by sixhobbits on 9/24/25, 8:24 AM with 622 comments
by gaoshan on 9/24/25, 2:31 PM
It is not accurate to claim "that's not a thing". Citing anonymous sources is a long established practice (in particular when it comes to law enforcement activities or potentially sensitive political reporting). The NYT has formal editorial standards around the identity of anonymous sources that require editors to assess the justification for applying it. It doesn't mean the information is reliable, that's where an editorial eye comes into play, but it does fall under the category of normal journalistic practice.
Next the "Washington Game": there’s a grain of truth here, but it is overstated. Yes, leaks can be part of a strategic move by politicians and it can be a source of exploitation by political operators but to equate all anonymous sourcing with propaganda is misleading. Plenty of such reporting has resulted in significant truths being revealed and powerful people being held accountable (Watergate, the Pentagon Papers, Abu Ghraib). Responsible reporting involves weighing a source's motivations as well as corroborating and contextualizing that information as accurately and truthfully as possible.
The author's dismissiveness oversimplifies (or mischaracterizes, if I am being less generous) the reason and function of anonymity here. They overstate the issue with propaganda and anonymous sources. Accurate in the sense that anonymity can enable propaganda (it has happened), it is inaccurate in its absolutism.
I feel like this sort of tone, with the absolutism, the attempt to reduce the complexity and nuance of reporting to the point where it can be dismissed is pretty typical of what passes for commentary in today's blog/tweet/commentary culture but it really plays more into the hands of those that would sow confusion and mistrust than it does into that of the truth and accuracy.
by aedocw on 9/24/25, 2:13 PM
It's a really good book, I wish more people were aware of it and read it.
by alansammarone on 9/24/25, 10:45 AM
When I read a personal blog article articulating a personal opinion, presenting evidence and trying to make a case for their conclusion, I usually apply a different standard. From them, I expect sound reasoning, which often requires a form of independence/neutrality that news organizations don't have.
And let's just say this article is not exactly structured as a sequence of QEDs, so to speak. It doesn't seem like the conclusions follow from the premisses. That's not to say it's wrong, just that if it is right, it would be in part by accident.
by sbarre on 9/24/25, 1:09 PM
by bilekas on 9/24/25, 10:16 AM
Yeah makes a lot of sense when framed like this, the timing of the secret service of all people busting this 'huge' operation was far too suspicious.
by bArray on 9/24/25, 10:32 AM
by nikcub on 9/24/25, 10:30 AM
by Animats on 9/24/25, 8:11 PM
Lots of variations available. Vertical stack, different brands of Android phones, rackmount, server racks for thousands of phones, software for clicking on ads, training videos. "No code".
Product info:
"only provide box for development or testing use.pls do not use it for illegal"
Description
Package
Each Box purchase includes the hardware (20 Phone motherboard ,USB cable, box power cord, phone motherboard +advanced control management software (15days free,after that $38 a year) download software from our website (in the video)
Whats is Box Phone Farm ? It is a piece of equipment that removes the phone screen/battery/camera/sim slot, integrates them into a chassis, and works with click farm software to achieve group control functions. 1 box contains 20 mobile phone motherboards. Install the click farm software on your computer and you can do batch operations.
Function:
Install the Click Farm software on your PC, and you can operate the device in batches or operate a mobile phone individually. Only one person can control 20 mobile phones at the same time, perform the same task, or perform different tasks separately, and easily build a network matrix of thousands of mobile phones. As long as it is an online project that mobile phone users participate in, they can participate in the control. The voltage support 110v- 220V, and when running the game all the time, one box only consumes about 100 watts.
Ethernet:
[OTG/LAN] can use USB mode, and can also use the network cable of the router to connect the box.Two connection modes can be switched.
[1] https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/S22-Server-Rack-S8-Bo...
by JdeBP on 9/24/25, 9:33 AM
by neuronexmachina on 9/24/25, 6:55 PM
* some of the US government officials protected by the Secret Service were the targets of swatting
* the USSS found the swatting calls were anonymized by a SIM Farm in/near NYC
* their investigation of the SIM Farm found "300 co-located SIM servers and 100,000 SIM cards across multiple sites"
* it could have hypothetically been used for swatting officials at the UN General Assembly, but that seems to be conjecture by the Secret Service, rather than anything they actually have evidence of
Does that seem consistent with what we know?
by topspin on 9/24/25, 12:05 PM
With the number of radios seen in the photos from the original story, there must have been a great deal of SMS from that structure. That is very easy to spot with low cost equipment: a TinySA[1] and a directional antenna should be sufficient. Hams do "fox hunting" with similarly basic equipment.
Given the resources of cell operators, the most charitable explanation for how something like this can exist for more than a brief interval is total indifference.
[1] The more recent versions ($150+) are pretty powerful and can see all 4G/5G bands.
by caseysoftware on 9/24/25, 12:54 PM
Yes, we should be skeptical of anything that is entirely sources from anonymous sources.. even if they align with what we want to believe.
And further, I'd love to see reporters start burning sources that lie to them. After all, the source is risking/destroying the reporter's credibility along the way. Unfortunately, we'll never see that as it's all an access game.
by BillTthree on 9/24/25, 2:18 PM
Is it somehow illegal to have many sim cards in the same place as having many radios?
The telco's are also capable of bringing down the network, and they are legally allowed to turn their services off. Its not government infrastructure, its a business. If the backbone ISP providers decided to turn off their services for an area for a time, thats fine, there are contractual provisions to deal with that. its not a crime.
There has been no mention of arrest, was this 'crime' perpetrated by the infamous hackerman in ablack hoodie?
by immibis on 9/24/25, 9:46 AM
by Johnny555 on 9/24/25, 9:31 PM
by rs186 on 9/24/25, 12:28 PM
Now I know why.
by picafrost on 9/24/25, 3:59 PM
by t1234s on 9/24/25, 12:16 PM
by hk1337 on 9/24/25, 10:18 AM
It could be just a scam bot farm but a scam bot farm with the intention of targeting vulnerable UN delegates with scams not necessarily to disrupt any cell tower?
by 2OEH8eoCRo0 on 9/24/25, 1:04 PM
> The Secret Service dismantled a network of more than 300 SIM servers and 100,000 SIM cards in the New York-area that were capable of crippling telecom systems and carrying out anonymous telephonic attacks, disrupting the threat before world leaders arrived for the UN General Assembly
> that were capable of
They didn't say this is what it was used for but that it was capable of doing so. Are we sure that's false? It sounds correct that the equipment is capable of such things.
by giantg2 on 9/24/25, 11:17 AM
by daft_pink on 9/24/25, 3:13 PM
by choutos on 9/24/25, 10:14 AM
by photochemsyn on 9/24/25, 4:38 PM
https://apnews.com/article/unga-sim-farm-threat-explainer-52...
by mcintyre1994 on 9/24/25, 10:47 AM
by numpad0 on 9/24/25, 12:15 PM
by ale42 on 9/24/25, 9:59 AM
by rob_c on 9/24/25, 11:57 AM
We get it you have some political bent and don't like those in charge, but given the professionalism of the setup you don't know how quickly it was setup. If the place was rented last month that _is_ a $1M investment all up front. If it's over time it's still a professional setup all the same by people looking to abuse the system in some way or other for profit. I.e. unknown threat actor until proved proven otherwise.
Honestly picking at a public body bigging up the work they do for the public isn't worth a rant. If this was close enough to the UN buildings and Embassy's to cause a problem then yes. That becomes an international issue. Do you honestly think if this was just a scam farm they wouldn't take money from someone else to burn the thing and turn the city into a circus?
Besides if this was an agency with tech skill but limited funding, like a certain northern province in Asia, they'd bankroll it by scamming to start anyway wouldn't they.
by mnemotronic on 9/24/25, 7:43 PM
So the "bad guys" have loads of SIM cards installed into machines that can make calls or send SMS text messages, right? Doesn't each SIM card require an account with a cell phone provider in order to access "the phone network"? If not then are they getting free cell service and how do I sign up with that (ahem) provider? If so then how were those sim cards paid for? Can we follow the money?
by cryptoegorophy on 9/24/25, 5:21 PM
by DonHopkins on 9/24/25, 7:50 PM
An Artist Used 99 Phones to Fake a Google Maps Traffic Jam:
https://www.wired.com/story/99-phones-fake-google-maps-traff...
Google Maps Hacks by Simon Weckert
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k5eL_al_m7Q
>99 smartphones are transported in a handcart to generate virtual traffic jam in Google Maps.Through this activity, it is possible to turn a green street red which has an impact in the physical world by navigating cars on another route to avoid being stuck in traffic. #googlemapshacks
by nailer on 9/24/25, 2:26 PM
Why is triangulation an error?
by ChoGGi on 9/24/25, 12:48 PM
by PLenz on 9/24/25, 10:00 AM
by slashdave on 9/24/25, 10:57 PM
by joecool1029 on 9/24/25, 4:59 PM
by johann8384 on 9/25/25, 7:43 PM
So, it maybe could have been used to initiate a TDoS attack if someone rented the capacity but that's not what it was there for. They caught a subcontractor and they want us to think they caught a kingpin.
by jacquesm on 9/24/25, 4:16 PM
Which parts of the story were embellished and who they were embellished by is an interesting question but the degree to which the original story being bogus is balanced out nicely by the degree to which this article (and the overblown title) itself is bogus.
The facts: a SIM farm was discovered. It had a very large number of active SIMS. It was found in NYC. It was active when it was found.
What is speculative/hard to verify:
It was used for specific swatting attempts. It was put there by nation state level actors rather than just ordinary criminals.
What is most likely bullshit:
That it had anything to do with the UN headquarters being close by.
But that still leaves plenty of meat on the bone.
by rooftopzen on 9/24/25, 4:50 PM
I've found legitimate stories also sourced from Reuters, but haven't found illegitimate stories NOT sourced from Reuters (in other words, they seem to originate from the same source, not sure why)
by tptacek on 9/24/25, 3:23 PM
by pkphilip on 9/24/25, 2:30 PM
But the news articles themselves were "massaged" in various ways by some of the same editorial teams to suit the left-leaning or the right-leaning newspapers. The idea that completely different spin can be put to the same news - and by the same editorial teams, was a big eye opener for me.
What this taught me is that the media's primary role is to polarise people to either the left or the right so that they can be herded to vote along or act along prescribed lines. What the media and the establishment hates are people who are not either left or right leaning and who are capable of picking and choosing the narrative depending on what makes the most sense - that is, the so called centrists.
But here we are more than 2 decades later from that time and I see that the spin doctors are busier than ever and the "centrists" have almost completely disappeared.
by Havoc on 9/24/25, 10:56 AM
by stefan_ on 9/24/25, 10:37 AM
by aryan14 on 9/24/25, 4:42 PM
Didn’t understand how it’d be used for espionage either, doesn’t even make sense
by metalman on 9/24/25, 11:36 AM
by duxup on 9/24/25, 12:55 PM
There's no reason your super evil plan to knock out cell service couldn't just sit hidden.
Rather this just seems like a criminal scam setup that got caught.
by toader on 9/24/25, 3:03 PM
by avazhi on 9/24/25, 5:45 PM
Stopped reading right here. That is a completely valid reason to talk to the media and happens quite often only under that specific condition.
by phh on 9/24/25, 9:36 AM
by dumbfounder on 9/24/25, 1:26 PM
by mcswell on 9/24/25, 1:53 PM
by ck2 on 9/24/25, 2:58 PM
https://newrepublic.com/post/200833/trump-team-messed-up-un-...
by pt9567 on 9/24/25, 7:12 PM
by ilyazub on 9/24/25, 10:42 AM
by danlugo92 on 9/24/25, 5:26 PM
by SilverBirch on 9/24/25, 10:44 AM
To be honest, with the contents of the post, probably neither. It's fine if you want to point at different sources and go "ooooh WEF" and make scare quotes with your hands, but that's not actually evidence it's just a description of your existing bias.
Frankly, the overstating of the threat in the original article is frankly about as bad as the overstating of the article being bogus. The feds shut down some sim farm. Is is a massive national security threat? Probably no, that's a bit of an overstatement. The NYTimes ran a clickbaity article, is it bogus? Probably no, that's a bit of an overstatement.
I don't understand why people like this get so wound up by the way places like the NYTimes write up articles. This is the way journalism is written, you don't write articles that say "X happened, but it's probably fine!". You write "X happened, and it could have Y impact!". People are smart enough to read the article and understand, we don't need you making baseless accusations about their sourcing.
by brokenmachine on 9/26/25, 1:27 AM
by labrador on 9/24/25, 2:53 PM
by sidewndr46 on 9/24/25, 12:31 PM
by _1tem on 9/25/25, 6:28 AM
by fidotron on 9/24/25, 10:32 AM
The real question here is who and what it was intended to warn off, and you'll never get a real answer to that.
by krunger on 9/24/25, 2:04 PM
by raverbashing on 9/24/25, 11:20 AM
No. This is not how any of this works
Just use SIP?
by didntknowyou on 9/27/25, 1:04 PM
by roody15 on 9/24/25, 12:09 PM
I tend to agree with student, NYT and major news outlets are clearly used for propaganda and if you sit back and look at it from perhaps another angle it makes sense , why wouldn’t a world super power with a massive government apparatus use media to influence and control citizen behavior?
So yes the anonymous experts, the anonymous intelligence experts, the experts on CNN panels .. etc etc. It’s the government pushing a narrative for a purpose. My two cents live your life and spend your precious emotional energy for the people you care about around you. Do things in your local community and help when and where you can.
by gsibble on 9/24/25, 4:02 PM
I don't like when people are inconsistent with how they apply standards.
by hdjdndndba on 9/24/25, 9:51 AM
by gootz on 9/24/25, 1:00 PM
by throwmeaway222 on 9/24/25, 2:32 PM
by CodeWriter23 on 9/24/25, 2:49 PM
The pattern: 1. Corroborate fact. 2. Pose plausible cause of fact. 3. Present unsubstantiated claim as fact.
Sounds like propaganda to me.