--- title: "Federal Reserve Cancels Meeting After Relentless Porn-Bombing" description: "A Federal Reserve Zoom meeting with over 220 attendees had to be shut down last week due to a hijacker, who bombed the virtual event with porn." date: "2023-03-06" modified: "2023-03-06" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/federal-reserve-cancels-meeting-after-porn-bombing" categories: - "Future Society" tags: - "the digest" - "zoom" - "zoom fatigue" --- # Federal Reserve Cancels Meeting After Relentless Porn-Bombing ![A Federal Reserve Zoom meeting with over 220 attendees had to be shut down last week due to a hijacker, who bombed the virtual event with porn.]() *\Image: Getty Images/Futurism\* ## Zoom Bomb A Federal Reserve Zoom meeting with over 220 attendees had to be shut down last week due to a hijacker who bombed the virtual event with porn, [*Reuters* reports](), a side effect of moving important conferences online during the COVID-19 pandemic. "We were a victim of a teleconference or Zoom hijacking and we are trying to understand what we need to do going forward to prevent this from ever happening again," meeting host Brent Tjarks, executive director of the Mid-Size Bank Coalition of America (MBCA), told *Reuters*. "It is an incident we deeply regret." A *Reuters* reporter who happened to be on the call noticed a participant called "Dan," who began posting graphic images. The images surfaced thanks to the hosts reportedly forgetting to mute everybody else's microphones and webcams. A Zoom spokesman told *Reuters* that the company takes "meeting disruptions extremely seriously and, where appropriate, we work closely with law enforcement authorities." The meeting, which was meant to have Federal Reserve Governor Christopher Waller give a speech, was promptly canceled, with the host citing "technical difficulties." ## Cat and Mouse We've already seen a wide variety of meeting disruptions since the COVID-19 pandemic led to the widespread adoption of video conferencing tools like Zoom. According to 2021 research, the vast majority of Zoom bombings that took place in 2020 were the result of a [participant posting a link publicly]() and inviting trolls, a trend that predominantly affected schools and universities. Even the Justice Department got involved, [warning]() in April 2020 that hijacking calls are a crime and not a joke. It's not the first time we've seen lewd content being displayed during high-profile Zoom meetings. Last year, for instance, Nobel prize-winning physicist Giorgio Parisi [was exposed]() to unofficial Final Fantasy VII porn being streamed by a hijacker. Other Zoom disruptions have been far tamer than the Federal Reserve's porn incident. Who could forget the time when Lizet Ocampo, the national political director for the progressive advocacy group People For the American Way, accidentally [turned herself into a talking potato]() during a 2020 meeting? Then there's the time county attorney Rod Ponton forgot to [turn off an adorable cat filter]() for a virtual court case in 2021. Even with robust password protection and end-to-end encryption in place, stopping Zoom bombings will forever be doomed to be a game of cat and mouse. After all, every video conference will inevitably include at the very least one participant, who is bored out of their mind. **READ MORE:** [Porn Zoom bomb forces cancellation of Fed's Waller event]() \[*Reuters*\] **More on Zoom bombing:** *[Hackers Force Nobel Prize Winning Physicist to Watching Hentai]()* ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()