NOTICE FROM THE FOUNDATION RECORDS AND INFORMATION SECURITY ADMINISTRATION

You are accessing an archived version of the documentation for SCP-4568, dated November 6, 1997. An archive of relevant revisions is included for purposes of context and analysis.

— Maria Jones, Director, RAISA

Item #: SCP-4568

Object Class: Keter

Special Containment Procedures: A disinformation campaign is ongoing to provide a natural justification for any seismic activity caused by SCP-4568; currently, this is attributed to the interaction of three concurrent tectonic plates near SCP-4568's main area of activity.

The building codes in countries affected by SCP-4568 (mainly continental Chile, the west of Argentina, Peru and Bolivia) is to be designed to ensure that buildings are able to withstand earthquakes of up to Class VII on the Modified Mercalli seismic intensity scale. Foundation personnel embedded in the security and emergency services of the affected countries are to direct evacuation and rescue efforts whenever necessary in order to reduce the impact of SCP-4568 and prevent a Broken Masquerade scenario.

Attempts to design a predictive model of the active periods of SCP-4568 and proper countermeasures to such activity are ongoing. Experimentation with Safe-class anomalies such as SCP-███ is authorised to devise an adequate containment or neutralization procedure.

Description: SCP-4568 is a massive, subterranean, serpentine entity which inhabits below the Andean mountain range in South America. Current estimates indicate a length of at least 500 km and a width of around 20 km. The entity is animate and autonomous and is composed of molten rock, highly compressed sediments, various metals, and ice. Sonar analysis reveals the existence of potentially artificial structures, resembling clockwork, gears and primitive circuits, along the body of the entity; these structures have no identified purpose and do not seem to be the mechanism behind the autonomous movement of SCP-4568.

SCP-4568 remains dormant most of the time. However, at certain periods the entity displaces itself along the Andean mountain range. Due to its massive size, this usually results in large-scale seismic activity, with magnitude proportional to the degree of displacement. Pattern analysis suggests that these movements are in response to an unknown trigger and the seismic activity is intentionally caused by SCP-4568, instead of being just an accidental byproduct. The purpose, if there is any, is unknown; due to the large amount of casualties caused by SCP-4568, the entity is presumed to be hostile. It is unknown if SCP-4568 is sapient.

Due to the inherent uncontainability of the entity itself, containment currently focuses on the study of SCP-4568 and mitigation of the aftereffects of its activity. So far, the following observations have been made:

The entity does not follow a consistent pattern of movement and appears to enter an active state in response to an unknown external stimulus. It is believed that this indicates a degree of sentience and a potential objective or purpose.

Minor tremors caused by SCP-4568 during periods of lesser activity (i.e. outside of its movement patterns) follow a positive-entropy1 pattern, lacking the characteristics of white noise. This suggests that they may be intended as a form of communication, and thus that SCP-4568 may be a sapient entity. So far these messages, if they are an actual form of communication, have not been deciphered.

Abnormal oceanic activity has been observed after SCP-4568's active state. It is unknown if this is a normal aftereffect of the seismic activity or caused by another factor.

Correlations have been found between SCP-4568's description and the local mythology of SCP-4568's area of activity. It is unknown how native inhabitants of this zone would have had the means to detect SCP-4568 and describe it; however, this, in addition to the aforementioned oceanic activity, imply that [DATA EXPUNGED]2. Preventive countermeasures are currently under study.

Addendum 4568-1: Containment/Neutralization Proposal

Due to the aforementioned observations about SCP-4568, its inherent uncontainability via conventional methods, and its high threat level towards the civilian population, Senior Researcher Javier Carreño has proposed a set of Extraordinary Special Containment Procedures based on key assumptions on the behavior of the entity.

To the O5 Council,

Based on the assumptions listed below:

that SCP-4568 is a sapient entity,

that it has a psychological profile similar enough to human baseline to have developed some form of linguistic skillset,

that it is actively hostile to humankind,

and that its active periods may lead to catastrophic containment breaches and massive loss of human life (see SCP-4568's file revision dated 23/05/1960),

I, in representation of the SCP-4568 Research Team, posit that SCP-4568 should be temporarily or permanently neutralized, as standard containment is impossible. Given the lack of physical methods of containment, I propose the usage of hostile memetic constructs, up to and including Berryman-Langford memetic kill agents, combined with the usage of anomalous objects SCP-███, SCP-███ and SCP-████ in order to project this memetic payload to SCP-4568 while minimizing accidental exposure to civilians or Foundation personnel.

Due to the extremely intensive logistics involved in this neutralization proposal, we currently do not have the resources to enact it immediately. We propose a passive and gradual preparation of these Extraordinary Special Containment Procedures, which would additionally provide a way to closely monitor SCP-4568 activity. Formal activation of the neutralization procedure would occur as soon as possible and would be accelerated in response to an Emergency Level 4 or higher civilian threat. It is expected that these countermeasures will be ready to deploy in around 10 to 15 years.

Javier Carreño Vásquez

SCP-4568 Research Lead

This procedure is currently under review by the O5 Council.

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Footnotes

1. Information entropy is a measurement of the complexity, randomness or predictability of a pattern, sequence or signal.

2. Declassified by SCP-4568's former Research Lead Javier Carreño on March 1, 2010, due to tangible evidence confirming this hypothesis.