NATION'S WATER SUPPLY SAVED BY MAN NAMED GARY WITH A WRENCH
Suspected Iranian hackers defeated by America's most ancient cybersecurity protocol: unplugging it and calling Gary.
The FBI confirmed this week that suspected Iranian-linked hackers targeted water utility systems across seven states, prompting officials in Minnesota, Michigan, and beyond to respond with a cybersecurity countermeasure so advanced it involves no software whatsoever: a guy named Gary, a wrench, and roughly forty years of not caring what a computer thinks. Utilities that switched from automated controls to manual operation reported zero disruptions, mostly because Gary does not accept remote login attempts, foreign or domestic.
"The moment we put a human with a toolbox in charge, the Iranian malware started asking for a bathroom break. Gary declined," said a utility spokesman, standing beside a now-famous photo of Gary eating a turkey sandwich next to the manually operated valve, captioned 'Threat level: lunch.' Cybersecurity analysts note the malware, designed to exploit sophisticated industrial control systems, has no known exploit for 'a man who insists on doing it the way his uncle taught him in 1987.'
"They came for our infrastructure. Gary came for lunch. Gary won," intoned anchor Ron Rugundy, pausing to let the gravity settle. "I'm not going to sugarcoat this. I don't know how. But I do know this: you can hack a server. You cannot hack a man named Gary who has already decided the valve turns clockwise no matter what the internet says." The EPA has not commented on whether Gary requires a security clearance, a raise, or simply another sandwich.
