4 ms·

As the article points out, using collected client data is problematic, because some errors will often be undetectable, as in numeric data. And in general, you w

As the article points out, using collected client data is problematic, because some errors will often be undetectable, as in numeric data. And in general, you would have to control for bit flips somehow caused by software. I wonder whether a SETI approach would be useful here. Allocate, say, 1MB of memory. Fill it with some known bit pattern. Periodically check the memory and look for discrepancies. Do this once an hour, on 10M devices, and that is a LOT of monitoring. Report discrepancies along with time, location (including elevation), hardware and OS information. I would think that this approach would provide a lot of interesting information about when and where bit flips occur, especially when matched against information on solar and atmospheric events (as in the article). Perhaps sensitive hardware and OS environments would be detected. Even completely negative results would be interesting: no bit flips observed would suggest that purported bit flips elsewhere might have other explanations.

EscargotCult 5y ago
This could be crowdsourced. Imagine some sort of reporting network of volunteers, running the simple program (memory allocation and periodic checks) on any hardware they're loaning time on, and submitting their location and altitude as well.
simne 5y ago
I've few years ago hear, US gov't created app, which periodically checked for random light flashes on camera sensor of smartphone, and send info to cloud, to use them as large distributed network for detecting of illegal nukes. (btw, Soviet and Russians really love to collect such weird facts). Idea looks very realistic, except that it will drain battery, and could also be used as surveillance tool, so I have not seen real app. To be strict, any digital camera sensor is excellent tool for such things, much better than ram, only need to close objective with something opaque for light, but transparent to particles (any thin plastic fit), and sure, run monitoring program and store logs in cloud. And in real life, on ali could buy Geiger counter shield for arduino, and one my pal even expose such sensor to internet. - Better to use two such sensors and simple logical circuit, so they will detect not all events, but only when two sensors simultaneous detect something, so you will see vector, from where cosmic particle appear. - This method of many sensors with logic and logs, where used in researches, which detected hidden rooms in Great Pyramids of Giza (real cosmic rays so powerful, that could detected with simple equipment at depths up to hundred meters, so ordinary concrete is like cardboard for them). And I even seen post from one guy, who installed such machinery at home (used 8 or 16 counters, I forgot details), and in few months from logs was clearly seen, where in his room is window :)
- ajxs 5y ago
  > "I've few years ago hear, US gov't created app..." At least at one point they had satellites deployed for this purpose. The phenomena they used to determine whether a detonation had taken place was the characteristic 'double flash'. You can read some more about this here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vela_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vela_incident They don't need to resort to such clandestine measures as infiltrating people's smartphones for this purpose. A nuclear blast was a pretty difficult thing to hide even 40 years ago.
  - simne 5y ago
    > satellites deployed for this purpose You missing point. I know about world system of monitoring for nuke explosions, but I don't talk about it. I mean, threat of use nuke by terrorists is very close by its consequences to real blast. Imagine, how much panic will happen, if appear plausible claim, that terrorists have nuke, which they planning to use in one of biggest US cities. So special semi-military agencies, constantly working on eliminating possibility that terrorists will have access even to radioactive waste, not even speaking about enriched materials. And this is what differ Western system of values from Russian or Asian - in Western system, lost of even one person considered unacceptable, but Russians accept sacrifice 20k of soldiers for crazy escapade, which they see in what now happen in Ukraine.

EscargotCult 5y ago

This could be crowdsourced. Imagine some sort of reporting network of volunteers, running the simple program (memory allocation and periodic checks) on any hardware they're loaning time on, and submitting their location and altitude as well.

simne 5y ago

I've few years ago hear, US gov't created app, which periodically checked for random light flashes on camera sensor of smartphone, and send info to cloud, to use them as large distributed network for detecting of illegal nukes. (btw, Soviet and Russians really love to collect such weird facts). Idea looks very realistic, except that it will drain battery, and could also be used as surveillance tool, so I have not seen real app. To be strict, any digital camera sensor is excellent tool for such things, much better than ram, only need to close objective with something opaque for light, but transparent to particles (any thin plastic fit), and sure, run monitoring program and store logs in cloud. And in real life, on ali could buy Geiger counter shield for arduino, and one my pal even expose such sensor to internet. - Better to use two such sensors and simple logical circuit, so they will detect not all events, but only when two sensors simultaneous detect something, so you will see vector, from where cosmic particle appear. - This method of many sensors with logic and logs, where used in researches, which detected hidden rooms in Great Pyramids of Giza (real cosmic rays so powerful, that could detected with simple equipment at depths up to hundred meters, so ordinary concrete is like cardboard for them). And I even seen post from one guy, who installed such machinery at home (used 8 or 16 counters, I forgot details), and in few months from logs was clearly seen, where in his room is window :)

ajxs 5y ago
> "I've few years ago hear, US gov't created app..." At least at one point they had satellites deployed for this purpose. The phenomena they used to determine whether a detonation had taken place was the characteristic 'double flash'. You can read some more about this here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vela_incident https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vela_incident They don't need to resort to such clandestine measures as infiltrating people's smartphones for this purpose. A nuclear blast was a pretty difficult thing to hide even 40 years ago.
- simne 5y ago
  > satellites deployed for this purpose You missing point. I know about world system of monitoring for nuke explosions, but I don't talk about it. I mean, threat of use nuke by terrorists is very close by its consequences to real blast. Imagine, how much panic will happen, if appear plausible claim, that terrorists have nuke, which they planning to use in one of biggest US cities. So special semi-military agencies, constantly working on eliminating possibility that terrorists will have access even to radioactive waste, not even speaking about enriched materials. And this is what differ Western system of values from Russian or Asian - in Western system, lost of even one person considered unacceptable, but Russians accept sacrifice 20k of soldiers for crazy escapade, which they see in what now happen in Ukraine.