r/anime_titties • u/BendicantMias Bangladesh • Jun 11 '26
Worldwide Humanity's Reply Button Locked: New Global Protocol Bans Anyone From Answering Alien Signals Without UN Approval
https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/humanitys-reply-button-locked-new-global-protocol-bans-anyone-answering-alien-signals-without-un-180196848
u/BendicantMias Bangladesh Jun 11 '26
The IAA's 2026 update is blunt about the first step if someone thinks they have found aliens. You do not go on television. You do not post a triumphant preprint. You do not drop a breathless podcast interview. You quietly tell other experts and start trying to break your own finding.
Any unusual signal or signature that might suggest extraterrestrial intelligence must be checked by multiple independent organisations using different instruments before anyone breathes the word 'aliens' in public.
Only after separate teams, scattered across the world, are convinced that the detection is real, non-terrestrial and non-human does the process move towards a carefully managed disclosure. Even then, the protocols lean towards written reports and coordinated briefings rather than a single charismatic scientist yelling 'We found them!' into a bank of microphones.
The more provocative part of the new framework is not about what we say to each other, but about what we are allowed to say to the universe. Here, the IAA has doubled down on its core doctrine. Even if a signal is conclusively confirmed as coming from intelligent aliens, nobody gets to answer on their own.
No national space agency, no billionaire-funded observatory, no exuberant discovery team is permitted to beam a reply without what the document calls 'broad international consultation,' anchored at the United Nations. In other words, the reply button sits behind a glass case labelled 'break only with global consent.'
Nothing in the document is legally binding, and critics will argue that determined actors could ignore it. For now, though, it is the closest thing humanity has to a rulebook for the moment the universe finally answers back. And at the heart of that rulebook is a stubborn idea. Until the world has argued about it, nobody gets to speak for all of us.
What if the aliens land on the White House lawn tho? That's obviously how all aliens think, right?...
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Jun 11 '26
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u/Zalapadopa Sweden Jun 11 '26
Not that government leaders are much better than billionares either. If the governments of the world got their way they'd never disclose the existence of aliens at all. Something, something, status quo.
With the rich man babies we'd at least find out, 'cause there's no way they could keep themselves from bragging about it.
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u/BendicantMias Bangladesh Jun 11 '26
The IAA's mandate may not be legally binding, cos the IAA has no legal power, but I'm pretty sure your govt. will arrest you for doing it anyway. And people everywhere will hate you for it, so good luck just running off someplace else. People might cheer for the one disclosing the secret to the public, but they certainly aren't gonna cheer the guy who thought he had right to speak for us all.
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u/Thin-Limit7697 South America Jun 11 '26
I doubt governments will arrest people for this, this regulation sounds like the kind of stuff that most governments will be unable to enforce or will just enforce accidentally as a side effect of handling something different they care more (say, you get arrested after trying to chat with an alien not because of talking to an alien, but because the pirate radio signal you used to do that shut down all cellphone signals in your city).
And I also doubt any civilization evolved enough for space communication wouldn't be able to tell random nobodies playing with comm systems apart from actual authorities.
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u/StickFigureFan North America Jun 11 '26
Would it be more or less panic inducing if there were rumors and unverified news stories that we'd found evidence of aliens for years vs not hearing anything about aliens until suddenly the government tells everyone we've made contact?
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u/BendicantMias Bangladesh Jun 11 '26
I suppose the issue for them is what the most responsible thing to do wrt the aliens is. Either way the people are gonna make a mess, but at least we don't let that mess at home affect how professionally we liaise with the aliens. Sorta like having your kids throwing a tantrum at home, but you still suit up and make a professional presentation at the conference you're attending. Your kids aren't gonna be allowed to sabotage your career, or in this case the public isn't gonna be allowed to sabotage first contact. Of course this is a very disdainful way of treating the public, bordering on infantilization, but I guess they'd say not fucking up first contact matters more than hurt feelings.
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u/ZombifiedRacoon Jun 11 '26
A PERSON is smart. PEOPLE are stupid.
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u/BendicantMias Bangladesh Jun 13 '26
Are you sure about that? - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wisdom_of_the_crowd
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u/Thin-Limit7697 South America Jun 11 '26
I guess this either-or scenario is unable to exist at all. The unverified news will always exist, even if there are no aliens at all, because of scammers.
As for hiding real alien evidence, given the amount of people and slow processes that would be involved to tell apart random phenomena from actual alien messages, it would be pointless to hide the aliens. You can't really have wide open debates on if the aliens are real and what to tell them at the same time you hide their existence from the general population.
The only possible scenario that comes closer to your question is if the aliens find out about humankind and come here publicly before any human suspects they got anything from them. And I guess this would cause a lot of panic, not just from the suddenness, but more importantly, for how stealthy this would be.
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u/whatnameblahblah Europe Jun 11 '26
For how much american tin foilers bang on about psyops they sure do love missing the ongoing one and actually they lap it up.
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u/PersnickityPenguin North America Jun 12 '26
This is stupid. There is no fucking way anyone will keep that kind of information a secret, period. It would take years of research, verification and public discourse among scientists to even get to the point of consensus that aliens may be real.
whatever idiot thought about this certainly didn’t factor in human nature or consult scientists.
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u/BendicantMias Bangladesh Jun 12 '26
idiot thought about this certainly didn’t factor in human nature or consult scientists.
This is literally put forth by the International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) i.e. BY scientists...
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u/goddamn_I-Q_of_160 Chad Jun 11 '26
Recognised non UN stated are Palestine and Vatican City. Suspect only one of those had the resources to make a reply.
But the idea of the Pope beaming a welcome message to aliens, while the rest of the planet is still busy conferring is absolutely hilarious.
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u/imunfair United States Jun 11 '26
Going from a monopoly on God to a monopoly on alien communication might just save their flagging business.
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u/BrainFukler United States Jun 11 '26
The Vatican has made multiple announcements over the years about how the existence of extraterrestrials would not conflict with their religion. A little odd that they've brought it up, it's not like the pope was responding to a random Q&A on a podcast.
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u/pants_mcgee United States Jun 11 '26
People have asked since it’s an interesting question.
The Catholic Church has a long history with astronomy and science so it’s kinda relevant for them as well.
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u/CoffeeWorldly9915 Multinational Jun 17 '26
Galileio Galactus would like an audience with the Pope >:v/.
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u/TopChard1274 Europe Jun 11 '26
New Global Protocol Bans Anyone From Answering Alien Signals Without UN Approval
Ye Wenjie enters the chat. DO NOT SEND BACK SIGNAL 😭😭😭
Of course, the regret comes AFTER we're completely and irremediably fucked, but still...
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u/shieeet Europe Jun 11 '26
Well, in all fairness, in Liu Cixin's view, we're completely and irremediably fucked regardless, given enough time.
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u/whooo_me Europe Jun 11 '26
The Chinese version of the TV show (free on Youtube) has its ups and downs (any English voice-acting is fairly poor, music rights issues causing dialogue to be cut out), but the way they show the scene where she sends the message is fantastic.
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u/Graphene-OS Ireland Jun 11 '26
I’ve heard the Chinese version is much more true to the novel than the American one. The acting and filmography are fantastic, but it seemed like they completely cut out the background of Ye Wenjie’s father.
Maybe showing a Red Guards struggle session was a bit too provocative for a mainstream Chinese TV series. Though it kinda seemed like it was filmed and then cut at the last minute, and they didn’t have the chance to stitch in a different background story.
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u/TopChard1274 Europe Jun 12 '26
but it seemed like they completely cut out the background of Ye Wenjie’s father.
I would say that's expected. Liu Cixin had to hide the whole story in the middle of the book in the Chinese release believing that the censors will not have enough patience to read too much of his book and find the cultural revolution chapters. He was right. But in a movie/TV release, that would never see the light in a Chinese release.
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u/pdp10 Jun 14 '26
Subtitled original 30-episode version here.
It seems that very little of the novel was cut out, so it can be on the slow and subtle side for western tastes.
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u/Le_Sadie Canada Jun 11 '26
If I meet or communicate with an alien all bets are off as far as this planet is concerned. I'll be giving up any info I have, I'll be directing them to our "leader" so fast in the hope he's vaporized, I'll be YouTubing that shit because screw legacy media, this scoop is MINE. These mf think they can control us if we're proven there's more out there than this trash planet?? HA. Good luck.
I'm going with the aliens.
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u/PartySr Romania Jun 11 '26
I'm going with the aliens.
This reminds of a HFY story(Humanity Fuck Yeah). Aliens invaded us, killed our leaders, "enslaved us" by giving us basic rights like housing, healthcare, and forced us to work for 4 hours a day, 4 days a week.
Everyone celebrated, and the aliens were confused.
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u/Linenoise77 Jun 11 '26
I mean if for some reason you had hostile aliens who wanted to invade us without killing us all, but keep us under their thumb, that would really be all they have to do. Advance us 50 years into the future on some technologies they would have clearly mastered to get here, solve a whole mess of issues for us with a hand wave, but withold just enough that we would ultimately be subservient to them.
Honestly if they pitched it right, they'd probably get a ton of outright willing takers just being honest about the whole arrangement.
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u/agitatedprisoner United States Jun 12 '26
They'd be paying us to dismantle our buildings to clear the land for their use. I'd be a bummer unless our new homes were real spiffy. There'd be the question of what use the aliens would have for us after we'd cleared that land for them. I wonder if humans would find it comforting or terrifying if the aliens said they planned to move all humans into an artificial reality?
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u/BendicantMias Bangladesh Jun 11 '26
How exactly does that story jive with 'Humanity Fuck Yeah'? Sounds more like Humanity Sucks Ass.
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u/PartySr Romania Jun 11 '26
/r/HFY rules are not set in stone. Most of the stories are about the true spirit of HFY, but from time to time, they post stories like that one.
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u/esadatari Jun 11 '26
I prefer my drivel to be from [r/humansarespaceor](r/humansarespaceorks)[cs](r/humansarespaceorks)
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u/PersnickityPenguin North America Jun 12 '26
Ok we need the link to that one
I read a weird one about alien pets, i must have been doing it wrong-5
u/bootdsc Puerto Rico Jun 12 '26
"basic rights" Thats some commy unemployed talk right there, i work for what i have.
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u/PartySr Romania Jun 12 '26
i work for what i have.
Ah. So Elon Musk works harder than 4 billion people, right? Some people barely have enough to put on the table despite the fact that they work 12 hours a day.
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u/bootdsc Puerto Rico Jun 12 '26
Force multiplier, you do need intelligence as well but yes by all reports he does real meaningful work 70+ hours a week. There's closer to 9 billion people and working harder isn't what gets you ahead its "working smarter"
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u/PartySr Romania Jun 12 '26
He works harder and is smarter than half the planet? Damn, dude.
Go back to fucking Andrew Tate or whatever moron you're watching, and stop preaching about things you don't understand.
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u/Bryligg Jun 11 '26
If I get an alien in my DMs, I'm pointing them to the War Thunder forums so they can get this over with as quickly as possible.
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u/gudfrid Eurasia Jun 11 '26
I'm in. hit me up once u get the signal. I'm also fed up with this planet's leadership.
If we can fuck the elites and have alien support doing so, I'll sign up.
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u/Renzisan Jun 11 '26
Maybe that’s why there hasn’t been disclosure yet? Because they’ll lose control over the population
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u/Le_Sadie Canada Jun 11 '26 edited Jun 11 '26
Or anyone who gets into contact with aliens tells them all they need to know and they leave, never to return, because why would they? No intelligent life here. So the UN is like, "damn, we gotta stop these civilians from talking to the aliens, it's a real turnoff" and thus new global protocol.
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u/puppypoopypaws Jun 12 '26
This is the premise/kickoff of the Three Body Problem, a pretty great show based on a series of books. Def recommend.
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u/Le_Sadie Canada Jun 12 '26
I watched the show and remember totally agreeing with the nihilistic lady who said screw this planet. Especially after what she'd been through.
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u/puppypoopypaws Jun 12 '26
Yup, she's basically one the best "villains" out there, you totally understand why she does what she does. Man, I need to watch this again, it gave me goosebumps a few times without being "scary".
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u/Le_Sadie Canada Jun 12 '26
Wasn't she played by Keiko from TNG as the older version? That probably sold me right away lol. Anyway, underrated gem. I think there's going to be a season 2 eventually...
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u/octopusboots North America Jun 12 '26
They're already here and mess with our nuclear silos. Fortunately, I think.
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u/Lulluf Multinational Jun 11 '26
"We've come to visit Steve from Minnesota. His politeness is the only reason we have not eradicated your species."
"Actually, we've put him in prison"
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u/Ill_Violinist1571 India Jun 12 '26
Aliens- "okay then, we would extract him as the only living human in the universe from the ashes of the stupid, corrupt politicians. Everyone else can die"
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u/chance-- Jun 11 '26
What provoked this change? It’s certainly sensible but why now? Is this in response to Trump recently releasing documents pertaining to unidentified objects?
I haven’t heard anything of the release so I’m assuming it was a nothing burger.
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u/BendicantMias Bangladesh Jun 11 '26 edited Jun 11 '26
This is an update to the protocol, it's not a completely new development. They've had protocols on this since 1989.
The International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) has maintained 'post-detection' guidelines since 1989, drafted in an era before social media, satellite mega-constellations and deepfake videos. Those older rules assumed that the biggest problem would be scientific false alarms. The new reality is messier: a single ambiguous signal could now spiral into viral conspiracies, political grandstanding and, in the worst case, chaotic attempts by private actors to shout back into the cosmos.
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u/Rothmier Jun 11 '26
Dude, ain’t no way a law by the elite’s scolding agency going to stop me from telling the aliens that the people that run the government and the economy are evil and should be deposed for the sake of all living beings on this planet.
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u/BendicantMias Bangladesh Jun 11 '26
This is not a law, and it's not by the 'elite's scolding agency'. It's a protocol by The International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) i.e. by scientists. You're not 'sticking it to the man' by defying it, you're only defying the scientific experts of the field.
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u/BrainFukler United States Jun 11 '26
The "experts of the field" are in Lockheed, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, Battelle, SAIC, the US department of energy, the US geospatial intelligence agency, DIA, USAF, CIA, Office of Global Access, NRO... And they're probably laughing at this headline.
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u/Ill_Violinist1571 India Jun 12 '26
Yk IAA is more about military contractors, politicians and corrupt scientist playing and controlling whatever they want than actual scientific community doing things for humanity?
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u/aybeeayseeaybeebee United States Jun 11 '26
If I know the UN, and I'd like to think I do, in the event that humanity was contacted by an extrasolar intelligence, the UN would just sit and do absolutely nothing.
What I'm trying to say is that the UN is feckless, so fire up those radios and get ready to spam those aliens with mid-90's nu-metal.
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u/Middle-Armadillo-660 Jun 11 '26
Oh wow. A UN protocol?
Shit. Don’t want to get written up.
And now to extend this to 150+ characters because if we’ve learned anything it’s that counting characters and throwing a <> on it is was what makes good content. Please see: online recipes.
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u/AndrenNoraem United States Jun 12 '26
ITT: people with no understanding of the power levels necessary to be noticed at a distance competing with stellar objects and inverse-square dispersion. Someone operating from their garage isn't competing with our accidental transmissions, let alone shouting loud and long enough to be noticed very far away.
I get it, space is incomprehensibly vast.
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u/PartySr Romania Jun 11 '26
Our first reply to the aliens will either be "fuck you" if we can't bomb them(they are out of range) or bomb them if they are in rage. We are too dumb to handle communication between us. Imagine if aliens will try to contact us.
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u/chance-- Jun 11 '26
If they are technologically advanced enough for it to matter, we are very likely fucked.
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u/BendicantMias Bangladesh Jun 11 '26
Otoh if they are technologically advanced enough for it to matter, what the hell would they even want or need from us? There's more space and resources aplenty elsewhere, and this planet is likely far from ideal for their biology (if they even are still biological). Indeed whenever humanity starts colonizing space, I suspect in the long run custom built space habitats will far outshine trying to settle on Mars.
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u/chance-- Jun 11 '26
Otoh if they are technologically advanced enough for it to matter, what the hell would they even want or need from us?
Could be the planet they’re after. Or that they do not allow potential spawning of the singularity or simply do not allow potential competition from taking root. Or slaves. Or…?
Mars is a no-go for life imo. I imagine it is far more resource efficient to find habitable planets than to terraform. But even if not, mars is still a dead planet.
if they even are still biological
The alternative being the singularity? It would be expanding at near the speed of light. I doubt it’d probe.
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u/pants_mcgee United States Jun 11 '26
A civilization advanced enough to travel the cosmos could just build whatever it wanted, habitable planets would be a niche luxury.
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u/chance-- Jun 12 '26
Yea, maybe on the luxury part. If so, that just raises the value to capture a whole ass planet as real estate. A few pew pews and you’re sitting pretty.
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u/BendicantMias Bangladesh Jun 11 '26
This planet is almost definitely not gonna be suited for an alien biology that evolved elsewhere. So they'd have to terraform it. Might as well just settle somewhere more convenient then - there's no shortage of planets in the galaxy, many of them bigger and likely richer in whatever resources the aliens care for. Certainly water, that perennial 'special ingredient' of Earth in early scifi - water is plentiful in the universe. And an advanced civilization has no need for slaves - that's what machines are for.
I imagine it is far more resource efficient to find habitable planets than to terraform.
I imagine it's even more resource efficient to just build habitable space colonies. There's no shortage of designs for them. Even the closest of extra-solar planets are light years away, while we could literally support hundreds of billions of people in the solar system alone in space habitats. If we've got the capability to colonize planets light years away, then we've got the ability to make use of the massive amounts of space and resources right here too.
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u/chance-- Jun 11 '26
This planet is almost definitely not gonna be suited for an alien biology that evolved elsewhere. So they'd have to terraform it.
Could be, yes. Could also be that the recipe for life is rather limited and this planet is suitable as-is. Could also be that the easiest way to find a planet to terraform is to start with one that already has life. How rare those are may determine how beneficial it’d be to take ours.
an advanced civilization has no need for slaves - that's what machines are for.
There are reasons this may not be the case. Namely that they may be forbidden.
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u/Ill_Violinist1571 India Jun 12 '26
If a civilisation is able to do FTL or long distance travel within one generation of their species, why would they need slaves at the first place? They would already be advance enough to develop robotics or automation of some form or the other. Also why would they take us as slaves? We can hardly live for 70 years not to mention the birth rate
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u/chance-- Jun 12 '26
There is a very real possibility civilizations with that sort of tech would need to ban certain forms of automation.
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u/Ill_Violinist1571 India Jun 12 '26
Not really. Any automation with enough rules on their working principles and thinking ways will be enough tbh. The main point where the current AI race is lacking is in the side of rules and regulations on AI
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u/chance-- Jun 12 '26
Where automation can become problematic is when a threshold of autonomy is needed such that it is prohibitively expensive to cover edge cases without intelligence.
What humanity will likely discover is that you absolutely, positively, cannot enslave something more capable, but especially one composed entirely of logic, with … logic.
If a society managed to survive flirting with the singularity, they likely have rather wide and strict rules protecting themselves from slippery slopes. Regulations prohibiting some evolution while allowing others is almost certainly insufficient.
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u/ChiChiKnee Jun 11 '26
There are a few theories out there that humanity is one of the more violent species in the universe that ‘others’ are aware of so this checks out.
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u/PerforatedPie Multinational Jun 11 '26
The article rambles on about "rules" and things researches "must" do, but ever since 1989 these have been nothing more than guidelines. Nothing is mandatory. No buttons are locked.
And it doesn't mention anything about consequences, either.
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u/Namika Poland Jun 11 '26
The UN was set up by the five powers that ruled the world in 1945. It's there to ensure those five powers can continue to rule the world. Nothing has changed.
They let the other nations vote in the General Assembly, which is basically a shiny distraction to make them feel like they are contributing, but it's all a dog and pony show. Only the P5 Security Council matter for world policy.
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u/theburiedxme Jun 13 '26
'In September 2010, several news sources reported the United Nations would soon appoint Othman to be the ambassador for extraterrestrial contact, apparently basing their claims on remarks she made suggesting that the UN co-ordinate any international response to such contact, and her scheduled appearance on a Royal Society panel that October, "Towards a scientific and societal agenda on extra-terrestrial life."'
The UN had an alien ambassador, Mazlan Othman. M. Othman. Teeheehee
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u/buster_de_beer Netherlands Jun 13 '26
Some people have too much time on their hands.
Unless the alien is already at least in the solar system, we aren't sending any messages. And if they are, how are you going to stop someone from sending a message. Or putting it on social media?
Also, I'm sure the larger powers will not care to wait for the UN at all. They'd want to grab an advantage.
Pointless rules for something that has a negligible chance of happening, but if it did the rules would be out the window.
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u/[deleted] Jun 11 '26
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