E-mail, designed in the mid-80's by and for computer geeks, in a tiny, trusting little pre-web internet, is a seriously crappy fit for the modern world.
But good luck replacing it.
Random idea: Add a few commands to ESMTP, which allow the mail server to tentatively accept an e-mail for delivery, then examine the message, then either handle it normally...or, optionally, do some basic back-and-forth with the sender. "Do you really want to sent this to 17,000 recipients?" "Your 50MB attachment is too large for reliable delivery." "Your system has the Zandu-j84 virus; an alert was sent to the IT Dept." Etc.
There's a whole lot of current computing that is just hacked together on top of unscalable bad-in-retrospect ideas from the 70s and 80s. If I had a couple billion dollars I'd be interested in hiring a small group of very bright people to see what building a computing platform and infrastructure from scratch with no concern for compatibility with the current paradigm would look like.
My personal favorite are the emails with a image at the bottom reminding me not to print to save the trees/environment with out realizing that in most cases the image has at least doubled the size of the mail and everything that goes with it from a a transfer storage and display perspective even if miniscule.
Not exactly what you are asking for but many MTA's do have options to limit recipients and ways to make exceptions so there are ways to protect against this and limit who can send to many people. Many enterprise mail servers have something similar to this as well.
I have no idea what the military are using these days. They mention Outlook in the article so I assume they are using O365 or whatever it was renamed to. O365 has the ability to write rules based on AD group membership to limit who can mass email. Perhaps the military can temporarily take away those permissions until people have had training.
Computer literacy is at no time covered while in the Army from my recent experience. It was required how ever to do a lot of those online Army classes each quarter. It would turn into entire days of people trying to figure out how to just login. Almost all admin duties from soldiers at any level has moved to a digital format and yet still often using Windows XP or the site requires running IE in a weird compatibility mode. All of this means we can quickly lose an entire day of work trying to get people to reset their passwords to do a 15min safety quiz or check if they have a dental appointment.
> What were they going to do, send paratroopers at it?
I think the balloon was flying at 60,000 feet. I'm not qualified to know if paratroopers can operate at that altitude, but it sounds tough. They'd need oxygen at the very least.
It would certainly make for a cool scene in a movie, although it seems pointless?
How many folks, or at what age cut-off, know what the "CC" stands for? And how many know where the 'carbon copy' term comes from?
For those that don't know:
> A sheet of carbon paper is placed between two or more sheets of paper. The pressure applied by the writing implement (pen, pencil, typewriter or impact printer) to the top sheet causes pigment from the carbon paper to reproduce the similar mark on the copy sheet(s). More than one copy can be made by stacking several sheets with carbon paper between each pair. Four or five copies is a practical limit. The top sheet is the original and each of the additional sheets is called a carbon copy.
Given the existence of bcc, this is as much a sysadmin failure as it is a tech illiteracy failure. This mail should have been bounced by the outgoing SMTP server.
The client is almost always unaware of the true size represented by an alias for a group it does not manage. These are the source of the big storms in my org.
My father-in-law works for a defense contractor around DC and works with and travels to allied countries on classified + items. He has several stories of him and his colleagues at his office being on the receiving end of un-intended reply-alls with the end result in most cases of a military team coming to the office and physically taking away all the computers that had been on the receiving end of the reply-alls.
[+] [-] bell-cot|3 years ago|reply
But good luck replacing it.
Random idea: Add a few commands to ESMTP, which allow the mail server to tentatively accept an e-mail for delivery, then examine the message, then either handle it normally...or, optionally, do some basic back-and-forth with the sender. "Do you really want to sent this to 17,000 recipients?" "Your 50MB attachment is too large for reliable delivery." "Your system has the Zandu-j84 virus; an alert was sent to the IT Dept." Etc.
[+] [-] AnIdiotOnTheNet|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mywacaday|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] LinuxBender|3 years ago|reply
I have no idea what the military are using these days. They mention Outlook in the article so I assume they are using O365 or whatever it was renamed to. O365 has the ability to write rules based on AD group membership to limit who can mass email. Perhaps the military can temporarily take away those permissions until people have had training.
[+] [-] zahrc|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sam_lowry_|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dr-detroit|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] boomboomsubban|3 years ago|reply
Something of nearly zero importance to the army. What were they going to do, send paratroopers at it?
>Second, it was quite clearly far from a wise use of military resources.
While true, I doubt this caused a significant waste of resources.
The third issue is fair.
The original source opinion piece seems better than this writeup.
[+] [-] Daltzn|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] FartyMcFarter|3 years ago|reply
I think the balloon was flying at 60,000 feet. I'm not qualified to know if paratroopers can operate at that altitude, but it sounds tough. They'd need oxygen at the very least.
It would certainly make for a cool scene in a movie, although it seems pointless?
[+] [-] nightski|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] MarkusWandel|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] throw0101c|3 years ago|reply
Meta question:
How many folks, or at what age cut-off, know what the "CC" stands for? And how many know where the 'carbon copy' term comes from?
For those that don't know:
> A sheet of carbon paper is placed between two or more sheets of paper. The pressure applied by the writing implement (pen, pencil, typewriter or impact printer) to the top sheet causes pigment from the carbon paper to reproduce the similar mark on the copy sheet(s). More than one copy can be made by stacking several sheets with carbon paper between each pair. Four or five copies is a practical limit. The top sheet is the original and each of the additional sheets is called a carbon copy.
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_copy
[+] [-] LinuxBender|3 years ago|reply
Yes. I recently had to explain that to my bank. Now I have the names and email addresses of all my fellow customers of the bank.
[+] [-] m000|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] WirelessGigabit|3 years ago|reply
If I receive an email because it's part of a mailing list it should be in 'To' or in 'Cc'.
Otherwise I have no way of filtering out the email based on its origin.
[+] [-] hef19898|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] invalidusernam3|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] xocdan|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] micromacrofoot|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hipsterstal1n|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aliqot|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TheBigSalad|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] ravroid|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Bender|3 years ago|reply
Here is an archive link [1]
[1] - https://archive.ph/6TBGB