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The first USB thumb drive I could find on Amazon was a Sandisk with dimensions of 7 x 41 x 17 millimetres. That gives it a total volume of just under 4.9cm3, wh

• hilbert42 4y ago
  I am very surprised that the journalist wasn't severely injured or killed. I reckon your estimate of a few lost fingers underestimates the potential damage. View it this way, the charge in a handgun bullet would easily fit into a USB stick—especially the larger type. Now consider that the amount of energy in the charge is calibrated to kill the recipient of the bullet, that is there is enough residual energy in the projectile to do the job after all coupling losses have been accounted for such as projectile/barrel friction, air resistance, penetrating victim's clothes etc. The likely real tragedy of this incident is that it becomes a copycat incident and that 'professionals' who know how to minimize the coupling losses will get involved. As for your point that the device would trigger immediately, it would depend on what the perpetrator's intentions were. I recall some years back that the Israelis killed a terrorist with a phone containing C4 or similar. Presumably, there was a delay between the time he answered the phone and when he put it to his ear. A 555 timer could delay the trigger say until the USB was removed and that it was, say, put into one's pocket. No doubt those with evil intent and inventive minds will think of other ideas to maximize damage. Irrespective, this incident is a horrible development and a portent of things to come. I just hope I'm wrong.
  • fwlr 4y ago
    A bullet is a bad comparison because guns are uniquely fantastic maximisers of the damage potential of explosions. What a gun does is take the entire explosion and concentrate it into one particular direction, it’s like a laser chamber for an explosion. Consider that the 5 milliwatt LED in a cheap laser pointer can cause permanent harm to the retina in seconds, while we light our houses with 5 watt LED bulbs all day and they don’t cause any harm to our retinas. This does raise another, perhaps more ethical idea. The shape of a thumb drive lends itself to building a shaped charge directing the explosion through the usb port into the internals of the computer. You could probably get reliable computer destruction with this method.
    • hilbert42 4y ago
      Time, unfortunately, will likely tell. I claim no great expertise in these matters but I do know C4 is a more powerful charge. I also know how much potential energy is locked up in a bullet cartridge. When the army instructed us in the absolute necessity of pull-through procedure and barrel cleaning it was drilled in by showing us a rifle with its breach blown to bits because the barrel was blocked. It was pointed out that breach explosions had killed many.
      • PhasmaFelis 4y ago
        If you set off a small explosion in a confined space, then likely something is going to get propelled at high velocity. If it's not the bullet you meant to launch, it'll be whatever side of the casing fails first, which is reasonably likely to be deadly if you're holding the casing next to your head, as you do when using a rifle. A USB stick is not normally held next to your head while being plugged in, and it doesn't have a heavy metal casing strong enough to channel an omnidirectional blast into penetrating directional shrapnel (nor any way to aim it if it did). It could put your eye out or slash an artery if you're unlucky, but barring major advances in chemistry, a couple of grams of unaimed, unchanneled explosive at arm's length is never going to be a really effective way to kill people.
        • 4y ago