Posted on 01/30/2024 1:44:21 PM PST by nickcarraway
Television is a staple in most American homes, allowing people to receive the news and catch up with the latest entertainment. Yet, in 1987, citizens of Chicago were subjected to something completely different — a bizarre pirate broadcast interrupting scheduled programming.
Known as the Max Headroom signal hijackings, the incident is objectively quite humorous and harmless. However, the surprise broadcast would’ve terrified many viewers at the time, who had no idea that, in the comfort of their own living room, they’d be subjected to a strange video of a man wearing a Max Headroom mask. What made the video so creepy was the uncanny effect achieved through the mask, concealing the identity of the hacker.
While the two broadcasts only featured short clips of the hacker moving around while wearing the mask in front of a rotating metal panel, the mystery surrounding it left many viewers shocked. To this day, the people behind the hijacking remain a mystery, although many theories about the true identity of the culprit have floated around the internet for decades.
The two hijackings took place on November 22nd, with the first occurring during a news report on WGN-TV. It was 9:14pm, and images of the Chicago Bears were interrupted by the first appearance of Max Headroom. At the time, Max Headroom was a fictional television presenter popular in the United Kingdom who was also the face of New Coke.
The hijacking lasted a mere 20 seconds, with the WGN-TV crew desperately trying to get rid of the broadcast. Luckily, the clip was unsettling but not offensive, with the hijacker simply nodding his head frantically. However, that wasn’t enough for the hijackers, who took over a broadcast of Horror of Fang Rock on WTTW just two hours later.
Now, this is where the incident gets considerably more interesting. Max Headroom begins rambling on, although the audio is rather difficult to hear as it is so distorted. Still, many people have deciphered what the hijacker said, and full videos with subtitles can be found on YouTube. He starts by saying, “That does it. He’s a frickin’ nerd” before laughing. Then, the hijacker continues, “Yeah, I think I’m better than Chuck Swirsky. Frickin’ liberal. Oh, Jesus.”
He also declares, “My piles!” and hums part of the Clutch Cargo theme song, all while engineers were failing to regain control of the network. Then, the broadcast cut to the hijacker bending over, receiving a light smack from a woman only partly in the frame, who tells him to “Bend over, bitch!”. This clip lasted about one minute and 30 seconds before the hijackers stopped the broadcast themselves.
To this day, the identity of the hijackers remains unsolved, although there are many internet forums and Reddit threads dedicated to discussing their possible identities. Yet, no one has ever taken responsibility, so the case remains a bizarre mystery.
I remember seeing the WTTW hack.
L
That turned out to be a worker at an uplink facility that simply aimed their uplink dish at the HBO satellite and overrode the regular HBO feed briefly.
I got a small medallion of MAX on my tool box 🧰 .
Never knew of This hijack
Bizarro World.
A grade D, low budget, backwater movie called “broadcast signal interruption” smacks of this story.
To me it’s one of those super cheap movies that is actually good and overall creepy.
Kayfabe
Why would the station want t stage it?
The two hack in this article are humorous, I wonder if a nefarious group could actually take over a major broadcaster to make a political statement.
For example, suppose a hacker group took over the signal just as the Super Bowl in 2 week was kicking off, millions of people would see it live and it wouldn’t take long to put out a threat or some type of political broadcast.
"You want the solution to inflation? Hi, friends. Marshall Lucky here for New Deal Used Cars, where we're lowering inflation not only by fighting high prices, not only by murdering high prices, but by blowing the living shit out of high prices. Yes sir. Here's an example. It's a 1972 Cadillac Coupe DeVille, for sixty-two ninety-nine. That price is too high."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjeUuakHsLw
Back in the olden days of television, there was a 2 GHz microwave link from the studio out to the location of the main TV transmitter, called the Studio-Transmitter Link, or STL for short.
This looks to me like someone with a live truck, that also has a 2 GHz microwave transmitter to get video back to the studio from a live remote, was used to override the WGN STL and put on their own video.
If a live remote truck was used, then the hijackers could have used anybody's garage for a studio and simply transmit from their neighborhood.
Cadillac man?
Used Cars.
too bad no one does that now during Xiden State of the Union Address!!
man that is reaching back. I watched bits and pieces of that movie, but missed that part.
Still broadcast signal interruption, is a good creepy movie to watch.
Lenny and Squiggy!! 😆😎
M-M-M-Max Headroom???
I resemble that remark.
"A Mercedes 450SL for Twenty-four thousand dollars? That's too f'n high!"
The Southern Television broadcast interruption came through the Hannington transmitter of the Independent Broadcasting Authority in the United Kingdom at 5:10 pm on 26th November 1977. A speaker interrupted transmissions for six minutes and claimed to be a representative of an “Intergalactic Association.”
The voice, which was disguised with a voice distorter, with a deep buzzing in the background, interrupted the local ITV news. It was audio only that was heard as the UHF audio signal of the early-evening news was over-ridden. The voice warned, “All your weapons of evil must be removed” and “You have but a short time to learn to live together in peace!”
Shortly after the statement had been delivered, transmissions returned to normal shortly and the end of a Looney Tunes cartoon could be seen. Southern Television later apologised for what it described as "a breakthrough in sound" for some viewers.
Were any of the weapons of evil removed?
How about replacing the Super Bowl with a pirate broadcast of Taylor Swift’s concert movie? Would anyone be able to tell the difference from the constant NFL Taylor updates?
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