Cylons vs Skynet

[Sarevok]

Given Cavils creepy sexual fetishes skynet could potentially pull a reverse Caprica Six by sending Cameron to him. :p

[Shroom Man 777]

Given Cavils creepy sexual fetishes skynet could potentially pull a reverse Caprica Six by sending Cameron to him. :p

ROBOT RIVER!!!

Really, if evilcat's examples of lousy Cylon firepower stands... then the HKs very well outgun them. We've seen HK tanks blow people into smithereens, we've seen aerial HKs waste everything from technicals, to bridges, to friggin submarines fathoms underwater. If the latest T4 movie is canon, I don't think that Skynet's forces are going to be outmatched in this randome altarnate realty senareo.

[Khaat]

But Cylons could possibly hack a defeated SkyNet resource (downed aerial H/K, dismembered/shut-down T-800....)

They could just as easily get hacked in return. Given Skynet's insanely good R&D capability (nanotech assassins and cyborgs and plasma guns and time travel in 20 years while building an infrastructure from scratch!) the Centurions and data fonts will probably be easy to crack. Raiders and organic cylons maybe a little longer, but Skynet also has ample experience with brain-computer interfacing (as evidenced by the hero in the 4th movie, the 'Infiltrator' books etc). We know the human resistance can reprogram terminators if they manage to physically disable them (or find them shut down), but Raiders have been shown to be disabled en mass by nothing more than a coded signal. This could go either way but frankly my money is on Skynet (again).

In Terminator: Salvation we see the same "coded signal shut down" used against SkyNet units (granted: it was a decoy!) so it really will be a matter of adaptability: who could grok the other side first. To be fair, the Cylons weren't "coded-signal hacked" by the Colonials, they were hacked by a Cylon with authorization/"administrator rights"! But this is off-course; my apologies.

My money's on SkyNet in this stand-up fight, though: better soldiers for the defined theatre.

In a city ruin, Skynet and the forces of the nBSG Cylons are brought to rumble. Centurions and T-600s are put on in equal numbers, with the T-800s supported by T-1s and Hunter-Killers. The Centurions are supported by raiders, not armed with nukes, which are also restricted to the atmosphere. Who would win in this situation?

No Resurrection, no R&D, just a stand-up fight, in SkyNet's arena (hunting humans in the ruins is something SkyNet forces were designed to do.)

[Bilbo]

Where do the Cylons are good hackers brain bug comes from ? They entire nBSG plot hinges upon Gaius Balter willingly sabotaging Colonial. It is a very stupid military if it can be brought down by one man. But even with Colonial incompetence the Cylons needed outside help. Every piece of equipment that had Gaius Balters handywork removed was immune.

They could hack Galactica remotely as soon as they built a network on their computers. Which, granted, either shows that Colonial computer security is a total joke, or that Cylons are OMGAWESOME hackers, since they can circumvent inconveniences like a physically isolated network (seriously, the Galactica physically connected its main computers with cables, and they could still hack the network and upload a virus)

Assumption there. We know according to "The Plan" that a Cavel was living quite comfortably on Galactica and that there were several Cylon skinjobs on the ship and fleet. For all we know the virus attack on Galactica came from within the ship from a Cylon infiltrator who was waiting for the Colonials to do something like link their systems together. Makes more sense then the impossible idea that as soon as you network a few computers you create an instant WAN.

[RecklessPrudence]

You forgot that the Cylons had the advantage over the Colonials because up until after humanity had its cunt punched, nobody knew the Cylons had humaniform infiltrators having secksytime with their dorky amoral dweeb womanizing scientist geniuses and possibly other facets of their military-industrial complexes. Cylon intelligence's infiltration of nBSG humanity was systemic, like if they managed to steal the Enigma Machine from the Nazzies or something. Maybe even worse.

This is not the case with Skynet. I mean, Skynet won't be using Colonial shit nor Cylon shit, so the Cylons can't magically "hack" them.

That's like some dweeb played by Jeff Goldblum managing to defeat an alien invasion by suddenly creating a computer virus out of the blue with his shitty Apple computer, when we all know Apple computers are shit. Apple computers can't even play Windows video games, so how can they work on alien ray shields? It just works? I hope those tentacled ID4 aliens strangle that obnoxious prick in those Apple commercials.

I know that the Cylons won't have the advantages against SkyNet that they did against the Colonials and, indeed, their systems may be completely incompatible. I didn't mean to imply otherwise. All my post was meant to do was say that while the Cylons are not automagically going to be able to 'hack' a system that they've never seen anything like, and was built by a completely separate culture, for all we know using completely different design and programming principles (I'm not that ignorant), they're not completely incompetent (at hacking, at least) either, which was the impression I was getting from some of the posts.

I think where I went wrong was in saying that "the Cylons are that shit-hot at hacking." I didn't mean to have the word 'that' in there. Having 'that' in that sentence changes the meaning from 'they're damn good', which is what I meant, to 'they're magic', which is not what I intended. I can only blame myself and apologise for it.

Also, even being able to hack the Colonial's (more complex, back then) computer systems in the First Cylon War isn't all that impressive, given that the Cylons presumably had an 'intimate' knowledge of Colonial programming habits, backdoors, and et cetera, being an end product of same. All I was trying to say was that they're not the equivalent of an eight-year-old thinking he can hack because he can bypass Windows 95's 'security' procedures.

Assumption there. We know according to "The Plan" that a Cavel was living quite comfortably on Galactica and that there were several Cylon skinjobs on the ship and fleet. For all we know the virus attack on Galactica came from within the ship from a Cylon infiltrator who was waiting for the Colonials to do something like link their systems together. Makes more sense then the impossible idea that as soon as you network a few computers you create an instant WAN.

I'm actually not sure how feasible it is, but I've seen the idea in a number of sci-fi universes now, that you can hack someone through their comms/sensor array (comms makes more sense to me, but sensors seem to be more prevalent), without the person operating either station from seeing anything other than maybe a blip. Considering that it was specifically said a few times in that episode that they were networking 'all' Galactica's computers (how wide is that 'all'? Does it include the computers on the Vipers and Raptors, or someone's personal computer? Do they have portable computers for civilians in nBSG? I don't remember), and I'm pretty sure the DRADIS computer was mentioned at least once, maybe that's what that scene was meant to get across? At least, that's what I assumed it was.

I've probably missed something else in this post that twists what I say away from what I mean, but as I reread my initial post in its entirety before posting and only caught the errant 'that' after some time had passed, I don't think checking this post again and again is going to yield anything useful, so if I did miss something, apologies in advance.

[Bilbo]

Its all hard to say. The Colonials were morons on many levels. If you face an enemy who can hack your system so easily then why do you even have hard drive. Upgrades may be a pain but you could attain near perfect security from hacking and system reprogramming by having every aspect of your net saved on non-programmable ROM chips. Sure, upgrades would require shipping out new chips, and this doesnt protect from someone messing with the ROM chips at the factory, but as long as you properly check all chips going out the door you would never ever have to worry about intrusions in the field. Just design your equipment to only use non-writable hardware.

Instead the Colonials used massive numbers of hard drives and made upgrades to their entire fleet with very little quality control check. I mean how stupid is it that a single update can be sent to every cap ship, auxillary ship, and fighter in the entire fleet at the exact same time. No one with a real brain does anything like that. At the very least you test it on a small number and carefully examine the code for problems after running it for weeks or months. Considering how fast the Colonials found the virus once they went looking it is obvious that it was not hidden all that well.

[PeZook]

Instead the Colonials used massive numbers of hard drives and made upgrades to their entire fleet with very little quality control check.

How do you know that, exactly? Did you forget that the lead programmer on the project became an enemy agent? Baltar violated all sorts of security protocols using his position, Six had free access to defence mainframes...she could've incorporated the backdoor at any point. It's not like system programmers will go over the code line after line when it's far into development.

I mean how stupid is it that a single update can be sent to every cap ship, auxillary ship, and fighter in the entire fleet at the exact same time.

It wasn't said when the upgrade began. It might just as well have been years in the making, with several version of the system tested for bugs already.

No one with a real brain does anything like that. At the very least you test it on a small number and carefully examine the code for problems after running it for weeks or months.

If the system didn't give any problems during field testing, why would they examine the code line after line?

Considering how fast the Colonials found the virus once they went looking it is obvious that it was not hidden all that well.

Uh, the colonials didn't find squat. Baltar "discovered" the back doors on Galactica after he was put to work on figuring out what happened, and had Gaeta summarily purge his program from the ship's computers to hide his involvement. As far as we know, he didn't even really anayze the code.

[Bilbo]

Uh, the colonials didn't find squat. Baltar "discovered" the back doors on Galactica after he was put to work on figuring out what happened, and had Gaeta summarily purge his program from the ship's computers to hide his involvement. As far as we know, he didn't even really anayze the code.

The Pegasus discovered the virus long before Baltar came along. Also in the plan it was specifically mentioned that the backdoor was part of the recent (as in during the Pegasus dock time) fleet wide upgrade to the nav system.

[PeZook]

The Pegasus discovered the virus long before Baltar came along.

By brutally interrogating their Six once they realized she was a Cylon. They only survived the attack because their computer system was down as the time and they blind jumped.

Also in the plan it was specifically mentioned that the backdoor was part of the recent (as in during the Pegasus dock time) fleet wide upgrade to the nav system.

Well, I didn't see The Plan. But was it said the entire program was installed then, or just some upgrade or another? If it was just a system patch, then there's no reason to expect it to be tested for months beforehand.

[Bilbo]

The Pegasus discovered the virus long before Baltar came along.

By brutally interrogating their Six once they realized she was a Cylon. They only survived the attack because their computer system was down as the time and they blind jumped.

Also in the plan it was specifically mentioned that the backdoor was part of the recent (as in during the Pegasus dock time) fleet wide upgrade to the nav system.

Well, I didn't see The Plan. But was it said the entire program was installed then, or just some upgrade or another? If it was just a system patch, then there's no reason to expect it to be tested for months beforehand.

Actually they found the virus before they discovered the Six among them was a Cylon. Why you would comment on something you have no seen is beyond me.

All I remember was that the Lieutenant that found it said it was part of a fleet wide upgrade to their navigation system. Being an upgrade to navigation which would include thir JUMP DRIVES means yes you would be pretty fucking stupid if you did not very carefully test and retest it before you send it out to the fleet.

[PeZook]

Actually they found the virus before they discovered the Six among them was a Cylon. Why you would comment on something you have no seen is beyond me.

I was going from the show itself. If The Plan fleshes it out, then I concede.

All I remember was that the Lieutenant that found it said it was part of a fleet wide upgrade to their navigation system. Being an upgrade to navigation which would include thir JUMP DRIVES means yes you would be pretty fucking stupid if you did not very carefully test and retest it before you send it out to the fleet.

How do you know they didn't? If it was tested for five years on a series of experimental cutters before implementation, it would still be a fleet-wide upgrade.

[Bilbo]

Actually they found the virus before they discovered the Six among them was a Cylon. Why you would comment on something you have no seen is beyond me.

I was going from the show itself. If The Plan fleshes it out, then I concede.

All I remember was that the Lieutenant that found it said it was part of a fleet wide upgrade to their navigation system. Being an upgrade to navigation which would include thir JUMP DRIVES means yes you would be pretty fucking stupid if you did not very carefully test and retest it before you send it out to the fleet.

How do you know they didn't? If it was tested for five years on a series of experimental cutters before implementation, it would still be a fleet-wide upgrade.

Well that is possible. But we know fom the opening Mini-series that Baltar let Caprica Six in just days before the upgrade was sent out. So if it was tested for years before deployment then the Colonials were so damn stupid that they only had one copy stored on the Defense Department mainframe and did not notice that it had been altered just days before it was deployed.

[PeZook]

Well that is possible. But we know fom the opening Mini-series that Baltar let Caprica Six in just days before the upgrade was sent out. So if it was tested for years before deployment then the Colonials were so damn stupid that they only had one copy stored on the Defense Department mainframe and did not notice that it had been altered just days before it was deployed.

I honestly don't remember, but was there dialogue establishing when, precisely, Six hooked up with Baltar? I only recall them talking about her helping him with programming, but not an actual timeframe, though I watched the miniseries ages ago.

[Bilbo]

Well that is possible. But we know fom the opening Mini-series that Baltar let Caprica Six in just days before the upgrade was sent out. So if it was tested for years before deployment then the Colonials were so damn stupid that they only had one copy stored on the Defense Department mainframe and did not notice that it had been altered just days before it was deployed.

I honestly don't remember, but was there dialogue establishing when, precisely, Six hooked up with Baltar? I only recall them talking about her helping him with programming, but not an actual timeframe, though I watched the miniseries ages ago.

It was recent enough that they were talking about it while walking, he knew nothing about her, and he barely remembered her name. Even for someone as ego-centric as Baltar it says a lot about how short term the relationship was.