In the big cities, crosswalks are equipped with those little buttons pedestrians can press to request a light change, and that also have speakers to announce which direction is safe to cross, a safety feature for blind people. Even little Morris has a set of these at one intersection, at 4th and Atlantic, if you’re ever in the area and want to gawk at our advanced technology.
It turns out that some nefarious people have figured out how to hack the message that comes out of the speakers.
On April 12, 2025 the top story on the Palo Alto (California) online news site was “Silicon Valley Crosswalk Buttons Apparently Hacked to Imitate Musk, Zuckerberg Voices” It told the story, covered by other media too, of how someone hacked into audible pedestrian signals so they broadcast messages such as “From undermining democracy, to cooking our grandparents’ brains with AI slop, to making the world less safe for trans people, nobody does it better than us – and I think that’s pretty neat..”
The Palo Alto Online story continued by sharing that “City employees determined that 12 downtown intersections were impacted and have disabled the voice announcement feature on the crosswalks until repairs can be made.”
There’s a glaring hole in this story and in all the reporting I’ve seen about this “hack.” The missing piece is this: Those signals have a voice announcements (and capability for audible output) because they are accessible signals that the blind community across the country have advocated and fought for for decades.
Can you tell which street is safe to cross from that message?
I’m ashamed that that sounds like an anti-Zuckerberg message that a Leftist might make. Don’t do that, people. It’s insensitive and hurts the innocent.
Is there no tactile arrow in the USA designs?
BTW, ours don’ talk, they make noises.
cf. https://theconversation.com/sublime-design-the-pb-5-pedestrian-button-26232
I’ve seen the videos of this, though the emphasis was on Musk not Zuck. Frankly wasn’t sure they had actually hacked the boxes or it was just a voiceover.
John Morales @ #1 — Some of the one’s I have seen around where I live have tactile arrows. Some of them just beep, or the voice is very simple: just “cross”…which is one reason why I was skeptical about the hack. There seems to be a lot of variation.
Tactile-dependent information is of little use to someone who has little to no feeling in their hands or feet due to diabetic neuropathy.
The only time I have ever come across audible walk signals was when I was working in Washington, DC for the National Park Service. It’s not too surprising to me that people would overlook the utility of these to people who are blind and the harm it might cause. Most people just don’t consider things like that. (For example, the ongoing debate about sticking to Daylight Savings Time versus Standard Time. My depth perception is nonexistent, so I have a restriction on my license against driving after dark or before dawn. DST year-round would entail it being dark outside until 8:30 in the morning in the depths of winter. So how am I supposed to start work at 8?)
I don’t see it on the Google street view. I don’t even see a stop light.
Could it be 5th and Atlantic?
I had assumed the hacked messages were the period when people needed to wait and that the safe to walk message still happened. Does anyone know?
Compare & contrast to flinging paint &/or food at the plexiglass covering major works of art.
Kidz theze daze!
Way back when we stuck to good clean healthy protest tactics, like levitating the Pentagon.
@ ^ Pierce R. Butler : What? Levitating the Pentagon?
Yeah, this form of protest is a serious case of not thinking about the possible Splash dmage and harm to others.
I hope #6 bcw bcw is right about how this was done but, if not, yeah, seriously unacceptable potentially deadly tactic.
bcw bcw @6 — What I saw in the reel was a hand touch the box on the post near a curb. A voice began to talk. That would have been during the “Wait” period. The reel ended before the switch to “Walk”.
In the UK, when the green figure is showing steadily, there is sometimes a beeper to indicate that it’s safe to cross (though sometimes only during daylight hours, and maybe not at all in residential areas). There are also tactile paving stones and a textured knob underneath the pushbutton housing that revolves during the “steady green figure” phase, for multiple redundancy and to cater to as many people’s individual situations as possible.
If I live long enough to lose the rather non-HD eyesight I have, I will be much more pissed off by someone leaving a baby changing table deployed in an accessible toilet or blocking a pavement than, say, uttering the phrase “blind hole”.
@10. robro : Thanks that’s good to know.
StevoR #8
It wasn’t successful
I’m not sure that the hardware was actually hacked. Its more likely that someone mounted an additional speaker and voice synthesizer behind the sign, and the button still works as intended.
This likely falls in the category of cute harmless pranks. Its the stuff that we need to distract from getting depressed about our decent into a corporate surveillance state.
Here in West Hollywood our signals have the directional sounds like the Australian A5s, but also say ‘wait’ whenever you activate them. (some use radar so you don’t have to touch them just get near). Then on green they stop saying ‘wait’ and repeatedly say ‘walk’ until it is no longer deemed safe to do so (each intersection has it’s own set time for this) Not all intersections in my city are orthogonal, so the directional beeps are very useful. The arrows exist, they are smaller and on the buttons themselves. (I haven’t seen anyone use the arrows) The directional beeps will continue even though the ‘walk’ command goes tacit so you can find your way to the opposite side if it takes you longer. If you approach the intersection while it is green but you don’t hear ‘walk’ you can activate the button and if the ‘walk’ message is not broken or missing and it will either say ‘wait’ if there is not enough time or if there is the directional beeping will restart.
@ Walter Solomon : Ah! Thanks! What an awesome idea and event.
Having a voice speaking at the crossings assumes everyone knows the language. The non-verbal signals at least theoretically reach more pedestrians.
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I am reminded of the people who vandalise Teslas. The owners usually bought them before the South African went full Roman Salute.
And…this brings me to the brilliant I’ve Never Met A Nice South African song by Spitting Image, but Youtube has removed the videos where you see Botha et al. You only get the song, without the visual context.
Asclepias @ 4
The only time I have come across this is in the film Blade Runner. I assumed the low-paid immigrant proles in the film were mostly illitterate so spoken “go” instructions were a necessity.