Should I actually be prepping right now out of fear of hackers?

Submitted ⁨⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨someone@lemmy.today⁩ to ⁨[deleted]⁩

This sort of feels like a stupid question.

I have a small food supply that could last a few weeks if needed…

but I do not have solar powered power banks, tents, gas masks, and things of that nature…

There’s been a lot of really impressive hacking lately… Could things like power grids and banks be hacked, creating chaos, and as a result I actually should be prepping this way?

I’m a pretty poor person. Buying some extra food is easy, buying solar panels and a portable power bank for hundreds costs a lot more. I already have an emergency radio.

More than that, as someone who is often poor, I may end up needing to move due to rent increases. I often think about the physical weight of anything I am buying, because I don’t drive and weight means moving or shipping costs.

With the FAA grounding thing, my initial reaction is “They are all morons, they can’t listen to advice, and so they pushed some AI slop to production because they are egomaniacs too stupid to listen to IT, or they have created a culture in which IT knows if they say something they will get fired, or IT is so exhausted from their stupidity they just do what they are told and don’t care.” But I’m actually not sure if that’s true.

Russians and other smart hackers probably knew those updates were being pushed. What if they have used that as an opportunity for hacking and confusion?

I am just not sure if this crisis is actually an opportunity to get more prepared for things getting worse… What do you think?

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Comments

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username_1@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I’m from Ukraine. We have electricity for 5-7 hours per day. Sometimes blackouts last for a few days. No, we’re still humans. Life is going on like normal. Just extremely uncomfortable.

You’re overreacting.

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- Onomatopoeia@lemmy.cafe ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  
  Life is going on like normal, just extremely uncomfortable.
  
  So well put. So many people need to hear this.
  
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- someone@lemmy.today ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I’m so sorry you are in that situation and can’t imagine what you are going through.
  
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grue@lemmy.world ⁨4⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago

I’m a pretty poor person. Buying some extra food is easy, buying solar panels and a portable power bank for hundreds costs a lot more. I already have an emergency radio.

Solve problems that are more likely/urgent before worrying about the ones that are less so. In other words, get financially stable in your normal life before you spend money on prepper stuff.

(That’s not to say you shouldn’t get solar panels, but that if you do it should be because it saves money on your power bill, not just for emergency use. And it also has to come only after you’ve already done everything else that has a higher or more immediate return, such as paying off high-interest debt.)

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Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
I’m not saying hackers deserve NO worry at all, but on the list of things that will inevitably end civilization, they’re probably not that high on the list.

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RodgeGrabTheCat@lemmy.ca ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Nothing wrong with prepping. Even the government says to have a 72 hour kit.

As for prepping specifically for being hacked - have good backups of any data you can’t be without. Keep your devices updated. Use 2fa where ever you can as well as strong unique passwords.

I’m not seeing a situation were being hacked would require a tent or gas mask.

An argument could be made for a solar panel and a power bank (assuming you can place it and your power bank in direct sunlight for 8 hours).

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- 2ndDegreeOWO@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  
  I’m not seeing a situation were being hacked would require a tent or gas mask.
  
  But if the chemical plant near you gets hacked, then you might be grateful to have a gas mask…
  
  But that kind of thing is highly dependent on location and your own personal risk profile. Personally, I do have gas masks for me and my girlfriend (old Polish military surplus that’s compatible with NATO filters, only about $30 each), but those are much more likely to be used for rioting/protesting than for emergency preparedness.
  
  (Though, actually, I did use it once in an emergency. A small kitchen fire started while we were on a walk. Put it out pretty easily with a fire extinguisher when we came back, but it was a pretty nasty smoky fire and filled the house with toxic-smelling smoke. We had two cats inside that I wanted to rescue, so I put on my gas mask to help find them. Once I found the gas mask and got it on, it was so much easier to see and breathe in the smoke. Which was good. One cat was quick and easy to find – came right to me. But the other cat had hidden in a pile of stuff in a corner and took quite a bit of effort to find – she was lethargic and weak when I finally found her, obviously suffering badly from smoke inhalation, but she recovered within a few minutes once I brought her outside into fresh air. For a couple days after that, we left all the windows open and lived in a travel trailer in the back yard instead, the cats as well. After that, the smell of smoke mostly cleared out, and we could move back in. I guess an RV in the back yard is also nice to have for emergency preparedness – it’s kind of an entire backup house when you need one.)
  
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GreenBeard@lemmy.ca ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
You should have been worried about hackers a long time ago, but it’s a bit late for that now. Yes, you should be ready. Don’t bother stockpiling, unless you own your own house it’s not going to help much. Same with solar panels. Keep a bug-out bag if you need to leave in a hurry. Learn to forage, garden if you have the space, try to figure out how you would live if you had to spend 3 months or so without modern conveniences like gas and electricity, and practice doing things for yourself.

Most importantly, build a community. On our own humans are the most pathetic animals of our size on Earth. We’re really not good at anything. In groups however, we are utterly incredible. Grow a circle of people you trust and can count on.and prepare together. Share resources and skills and best practices.organize ways to communicate, gather, and organize if there’s an emergency.build skills that compliment each other to compensate for individual weaknesses.

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- cecilkorik@piefed.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨hour⁩ ago
  This guy gets it. People didn’t survive the great depression because they had self-sufficient 10-year supply bunkers. People survived the great depression because they had communities. Together, we survive. Alone, we are doomed. Notice how all the technology they build and tell us is supposed to “connect” us only manages to divide us and make us feel lonely. It’s probably not an accident. Organize. Meet your neighbors, your local shopkeepers, attend community events. Be part of something. It doesn’t have to be transactional. You don’t have to devote your life to it. But get to know the people around you, and support them if you can, because someday your life might depend on it.
  
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Onomatopoeia@lemmy.cafe ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Listen to username1

I think what most people misunderstand is that we’re always “smoothing the curves”. Under usual circumstances those curves are daily or weekly curves. Under atypical circumstances those curves become unpredictable or larger/longer.

So smooth the curves that you can in a reasonable way.

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Kyrias@lemmy.ca ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Look into low-income supported therapy.

There’s a lot going on here.

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- someone@lemmy.today ⁨7⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  I’ve had terrible experiences with mental health professionals and would never see one again. I’m not looking for emotional support or to talk about my feelings.
  
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  - erin@piefed.blahaj.zone ⁨5⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    You can see a therapist without seeing a psychiatrist…
    
    Just tell them you’re not interested in medication. You seem very unregulated. I am poor. Negative money. I see a therapist, and it’s been very helpful. You’re making a great deal of leaps in logic based on anecdotes and personal biases and ascribing them to a well tested and researched field of medicine. You’re not just wrong, you’re letting yourself spiral into paranoia instead of getting help.
    
    You’re building up an entire field into this absolute monster when it’s generally so benign. You’re only at risk of institutionalization if you are an imminent risk to your own life or others, and if that is the case, you need the help. Our carceral mental health system is pretty shit, but it’s better than dying. Again, therapists done prescribe medications. Psychiatrists do. Go see a mental health counselor or a licensed therapist, not a psychiatrist, and you’re in no risk of “big pharma drugs” being pushed on you.
    
    Mental healthcare is not psuedoscience. It’s well tested and proven. Everything you’re jumping to in your third paragraph is just delusion. It’s just talking to someone, dude. Like. Just talking. You talk through your problems with someone that is trained to help you process them. You don’t need to take any medication if you don’t want to, and your therapist typically can’t prescribe those anyways. If you have a chronic deficiency, medication might help, but you can’t be forced to take it.
    
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  - Postmortal_Pop@lemmy.world ⁨3⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
    Hey, full disclosure I’m a mental health provider so you are wholly in the right to question the position I stand on this but for that it’s worth, I’m in the field because I had very similar feelings to you and fell validated by letting my experiences help others.
    
    There’s a lot in this post that is an accurate read but I do genuinely want to emphasize that the past 15 years has seen a lot of these things become the albatross of this field as it shifts culturally towards doing better. My company for instance is the government approved mental health provider for one of the most populated counties in the state and it’s not even remotely capable of medicating people, let alone giving shock therapy. The best we can do is med management which involves interviewing you once every 3 months and getting refills ordered for you.
    
    More importantly, they provide a lot of services that aren’t Therapy and that’s what I really want to point you towards. Personally, I do parent peer support. My job is to visit other parents of children with behavioral and mental health issues and just encourage them to fo the best. I joke that I’m something between a well meaning neighbor and a state appointed friend.
    
    I really think you would benefit from some genuine peer support. I’m going to be frank, some of what you’re saying is pushing the crazy line and while I’m not one to judge I think your focus could really use an outside perspective and some human contact. I want to emphasize that I’m not calling you crazy, our infrastructure is held together by zip ties and bent clothes hangers, a stiff breeze can probably knock out the power grid where you are, because it literally does every June around here. That said, a bunker full of canned beans and 9mm isn’t going to improve that.
    
    Get yourself a camping stove or a propane grill, learn a few good recipes for rice and beans, but fumpingball your money into solar and generators isn’t going to get you anything but less money. The banks getting hacked would only be possible if the wealthy didn’t need them to control the masses and the tiny cabal of wealthy pedophile psychopaths already run the world. Prepping for an apocalypse isn’t going to give you the security you’re looking for.
    
    For what it’s worth, I take that control back in my life by deciding how I engage with the culture I have grown to resent. I make as much as I can and when I can’t I try to learn how before I go buy it. Turns out nice furniture is a lot cheaper when you build it yourself.
    
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CombatWombat@feddit.online ⁨6⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Yes, but no need to be extreme about it. Are you familiar with local plants you can forage? If things get real rough, that’s important knowledge to have, and it’s low cost and low risk to check out some books from the local library and go on some hikes. Do you know how to store food without refrigeration, like dehydrating, canning and fermenting? Learning to make jerky or sauerkraut is fun and easy, and you’ll end up saving money rather than spending extra to prep. Plug-in solar and batteries might make sense at some point, but when it’s comfortable for your finances, and when you can get a setup going where you use it daily to charge your devices and reduce your electricity costs. The world probably won’t end tomorrow, but it might end someday, so put a little time and money into being prepared each week or month or whatever, and focus mostly on things that will help you even if hackers don’t destroy everything.

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Onomatopoeia@lemmy.cafe ⁨6⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
Why would you need gas masks? What analysis demonstrates there’s a risk that such things would address?

Respond to clear risks that have strong analytical backing and urgency. Don’t let your own fear drive decisions.

For example, when driving I don’t worry about a large truck 2 miles ahead of me, but rather the vehicles close to me, and I keep an eye on vehicles a little farther ahead and behind me.

I do try to keep vehicles filled, but that’s as much for convenience and risk aversion: I’ve had to do a longer drive at the drop of a hat, and sit in traffic for bad weather or accidents.

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- someone@lemmy.today ⁨6⁩ ⁨hours⁩ ago
  So the power bank is what I am thinking of buying, which is between 100-800 dollars. The gas mask is more of an emergency item that I wish I had just in case, but doubt I would need.
  
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