Xbox Live users could soon be trading in the covert ops of Modern Warfare 2 for real life intelligence gathering. Government agency GCHQ, which works with MI5 and MI6, is running a six-week recruitment ad campaign on Microsoft’s online service.
The campaign will feature ads both on the Xbox Live Dashboard and within games themselves, via streamed video banners. There will even be free GCHQ themes and gamer pictures (no, we’re not making this up).
Xbox Live is popular with 18 to 34-year-olds, which fits in with GCHQ’s recruitment policy, and the agency claims that many of its employment criteria are “reflected in game-play experience on Xbox, such as quick thinking, problem solving and team work”.
Anyone who uses the service regularly will know that Xbox Live is also fairly popular with screeching potty mouths, homophobes and racists – many of whom seem unfit to work in a McDonalds, let alone a government intelligence agency. Still, hopefully they’ll get weeded out in the recruitment process…
Xbox Live (via The Guardian)
Is there anyone intelligent left on Xbox Live? PS3 is a superior console, PSN is cheaper and superior too, it’s only the idiots left on XBox Live, believing Microsoft when they tell them they are getting a better P2P Add infested service for their recurring subscription fees.
Now now, each to their own. I can think of better place I’d choose to advertise for spies online. XDA? GCHQ needs good coders. Maybe not 4chan though.