This is not the weekly update
One of the joys of this weekly update is finding out what there is to talk about. On Monday, you’re sitting at your desk wondering what you can possibly have to say, and by Friday–as if by magic–something has emerged from the zeitgeist (more accessibly known as the spirit of the times).
This week was almost too obvious: denial. Not just about COVID, not just about the election, not just about my poor choices of binge-television. About denial in all its helpful and unhelpful forms.
And let’s be honest, we are all in denial about something. If you don’t believe me, just ask your friends or your partner.
Let’s swipe right on the whole Internet thing and talk about the hacker-verse where there is something called a Denial-of-Service attack. This attempts to shut down a network by flooding the server with too much traffic to handle, causing it to slow down and eventually stop. Think of a high school football team at an all-you-can-eat pizza buffet.
As it is relatively easy to identify a single point of attack, sophisticated hackers use a Distributed DoS attack which launches the incoming barrage from a number of different places. As if every high school team in the city came to the same all-you-can-eat pizza buffet.
(In case you are wondering, at least one of us was part of a DoS pizza attack back in high school. We were subsequently denied service.)
There were 7.9 million Distributed Denial of Service Attacks in 2018 and this is forecast to double by 2023. The most significant attack to date happened to Amazon last February. Over 2.3 Terabits of data per second were fire-hosed at Amazon servers. That’s the equivalent of 800 episodes of The Crown every second. I only wish there were 800 episodes of The Crown.
Another variation of the DDoS is the Smurf attack. It works like this:
Or maybe like this:
Not being hackers, we’re not sure which.
The original denial of service was a response by businesses in the 1960s and 1970s to keep long-haired hippies out of stores and restaurants. While there are few, if any, federal laws to keep the hippies out, there are laws that allow businesses to make their own regulations. This led to the now ubiquitous store entry sign:
And after successfully fending off the viral plague of hippies for the past 50 years, this message has been given new life in the current pandemic.
This is one of the least imaginative mask signs we’ve come across. There are better ones, but It is uncertain if Queen (the band not the crown) has approved them:
(I bet you’re singing that song right now. And probably stomping your feet too. Don’t deny it.)
Denial can be useful–sometimes even necessary–to be able to function. It is a defense mechanism in which a person, faced with a painful fact, rejects the reality of that fact. We’re bombarded with a lot of uncertainties and unknowns right now and many are turning to coping mechanisms (i.e. denial, inflation, depression) and numbing tools (i.e. alcohol, food, TV) because it’s just too much to feel and deal with at once. In the short term this can be great. But taken too far it can be harmful.
Some of the things we like denying include:
Male pattern baldness.
Last night’s little ice-cream problem.
The fact that she pooped in her diaper while I was holding her (and thereby have contractual obligation to change said diaper under the “if you smell it you change it” rule).
The earth is round.
Watching Hallmark Christmas movies, by choice.
Denial comes in three flavours:
Simple denial is when the painful fact is denied altogether.
Minimizational denial is when the painful fact is admitted but its seriousness is downplayed.
Transference denial is when the painful fact is admitted, the seriousness also admitted, but one's moral responsibility in the situation involving the painful fact is downplayed.
When a person is in denial, they engage in distractive or escapist strategies to reduce stress and help them cope. A 2006 study in the Netherlands showed that up to 47% of patients denied the fact that they have been diagnosed with cancer, 70% denied the impact of the diagnosis upon their lives, and 42% denied that it had any effect upon their feelings. (Denial is in fact the first stage of grief.)
In a more current context: election + simple denial + minimization + transference = golf. Lots of golf.
You may have noticed that denial can thrive in the workplace. This is particularly found during strategic planning where it is a significant issue. A four-year study by LeadershipIQ.com found that 23% of CEOs were fired for denying reality, meaning refusing to recognize negative facts about their organization’s performance.
To help colleagues in denial, don’t lead with facts or logic–that’s usually exactly the wrong thing to do. Emotions are behind the denial of many clear facts.
Once you see denial emerging, work to understand your colleague’s emotions and figure out their emotional blocks. Perhaps they are worried about not being seen as worthy of their new position and that is why they are stubbornly insisting they are right. Perhaps the strategy they are advocating for is a very successful one they’ve championed in the past. Perhaps the poor hire is someone they personally recommended.
Perhaps they thought their friend starred in “Never Kiss a Man in a Christmas Sweater” and they had to watch the other 38 to be sure.
Strategic denial needs emotional conversations in order to be addressed, not rational proofs. Caution, if every time you think your colleague (or spouse) is wrong you just say, “you’re in denial!” it’s not going to go very well. Trust me.
If you’re looking for proof that hackers are a bigger threat than hippies, consider this: hackers have already calculated every possible “password fingerprint” for every known dictionary word in every language (including Klingon), for every first and last name in every country, for the name of every character in existing literature. They’ve also factored all of the obvious combinations and variations. Yikes.
Even twitter-super-users who should know better are not immune from having their passwords hacked. By any stretch, “yourefired” and “maga2020!” are not secure passwords. (Ed. This is not fake news.) An effective if sightly daunting approach to password security is outlined in this article.
But it is worth noting that the malicious hacker is a tired trope in today’s culture. As Remy, one of our team’s sons, says, most are not malicious hackers. Real hackers are
“digitally fluent makers, critical thinkers, social activists and rebels who use technology to find new, unexpected and often counter–intuitive means of solving problems.”
We need more of these COVID-era hippy-hackers in the age of denialism.
Make love, not democracy-undermining tweets. And stay safe.