I’ve encountered the term honeypot three times in my life, and each time it has had a slightly different meaning. The first time was when I was a college freshman in 1965. I was a math and physics major – just turned 17. She was a chemistry major and a year older than I. We were one another’s romantic interest at the time. At some point in that first year of college, she related to me that her father referred to the vagina as “the honeypot.” That was my first encounter with the term.
Decades later, in 2012 I read the novel, Worm: The Digital World War, and encountered the honeypot again – only now it meant a computer server designed to attract and host computer malware so that cyber-sleuths could dissect it and design appropriate remedies. Viruses, worms, and other forms of malware were invited into undefended, virtual computers where virus hunters could observe the behavior of these bits of malicious code.
The particular worm in the novel was the conficker worm that infected more Windows computers than any other malware at that time. Conficker was the brainchild of Ukrainian hackers – one of whom ultimately served prison time. Microsoft eventually came up with a de-worming routine and also plugged the vulnerability in the operating system that gave conficker its foothold.
These days, software houses that produce antivirus software (AVG, Norton, McAfee, and others) still use honeypots to trap new viruses in order to update their software to detect them and defend against them. The honeypot is a trap. Well, maybe the first meaning that I learned for that term wasn’t so different.
My most recent encounter with the term honeypot is in the context of right-wing conspiracy theory. Any invitation to questionable, if not patently illegal, action is considered a potential honeypot. That is, the right-wing crazies considering such action are concerned that it might be a government plot to entrap them. Most recently, the honeypot hypothesis has come up in the context of the Right-wing Nut Job (RWNJ) call for a convoy of 18-wheelers to converge in Eagle Pass, Texas.
I doubt that the federal government has created this boneheaded Convoy of God’s Army as a honeypot. More likely it is a RWNJ self-own. It’s a wonder that these morons answer calls to civil disobedience and/or lawlessness after their brethren have been sentenced to prison by the hundreds for the events of 1/6/21.
As a friend recently replied to one of my posts, “You can’t fix stupid.”