Oops: Photo Reveals Password at Hawaii Emergency HQ

Yes, the same office that sent out the bogus missile alert
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted Jan 17, 2018 1:21 AM CST
Updated Jan 17, 2018 6:20 AM CST
Employee Who Sent Hawaii Alert Is Getting Death Threats
A password can be seen stuck to a computer in this July photo from the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency's headquarters in Honolulu.   (AP Photo/Jennifer Sinco Kelleher)

The emergency warning officer who accidentally sent Hawaii an incoming missile alert has been receiving death threats and is "not doing well," says the executive officer of the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency. Toby Clairmont tells the Honolulu Star-Advertiser that the employee, a 10-year agency veteran, has received "dozens of death threats by fax, telephone, social media." The worker, who has been reassigned to other duties, is "distraught that they've received death threats," Clairmont says. "This is hard. What can be worse than this? Running over a child in a crosswalk and you realize you did it? It's that kind of feeling," he says. "This employee is not doing well. We need to help them, too."

Clairmont says the employee, who caused widespread panic with just two mouse clicks Saturday morning, has not been disciplined and is helping the investigation, though "anything from a reprimand to termination" is still on the table. Hawaii News Now reports that the agency's password protection measures are also in the spotlight: When an otherwise innocuous photo from the agency's Honolulu headquarters appeared in news reports, sharp-eyed readers noticed that a password was on a Post-It note stuck on a computer. (The password could be read with the photo enlarged.) Agency spokesman Richard Rapoza says the password was indeed real, though for an "internal application," not "major piece of software." It is no longer in use. Rapoza says the agency has also had to debunk an online rumor that there has been a cover-up and the missile alert was real. (More Hawaii stories.)

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