A widespread concern is what would happen to Dutch weapon systems if the Americans were to withdraw completely as an ally. For example, Dutch F-35 aircraft are dependent on American software updates. Yet, Tuinman isn’t particularly worried about this.

“The F-35 is truly a shared product. The British make the Rolls-Royce engines, and the Americans simply need them too.” And even if this mutual dependency doesn’t result in software updates, the F-35, in its current state, is still a better aircraft than other types of fighters.

If you still want to upgrade despite everything, I’m going to say something I should never say, but I will anyway: you can jailbreak an F-35 just like an iPhone. (Crack it with your own software, ed.)

  • hector@lemmy.today
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    3 hours ago

    Except the US has killswitches hard wired in. A fusible link, irreversibly bricking it based on signal from the mother ship.

    • Iconoclast@feddit.uk
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      38 minutes ago

      Either you’re talking confidently about something you couldn’t possibly know, or you’re risking the rest of your life in prison for leaking top-secret military info. Which is it?

      • hector@lemmy.today
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        3 hours ago

        The way I heard it, it’s like hard wired it is thought, not like a part of the software per se, something physical in there they can trigger with a message that makes a circuit that bricks the unit.

        We don’t actually know though, I bet if someone did find out lockheed would have their head and the news wouldn’t touch it.

    • Squizzy@lemmy.world
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      3 hours ago

      Where is the support for this? I believe they would but as I understand it they cut cloud services, not core functionality.

      • hector@lemmy.today
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        3 hours ago

        It is a long standing rumour. Not just in these in a lot of their gear. I believe it.

        It’s also rumoured, going way back over 20 years, that the us has kill switches in a majority of the world’s computers.

        • Squizzy@lemmy.world
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          43 minutes ago

          Meh, they are whores but they dont produce shit. They get your information through invasive NSA actions and capitalist acumbaggery.

        • tidderuuf@lemmy.world
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          2 hours ago

          I remember working with an old dude 10 years ago who pointed at the CPU in a computer and said “the government can turn that off whenever they want”. He died of COVID so take his quote with what value you want.