Failure by Standard Protocol

2026-07-16 · Ho Chanh Nghia

Originally published on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/failure-standard-protocol-khanh-pham-lucbc/

Failure by Standard Protocol

E-Verify employer accounts are experiencing technical issues affecting many users. The problem is linked to a new account validation feature, which has now been turned off to prevent further disruptions. Our team is working to resolve the issue, but we do not yet know when it will be addressed. We will provide updates as we learn more. At this time, there is no need to contact E-Verify support, as we are unable to offer further assistance until the system is restored.

You take your care to a shop, to improve its performance. You take it back, and it breaks down before you arrive home.

You take your computer to an expert, to modify its performance. You take it home, and it erases your files and backups as well.

You upgrade the national and international hardware and software for the United States Atomic Energy Detection System, and it fails to remain online, with the data stream broken.

You ask the expert to fix it, and the expert says they do not know how to fix it. They will look into it.

Hours later, they are looking into it.

Days later, they are looking into it.

Months later, they are looking into it.

Two years later, they are looking into it.

I was present for many of these decisions made by Oracle and the US Air Force. Management believes they understand what they are managing, but when reality checks arrive, they can only offer prayers.

There is a better way to manage life and business.

Staying within what you know.

When I was managing primary station 41, AFTAC wanted to upgrade the communications equipment. I asked where the manuals for the new equipment were. I asked where the trainings were.

AFTAC HQ said, you do not need them. If something goes wrong, they will fix it. My boss at the time was Joshua Darting, a 20-year US Air Force veteran who mistook his confidence for competency. He said, do not worry about it, AFTAC will fix it if anything goes wrong.

Something goes wrong. Joshua Darting begs me to abandon my emergency leave to return to work to fix the communications equipment.

Why?

AFTAC failed. Faced with what is naturally coming.

ULTI Sat failed. As a communications vendor, they failed to ensure that the skills required to keep the equipment up and running existed before putting it in place.

This is how national security for the US is actually operating. Here again, you can see that this type of habit is happening with the USCIS system. Along with all the AI and new software updates that the US government has implemented up to 2026. How many people alive can fix them when they go down? Likely zero.

My 2 years at Oracle demonstrated something similar. They are so large they are like a government themselves. What happens is they all share this philosophy that if they cannot fix it, someone else will. So when I came onboard, I was calling customers with problems that have come up on their 2 years anniversaries. How does a 5 star hotel run their operations on this level of support for their overpriced software? On one leg?

It is not enough to innovate and cause changes, and add new software and new hardware. Children can do this as the consequences are only toys on the playground. Adults should not treat national security and systems as children’s playgrounds. Where you just do whatever you want, and then see what happens. If things break, you create a trouble ticket. If you cannot solve it, someone else will. It does not always work out that way.

When AFTAC decided to break the US laws and illegally detained me for 4 months. They even got the help of the US Consulate Chiang Mai, Todd Bate Boxton helped them in illegally seizing and searching my home in Chiang Mai Thailand. They were exercising standard protocol. But not the sort of SOP that were written and reviewed. They were following procedures they conceived of in their head without reading the regulations. Then when things hit the fan, they want to apologize for what they have done.

Some damage cannot be reversed. What then?

When the US empire is sitting in rubbles, what will these people do?

Hit Reset?

The USCIS system going down is not all life threatening in and of itself. But if multiple organs of a human body fail at the same time, what do you call that? What do you call an empire without a functioning organ?