Is it possible to turn a computer into a bomb?

In 2011 the news was reporting on HP Printers catching fire. HP Responded saying that there was a hardware element called a "thermal breaker" to prevent this from happening. The researcher never produced a burning pile of printer.

Also in 2011 Charlie Miller was researching the firmware on Apple's batteries trying to get them to explode or catch fire. However the worst he was able to do was brick the battery.

Edit Feb 2014 - CrowdStrike demonstrated an attack at RSA on a Mac which overrode temperature controls, powered off the fans and spiked the CPU usage in order to overheat the machine. And while this specific example was limited as fires are not welcomed in the Moscone Centre, the ateam state that they can cause the machine to catch fire.

Now lets flash back to 1985. The Therac-25 radiation therapy machine is killing people due to a bug in how the software interacted with hardware. An eariler model had "Hardware Interlocks" which prevented the operator from accidentally overdosing patents with radation.

All of the devices we use should have a hardware control preventing software from damaging the physical world.

But there are some systems where its impractical for hardware to prevent all damage to physical systems. This is the real fear behind vulnerabilities in SCADA systems. It maybe possible for an attacker to remove safety controls used by a power plant or put it into an unstable state.

An example of this happening in real life is Stuxnet being used to destroy centrifuges. There is some evidence to suggest that a hacker was the cause of a missile explosion at an Iranian Military base. So if the computer happens to also be a bomb, then yes, a hacker can probably make it explode.

It's taking me a few minutes to come up with something beyond, "That's patently damn absurd!"

But... I guess like many things, nobody would write it if somebody didn't buy it. My first thought from the formatting and related image is that this was sensationalist crud from a few decades ago. After all, that machine has a 5 1/4" floppy... but they're talking about Amazon.com, so it's not that old.

Sure, there have been instances of software failures killing people, but wholesale madness probably isn't going to happen. Most critical systems, like traffic lights and railroad signaling, have safety systems that back them up. Thus, you'll never see an intersection with opposing lanes having a green light. Even sprinkler systems rarely activate all at once -- that requires a special system known as a "deluge" sprinkler setup. I guess it just looks cooler on screen if they all go off at once.

Granted, Therac-25 is a memorable example of that being improperly designed. We've also seen viruses like Stuxnet that have caused some chaos for certain folks. However, "coming within 2 digits of a 37 digit code to launch nukes at five American cities" is complete bollocks. I mean, if they came within 2, did they know and tell us? Was the military aware of all the codes they tried?

Jack Sparrow: It's the Pearl.

Prisoner: The Black Pearl! I've heard stories. She's been preying on ships and settlements for near ten years. Never leaves any survivors.

Jack Sparrow: No survivors? Then where do the stories come from, I wonder?

If you're going to die in your home from your own technology, it's going to be because you have lousy wiring or some malfunctioning device and don't have smoke detectors (granted, this incident happened because of hot coals).

There's nothing your own PC can do to blow itself up. Unfortunate conditions can cause Li-ion batteries to blow, but not from software (again, interlocks unless the designer wants to go bankrupt). However, those critical interlocks are a consideration for industrial design, but more so for mistakes than for malfeasance. The idea that hackers are going to turn your computer into a bomb, though, is outright scare-mongering of the most pathetic kind.

In the old days of Linux, when a 14.4k modem was good and 28.8k was a treasure, and downloading slackware required whole nights, I (very young at the time) was rather worried by a small notice of warning relative to setting the frequency of the monitor in the .Xconfig file. A wrong frequency could, apparently, lead to a failure (and/or explosion!) of the monitor.

I never had the slightest problem with it and don't have idea if it really ever happened. But I am sure that it sounded scary. I think it was in some man pages.

See the red box under section 30.3.1.7 for an example.