In the early hours of June 20, Brazilian time, cellphone users in several states suddenly received a push notification labeled an “extreme alert.” The message contained the Portuguese word “misantropi4” (a variant of “misantropia,” which corresponds to the English word “misanthropy” meaning “hatred of humanity”), where the letter “a” was replaced with the number “4” — a common character substitution technique used in hacker communities. According to the Brazilian Ministry of Integration and Regional Development, the alert was triggered remotely by hackers who had illegally infiltrated the country’s national civil defense early warning platform. The Federal Police have opened an investigation. Affected areas include major cities such as São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro. Reports indicate that at least seven cities received the push alert. In Belo Horizonte, an even more absurd variant appeared, reading: “Protect yourselves: alien attack, we have arrived.” The Cellbroadcast tool, managed by Brazil’s National Telecommunications Agency (Anatel), was taken offline shortly after the incident was confirmed at 1:30 a.m. local time. Its reactivation is pending the completion of a security review.
The National Civil Defense Secretariat issued a statement making it clear that the sender of the alert “is not a member of the National Civil Protection and Civil Defense System” and that this was a case of “unauthorized remote triggering.” The Cellbroadcast system works similarly to the U.S. Wireless Emergency Alerts (WEA) system, pushing messages directly to all devices within a specific geographic area without requiring a phone number or carrier. Once breached, the system has a very broad reach and is difficult to shut down quickly. National Civil Defense Secretary Wolney Wolf stated in a press conference that a total of 10 alerts spanning multiple states were tracked. The exact number of affected cellphones nationwide has not yet been released.