I was able to establish communication with their race and
make all this progress. Who'd would have thought? An entire planet led by
Orville Redenbacher.

I'm currently working on a SCIF for my X-box. Hope to have that finished by
the time the invading spaceships arrive so I can fight them off with Halo,
which is NOT a video game. It's actually a battle-control device that remotely
controls events on their home planet.

</humor>

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abrahamsen
Already debunked:
[http://zapatopi.net/blog/?post=200511112730.afdb_effectivene...](http://zapatopi.net/blog/?post=200511112730.afdb_effectiveness)

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m_eiman
Hang on, an amplification of 30dB at 2.6GHz? Sounds like someone needs to
check if a tinfoil hat can be used to improve Wifi reception! Is it close
enough to 2.4GHz to be of any use?

~~~
olliesaunders
Yes it can, that's been done.

~~~
m_eiman
Cool. Does it work for both receiving and transmitting? If it does, there
should be a business opportunity in tinfoil hats for laptops.

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taitems
Excuse us non-technical foreign people, but this says that wearing tin foil
hats actually amplifies radio signals instead of blocking them? And paranoid
people wear them under the false impression it will block government radio
signals?

~~~
dave_au
Aaaargh - I don't want to give away the punchline but I also don't like the
idea of some people becoming horribly confused.

If only HN has spoiler tags...

~~~
sp332
<http://www.rot13.com/>

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azgolfer
Next they should address the spider problem.

[http://www.theonion.com/content/news/meth_addicts_demand_gov...](http://www.theonion.com/content/news/meth_addicts_demand_government)

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nico
Hahahaahaha :D

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onreact-com
This is satire, isn't it?

