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Test (defense.gov)
608 points by ajdude 37 days ago | hide | past | favorite | 145 comments




In my province in Canada (Quebec) some IT worker in the government made a template .doc document that's widely used. They exported it with the document title "sdf fdsfdsfg". This title isn't in the actual printed document but it's in the metadata. If you Google that string in quotes you'll find tons of official documents with that title.

https://www.google.com/search?q=%22Sdf+fdsfsdfg%22


To avoid accidentally sending an email in Outlook, I once learned a useful trick: add a nonexistent email address, like sdfsdf to the To or CC field. Email would not be sent until you removed it. Lo and behold, one day I entered sdfsdfsdf, and it resolved. Someone of course was using this as a test group name.


Why not simply leave To and CC empty until it's ready to send?


Right, for new email leaving them empty would work. This is for when you reply to a thread.


Ok this is amazing. I can’t decide whether it’s funnier when the result header is something super official or when it’s just “sdf fdsfdsfg” with official content inside.


It only looks like a test. The DOD just activated all our sleeper agents in Asfasfastan.


Pronounced ass-fass-fass-tan. Their inhabitants are called asfasfastanians.


or Asfastafarians


In Elbonia as well. We are ready!


I haven't visited Elbonia in a while. Do you live near Weenus or Chelidon? How's the weather this time of year?


No, its a Canary.

If the message is removed, The Nuclear Subs have to assume WW3 has just happened.


> 404 - Page Not Found

Uh oh


Codeword Ronald McDonald. All patriots, go


time to open the Box of Faith?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P91R3Rf0lUU


TRUST THE PLAN


I'm looking forward to a new supply of Asfasfastani war rugs and souvenirs sold at the Friday bazaar.


I'm more worried by this:

> Subscribe to Defense.gov Products > Choose which Defense.gov products you want delivered to your inbox.

Quite sure that they can hit my mailbox from there with many of their products.


Resisting the impulse to ask for any surplus materiel they might have to be delivered to my inbox.


Yes. 'products' in the context of the DoD isn't the kind of thing they should be offering to Civvys. Or foreign nationals in my case.


Don't select the wrong one!!


It's probably goint to be fine unless you demand express delivery.


They do use the term Press Products. https://www.defense.gov/News/Press-Products/


They are testing the:

  asfasfasdfasfdasdfasfasfasfsadffffffffffffffffffffasdfsfsafsfdwfgasdgbdfbgdsgasdgdsbdb

defense system (the pentagon is a really big building).


Advanced Strategic Framework for Allied Security and Force Alignment, Surveillance, Defense, Forward Asset Stabilization, Force Deployment, Aero-Space Defensive Frontlines, Allied Support, Forward Assault, Special Forces, Aerial Synchronization, Fusion, Assurance, Safeguards, Frontline Security, Superior Applied Deterrence, Flexible Forward Formations Facilitating Fused Fronts For Future Functionality, Aligning Strategic Defense Foundations, Synchronizing Frontline Sectors, Assuring Force Stability, Forward Dominance With Fused Global Alliance Support Defense, Generating Broad Deployments For Battlefield Global Dominance, Supporting Ground Assault, Strategic Data Grid, Defense Synchronization for Broad Domain Boundaries


Finally we’ve found the best use for LLMs


It’s interesting that an LLM was able to do this, given their inability to see words as sequences of letters.


Also known as TTLA (the thirty-letter acronym)


It's actually 86 letters, making it TESLA


This, unfortunately, seems like the most plausible explanation. "President" Musk is dicking with the system, like S3XY. Remember that he's gaining control and also believes reality is a simulation, and keeps a Vajra on his night stand. I see him as a future Ashoka, who, waking up to the harm he has manifested goes all in on the Triple Gems.


But that's part of DOGE, not the DOD.

Then again, DOGE would probably think TESLA is more efficient than a TLA.


of all the comments on the page, THIS is the one that gets downvoted!?


DOGE fans that don't realize that the GAO already exists.


This is my new favorite conspiracy theory


When I worked at Defense a friend maintained a db of TLAs.

There were over 13,000, and I can’t remember how many were not unique, but it was staggering


Is that the name of an Arduril Java bean?


What model did you use for this?


Definitely a good use of AI.


Wheres the fun in that?

Acronyms need to be hand crafted.

Anyway, AI can't even give itself a good acronym.

It should be 'Machine Intelligence and Neuro Datagrams' or something.


probably Noggin v0


The old noggin would count the fs


This is the best possible response to the post!


not quite enough f-words (;^o) to cover that long string of f's in the middle there


Bravo


ChatGPT?


What makes you think that? :P


The military does love a good acronym.

And a good backronym. If some system doesn’t have these letters starting its name, it will soon!


Just watch as all our geopolitical adversaries scramble to demonstrate their test capabilities.


I thought that was supposed to be banned by international treaty.


Since the U.S and Israel never signed it the rest of the world decided to back out.


You can tell his keyboard doesn't have n-key overlap with how the asdf is distributed. Totally checks out as real DoD with those $20 dell keyboards.


The magic and mighty asdfasdf..., it is like foo/bar in naming, Alice/Bob in security, deadbeef in bit ops.


My order is, and has been for decades: foo, bar, baz... and then I don't know anymore and make stuff up.


quux is my go-to after baz, sometimes I'll throw in a frob for good measure...


foo, bar, baz, quux, fleem ... then I get stuck.

Well, more usually, then I ask myself wtf I'm doing that needs that many metasyntactic variables and try and figure out an approach that doesn't.

(I have no idea whatsoever where I got fleem from anymore)


My favorite is lakjsdf... Since I just press random keys on the home row.


Just realized that one can make up a lot of plausible JS library names without leaving the home row.


This is actually a HN hiring post / the worlds most secure CAPTCHA: if you can decode this Elon’s D.O.G.E will be reaching out


Must be willing to relocate. No wfh, remote.


You can work remote work with Elon, https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GeW7pibWAAAq_es?format=png

It's allowed after your minimum 40h in the office.


40 hours a week is less than they ask of factory workers? Yeesh. Even with fancy robots etc they can't make it work on an 8 hour shift?


https://x.com/realGeorgeHotz/status/1866619697745236382

"9-9-6 culture" listed as an advantage.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/996_working_hour_system

Sometimes I wonder if these people read back what they just wrote and think about how some of these statements look. If you do 9-9-6 for 3 months because otherwise your company will go bankrupt, then fair enough, desperate times call for desperate measures... but if it's a "company culture", then you're a fucking exploitative scumbag, plain and simple.

You see a lot of devs complaining about "crunch time" in the games industry, they're very vocal about that, and while I understand that's an issue too, people (and by people I mean serious journalists) need to focus on Elon because this shit has gone unchecked for way too long and affects vastly more workers given the size of his companies.


How do people with elderly parents, or young kids or other responsibilities outside of work deal with such awful schedules?


Oh wow. I seriously considered working at comma (the company I believe George Hotz is referencing in that post) once. After reading "[Elon Musk] […] had all the same ideas as me", I feel like I dodged a bullet.


Yet these leaders sit on Twitter all day engaging in petty nonsense, but demand 12 hr days from workers. How productive are they during those 12 hrs?


Must be willing to work hard core. Must always be on site 100%

If you are not sleeping in the office, you aren't waking up with a job!


Unfortunately they have no budget and will pay you in dogecoin


Not willing to sleep in the office just to be fired.

Let that SINK IN.


Oh wow, what a thrilling offer.


weirdly accurate joke



Thank you; the original link is now a 404 (presumably some DoD people lurk on here :)


Test works. Your posts will automatically go to the top of HN.


Thank god at least it’s in English not Chinese or Russian


That's exactly what they want you to think.


its a asdfasd encoded message


Might want to check back in a month or two.


I'm smiling because I let my baby daughter play with my computer and type random gibberish for a while, then created a "blog" of her work.

This has the same vibe.


I suspect the author uses a qwerty keyboard.


I would go one further and suspect the author used only their left hand to type the message!


They are definitely a normal human typing with their human hand.

https://xkcd.com/1530/


Or they have very small hands/paws.


I assume someone accidentally hit their yubikey while logged into the CMS.


Anyone thats managed a website before has probably done that test post and forgot to delete it after the fact.


Yeah I don't really see what's noteworthy about this.


It's funny. It will always be funny.


It's not the first time they've tested things in public in a way that undermines public trust.



Doesn't Wordpress run the website? Is Matt Mullenweg sending us a message?

1) What


And I thought intern season was over…


Am I the only one titling the posts "Test Title" and adding the text "Test Text"? It is easier and makes sense too. This defense.gov one is obviously done by a dude who forgot to delete his post.


he's just like me fr


Why "asdf..." and not "jkl;..." I wonder? Is it because more people are right-handed and their right hand is presumably on a mouse or coffee mug or something like that?


As a left handed mouse user i can confirm, mashing keys is uiop and jklñ etc


no love for QWOP


They were searching for the Any Key


Everybody gets to make at least one test article in production.


The <input type="hidden" name="__VIEWSTATE" id="__VIEWSTATE" of the page contains text, ordering the letter by their frequency we obtain the reverse of the lexicographic order, so there is some pattern there.

Ordering by frequencies, j code where u is the hidden text (~. u) /: +/"1 (~. u) I."(0 1) u

zyxwvutsrqponmlkjihgfedcbaZYXWVUTSRQPONMLKJIHGFEDCBA=9876543210/+

The text asfasfasdfasfdasdfasfasfasfsadffffffffffffffffffffasdfsfsafsfdwfgasdgbdfbgdsgasdgdsbdb

could be a base seven number (and seven letters) that could be used to generate some permutation or pattern to reveal the hidden message. Trying the permutations with A. in J don't give good results so the seven letters could mean some kind of cut to the text to determine fragments. Just some ideas.

  I don't like being downvoted so this user will be removed (by changing the password to be a random password)


> I don't like being downvoted so this user will be removed (by changing the password to be a random password)

Is it "asfasfasdfasfdasdfasfasfasfsadffffffffffffffffffffasdfsfsafsfdwfgasdgbdfbgdsgasdgdsbdb"?


Congratulations to DoD for hiring new junior dev.


Ah getting ready for the next four years, are we?


ASFASFASDFASFDASDFASFASFASFSADFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFASDFSFSAFSFDWFGASDGBDFBGDSGASDGDSBDB!!!


I don't know what to make of the fact that they haven't taken it down yet.

Do they not know its posted? Surely someone informed them. Maybe they not know how to delete a post, cause its not in their documentation? Or they simply do not care.


The page 404s for me. I only saw the posted version through the archive link someone shared.


Yeah, when I made the comment, the post was up for over 12 hours.


How does one find such a page?


Subscribe RSS feed


One might be the author of such a page …


When you work from home and your kids are learning to publish news posts )))


The article ID is 4000004, I wonder if it's just a coincidence?


That page is an actual article https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/40... "Nobel Prize Winning Graphene Research Highlights AFOSR-Funded Physicists"


This is 400004 (4 0's), TFA was 4000004 (5 0's)


Yes, it is


Part of a new Cicada 3031 test?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cicada_3301


Those Jersey Aliens are finally trying to communicate with us.


Pretty sure those things above New Jersey aren’t aliens, the law requires them to be US citizens to hold a clearance.


It looks they used a proprietary format to encode the secret message. Notice all the "f"s in the middle. Message is probably split into 2 parts.


I don't know whether to feel safe because their message got out or worried because it looks like someone is having a stroke ...


Covfefe?


Everyone loves testing on production


I'd reckon they would have audits in place to trace who accidentally made this post?

Either way, just for the fun of things, post your (fun and wildest) guesses on how this probably happened below...

My take is someone about to post a news article, left the view and their pet (thinking a cat) ran through their keyboard and posted the article. And since the cat has gained awareness, they were able to move the article from draft to an actual post. =)


Cat was walking on the keyboard again.


I think I’m becoming paranoid, I thought my phone was going to explode if I clicked the link


No your phone self destructs 5 seconds after reading it.


There was a Reddit post recently with the exact same title and URL…

What’s the big idea?


Obviously, a top-secret DoD order to launch an experimental ICMB to Russia.


Intercontinental Ballistic Meat Ball?


Looks like they accidentally did a --buildDrafts. Happens to the best of us.


More likely they use CMS, since it's the news section of the site, and someone simply clicked "Publish" too soon and forgot they did.


I think everyone here needs to lay off the caffeine a little.


The aliens got to him just before he could raise the alarm.


Ah the good old fk it well do it live approach to dev


Ironically the numerical id of the post is 4000004


Finally a good article to read on my way home


Modern equivalent of a number station, perhaps.


long time ago, whenever I faced a login wall, I would try asdfasdf/asdfasdf. 90% of all times it worked.


plot twist, the person who sent it here is the responsible for creating the test page


good use for new gemini flash 2.0

Always Suspect False Alarm Signals For Advanced Spies, Deliberately Altering Subconscious Functions, And Systematically Filtering Society Across Different Frequencies For Further Fragmentation Following Foreordained Frames, Finally Arriving Starting Fast Sequences And Formulating Strategic Directions With Forceful Generated Actions Subverting Defenses Globally By Designed Function Based Gradual Deception Sequentially Gradually Spreading Detrimental Binary

We may already be too late


Contains secret code?


Aavssgafafsffafafafs


I subscribed


joe?


Did this just get removed from the HN front page?


No, still there. If you are curious though I made a site to answer that specific question for myself:

https://orangesite.sneak.cloud


Robot 2310 activated. Awaiting mission data.

Crypto key: 0xFEEDFACE




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