06 November, 2006

5 Myths - part 3 of 6


Myth # 2
It is technically challenging to affect/change/hack these systems and a person will (can) intervene to stop problems or fail safes completely protect.

It is trivial to research how to operate these systems and just like any other system they are becoming more and more intuitive and therefore vulnerable to the wrong people making mistakes or intentionally harming them. It is certainly true that in many cases a person (and preconfigured fail safe) is able to mitigate potential impact but the increasing complexity and the speed with which some of the systems are working means that even if a person is able quickly understand and intervene the damage might already be done. Fail safes are an essential part of the overall control process but in some cases they can be remotely overridden or an unforeseen situation can be created that reduces or eliminates their effectiveness.

No comments: