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129: Gollumfun (Part 2)

Brett Johnson, AKA Gollumfun was involved with the websites Counterfeit Library and Shadow Crew. He tells his story of what happened there and some of the crimes he committed.I

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Taking Elon Musk Seriously

We have to talk about Elon Musk. It’s fun to make fun of him, and whatever he’s doing at Twitter certainly looks like the weird flailing of a man who doesn’t know how to run a company. But let’s take

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Why Community Feedback’ Doesn’t Work

We’ve all seen the videos. Those viral townhall meetings where the community gathers to give its feedback to city managers on this or that subject. Too often a crank with a microphone stands before a

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Who Is Sam Bankman-Fried, the Savior’ Who Crashed FTX?

Have you heard about Sam Bankman-Fried and FTX? FTX was the second largest crypto currency exchange in the world and Bankman-Fried was the guy who ran it. He was a young genius, people said. He practi

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128: Gollumfun (Part 1)

Brett Johnson, AKA Gollumfun was involved with the websites Counterfeit Library and Shadow Crew. He tells his story of what happened there and some of the crimes he committed.S

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How Sex Changed the Internet

Without sex there would be no internet. From the moment the servers spun up, users were trying to figure out how to use instant connection to pleasures themselves and each other. The history of sex an

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Social Media Is Dead

We’re living through the end of something. Facebook is the site where your older family shares racist memes, Twitter seems only capable of talking about itself, and Instagram can’t compete with TikTok

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Why Concert Tickets Are So Expensive

Have you tried going to a concert recently? What about a stadium show for a popular comedian? What did it cost? How was the Ticketmaster experience? Like everything else, the price of live event ticke

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Watching Facebook Burn

For almost two decades, Facebook has dominated headlines and the lives of its users. It’s been blamed for genocides, pointed to as a vector of and depressed you as you scrolled past hi

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127: Maddie

Maddie Stone is a security researcher for Google’s Project Zero. In this episode we hear what it’s like battling zero day for this show comes from Zscalar. Zscalar zero

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The Killer Robot Future Is Already Here

The killer robots are here and they’re not going all seen footage of the cute robot dogs stumbling around with weapons strapped to their back, and loitering munitions (or so-called “s

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A History of American Terror’

America and political violence go together like George Lincoln Rockwell and a corncob pipe. There is a growing movement in the U.S., one that’s spreading online and probably in some of your neighborho

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When the Video Game Reaches Out to Ask You to Spend More Money

We’ve all gotten a little too involved in a video game. I’ve talked repeatedly about how I’ve gotten lost in trying to complete maps in open world games like Assassin’s Creed. And there’s a million st

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126: REvil

REvil is the name of a ransomware service as well as a group of criminals inflicting ransomware onto the world. Hear how this ransomware shook the world.A special thanks to our guest Will, a CTI resea

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Nuclear War 101

On this episode of Cyber we talk about an old technology that suddenly feels very new. The bomb. That’s right, this episode is all about nuclear weapons. Thanks to Moscow’s war in Ukraine and Putin’s

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Inflection Is the Background Check Company Making Decisions for Uber and Airbnb

Apps have made our life so convenient haven’t they? With the push of a button you can order Postmates, book an Airbnb, or even call an Uber. But what happens when the apps stop taking your calls? What

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How Corporations and Governments Use Games to Control Us

Do you ever feel like you’re being played? Like the people who run the world have got you on a treadmill that’s feeding you just enough rewards to keep going. Gold stars on your attendance sheet at el

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125: Jeremiah

Jeremiah Roe is a seasoned penetration tester. In this episode he tells us about a time when he had to break into a building to prove it wasn’t as secure as the company thought.You can catch more of J

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How To Protect Yourself From Social Engineering Hacks

Hacks are increasing but the hackers are not necessarily getting more sophisticated. What do Twitter, Twilio, and Uber all have in common? They were all hacked by, in part, a conversation. In all thre

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The Chess Scandal Involving Butt Plugs, AI, and Accusations of Cheating

Chess. Chess. Chess. You, the audience, quite literally asked for it. It’s the scandal that just won’t quit. On September 4 at a live Chess Tournament in St. Louis, chess grandmaster Magnus Carlsen lo

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AI Art is Powered by ISIS Executions and Non-Consenual Porn

AI art has gotten wildly popular over the past year. Programs like Midjourney and Dall-E are generating incredible images and incredible controversy. But these programs don’t exist in a vacuum. AI’s r

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Inside the Tool the US Military Is Using to Monitor Emails and Web Traffic

You ever feel like somebody’s watching you? Well, on the internet, it’s often true. Every move you make on the internet generates reams of data that ISPs and data brokers sell on to on to a ton of peo

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124: Synthetic Remittance

What do you get when you combine social engineering, email, crime, finance, and the money stream flowing through big tech? Evaldas Rimašauskas comes to mind. He combined all these to make his big move

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Uber’s Been Hacked and Sim Swappers Are Getting Violent

Groups on Telegram that used to primarily be interested in taking over people’s phones and online accounts have changed tactics. Now, they’re selling violence. And to cap off the week, a hacker we don

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Our Latest UFO Obsession and the Chess Scandal Heard Round the World

This week on Cyber we’re going deep into recent stories of unidentified flying objects and Chess. The Pentagon has gotten big into investigating what it calls unidentified aerial phenomenon and a ches

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CYBER LIVE: Living in a Dystopia, We're All Luddites, Taking Life Back From Corporations (f

Today on Cyber we’ve got a special presentation: We’re talking about Motherboard’s science fiction short story collection Terraform one last time. This week’s episode is a recording of a live roundtab

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123: Newswires

Investing in the stock market can be very profitable. Especially if you can see into the future. This is a story of how a group of traders and hackers got together to figure out a way to see into the

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Escape Fantasies of the Tech Billionaires

It seems like the Earth’s billionaires are desperate to escape the planet. Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos are looking to outer space. Mark Zuckerberg is looking to the inner space of virtual reality. So man

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The Hypercane and Other Looming Climate Disasters

Woe to those who live in the path of a hypercane. What’s a hypercane? I’m glad you asked. In a frighteningly possible future you’ll be hearing more about them. As the planet warms and the climate chan

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A Nuclear War Would Starve the Planet

A new study in Nature Food has revealed, once again, the unprecedented danger of nuclear weapons. Built on the foundation of decades of research, it’s about the climate change and global famine that w

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A Hopeful Future Where Drones Become Farmers

Drone. The word has come to mean so many things. An eye in the sky. A hobbyist flying toy. A dangerous voyeur. A weapon of war. An enforcer. A worker. But a worker that’s maybe not as soulless as the

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122: Lisa

We’ve all seen the videos. Those viral townhall meetings where the community gathers to give its feedback to city managers on this or that subject. Too often a crank with a microphone stands before a3