› added 3 years ago

116

TIL about Crypto AG, a Swiss company that produced encryption devices and sold them to 120 countries for 50 years. In 2020, their products were revealed to have contained backdoors that allowed them to be compromised by Crypto AG's real secret owners - BND and CIA.

Read more wikipedia.org

via reddit.com

e0xbk TIL Mississippi is the only U.S. state that allows people to drink alcohol while driving, as long as their blood alcohol level stays below the legal limit
Y7PZx TIL the song “Mother” on Pink Floyd’s album, The Wall, was actually Jeff Porcaro on drums, not Nick Mason. Jeff Porcaro being the drummer for the band Toto and as well as the studio drummer for various other bands such as Steely Dan, Boz Scaggs, Michael Jackson, etc.
9DQ7 TIL that from 1952 to 1956, billions of Kent Micronite cigarettes were sold with a filter made from asbestos. The new filter was marketed as “the greatest health protection in cigarette history.”
wDrJ TIL Jupiter is a “cosmic vacuum cleaner.” Its gravitational influence causes comets and asteroids to collide with it. The rate of impacts on Jupiter is about 2000-8000X higher than the rate on Earth. Without Jupiter, the probability of asteroid impacts with the inner planets would be much greater.
8kLb TIL that the same company that produced the Zyclon B gas for Auschwitz also created the anti-graffiti coating for the Holocaust memorial in Berlin