Reminds me of the reporter who was supposedly working on a massive investigation and then died in a flaming car crash while skipping town. Forgot his name
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Hastings_(journalist)
https://www.metabunk.org/debunked-michael-hastings-crash-car...
The CIA has multiple ways to cause a death. No doubt about that. They don't "need" to use any particular method, but if they want to kill someone, that have to choose at least one method.
>nor would they want to draw the unnecessary speculation and attention.
What unnecessary speculation and attention? Is LAPD going to bust out their JTAG debuggers, and compare the collection of firmwares in Hastings' car to a clean sample? Practically nobody believes that the CIA/US gov't killed Hastings by hacking his car. Given the propensity for most Americans to never even consider a thing once its been labeled as a conspiracy theory, I'd say that gives about as good a cover as the CIA (or whomever) would ever need. We already have people hypothesizing this as the manner of Hastings' death; but do we see any apparent effort to dispute/disprove it? No, simply chuckle and call it a conspiracy theory. It will go away on its own without regard to whether it was in fact a conspiracy.
>I would expect antics like that to be reserved for high-ranking foreign officials or other hard-to-reach people.
The spies have to perfect their craft somehow. Where is it written that a method of assassination must vary by the apparent importance of the proposed victim?
As an aside, I"m not familiar with his car but I find it hard to believe that neither the ebreak, main break, ignition, nor transmission lever (assuming it was auto) could mitigate his situation. I think they would have to hack more than just firmware, since there are mechanical linkages and/or hardware interlocks on some of those components.
>why would they resort to elaborate techniques
Spy agencies in general, and the CIA in particular are infamous for concocting and using elaborate sometimes down right goofy techniques to assassinate people, and also for periodically failing at the job. This isn't just hyperbole, or me reading too much spy fiction, it's in the public record if you care to look.
>I'm not saying feds wouldn't kill a US citizen, I just dont think they chose to hack the firmware in this case.
I don't really think they did either, it's extremely unlikely. But I won't rule it out because I haven't seen any convincing reason to do so.
>As an aside, I"m not familiar with his car but I find it hard to believe that neither the ebreak, main break, ignition, nor transmission lever (assuming it was auto) could mitigate his situation. I think they would have to hack more than just firmware, since there are mechanical linkages and/or hardware interlocks on some of those components.
If you care to look into it I think you'll find it to be plausible to take control of the car's accelerator, and steer it with the brakes. In principle it's possible with any car that has electronic ABS, and electronic fuel injection and throttle. On some models, advanced features could simplify the job quite a bit. That's not to say that a quick-thinking person couldn't survive the attempt either, by applying the brake, or shifting the transmission or something.
> If you care to look into it (x2)
comments like this really have no place on HN and don't strengthen your position.
>comments like this really have no place on HN and don't strengthen your position.
In your own post you admit that you know none of the relevant details (and apparently can't be bothered to look) about some recent event A which was covered widely in the press. But nevertheless, you can't believe that event A could have occurred in some particular way because you think it implausible or because you like a simpler or more familiar explanation. In fact, there is nothing at all implausible about steering a four wheeled vehicle by applying left or right brakes, and the correct spelling is brakes, not breaks FYI. Nor is it implausible for an attacker to take control of a vehicle's accelerator in a modern automobile. No, I am not going to prove that for you. If you think that I or any other poster on HN is your paid technical or historical research assistant / spoon-feeder, you are mistaken.
“There is reason to believe that intelligence agencies for major powers [know how to remotely seize control of a car],” he said.
Michael Hastings was a recovering alcoholic and meth-abuser whose brother, Jonathan, had flown into town the day before because he suspected that Michael was having a manic breakdown similar to the ones he had in the past. Jonathan had been called to LA since several of Michael's coworkers had reached out about his mental state.
After spending the day with Michael, Jonathan called their third brother to come help get Michael back into rehab. That brother arranged to fly out the next day but that night, at 4:30am, Michael snuck out of his apartment and crashed his car into a tree at very high speed.
Here's what Jonathan Hastings thinks about his brother's death:
I really rule out foul play entirely. I might have been suspicious if I hadn’t been with him the day before he died. After all, he definitely was investigating and writing about a lot of sensitive subjects. But based on being with him and talking to people who were worried about him in the weeks leading up to his death, and being around him when he had had similar problems when he was younger, I was pretty much convinced that he wasn’t in danger from any outside agency.
https://www.salon.com/2013/11/05/michael_hastings_life_and_d...
I mean, it's just as likely people pressured his family to say this (either organized crime or the government .. really the same thing).
It's not dying because it's highly suspicious and the narrative doesn't fit, the news reports are conflicting and much of the evidence is gone.
Do you realize how ridiculous this sounds? I take it you're an experienced crash-scene investigator?
How exactly would an accident scene differ if the accident were caused by a CIA-backed exploit vs. your standard high speed crash?
> I mean, it's just as likely people pressured his family to say this (either organized crime or the government .. really the same thing).
No, it's really not just as likely. In fact it's not likely at all.