at 6.30 p.m. 
here on WBAI New York 99.5 FM and WBAI.org online. 
Stay tuned for Off the Hook coming up, and it's now 7 p.m. 
Stay tuned. 
El teléfono que usted ha marcado. 
Cambio de número. 
Código. 
The number you've got has been changed. 
Código. 
If you'd like to make a call, please hang up and try again. 
If you need help, stay on the line, and a hacker will assist you shortly. 
El teléfono keeps ringing, so I ripped it off the wall. 
I cut myself while shaving, now I can't make a call. 
It couldn't get much worse, but if it could, they would. 
Bum, dilly, bum, but the flesh just made the worst. 
I hope that's understood. 
Bum, dilly, bum! 
Bum, dilly, bum! 
Thank you. 
And a very good evening to everybody. 
The program is Off the Hook. 
Emmanuel Goldstein here with you, joined tonight by Kyle. 
Yes, indeed. 
Out in Skypeland, we have Gila. 
Good evening. 
We have Rob T. Firefly. 
Good evening. 
And we have Alex. 
Good evening. 
And what part of the world are you in this week, Alex? 
Well, I am in a different country, as I promised, from last week. 
I am in the mountains of Croatia today. 
So hello from Croatia. 
Wow. 
Okay. 
Well, that's a good choice. 
And I hope it's scenic enough for you there, because when I was there, it was very scenic. 
Oh, it's absolutely beautiful here. 
I'm in the Dalmatian coast. 
I'm in the island of Brash. 
And it's absolutely gorgeous. 
There's also a massive thunder and lightning storm going on behind me. 
Oh, could you? 
That'll add to the ambience. 
Yeah, step outside so we can get the full benefit of that. 
We'd like to hear that. 
Yeah. 
Well, let's see if we can hear it. 
I don't know. 
I can't make it thunder, but maybe we'll have a coincidence that when I'm talking, it'll start thundering. 
There is nothing, nothing like Croatian thunder. 
Let that be said. 
There really is. 
Yeah. 
And you're so close to it up here. 
So it's an amazing place. 
Well, we are here for the full hour this week. 
Next week is our special BAI Buddy show. 
And what that means is we're going to be calling on our listeners to become BAI Buddies. 
And what that means is that you pledge a certain amount every month, a small amount, like $10, $15, and it adds up over a year and helps us pay the bills. 
We're going to be asking many people to become BAI Buddies next week. 
Of course, you can become a BAI Buddy right now if you want, but next week is, you know, we're making it official and we want it to be a big response. 
So please spread the word, let people know, and you'll become our buddies as well. 
But you can always pledge to WBAI. 
Go to the website, wbai.org, call 212-209-2950. 
We have a lot of things to talk about tonight. 
And, you know, there's something going on north of the border that I don't know if many of us are aware of. 
Here's a headline that was in the Washington Post a couple of days ago. 
As fires and floods rage, Facebook and Twitter are missing in action. 
Yeah. 
You guys know about this? 
Basically, Google, Facebook, Twitter, they all are fighting with the Canadian government because the Canadian government wants these massive companies to pay news outlets for linking to articles. 
Now, the Canadian parliament passed a law that will require technology companies to pay domestic news outlets for linking to their articles, prompting the owners of Facebook and Instagram to say that it would pull news articles from both platforms in the country. 
And I believe Twitter has started doing the same thing. 
The law passed on, I guess, mid-June is when this actually was passed. 
It's the latest salvo and a push by governments around the world to force big companies like Google and Facebook to pay for news that they share on their platforms, a campaign the companies have resisted at virtually every turn. 
Now, with some caveats, the new Canadian law is going to force search engines and social media companies to engage in a bargaining process and binding arbitration if necessary for licensing news content for their use. 
The law is called the Online News Act. 
It was modeled after a similar one that passed in Australia two years ago. 
It's designed to enhance fairness in the Canadian digital news marketplace and contribute to its sustainability. 
That's according to an official summary exactly when the law takes effect. 
It's not entirely clear, but it's definitely getting a reaction. 
And these companies have simply cut off news access. 
In other words, if you post a link to a news story, it won't go through. 
They will not let you do that on their services because they don't want to have to pay however much the Canadian government is assisting they pay in order to do this. 
And I'll just throw it out. 
What do you guys think about this? 
Alex? 
Well, you know, this is something I think we've talked about this a bit before on this show with respect to, I believe it was, Australia a couple of months ago. 
And I think this is chipping away at the utility of the social media platforms themselves. 
You know, they don't want to pay for this type of information. 
They don't want to support these third-party organizations that are, in turn, supporting their own platforms. 
It seems to me like a real matter of equity here. 
And it's a game of chicken. 
The social media platforms are playing with these governments. 
And I think that, ultimately, you know, the governments might cave in. 
And I think that's what the social media platforms are very much hoping for here is that, say, well, look, you know, there's been an uproar in our country. 
You know, and they'll see that these platforms are becoming more powerful than the regional governments that they're opposing. 
But I think if the governments stand firm, this is something that really can cause social media companies to have to bend the knee to them. 
Because I do see it as really a matter of fairness that they should have to pay something for the news that they are disseminating on their platforms. 
It seems to be, you know, akin to a small tax. 
Now, is this something that is unprecedented where you expect somebody to pay for a link that is on their site? 
Perhaps in a sense. 
But I think the links are also providing the amplification or the fuel for the sharing of the content itself. 
And that the link is going to also have some information about the article. 
Not just the link. 
That there'll be some kind of preview of the information. 
And if you think about it, that may be enough for somebody to get a taste of what the information is. 
Nobody really reads through any article in its entirety these days. 
I mean, maybe you and I do. 
To prepare for this type of show or something like this. 
But I think a lot of people just skim or look through their social media feeds and get a taste for what the information is without even clicking on those particular links. 
So I think the preview of the information itself may be sufficient for the governments to state their position. 
You know, Alex, I was having an issue with this because all kinds of alarm bells were going off in my head. 
Expecting anyone to pay just to link someplace just seemed like something I should be against. 
But what you just said was the preview. 
Yeah, you know, if I was to take a picture of a news story and put it on a website and then put all kinds of other pictures of front pages of newspapers. 
Yeah, it's only a preview. 
But I'm still using their content for my benefit. 
And that is exactly what Facebook and Twitter do. 
Because when you post those links, you see an image with the headline and you're getting the information without ever leaving Twitter, without ever leaving Facebook. 
I think it's about that more than it's about transferring your connection, going over to the New York Times or the Washington Post or whatever and reading the story over there. 
Of course, they want you to do that. 
They want you to go to their site. 
But like you said, many people just stay on the platform, on Facebook, on Twitter, and never really read the entire article if they even click on it at all. 
But they're getting the story. 
They're getting the headline. 
They're getting the information. 
And the news outlets are getting nothing. 
And Facebook and Twitter are making a ton of money. 
Rob? 
I think this is bananas that anyone would think that they're entitled to some kind of payment for another site linking to them. 
All of us here, I think, on this program, we all have experience putting content online. 
And, you know, when you publish stuff online for people to see, links to what you're doing are good. 
That's what brings in the eyeballs to what you're doing. 
That's what brings people in and, you know, gets them a look at your product. 
But as far as this preview for the link, that's something that Twitter and Facebook have control over. 
One example is Instagram. 
Twitter has had a beef with Instagram for ages. 
And for that reason, when you post a link to a photo on Instagram to your Twitter, that preview isn't generated. 
It's just the link. 
But people can click the link, go over to Instagram, and see the thing. 
So it's about that functionality. 
And Twitter and Facebook could easily just stop generating those previews. 
And I think that might bring it into compliance with whatever. 
But I think this is also potentially very, very dangerous because if people stop linking to, say, established news sites, then the news that's going to get posted or the, quote, news that's going to get posted to social media and make the rounds is going to be any old garbage from, like, random sites around the web that may or may not have any dependability whatsoever. 
But if you can post it to your Facebook instead of CNN or what have you, then those links are the ones that are going to get around. 
And that's potentially just going to be ground zero for all kinds of misinformation and crap. 
Yeah, but, you know, I think that might actually be a positive because if you're not confusing mainstream news or sources that are legitimate sources with all kinds of just wacky sites that people come up with, if you only have the wacky sites and people won't trust Facebook or Twitter for being a source of news or a clearinghouse. 
You know, we've seen on Canadian TV, because this is a big deal up in Canada, we see pleas for viewers to download apps for specific newspapers or media outlets so that they can get the news directly from those sources, which is the way it should be. 
You know, they should be going to these sources and reading the paper themselves and not relying on somebody who might be manipulating it in some way on one of these social media sites. 
But I do think that maybe maybe what we're talking about right now could solve the problem if they don't make those those previews. 
They simply have a link. 
And if somebody wants the story, they have to click on the link because all they're going to see is a link otherwise. 
And maybe that will satisfy the governments that are insisting on payment for this. 
Yes, Alex. 
Yeah, I think I think we're on to something here. 
And I think the the unintentional but foreseeable consequence of this particular type of law is exactly what you had mentioned, Emmanuel, which is that perhaps users now will realize that social media platforms are not the right place to get their news. 
If if this game of chicken continues and news is something that becomes forbidden on these social media sites, well, then we'll stop getting our news from social media sites. 
And that's probably a really damn good thing, because that will prevent us from being manipulated by disinformation, by misinformation, by troll farms. 
Like we saw in 2016 with the Internet Research Agency and by things like generative artificial intelligence. 
That's going to be producing massive amounts of disinformation ahead of the next election cycle that that's sure to happen as well. 
And that's going to be amplified and propelled, especially on these social media platforms. 
So if we train ourselves away from the idea that Facebook and Twitter or X, whatever the hell you want to call it, is where we should be scrolling through and getting updates on what's happening in the world, that's probably not a bad thing. 
And if you just go to if you use the CNN app or the New York Post app or the Financial Times app in order to get your news, I see that being a very much a good thing. 
And it prevents us from being manipulated by other channels, even things like domain names that might look like the New York Times or the Financial Times or or, you know, what we saw in 2016 as well was the the creation of wholesale bogus media organizations that looked legitimate and had legitimate names, but were just completely made up. 
So I think getting getting ourselves away from the idea that social media platforms are where we should be ingesting our news is a really good thing because it's not what they were designed for. 
Social media platforms, and we keep saying this on the show, they were using them for purposes for which they were not designed. 
They were not designed to ingest news. 
They were not designed for things like foreign relations between nuclear powers, like we saw during the Trump administration with North Korea. 
So let's use social media platforms for what they were originally designed to do, which was to connect with friends, supposedly, and create communities. 
Let's wean ourselves off of them. 
I think this could end up being a great thing. 
Go ahead, Rob. 
And we've seen sort of this this era of social media and the importance of news on it. 
You know, news spreading via social media when the normal channels weren't available has fueled social change, has fueled upheaval, has fueled all sorts of positive things around the world. 
And to say social media isn't intended to spread news. 
I mean, when you go to Twitter, the box where you type your tweet into, it still says, what is happening, question mark? 
And exclamation point. 
They added an exclamation point. 
And exclamation point. 
Wow. 
What is happening in Terabang? 
But still, you post on there what's happening. 
And if what's happening, like where's the line between what's happening and news? 
This is a very interesting, fuzzy place. 
But you can you can talk about the news, but it should be in your words. 
If we're just going to be posting previews from other sites, you know, those other sites should be involved somehow. 
You know, otherwise, what is Twitter actually doing? 
They're just, you know, a clearinghouse of one sort or another, but without any of the responsibility. 
Yes. 
But I mean, if we're talking about freelance journalists, for example, are you if you're a freelance journalist, are you going to say, I can no longer share what I have written? 
Can, you know, or I remember when we talked about this a few months ago, the thing that popped into my head was, can you share like an obituary that was in the newspaper about a family member? 
Is that prohibited as well? 
And, you know, where's where's the line going to be? 
And the question is, you know, if we're talking about people who are able to, you can watch situations happening in real time on social media, probably not as much on Twitter anymore. 
I will always call it Twitter. 
But, you know, what we're watching in real time versus where the links are, I guess. 
Yeah. 
And, you know, you basically run into the issue of paywalls. 
If you click on a link, it might ask you to pay to read the news story. 
You know, because that's that's how newspapers and media outlets think that they will be able to survive by charging people, whether or not that works or not. 
It's, you know, it's different for everybody, I suppose. 
But, you know, Google News, if you click on stories, most of them will take you to paywalls now. 
But Google's not paying anything. 
They have all the news right there on a page. 
You can go to that page and get an idea of what's happening without picking up a newspaper. 
And maybe you won't pick up a newspaper because you're reading through all the headlines on Google News. 
And they're getting your eyes on their page. 
But all the sources of that news aren't getting anything. 
There's this success, I think, in part. 
And there's like competing business models. 
But I think there is some success in that they're able to ask for this because the paywalls themselves have become ubiquitous and independent news and publishers and different groups, consortiums of of interests. 
Whatever they're doing, like they're able to do and charge for their blog or whatever it is without sort of an intermediary. 
So they're empowered in some sense. 
And that should be good for more of the small publishers and local publishers that have struggled. 
And I think maybe the competition here is part of that success. 
But the other thing I'm hearing and I think we might be missing is that they're benefiting a little bit from the aggregation that a Google News might be doing because every single one of those opportunities is a chance for someone to click through and be prompted or maybe they get a free visit. 
But that process allows them to be asked yet again. 
And maybe at some point they'll say, I like this news source. 
I think they bet on that to a degree. 
So they are benefiting a little bit in having those previews. 
So there may be a little bit of a disinterest. 
But I just I there's a lot of, I think, competing things going on or evolving in this in this story at all. 
And lastly, I think places like like Twitter that are more on demand or like you're saying, a real real time reporting tool, or at least that had been used that way. 
And a lot of other different video or other applications have the same kind of sharing technology. 
But it's more of a place where ideas are kind of being moved around and maybe news is referenced. 
But I don't really think either Google News or like a social media app really belong as authoritative news sources. 
I don't think they can really point to any kind of editor or anything. 
A lot of them are just mostly promoting or proud of their algorithms and how it's just basically automated. 
Yes, all robots and and and it's certain things surface as they do and they try their best. 
But G news is hard. 
And, you know, the thing to keep in mind here is that these companies are making a ton of money off of your actions. 
Whenever you go to their sites, you're being fed their ads. 
And I think that's where a lot of the the hostility is coming from is that they're benefiting so much. 
And there are so many others who aren't getting anything out of it, even though their content is being used. 
I don't think it's the same as as if one of us had a Web site and we link to a new story. 
It would be completely different. 
But when you see a company that is, you know, making so much money, benefiting so much. 
And then the reaction, rather than have a dialogue about this, is to simply just cut off and give a big middle finger to everybody. 
In fact, you know, there's a headline on Reuters. 
Canada demands that Meta, the parent company of Facebook, lift news ban to allow wildfire info sharing. 
You know, they have wildfires up there. 
They can't post news stories. 
They can't post links to news stories because Facebook is blocking them. 
Instagram is blocking them instead of simply saying, look, this is something we're going to argue about and we're going to appeal this. 
But we're not going to to inconvenience our our visitors or the people who use our service. 
And we're not going to do something that could result in people not getting vital information. 
That is the way they act. 
That is how they respond to somebody daring to question them. 
They simply cut everybody off. 
And in Canada, you can't link to a story about wildfires that might be encroaching on your neighborhood. 
So I think that kind of says where they're coming from. 
Go ahead, Rob. 
And there is an accessibility issue at play because historically, one of the best ways around paywalls, if you were confronted with a news article about something, you saw a headline that was interesting. 
You click on it and you're presented with a paywall, one thing to do would be to just go to Google News, type in that headline and see what other publications are saying about it, some of them with more accessible business models. 
And failing that, you would go to social media and put that in the search box and see what people are saying about that thing. 
And so for news stories to just not get out there in the traditional form, this is going to be a big shift if it goes through. 
It's going to be really interesting to see how people reassess their dependence on this sort of thing as a news source. 
Yeah, and every time you do that, every time you enter it into their site or go searching, they're making money off that. 
You're getting fed ads. 
Your eyeballs are valuable. 
Yeah, there's like behavior and other kinds of tracking and they're selling that data about you. 
And that is, again, I think I was alluding to it as part of like the competing business models because a newspaper that, you know, just released their app or wants to get some digital subscribers is not really doing the same kind of or same level of advertising to you. 
Alex, did you have something else on this? 
Yeah, I want to go back to the point that you originally made, Emmanuel, which is that the rather one of the points originally made, which was that social media companies are making massive amounts of money off of this content and generating data based on user behavior on their platform. 
So the more they keep users on their platforms, looking at these particular headlines, the link previews, et cetera, the more money they're making, it's really more like a matter of equity to me than anything else that they're going to be sharing some of those profits with the companies that have actually created the content that are keeping the users on that platform. 
And their failure to do so is what's causing these countries to enact these national laws, legislation, to force them to do that. 
But from the perspective of the Facebooks, the X's, the Twitters, the threads, whatever the hell we have out there now, the contrary viewpoint is that, well, maybe from their perspective, it would be right to oppose all of this right now because it's such a compliance pain in the butt to try to deal with this with regard to one law from Canada, another law from Australia, another law from, let's say, Croatia, another law. 
From the United Kingdom, and I'm not saying this is because of where I am in the world right now, but it's going to create this balkanization of the internet where certain information is available in certain places and certain bubbles and certain data is not going to be available in other places. 
It's going to create, as you noted before, public safety issues with regard to things like wildfires spreading in Canada or any other kind of public safety disaster anywhere else in the world if that can't be spread because of these social media policies. 
But I think the social media companies can get around this particular issue, arguing against myself, against the counterpoint that I just made, by coming to the table and perhaps creating their own type of policy whereby they engage in some form of limited profit sharing based on the links that are posted on their networks, such that they don't have to have their hand forced to share some of these profits by national legislation coming from all these different countries, but by doing it themselves, by being fair, by being equitable. 
I think that's ultimately what we're talking about here is people that are generating the news need to be able to profit from their own labor. 
That's exactly it, because you have these companies that are booming, that are doing so well, making money hand over fist, and then you have the journalism outlets that are struggling, that are failing, that are closing down. 
Okay, the two of those can work with each other, and one can help the other, in fact, they can both help each other. 
So the very fact that one company is doing great while another company is failing, and they're working together, it seems like there should be some symbiotic relationship there. 
And the reason all of this is coming to a head now is because the tech companies have done nothing to make that happen, and we're seeing the results of that. 
Kyle, did you have something? 
Yeah, I just think there's a little bit of reluctance. 
So, I mean, they're disinterested, I think, in cooperating in any way with the news sources, especially because of the very kind of institutions that might, you know, share things about their companies and talk about some of the impacts of their products and stuff. 
But what I was going to point to, I think Alex brought up, regarding public safety, like, that's particularly galling to me, because you know when, like, the ad campaigns come out in the Super Bowl or whatever, they're going to do this, like, feel good. 
We're doing all this good for emergency response and helping in the effort and all of that for disaster relief. 
And all of that, with this being sort of the actual way they operate in business and when it is actually impacting people's lives directly, because information is key in moments like this, especially when there's a disaster or something calamitous going on. 
And to enact these policies in places most affected at a time like this, it's just, it's gross. 
TikTok's already doing it, like, oh, look at all the good we do for people. 
Anyway. 
You know, what I found ironic, speaking of TikTok, all the TikTok ads during the Republican debate last week, you know, they spend all this time making us fear TikTok and China and all that, and then they have TikTok ads on Fox. 
Counterprogramming it. 
Yeah, that was just weird. 
Yeah. 
Okay, moving on. 
Speaking of tracking, a few people sent us this article that ran in a publication called, or an online publication called 404media.co. 
I tracked an NYC subway rider's movements with an MTA, quote-unquote, feature. 
I'm just going to read the opening bit of this. 
In the mid-afternoon one Saturday earlier this month, the target got on the New York subway. 
I knew what station they entered the subway at and at what specific time. 
They then entered another station a few hours later. 
If I had kept monitoring this person, I would have figured out the subway station they often start a journey at, which is near where they live. 
I would also know what specific time this person may go to the subway each day. 
During all this monitoring, I wasn't anywhere near the rider. 
I didn't even need to see them with my own eyes. 
Instead, I was sitting inside an apartment, following their movements through a feature on the Metropolitan Transportation Authority's website, which runs the New York City subway system. 
With their consent, I had entered the rider's credit card information, data that is often easy to buy from criminal marketplaces or which might be trivial for an abusive partner to obtain, and punched that into the MTA site for Omni, the subway's contactless payments system. 
After a few seconds, the site churned out the rider's travel history for the past seven days. 
No other verification required. 
I checked this out, and it's true. 
If you go to omni.info, O-M-N-Y.info, there is an option. 
There's two options, actually. 
If you have an Omni card, it expects you to enter the Omni card number plus a security code, expiration date, and all that. 
But if you don't have an Omni card, if you instead use your credit card to get into the system, all you need is your card number, expiration date. 
That's it. 
That's all you need. 
Now, you might say, okay, well, who's going to get a credit card number? 
Who's going to have the expiration? 
Well, okay, you know what? 
There are many instances where you are able to get somebody's credit card number, 16 digits, and expiration date. 
It's not that hard. 
You look in somebody's wallet if they're in the same location as you. 
You know, if you live with somebody, it's easy to get that. 
Or if they buy something from your store, let's say, okay, let's say that somebody is a merchant and you give them, or, you know, a waiter. 
Okay, how about this? 
A waiter that you stiff on tips and that waiter is now upset at you. 
I'm not picking on waiters. 
I'm just the first example that came to mind. 
And now that waiter has your credit card number, has your expiration date, and can track you and figure out where it is you're going and when you're on the subway and when you're on a bus. 
Okay, you know, that might not seem like much, but it's tracking. 
It really is tracking. 
And it's very accurate tracking as well. 
Now, in New York City, fortunately, you don't have to scan your card when you're getting off a bus or when you're getting off a train. 
So where you're going is still something that's fairly private. 
But this system, this is a bad system. 
This is not how you want to have ride history be stored, just with a credit card number. 
You need to have an account with a password that only you know, you know, at least have that option and encourage the use of that option. 
What do you guys think? 
Yeah, the fact that there is zero security on this, like you don't even have the opportunity or the ability to, say, log into the MTA website and set yourself up a four-digit PIN at the very least or a password at, you know, a more sane level is mind-blowing. 
It's mind-blowing that this is so wide open for anybody to abuse. 
There was just this week, without going into details, I had a doctor bill that needed paying, and I'm covered under Gila's employer as her spouse. 
And Gila, of course, this is not a malicious act at all, but Gila, you were able to use things you easily knew about me to get into the system at this medical establishment and pull up my bill without me. 
Right. 
I mean, I did happen to have another bill that had your account number on it. 
But yes, I just needed your account number and your birth date. 
And fortunately, we're on very good terms, but if you were, say, an abusive partner, but – Well, if I were an abusive partner, I probably wouldn't, you know, be helping pay your medical bills. 
That's true. 
No, I mean, they're not even asking for the – oh, my God, the super secret code, the super secret four-digit code. 
Right, on your credit card. 
On your credit card, three-digit code. 
It depends if it's Amex or if it's – yeah, but yeah, that's a good point. 
That is not being asked for, just the expiration date and the card number. 
Like, I have a prepaid Amex gift card that I got for Christmas last year. 
And if I want to check the balance on that thing, I have to put in all 15 digits plus the expiration date plus the super secret four-digit code, which on an Amex is on the front, so it's not super secret. 
But you need that extra piece of information to make it work, a zip code, anything. 
This – I didn't know about this until today because I have an Omnicard, but this is terrifying. 
Well, a zip code is really easy because, you know, it's where you live. 
And if somebody has information on you, they probably know where you live or what your zip code is. 
But also the fact that this is connected to transit, I mean, that's where you are in the physical real world. 
And that is a massive security hole. 
Information about where you are on the planet is privileged and should be and should be behind at least some kind of security. 
Now, I don't know if you guys have Omnicards. 
We're talking about credit cards here. 
But Omnicard is the dedicated card that you can get now. 
And they have a way you can look at your ride history or someone else's ride history online with that. 
You need the card number. 
You need the expiration date. 
And you need a security code. 
The security code is three digits. 
Okay? 
It doesn't take very long to figure out what the security code is. 
But, you know, the security code also, it's printed on the card. 
So, you know, it's really not that hard to get a glimpse of that if you're looking at somebody. 
Hey, I want to see what the Omnicard looks like. 
Can I see that for a second? 
All of a sudden, maybe I have a photographic memory. 
I memorized the whole thing. 
And now I'm tracking you for as long as you have that card. 
That's another good reason not to be friendly. 
Don't just participate in people's antics. 
That's true. 
Hustle you like that. 
Oh, yeah, this would be fun. 
No. 
Don't talk to people. 
Don't show them anything. 
Just go about your business. 
Yeah. 
Uh-huh. 
Stu. 
Gila, go ahead. 
No, it's a long number. 
I just pulled out my Omnicard, just for argument's sake. 
What's the first, what does the number begin with? 
Two. 
Okay. 
You shouldn't have answered that, by the way. 
Because now I just have a certain number of numbers left to get from you. 
Do you know how many digits? 
I've got the two. 
Do you know how many digits are in an Omnicard number? 
How many digits? 
A lot. 
How many? 
Hang on, I'm counting. 
Okay. 
This is exciting. 
18. 
18. 
Now, you see, you gave me that information, too. 
Now I know how many digits there are. 
You've given me two valuable bits of information here. 
18 digits, two more than a credit card, and it begins with two. 
And maybe they don't all begin with two. 
I don't know, but I'm learning. 
I mean, in... 
Go ahead. 
I was going to say, you know, in the work that I do, I learned things about credit cards that they all start with the same digit. 
Well, no, they don't all start with the same digit. 
Visa is four. 
MasterCard is five. 
MX is three. 
Discover is six. 
Discover is six. 
Nobody has those. 
Yeah. 
So Omni starts with two. 
And yeah, I mean, I live in my trip history because I want to see how close I am to the ride threshold. 
So I'm checking it constantly. 
Okay, wait. 
Explain the ride threshold for people. 
Absolutely. 
So there's a system, if you swipe, if you use the same payment card 12 times from a Monday to a Sunday, everything above the 12th ride is free. 
So that can be super helpful. 
And there are weeks I've gotten over it, and there are weeks I've gotten to 11 and been very disappointed. 
So yeah, I check my ride history on a fairly regular basis so that I have an idea of how close I am to the cap. 
Couldn't you just, I mean, okay, two questions. 
If you want to get to that ride threshold, and you get on the subway, and then you get onto a bus, the bus is a transfer. 
Does that count as a second ride, or is that part of the first ride? 
I imagine it's part of the first ride. 
Okay, so I'd be bummed out getting a free transfer because I want to get the ride threshold up. 
So maybe I just go all around town entering different subway stations and bringing that up in one day to that magic number. 
And then I know that this card is, I can go anywhere, you know, for the next week or so. 
Yeah. 
For free. 
Or you could be Subway Robin Hood, and every time you leave a station, swipe somebody else in. 
Uh-huh. 
Yeah. 
Yeah, we've done that. 
Gil, did you load this? 
Does it have a capacity to add value? 
What's the interface like? 
So it's via the website. 
Okay. 
And I, you know, I use transit benefits for my employer, and I have it set to auto refill every month with my pre-tax dollars. 
Okay. 
So you can add a credit card too, though, right? 
Yeah. 
I'm really curious. 
Well, the credit card is how you pay for the Omni card, right? 
Right. 
Okay. 
In your online account, that is. 
All right. 
I'll let her finish, but I had a point to make. 
I was curious about this. 
Okay. 
Gila, you finished. 
Kyle has a point, and I believe Alex is up next. 
Oh. 
So all I was going to say, and I think this is probably a weird safety thing, but the way that I get my transit benefits is through a pre-funded credit card that I can only use for transit benefits. 
So even if someone breaks into my Omni account and gets my credit card information, they can't do anything with it because it will only refill for transit. 
That's all I was going to say. 
I'm curious about how many people might actually get an Omni card, set up an account, and then top it up, so to speak, for the first time. 
Because it seems to me the MTA would be incentivized to do that because when people are using the app or something that's a card, it's like a transactional thing, whereas you have, I don't know, however many people might be interested in doing this. 
I'm sure they have it down to a percentage of ridership. 
But wouldn't that be like an instant, depending on how much people load up, but if everybody put 50 bucks in and you extend that out over the population that uses the system, wouldn't that be something that would incentivize MTA to encourage people to set this up? 
Because it would instantly create some kind of revenue to at least pay for a decent website to handle it all. 
Well, right now, it costs $5 to get an Omni card. 
Just to get the card. 
Just to get the card. 
And then you associate it with your site. 
And well, then you add money to it for actual rides. 
And then you can set it up to auto-refresh or auto-update if you get below, say, $20. 
But you don't have to do... 
Oh, okay. 
It can put more. 
Or you can even set it up on a particular day of the month. 
That's when you replenish your Omni account. 
Is that what you do, Gila? 
Like you set it at a certain interval, like add $10 if below certain... 
I have it to refill functionally the amount of a monthly pass on the 20th of every month is what I set it for. 
But I think you can also reload an Omni card with cash in a store, like where you bought an Omni card, if you don't want to set up an online account. 
There are ways around it, but they've made it pretty cumbersome. 
Yeah. 
Alex, go ahead. 
Let's go to the store option. 
I think fundamentally this, in going back to the main point here about whether or not this is a good idea, a bad idea, or if something goes very poorly implemented, I think this is just a very bad idea when it comes to identity and access management. 
This is something that's fundamental to cybersecurity and to system design and to security engineering. 
And the idea of tying someone's identity to something as simple as a 16-digit credit card number together with an expiration date that any merchant is going to have is just a very, very bad way of challenging to prove somebody's identity. 
And I don't think we're ever going to get around that unless the system changes its design. 
I also see the potential for abuse for this stemming not just from people who may be stalkers or abusive spouses or something like that, but also from law enforcement as well. 
It's going to be incredibly easy for law enforcement now to begin to track people, especially if they know what their financial details are with respect to credit cards, and it's easy for law enforcement to get that information, as well as private investigators. 
I'm sure maybe they have already been using this type of information to track their targets, and that makes all of us, I think, more vulnerable to have a system like this out in the wild. 
The other thing about this is I think a lot of people, when they ride the subway these days, they're not using Omni cards. 
They're not using Metro cards. 
They're just using their credit cards, or they're using Apple Pay. 
Right. 
And as I understand it, you put your phone up next to the MTA transit turnstile, and that information is then going to be publicly, well, not publicly accessible, but accessible by way of just knowing what the credit card number was that was used. 
I think this is a really important article that isn't getting enough attention in the mainstream media, and I certainly hope that our attention to this increases the extent to which people begin paying attention to this, because I think it's a very, very bad system design, and I'd hate to see it replicated in other major cities across the United States. 
And the really disturbing thing, occasionally we hear of a whole trove of credit card numbers that was compromised, and there's a list of thousands of numbers, and the threat of stealing someone's identity is very real. 
But imagine you have thousands of credit card numbers, and you know that they're in the New York area, and you're able to track all those people based on that information. 
And you can really find out a whole lot more about somebody by tracking their movements than by simply having their credit card number. 
So I'm worried that the next time a whole bunch of these credit card numbers is compromised, that maybe somebody will be saving those numbers and watching and seeing what people do, and then making their next nefarious move after they learn a whole lot about somebody and their habits. 
It's very dangerous. 
I think, you know, the simple solution here, add a damn password at least, make the account number different from the credit card number, and give the users the power to implement as much security as they're comfortable with. 
Okay, we are almost out of time, so there's one more story I wanted to get to. 
This has to do with drones. 
And, Kyle, I know you're very interested in this. 
The FAA has released a document outlining compliance measures with something known as Remote ID, otherwise known as Part 89. 
It's going to require all drones be equipped with new Remote ID recognition and tracking technology in order to further integrate UAVs into the national airspace system. 
Beginning on September 15th, I'm sorry, September 16th, all pilots who are required to register the UAS must follow the new rule, which requires drones to either have a native Remote ID or be fitted with a Remote ID broadcast module, like a portable transmitter. 
If the drone has a broadcast module, the FAA website says that the drone must be operated within visual line of sight. 
If your drone is not Remote ID compliant or equipped with a Remote ID broadcast module, you may only fly in designated FAA-recognized identification areas, known as FRIA, sponsored by community-based organizations, CBOs, where they love their acronyms, or educational institutions, such as AMA Flying Fields. 
American Modelers Association, I gather? 
Yes, of course. 
I don't even know, but I'm guessing. 
I know you've flown drones a couple of times, Carl. 
What do you think of this? 
I've built model airplanes and all kinds of things, and there was a purchase made regarding a drone around headquarters, basically. 
And, well, we flew it, and then we hit the wrong button, and it crash-landed. 
And, well, anyway, that was fine. 
It is legal, in other words. 
It's, like, registered and so forth. 
But it's been sitting. 
Basically, the batteries all stopped charging. 
It's been plagued with problems. 
And now I think the company that makes it just makes, like, stuff for defense or something. 
They're just busy selling AI or whatever in their drones. 
And so, like, there's no support, and the best help I've found is, like, how to hack this particular type of drone. 
And no doubt, like, hackers talking about that model years ago are actually giving me more insight into, like, exactly what it is and how to fix it. 
What's the model? 
We can shame the company. 
No, I'm embarrassed. 
I'm embarrassed. 
No, they should be embarrassed. 
I'm embarrassed. 
They make a drone, and then they don't support it. 
That's not the point. 
That's not the point of this. 
No, it's not the point. 
Save for overtime. 
Okay. 
Where I'm going, though, with the remote ID thing is, if you fall into this category, in other words, you don't have a brand spanking new drone that basically integrates this into the setup, you have to, at some expense, buy tags and extra stuff to be compliant so that you can be tracked, like, literally tracked, where you are, where your drone is, how fast it's going, all of that. 
So, if you've been grounded, so to speak, and you wake up September 17th, I think it is, you have to be able to comply with this or else go to your little RC hobby field and hope you don't get in trouble or whatever or make those people mad or be at an event or special use scenario or inside a butterfly net. 
I don't know. 
So, the point is, it's a lot of extra steps, and I'm not a drone person per se. 
This is a whole industry. 
It's a sports thing. 
There's leagues. 
There's jobs, industrial uses. 
This is a field that is really – and I'm not even going to make the puns – it's become prevalent. 
And so, we're curious. 
If you have any insights or information about how you feel about compliance and what the take is from drone people, we would love to know. 
OTH at 2600.com. 
Because, obviously, the tracking part, we have strong feelings about. 
I'm not totally clear on the protocols, but I believe there's some Bluetooth involved and the ability to use that at a great distance. 
So, to me, that says that there's some kind of network that they've established or they're using existing transmission sites like cell towers or something to monitor those frequencies for these IDs when they're implemented. 
And for people that are working and doing this, of course, they'll do what they have to do to continue doing their business. 
For hobbyists, it's like, okay, you want to fly a second time. 
You've got to spend – I think the only place I could find that's making this is in Czech Republic or CZ, .CZ. 
Yeah. 
This place called Drone Tag. 
They make like a little PCB. 
I'm curious also if there are domestic manufacturers that are making modules so that people can be in compliance because this one's like over 100 or so and hundreds of dollars. 
You don't want to go into all this if you're just a hobbyist. 
So, how do people feel about this? 
I'm curious because it's adding expense. 
Even if you're a local news reporter or something, you have to go through all this and the wrangling of it. 
And then, of course, what happens when people clone these or come up with falsification and so forth? 
There's just a lot of aspects to this I think we're going to be reporting on in the future. 
We only have 45 seconds left. 
Anybody have any quick comments on this? 
We can continue on overtime. 
Go ahead, Rob. 
2600 meetings are happening this Friday all over the world, 2600.com slash meetings. 
Okay. 
I meant comment on what Kyle just said, but okay. 
Alex, did you have something? 
Yeah, I think Kyle's right to be concerned about this because it just adds layers of complexity to what's, I think, a really interesting and innovative technological hobby. 
And I think that's really unfortunate. 
I think he's right to bring this up, and I look forward to addressing it in the future. 
Okay, and we can, again, continue this conversation on overtime, which starts at 8 p.m. 
on YouTube. 
You can get the link from the main 2600.com webpage or just go to channel 2600 on YouTube. 
Again, I'll be back next week with our special BAI Buddy Show, and please spread the word on that, or go to give2wbai.org and pledge your support to WBAI. 
We will see you next week or at 8 o'clock on overtime. 
Good night. 
  And welcome everybody on YouTube as we start off the hook overtime for this August the 30th Kyle you make it. 
Okay Yes, okay. 
Looks looks. 
Okay, Rob Gila Hi present and can you confirm that we are actually in fact on YouTube? 
We are actually in fact on YouTube Yes, and Alex. 
I'm surprised to see you. 
I thought Since you were in Croatia, you'd be signing off early I Was gonna peel off a little bit early, but you know, I'm awake for a little bit I think yeah The conversation is interference. 
I'll hang out like 15 20 minutes or so and At least say hello to rebel Okay, thanks for encouraging that that's that's just great you guys want to continue talking about drones or are we finished with that I'm fine. 
I just was looking up. 
I mean there are rules about Fraudulent fraudulent activity and your Applications and all this stuff that just throwing so much at people and I'm concerned I'm concerned because I think there's a lot of people out there that They if it's a new type of aircraft they're gonna just sort of comply with it immediately and they may not realize exactly what it's all about and what you know what it means and People that are trying to comply may have to have extra expense and and of course since it's older They're not gonna have any support, you know, no support because product life cycles are instantaneous and who cares so Good luck and and that kind of stuff as well as the people that okay Yeah, I did say people might not comply but okay Really really don't comply like don't want to and I'm not saying like intentionally do not comply I'm not saying they're like everyday citizens. 
I'm saying That's part of the pool of aircraft. 
You can't really track with your system How do you track a drone that doesn't want to be tracked? 
Right. 
I mean, I think it's incentivizing some of that and that like when we talk about other kinds of dangers we say like, you know That if If you try to try to Institute institute this People that are determined are still gonna slip through that kind of that kind of thing so, I mean there's a lot of angles to it and of course, we don't know that much about like all the technology and You know, there's some language in I haven't read all of it in in honesty, but there's some language about Retention of data, you know, you already have to have an FAA account. 
So you have to kind of already be in their system and Set up to do any of this unless you get a very very small. 
I believe these sizes 0.55 pounds So you have to be under half a pound? 
And most small drones I think very very small ones like indoor and like toy drones and even some racing drones are a little bit under that but the kinds that people are using for photography or older ones might be much larger or maybe You broke down and got some Different batteries and you modified it. 
Maybe you've added some stuff of your own But there are some other aspects of this I didn't really have enough time to talk about it that are interesting in what they're changing what they're allowing I don't want to just say like oh, there's no support and as though I'm Totally upset. 
I'm more curious about what this all means and how we're gonna respond to it How people are going to use it? 
Well, the behaviors will actually be but there's things like more permissive stuff around where and how you can fly and of course the other interesting thing was nighttime flying and Certain things like adding strobes and and other safety features to your drone Which maybe you know people will get creative with I've been playing around with some of that with this old thing I'm trying to trying to make fly again. 
So but anyway that that It's a whole World, I realized it's like you turn around and something that you thought was just kind of fledgling. 
It's just quite evolved and Just understanding all of it and how it all works is Takes a lot So I'm really curious what? 
Kind of drone experts out there Might have to say and drone hackers and in other countries as well because what you're describing is only in the United States Well, correct. 
Yeah. 
Yeah. 
Yeah, that's the the establishment of the system here. 
And of course, yeah What would you do if you were going overseas you would obviously maybe want to turn that off? 
In instead of broadcasting information like that if you don't need it And and but but this may turn out to be like a an example or a template for other nations where you have to do This everywhere. 
All right, Rob As someone who's terribly curious, but isn't into the drone hobby at all I'm wondering about the enforcement for this sort of thing Like are we at now or are we going to get to a spot? 
Where the authorities like if they don't think your drone is identifying itself well enough can like shoot it out of the air or take out A big butterfly net and catch it or I don't know how it works Well, yeah, I think that's less likely but I think there is is logging of it if they don't like If you are using this transmission technology, then yeah You're you're going to be willfully sort of giving them a whole lot of telemetry data But the without it, of course, I mean I Think that it's and under those strictures. 
What I'm saying is that it's It's the kind of thing where your license your ability to fly legally in their system could be revoked I was also looking up if like if there are fines and stuff associated with it, but I'm not totally sure on that But it seems like it's a very It's also a hedge for like forensic stuff if they can prove that a certain type of drone or a certain Serial number even it just makes it that much easier to verify Implicating someone who might have been the area of a crime or something that was interfering with the investigation Interesting our phone number 802 3 2 1 4 2 2 5 and I wants to join the conversation has any comments on Things we've talked about tonight or anything completely new and different and I should open that up to to you folks here there's anything that You want to bring up that we haven't? 
Haven't mentioned in the past hour. 
There's there's a lot of things that we haven't talked about You folks here, there's anything that you want to bring up that we haven't Haven't mentioned in the past hour and change Um, just want to say hello to the 29 Well 28 because one of them is me Um people who are in the who are watching us live on youtube right now Um, well, you're not seeing you're not seeing much because we don't turn the video cameras on The 28 people who have joined us live on youtube and are looking at this I still don't know what that first word is um Is it bikes? 
I'm sorry. 
What are you asking if the first word in the picture that's scratched out? 
Is it bikes something will be removed. 
It's scratched out. 
I don't know what it is. 
We've never revealed that Yeah to this day that has remained I mean, is it is it bikes? 
Is it locks? 
Is it I think we've been told at some point is I think it's safe to assume bikes is probably what it is about But we're not for sure Off off the top of our heads if we if you discuss it at all before um I don't know exactly where that photo was taken But i'm sure people around in that part of the world might recognize it and say yes exactly It's probably mentioned on a previous on a previous show i'm sure we can look it up Yeah, i'm sure we can look it up. 
Um, also I did want to um Mention that we did have a quick chime in on the chat about the drone stuff, uh tim in connecticut says I haven't flown my faa registered drone in so long in a hobby mode in photography I would not buy and retrofit my drone to be legal As uh as I still have the same overflight restrictions um Also, yes people are now chiming in in the chat. 
We have uh, someone says locks may be removed. 
Someone says bills someone says signs um This is a fun game You're talking about the picture if you go to our if you're listening to us now Actually, if you if you're on youtube now, you see a picture It's um, it's a sign of some sort It says something will be removed and the first word is scratched out and people are now chiming in with what the word could be yes, um And fun talks does say emmanuel um I don't know if he's trying to get your attention or if I mean, I don't think the the space there is long enough to say emmanuel and it definitely ends with an s Yeah, I don't very much. 
It says that I think it's uh open to interpretation. 
I think that's the artistic intent behind the image. 
Yes um so Oh, we're up to 35 people now including me. 
So 34. 
Um, but Yeah, uh folks in the chat Keep keep it coming um and hopefully We'll get a call so If I had a whole bunch of drones, what if I had all the same? 
broadcast and you just were a big swarm of like a whole bunch of the same thing and you were like just messing up a whole thing and then one of them wasn't Like that. 
I mean What kinds of things this is going to drive people to do? 
I really want to know Because it's um, I mean could you would a system like that be flooded? 
um Wow, it's gonna be weird. 
It's gonna be weird It just limits a whole lot of like the sort of gray area of what that all was for so long as far as drones just being kind of a Emerging sort of free-for-all thing. 
Go ahead. 
Rob I mean i'm thinking about uh, all the apps that you can get for computers and mobile devices that do things like randomize your mac address uh, whenever you hook to a network somewhere and uh things of that sort and if If you could get like a small, uh, a small board together to just Randomize the id number that it sends out or you know, at least have it. 
Uh, Um setable by the user, um, that would probably be Something looked down upon by the authorities, but probably technically trivial Right, right. 
I mean like let's speak to that. 
I mean why they're implementing this is to sort of streamline the airspace and make it um a Functional um Uh, but safe area for these kinds of vehicles to be used more I guess in in industry uh for hobbyists having some abilities and then also um you name the purpose, uh, whether it's uh, Realtors or or other sorts of service and and um or inspection whatever it is There's just going to be or that Think of that layered with like delivery and I think that's where a lot of the concern is but also of course in um Overall security. 
I think there's just this yearning to know What's flying? 
um real low and and um At other altitudes and and those sort of in between spaces as well And a bit of a panic even given how it's being used in war so Those are all things to confront But it's um It's going to be interesting It's going to be interesting because I think a lot of people will have to navigate this just to continue to enjoy What they are are getting out of that And it is really kind of a useful useful tool and and an interesting vantage Uh, whatever and however people are using them Even for fun Is anyone else here am I alone did everyone walk out i'm so sorry youtube I feel really left. 
Uh, does anyone else want to talk about something other than drones or shall I drone? 
The cut the conversation is kind of droning on and on but uh You can join the conversation by giving us a phone call 802-321-4225 That's 802-321-HAC or you could uh, if you're in the united states get us toll free at 833-755-2600 We have no callers Yeah, if we did we'd be talking to them not ourselves Well as much as we love this youtube chat, this is primarily a telephone call in Uh show that we have so, uh, I think we would like to get some callers. 
So don't be shy Give us a give us a call. 
We want to hear your voice Yeah, this is what happens when you open up the chat people chat to each other and forget about us And uh your comments don't have to be about remote id or drones They can be about anything what you hacked, uh what you hacked for breakfast Um, I don't know, okay Um, well, here's a story that I think might be a little interesting about something that was hacked A brazilian phone spyware Application was hacked and victims devices deleted from the server Uh, this is considered a good thing uh, because um It's stalkerware now Uh, it's it's called web detective without a c Yeah, so imagine the word detective and take the c out. 
That's that's I don't know how to pronounce that web detective Web detective, uh, I don't know what that mean means but uh, probably web detective was taken so they got that one Um, it's been used to compromise more than 76 000 android phones in recent years across south america largely in brazil Uh web detective is also the latest phone spyware company in recent months to have been hacked Now tech crunch reports this an undated note that they saw Uh, the unnamed hackers described how they found and exploited several security vulnerabilities That allowed them to compromise web detective servers and access its user databases By exploiting other flaws in the spyware makers web dashboard used by abusers to access the stolen phone data of their victims The hackers said they enumerated and downloaded every dashboard record including every customer's email address The hackers said that dashboard access also allowed them to delete victim devices from the spyware network altogether Effectively severing the connection at the server level to prevent the device from uploading new data Which we definitely did because we could Yeah Sounds like a good thing sounds like if you're going to hack something hack something that's abusive and And disable it Although i'm sure there's somebody who would object to this probably um Governments following people that they suspect of doing something bad and Uh, they use the stalkerware software as well or something like that But I think it's a good thing Yeah, it's it's a good thing it's a socially responsible thing and I love when the hacker spirit Um is turned to making things safer and nicer for everybody at At the time of this hack, um web detective had compromised 76,794 devices The data also contains 74,336 unique customer email addresses The web detective doesn't verify a customer's email address when signing up Preventing any meaningful analysis of the spyware's customers Yeah, so, uh, it's not known who did this But somebody with um with good motive supposedly I believe we have a phone call. 
Is that right? 
We do. 
Okay, let's see who's out there Good evening. 
You're on off the cover time. 
Go ahead Good evening gang. 
How are you tonight? 
Good. 
How are you? 
Not too bad. 
This is tim in connecticut Hi, tim in connecticut yeah, I was calling him mitch originally to respond to the drones, but uh, if you're if we've switched over to the Oh the hacker thing. 
Well Throw quotations, of course around that Just recently I heard of the fbi takes down notorious, uh, quack bot Hacking network. 
Yeah, I was just going to mention that story. 
Do you want to tell people about that? 
Oh, i'd have to pull it up in an article, but sure I mean, you know not being In the group theoretically, uh fbi takes down notorious quack bot hacking network that used 700 000 infected computers Worldwide to steal hundreds of millions from unsuspecting targets in ransomware and financial fraud attacks And it goes on to basically say that you know, most of these are because somebody replied to a link or uh, You know an inappropriate. 
Um Url that popped up in an email thing and that's how they got into the company's network the usual you know You can take you can have a whole bunch of security and somebody's going to either lose the keys or you know leave the door unlocked or there's always the human element that's going to allow anybody to get a You know foothold in your system Sure, yeah in this case I think what they did is uh, they stopped it, uh communicating with the network itself, um from the Controller side they basically hacked that and were able to uh basically just disrupt or totally, um uh cut off communications with the affected machines essentially Disabling it in the same way this this other detective stuff detective Uh software. 
I don't know how to say it Yeah, they said after gaining access Hacker gangs would then extort their victims seeking ransom payments in bitcoin or other crypto Before returning access to the encrypted computer network Technically some were not Some were just simply take the money and run right and also apparently the fbi did get to reverse a in the millions of crypto coins Payments that were stolen before shutting down the network Yeah, I mean that that's like, uh Nice, uh technique, right? 
I mean pretty pretty smooth And it's like oh, you know, yeah. 
Well, yeah, you would have to have a a sandboxed uh system right that you could respond with and play with so you don't uh allow your Uh system to perpetuate the problem, right? 
Right I I would think it would be very hard to make sure that your machine at work is the only machine that's Communicating with the hackers or or the fact that you'd have to know That you're compromised Without alerting the people doing the compromise. 
Oh sure. 
Yeah. 
Yeah, like um Yeah, like like basically, um incubating an effect infected system and then um uh sort of uh, or or having enough information to to um Access the control infrastructure So like that would take a lot of other techniques, maybe some monitoring maybe somebody talks maybe somebody got paid I don't know, you know that that's kind of their technique But it would be important in getting to the point where you can actually be effective I unfortunately, I think the whole thing is a little bit like table scraps this is good work, but it's it's like I mean I'm not I don't want to be too thankful You can really make a big headway and do some damages. 
You got to find out who has been infected so Not only are you securing your own and cutting your own off and then killing the source, but everybody who's affected you have to I don't know clean or disable them So they don't propagate once everything gets, you know rebooted I'm sure they have backups Yeah so in other words you're saying that um The network may have been the control may have been shut down, but it may be something that is still spread Because it's not functionally disabling what code or or uh vulnerability is still out there. 
Okay Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean if it's out there and it's still replicating and and your source is down somebody Within that group. 
It was a few people Would have backups and i'm sure if it's you know, they're cash cow They would certainly want to bring up another system maybe in a different place. 
You're talking controller side. 
Yeah Yeah um That that is I think a part of it too. 
Yeah, like What but but it would be something that I think people this deep in investigating it would probably be well well attuned to um But also but you don't know they don't know uh, who exactly they're dealing with just because they disrupt a machine doesn't mean they've Actually affected the human side of that unless that's part of the announcement I don't know much more about this story. 
Like if they've implicated Anything I mean other than what the operation? 
Involved authorities from france germany netherlands the united kingdom romania and latvia Sounds like a fun bunch um Cool was croatia in there No, that's the only one that they had here Alex check in on that Are you okay? 
Alex? 
Oh, he's there. 
There you go. 
Oh, yeah. 
I'm i'm i'm i'm here. 
I'm here Listening intently rob, you had something something that i'll tell you. 
Yeah, I'll hang on. 
Sorry. 
Go ahead. 
I know you had more to say Alex, go ahead Oh, I do I I want to say I think these coordinated takedowns are are really interesting in how they They combine an understanding of the technical infrastructure of the threat actor together with the use of legal process and it's actually it's something that um, That that my firm has actually been doing for microsoft for for some time and that Um, we also have an active case right now in the eastern district of new york Whereby we have dismantled a lot of the back-end infrastructure for Domains that have been hosting cracked versions of cobalt strike Cobalt strike for for people that are listening and don't know what it is I imagine many many of our listeners probably do Cobalt strike is penetration testing software that's really effective at simulating The types of tools that threat actors would use and because of that cobalt strike is very often used Uh to compromise organizations and is and is also very often a precursor to ransomware event So by using the same type of investigative techniques Together with legal process. 
We were able to dismantle these huge networks of threat actors utilizing cracked cobalt strike infrastructure and thereby Actually make a dent in the amount of ransomware Instances that have been popping up over the last but let's say seven eight months So we're doing similar stuff to what law enforcement is doing but on the civil side Interesting rob, you had something yeah, um, I wanted to relate the information given further down in this tech crunch article, which is um, How easy it is to detect the web detetive? 
Uh app if it's uh, it's sold on your android phone um, the app apparently, uh appears on your desktop on your phone's desktop or on your apps list as Uh wi-fi it's named wi-fi and the icon is just a blue and white wi-fi symbol But if you long press on it and get the app info it gives the name sistema which is a system in portuguese and uh That is this app this piece of stalkerware, uh poorly disguising itself as a system app and if you have If you find you have this or you suspect that there's other stalkerware on your phone Um, I just wanted to give a shout out to the site stop stalkerware.org Org which uh has a lot of uh resources and guides on how to check your phone for spyware What to do if you find it how to get rid of it and everything else and it's very uh, user-friendly and uh, you don't have to be technical to Benefit from the info on there. 
So that's stop stalkerware.org Anything else caller, uh, no, not at all. 
I just uh, don't foresee myself putting any um id on my drone just simply because of the age and uh, I think a lot that took the um Look the things that happened that made me lose interest in flying out my dji phantom drone Is simply that they've they've reduced the areas that you can do. 
So legitimately legally state parks Um, I mean, you know some some are fine like I can't fly within five miles of an airport That sort of makes sense But uh, you know, you just can't take it Anywhere and uh, just put it up and fly around and use your camera to look at things I just thought it was a very good thing for photography purposes Yeah, I mean there's uh, I mean So much of the country's got wildfire and you can't um fly around that obviously like there's uh, pretty strict rules around Emergencies and disasters, although they've been using them commercially and I think that's that's kind of the point I was making too It's just this huge emphasis on commercial use but even right small entrepreneurs or my uh, 107 license You know, I just didn't see the need to put the money into that and and because i'm not going to be a commercial pilot I'm not yeah And they were offering surveys and things like that. 
Correct. 
Correct, uh different levels of uh training and they've changed it a little bit and um and uh been overall like I think pretty upfront about what you have to do to To uh Set up and to be aware of where exactly you're operating and they very much treat you like you're a pilot sort of Which I mean, of course, what do you expect from the FAA? 
but right, it's Definitely like they're clamping down. 
It's definitely it's less desirable and it just seems like it is not the free-for-all as I mentioned and rob was alluding to where you can I think just go and and feel free to enjoy these things that um With no kind of bound and and right there have been accidents there's there's good reason for all of this and and they do want to actually mature that sort of concept of like getting a pizza with a drone or whatever, you know, the Ideal is with all of this, but they're just sort of I think mostly anticipating a lot more of them in the future and how to get some kind of Um strictures around their use and just overall presence and prevalence so It's very interesting, but I I share where you're coming from fully, you know, it's it's uh, it's gonna be uh, it's a little weird Well, I would think that if I wanted to get back into the hobby I'd I would just have to buy a new device if I wanted to be fully legal because well Right amount of money that I would have to take and spend on an old unit. 
Sure Since they've come down in price so much. 
It's probably just easier to pick up something new. 
Yeah has all the information in it yeah, I mean I feel like More and more. 
I have mixed feelings about so many things. 
I think that's true but I think there's also this like life cycle like it's it they are sort of expensive but not at the same time and I mean If you want something that's a all-in-one and I mean I you can go into this. 
I mean it's a whole market and and so forth and um It is I think it's an appreciable cost for most people so you have to kind of um, You know weigh that and and the total expense of it um And of course you want to avoid accidents and and not be like a risk to the public But like you said just taking a picture all of a sudden someone complains go ahead I'm, sorry, the hard part is to stay within line of sight of everything. 
Well that too unless you're in a big flat field yeah, and I just think that like okay the new drones that people can That have the flight time and that people, you know People that have money can go and buy that and run their autonomous, you know Run their maps and do do all that stuff unattended and um I just don't know that like You're really growing something that's emerging in an in in a very fair way if um, you know, those are the actors that Um are free to do that kind of thing. 
But I mean again, this is all like discussed So there's probably some safety reasons. 
So the older ones with these beacons will yes have to be line of sight so it's sort of building in this thing of like well, you got to spend the spend on the beacon and then you gotta You know plan your sort of use and and if you're A photographer or you just um are just learning and so forth. 
Um All of a sudden diving into thousands or you know, even more money it just it might turn people off uh that would otherwise have a lot of fun with it or you know be into get turned on to it or be More interested after getting a chance to to try it out And I just i'm worrying that there's going to be so much emphasis on the commercial that it's going to alienate a lot of people that are Really new to it and don't have that much practice so to speak So to speak hey, uh, kyle, you said you might um, uh reveal the name of the uh, the drone that the company, uh, Stopped showing any support for to shame them and to uh, no, I don't want to shame them. 
Why not? 
I I don't it's um So it doesn't have a set of initials does it No, no, no. 
No, it's not one of those. 
We've got a parrot um, so we've got one of the um early Early models of that not the um The what is it the ar? 
a.r One a couple after that, uh, one of the bebop. 
I had a pair at once. 
Yeah But you can't even get a battery for it, right? 
That's it's so I couldn't find out anything about the thing until I I found an old. 
Um, Uh talk about how vulnerable they were to being hacked and it was really interesting and talked about it. 
Um, Running a variant of I believe linux or unix and um how the sort of camera sensors oriented just all the details for Actually playing with it and I just think in the context of other conversations we have not just getting away from privacy for a moment, but like Right to repair and like keeping stuff from just being junk or Truly, you know sunk costs. 
Um Um there ought to be like at least information if the company is going to move on and Declare that life cycle over that's fine. 
But like why do Why I found it sort of fitting that that the hacker uh Angle was the only place That I could get information about this sort of forgotten model that I wanted to play with And never really felt like I got that much out of it Uh, no sooner do you like register it and do all this stuff? 
um, I I felt contained then like kind of like wow, this is This is a lot. 
I haven't even really gotten started and now they're they're doubling down with more of that And yeah, the manufacturer is is making all kinds of defense and other kinds of commercial stuff And you can't find anything about this model at all on their site and um They they were the same kind of apathetic around battery replacement, so i've Made my own adapter and matched the batteries and done a lot of other customizing. 
I have my own strobe With made out of a ping-pong ball. 
I'm ready Wow All right. 
I hear you. 
Is it now you just you know, you got to stay under a certain feeling can't be by an airport or helipad or Yep state park. 
I wanted to try it out. 
I want to have fun and you know, you know, you'll have people They'll be like well, that's a lithium battery that's flying around. 
What if it crashes starts a fire? 
Well, right I mean I learned about that sizing and trying to like come up with a solution for Like what are drone people doing as far as power supplies? 
Like what's where's that at and I had to figure out um connectors i'd never seen before and all of that and solder and you know get really into all of that and um just Just like deciding where you're going to operate the thing, you know you're now going to be like considering the privacy thing just on top of all the uh Planning you have to do just to try it out and I don't know. 
I don't know if it's worth it anymore Yeah, that's what it always comes down to lots of you know, what's the uh Trying to remember the very very small ones The whirly hoops or or whatever. 
They're oh, yeah. 
I've looked at those. 
Yeah Those are great to train with yeah I'm out of my height really in the air. 
It's just that A gust of wind would You know make it go away forever. 
Yeah. 
Yeah, I read some reviews about those being good to learn on i'm also curious about like some of the fancy controllers like can I get one of those to Add this older drone because a lot of those store different profiles. 
You can like keep multiple Drones, but I don't know if it will associate with one that is for all intents and purposes proprietary Exactly Learning protocols what language they talk. 
Yeah. 
So anyway, um, we're gonna move on i'll i'll um I'll i'll get um some more thoughts on this and and keep updating on the uh Perils of flying a drone. 
Yeah, i'm sure there's more to come in this in this saga Okay, i'll let you guys go and get on to the next caller, all right, thanks thanks for your call take care Right. 
Oh, bye. 
Bye so alex, I know, um, you said you had to uh to run but i'd like you to describe uh Some of croatia for us first before you do and what your what your travel plans are next Yeah, sure, um, yeah i'll be i'll be here for a couple more days and then Uh heading back to italy For a few days with some colleagues And friends and then uh, and then back to new york. 
So, um Uh, also by the way, what interesting thing about croatia is, you know, we can play a little bit of trivia here Um, does anybody without googling it? 
Or know what the ccpld? 
D Is for the country of croatia Dot hr. 
You're right. 
Okay. 
Yep. 
You got it. 
Yeah, very good. 
Remember who you're talking to alex Got any more brain busters? 
Yep. 
All right, but why is it dot hr? 
Can you explain that's how you say? 
Herzegovina Uh, yes Right, this is how you say croatian which Yes, uh h the how you spell croatia in croatian is h r v a t s k a All right, where I believe the v Is pronounced almost like the latin v as a as a w And and the name comes from I think the late medieval latin Uh for for croatia I don't understand why we don't say the names of countries the way they say the name of their country Why do we have to rename it? 
I Yeah, yeah, I know it's tricky, isn't it? 
Um I I I couldn't answer that. 
No, but man, it's just too late for me. 
I mean, you know France is a bad example. 
Um But italy, you know, how do you say italy in italian Italia. 
Yeah, how hard would that be? 
Come on? 
I can say italia. 
Yeah, and roma instead of rome. 
It's roma Right Uh, yes, that's right. 
Roma. 
I know a lot of it already. 
Yeah Napoli instead of naples Milano instead of milan moscow is moskva, you know, there's so many there's so many and uh, I don't know. 
It just would make things a lot easier to Understand people russians instead of russia Sure, you know, you know, uh, you know It's a good point but to go back to your other question. 
Um, I think croatia is just a extraordinary place someplace I wanted to visit for a while and it has this, you know, really majestic beauty in terms of of having these scattered islands Wonderful parks Natural, um, i'm sorry national parks kind of littered all around the landscape Um, I don't know immanuel when you were in croatia if you went to the pletvice by any chance I don't believe national park. 
No That that was a little uh Couple hours away from from where I am now more in the mainland of croatia But also way up in the mountains and there's this series of lakes and massive waterfalls Uh that are fed by glacial waters Actually on the unesco heritage site And we spent the day walking around all of these waterfalls and and essentially these glacial lakes that are just just beautiful blue at um, and and Clearest water that you could absolutely imagine with it's just extraordinary. 
I've never seen Anything like it? 
Uh, but you know, it's it's a slavic place and people are different um, you know, it's very close to italy, but the food and the culture and the history is Completely different I think from a lot of what we would ordinarily consider to be western european countries um And and because of the the slavic uh Culture here. 
I think people are not necessarily as open or as warm as as you would expect in in kind of other other bits of europe um But it's you know, it's it's different. 
It's a different culture. 
I think They're the slavic people there. 
They may not it may be tough nuts to crack in in the sense of They're not always outwardly very friendly or helpful But once you get past that shell Um, they are, you know extraordinarily warm and friendly people and and I think they are will be loyal friends for life and that's So it's it's been a very very interesting Experience here. 
Well, i've heard the same thing said about new yorkers. 
So, um And you know, I I I don't think I found friendlier people than when I was in uh, croatia and serbia And in fact that whole region bosnia and macedonia or however you're supposed to say it now north macedonia Um, yeah, it's it's fascinating to simply go from one place to another and see all the differences um, it's it's really uh A fascinating part of the world with so much history so much history yeah, and and the food is extraordinary here, too, I mean the the meats the stews the You know the one thing that i've been trying to do is you know Eat eat out most nights that we're here And it's really just to try to order the local stuff off of the menu, you know Not go to the touristy places and eat the local foods drink the local beers And I feel like I I have just not been able to go wrong ordering any of the local stews uh, they're really Kind of extraordinary what they're able to do here. 
Um in terms of their cuisine and Um, i've i've been really impressed by it This is a great place. 
I'm gonna definitely be back here. 
I hope many times in the future Cool And what time is it there now? 
It is 2 42 a.m. 
So with that i'm going to take my leave and let you guys, uh, finish up the rest of overtime Okay, but it's been an absolute pleasure and i'll uh, i'll see everybody next week. 
All right. 
Have a good time there Yeah, all right, I will talk to everybody soon. 
Have a good one. 
Take care. 
Good night. 
Alec Our phone number 802-321-4225. 
Is there anyone else out there who wishes to um, Say something on the air as it were gala. 
Go ahead. 
Um, we have a quick question from youtube participant checkers lane Who says this is just a quick one for you emmanuel? 
I see these many wusb radio videos posted on off the hook youtube channel. 
What radio station was that? 
You just said what radio station that was I I I I know that well, then, you know the answer I mean i'm not trying to be a wise guy here, but uh, you just asked me, uh, what um, You mentioned wusb videos and asked what radio state wusb is the radio station. 
I mean, is this a trick question? 
Checkers lane, does that answer your question? 
Uh, please reply in the chat. 
Um also A youtube participant dory points out something very interesting that has happened. 
Um in michigan This week, uh in response to a cyber attack the university of michigan Took their entire network for other campuses offline, which would not have been a problem It had the fall semester not started on monday. 
So they've been running the first week of the semester functionally offline Good for them good for them. 
Give that a try, you know Cut yourself off from the net every now and then and see if you've got anything of value and uh odds are you'll discover That you do It's interesting. 
They've had to waive some fees um things are not getting Things that are normally now taken care of on the internet Obviously are not happening people are not being charged to withdraw or register late at this point Um, some things have gone back online others are taking more time, but it's very interesting um Story to watch go by so thank you dory for bringing that to our attention Yeah, you know you could still be um, uh connected On campus without being connected to the outside net you could still have you know, your own local network, right? 
The campus internet the campus. 
Um, What's the word i'm looking for intranet? 
Thank you. 
The intranet is also gone down the ftp server yeah, just everything is is The freshmen are having a hard time let's put it that way It's finally eternal september ends. 
Yeah college is supposed to be challenging. 
So, uh, here's your first challenge All right. 
You have a phone call We do. 
All right. 
Let's uh, see who's out there. 
Good evening. 
You're on off the cover time. 
Go ahead Hi, it's johnny fusion. 
Hey, how you doing? 
I'm doing great My last uh clinic appointment they said I was the healthiest and strongest they ever saw me cool And my transplanted lungs are now In the normal range for lung capacity Wow, okay. 
That's that's something to be happy about Yeah so I wanted I wanted to kind of Tell maybe write for the magazine an old story about Basically my first Online intrusion Okay, go ahead yeah, so You know, so johnny was a young teenage hacker Looking for guidance found a hacker bbs And someone said sure i'll teach you first War dial this exchange, right? 
And i'm like, okay and funnily enough, I never heard from them again, but I found some interesting stuff And I found this one system Didn't quite work with my terminal program. 
It was like weird noise and stuff It was just a login prompt and nothing else and you know, i'm trying all the usual Things like kelp login Kelp login Admin sysop because I mean this was like The early 90s. 
So those were still account names you might get on dial up And one time I had a friend over that was you know, like one of the computer nerds from my high school And I told him look at this weird system. 
I found he goes Wait a minute And I see him and he types in his name And then he types in the password and he gets in and he disconnects right away and he says lose this number This is a government system that I work on You really don't want to be messing with this. 
So of course I had to hack it. 
Oh boy, right But now I knew that logins were first names So like i'm just trying to think of names and every once in a while I get a name I get a password prompt and I write it down. 
Okay, that's an account with with this system And it gets to the point where i'm just using Names from television shows that I watched as a kid, you know, I go I go through the brady bunch Greg, marsha, jan, cindy, bobby, peter. 
Wow. 
Don't forget alice. 
Don't forget alice. 
She's important And alice, yeah And and then I get to leave it to beaver. 
I'm like ted theodore wally, wallace, eddie june Ward and when I type ward I don't get a password prompt I get access There was an account named ward That didn't have a password and you just happened to type that Yeah Just just persistence and dumb luck because I knew logins were first names. 
I was just trying to map what the account names were So I have this system Completely open and the first thing I do is I download and print out a user list And I find all the other accounts without passwords so if ward ever goes away I have all these backups And I so I completely own this system I didn't do any vandalism You know, there was like appointment calendars and mail that I could read and stuff like that But that's just that's just that's just how it was done like in 1991 92 dialing random numbers Systematically finding modems and seeing what was on the other side Wow, uh, yes rob. 
Go ahead Um without uh without going into more information than uh, you're comfortable with. 
Uh, did you ever find out exactly what this system was? 
Yes, I did um, i'm not going to say uh What it was but it was a little state agency That gives resources to um families and kids That have developmental disabilities and stuff like that Yeah um Johnny fusion. 
I just wanted to let you know that the chat Is everybody is thrilled for you and just sending you their very best wishes Um, everyone is thrilled to hear your news and I just wanted to pass that along to you Oh, thank you chat. 
I'm not looking at the chat right now because I want to pay attention to the call Right. 
I pay attention to the chat. 
That's you know, how everybody yeah, everybody's got something to do here But yes, everybody's thrilled for you and I just wanted to let you know Yeah, I mean it's been a long journey. 
I mean what you know when I first started calling in the show I wasn't doing too hot, you know, I was institutionalized and You know in medical care Care And now i'm living my best life probably going to the 2600 meeting Uh this friday because it's this friday, right? 
Yes it is And and which meeting is that san francisco, okay, let us know how that is I went last month and only three of us showed up and we were all there for the first time. 
So That can happen but that that is a meeting, you know, two people is a meeting um, they don't always occur when when you expect them to but um, they they occur more times than not Yeah, one guy was visit was a regular at the austin 2600 meeting and he said attendance is Since the pandemic since the restart has been really low and sometimes it's only three people. 
Yeah and I know there are a lot more meetings that are happening that we don't know about because For some reason they have meetings and they don't tell us And and we can't list them if we don't know about them but they assume we do I think Yeah, the the funny thing is um many years later When I was married and I hung up my black hat Because there was there was a specific event that made me hang up my black hat And that's when my partner said i'm pregnant I'm, like, okay now It's the risk is too high To be doing this kind of hacking And eventually we got services from that same state organization for our kid Wow so and I would and I would And I was just curious. 
I'm one like I wonder if it still works So I put on my black hat just for a little bit and I dialed into the number still had a modem there Ward's account still didn't have a password And I could see our workers calendar And I thought hey if we ever want to be seen I could just make our own appointment Oh my god I I can't believe there's a system out there that doesn't have a password on an account I didn't know that was even possible still Well, if you remember like clifford soul doesn't like passwords he he recommends that clifford stole. 
Um Who's the the free software guy? 
uh, richard stallman Yeah, but you know They're not replacing it with nothing. 
They're replacing it with some other form of um of confirmation Yeah, I I remember like There was there was a time maybe 20 30 years ago where he was anti-password Just just have your account open because it was all about being free and open, right? 
Yeah, and I I know the machine that he ran had no password on it and of course uh What kinds of crazy things happened as a result? 
But I you know, I I understand and respect that that position but for you know a state agency Yeah, you got to have passwords Yeah, well it was the wild woolly time I mean home internet was still dial up well actually when I first breached it There was home internet wasn't a thing yet I'm still a year or two away And then even then home internet was very different it was you got a shell account And you have a unix shell And you run unix programs to get on irc to read usenet to do your mail That's probably that's how I got my start with With getting really savvy with with unix-like operating systems and I eventually When I was in amsterdam The hacktech guys who were then Xs for all because the netherlands finally got around to making hacking illegal They set me up they said do you know unix i'm like Well, yeah a bit like okay we got you can have this sysadmin job that one of our people wants to quit Wow, and they hooked me up with a job doing sysadmin. 
They gave me a manual And said here's the manual And they said it's a very hacker thing to get a job That you barely know how to do and learn as you go And that was my first sysadmin job interesting A many Wow Well, sounds like you've had a you've had a good week a good couple of weeks and uh, we hope things continue to go well Thanks, I just want I just wanted to share some stories from the olden days. 
Yeah. 
Well, that definitely was a good one Wonder who uh who ward is or what that would work in article form like a tales from the old hat Well, yeah, but a different tale because you're already told this one unless there's new details that you want to add Oh, okay, i'm sure there there are many stories though just capturing the whole mood of the uh, Of that time is is a valuable thing to do Yeah, I mean I was a baby hacker, you know, it's just like and it and it was wild then You know Things things were a lot different like we didn't have this connected world We have today where computers and access was few and far between Very true All right. 
Look good hearing from you and uh, we're gonna probably head out now, right? 
Okay. 
Thanks. 
All right. 
We'll talk to you again soon. 
Be well Bye. 
Bye Wow So Yes, indeed Rob, go ahead Before before we do head out for the night. 
Uh, kyle. 
I want to go go back to something you said earlier What what did I say? 
What did you say? 
Kyle? 
Um when you when you were talking about the the drone you've got the dead drone Um, you mentioned it's a parrot Yeah So you're saying you have a dead parrot. 
Oh, here we go The rest of life it rests in peace It's pushing up the daisies it's off the twig it's kicked the bucket shuffled off this mortal coil Yeah, it's a dead parrot Yeah, and he's married to me and no one else It's not talking much and all we just want it replaced. 
That's all Wait one replaced. 
Well, you know It's it's a dead parrot. 
It's yeah, it's Alive when we came in here i'm sure yeah Well, they'll replace it with some like sentient ai thing that is really not just for you know taking fun pictures and learning how to fly so Back to the drawing board if you want anything done in this country, you have to do it yourself All right with that I think we're done oth You all right there gila. 
Yeah, it's gonna take me a second literally rolling on the floor Oh, we have another phone call should we take that one phone call let's make it a quick phone call because we only took two All right Uh, good evening. 
You are the last phone call and hopefully a quick phone call Yeah. 
Hi. 
Uh, I just wanted to pass along a uh a guest suggestion Uh jonathan taplin. 
He has a new book coming out. 
It's called the end of reality How four billionaires are selling a fantasy future of the metaverse mars and crypto And he focuses on uh, elon musk mark, zuckerberg mark, andreessen and peter teal and um I read some advanced reviews and it's getting uh, very favorable coverage And um, I thought that might be something of interest to you guys. 
Okay. 
Well, we'll keep that in mind for sure Yeah, thanks for that. 
Um, we're always Interested in learning about how the super class is not so super Right and uh one other thing I noticed the volume Um on the uh, the callers that uh called in before me Um, the the audio was terrible. 
I could barely hear them. 
I mean I hear you guys your volume isn't great But it's coming in but the callers it sounded almost as if they were whispering really Okay, we'll look into that because it sounded fine on this end how did it sound to you guys rob gila I mean we heard it fine. 
Yeah. 
All right. 
We'll look into that see if that's something that's on the archive Something may have come loose. 
Yeah, we'll uh, we'll check. 
Yeah All right. 
Thanks. 
All right. 
Have a great night. 
You too. 
Take care And with that we are done for the night. 
Thanks everyone for listening. 
Uh again, we'll be back next week for another Uh show on wbai again the bai buddy week They expect us to get at least 10 bai buddies So please spread the word we could be in a lot of trouble uh Yeah, and and we'll be giving out all the details then Write to us oth at 2600 dot com We'll see you next week. 
Good night. 
See ya 


And welcome everybody on YouTube as we start off the hook overtime for this August the 30th.
Kyle, do you make it okay?
Yes.
Okay, looks okay. Rob, Gila?
Hi.
Present.
And can you confirm that we are actually, in fact, on YouTube?
We are actually, in fact, on YouTube.
Yes.
And Alex, I'm surprised to see you. I thought since you were in Croatia, you'd be signing off early.
Well, I was going to peel off a little bit early, but you know what? I'm awake for a little bit.
I think the conversation has entered. I'll hang out for like 15, 20 minutes or so and at least say hello to Rebel.
Okay, thanks for encouraging that. That's just great.
Do you guys want to continue talking about drones, or are we finished with that?
I'm fine. I just was looking up. I mean, there are rules about fraudulent activity in your applications and all this stuff.
They're just throwing so much at people.
And I'm concerned. I'm concerned because I think there's a lot of people out there that if it's a new type of aircraft,
they're going to just sort of comply with it immediately, and they may not realize exactly what it's all about and what it means.
And people that are trying to comply may have to have extra expense.
And, of course, since it's older, they're not going to have any support, you know, no support,
because product life cycles are instantaneous, and who cares?
So, good luck, and that kind of stuff, as well as the people that, okay, yeah, I did say people might not comply,
but, okay, what about the people that really, really don't comply, like, don't want to?
And I'm not saying, like, intentionally, do not comply.
I'm not saying they're like everyday citizens.
I'm saying that's part of the pool of aircraft you can't really track with your new system.
How do you track a drone that doesn't want to be tracked?
Right. I mean, I think it's incentivizing some of that, and that, like, when we talk about other kinds of dangers,
we say, like, you know, that if you try to institute this, people that are determined are still going to slip through,
that kind of thing.
So, I mean, there's a lot of angles to it.
And, of course, we don't know that much about, like, all of the technology, and, you know, there's some language in,
I haven't read all of it, in honesty, but there's some language about retention of data.
You know, you already have to have an FAA account, so you have to kind of already be in their system and set up to do any of this,
unless you get a very, very small, I believe the size is 0.55 pounds, so you have to be under half a pound.
And most small drones, I think very, very small ones, like indoor and, like, toy drones, and even some racing drones are a little bit under that.
But the kinds that people are using for photography or older ones might be much larger.
Or maybe you broke down and got some different batteries and you modified it.
Maybe you've added some stuff of your own.
But there are some other aspects of this, and I didn't really have enough time to talk about it,
that are interesting in what they're changing, what they're allowing.
I don't want to just say, like, oh, there's no support, and as though I'm totally upset.
I'm more curious about what this all means and how we're going to respond to it, how people are going to use it,
what the behaviors will actually be.
But there's things like more permissive stuff around where and how you can fly.
And, of course, the other interesting thing was nighttime flying and certain things like adding strobes and other safety features to your drone,
which maybe, you know, people will get creative with.
I've been playing around with some of that with this old thing I'm trying to make fly again.
But anyway, it's a whole world, I realized.
It's like you turn around and something that you thought was just kind of fledgling, it's just quite evolved.
And just understanding all of it and how it all works takes a lot.
So I'm really curious what kind of drone experts out there might have to say and drone hackers.
And in other countries as well, because what you're describing is only in the United States.
Well, correct.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
That's the establishment of the system here.
And, of course, yeah, what would you do if you were going overseas?
You would obviously maybe want to turn that off instead of broadcasting information like that if you don't need it.
But this may turn out to be like an example or a template for other nations where you have to do this everywhere.
Go ahead, Rob.
As someone who's terribly curious but isn't into the drone hobby at all, I'm wondering about the enforcement for this sort of thing.
Like, are we at now or are we going to get to a spot where the authorities, like, if they don't think your drone is identifying itself well enough, can, like, shoot it out of the air or take out a big butterfly net and catch it?
Or I don't know how it works.
Well, yeah, I think that's less likely.
But I think there is logging of it.
If they don't, like, if you are using this transmission technology, then, yeah, you're going to be willfully sort of giving them a whole lot of telemetry data about how your drone behaves.
And but the without it, of course, I mean, I think that it's and under those strictures, what I'm saying is that it's it's the kind of thing where your license, your ability to fly legally in their system could be revoked.
I was also looking up if like if there are fines and stuff associated with it, but I'm not totally sure on that.
But it seems like it's mostly it's also a hedge for, like, forensic stuff.
If they can prove that a certain type of drone or a certain serial number, even it just makes it that much easier to verify implicating someone who might have been the area of a crime or something that was interfering with public safety or whatever their reasons become.
Interesting. Our phone number, 802-321-4225, anybody wants to join the conversation, has any comments on things we've talked about tonight or anything completely new and different?
And I should open that up to to you folks here.
There's anything that you want to bring up that we haven't haven't mentioned in the past hour and change.
Um, just want to say hello to the 29, well, 28, because one of them is me, um, people who are in the who are watching us live on YouTube right now.
Um, well, you're not seeing you're not seeing much because we don't turn the video cameras on.
The 28 people who have joined us live on YouTube and are looking at this.
I still don't know what that first word is.
Um, is it bikes?
I'm sorry.
What are you asking?
In the first word in the picture that's scratched out.
Is it bikes?
Something will be removed.
It's scratched out.
I don't know what it is.
We've never revealed that.
Yeah.
To this day, that has remained a secret.
I mean, is it, is it bikes?
Is it locks?
Is it?
I think we've been told at some point.
I think it's safe to assume bikes is probably what it is about, but we're not for sure.
Off, off the top of our heads.
If we, if you discussed it at all before, um, I don't know exactly where that photo was taken, but I'm sure people around in that part of the world might recognize it and say, yes, exactly.
It's probably mentioned on a previous, on a previous show.
I'm sure we can look it up.
Yep.
I'm sure we can look it up.
Um, also I did want to, um, mention that we did have a quick chime in on the chat about the drone stuff.
Uh, Tim in Connecticut says, I haven't flown my FAA registered drone in so long in a hobby mode in photography.
I would not buy and retrofit my drone to be legal as, uh, as I'd still have the same overflight restrictions.
Um, also, yes, people are now chiming in, in the chat.
We have, uh, someone says locks may be removed.
Someone says bills.
Someone says signs.
Um, this is a fun game.
You're talking about the picture.
If you go to our, if you're listening to us now, actually, if you're, if you're on YouTube now, you see a picture.
However, it's, um, it's a sign of some sort.
It says something will be removed and the first word is scratched out and people are now chiming in with what the word could be.
Yes.
Um, and fun sucks to say Emanuel.
Um, I don't know if he's trying to get your attention or if, I mean, I don't think the, the space there is long enough to say Emanuel and it definitely ends with an S.
Yeah, I doubt very much it says that.
I think it's, uh, open to interpretation.
I think that's the, the artistic intent behind the image.
Yes.
Um, so, oh, we're up to 35 people now, including me.
So 34, um, but yeah, uh, folks in the chat, keep, keep it coming.
Um, and hopefully we'll get a call.
So if I had a whole bunch of drones, what if I had all the same broadcast and you just were a big swarm of like a whole bunch of the same thing and you were like just messing up a whole thing.
And then one of them wasn't like that.
I mean, what kinds of things is this going to drive people to do?
I really want to know because it's, um, I mean, could you, would a system like that be flooded?
Um, wow.
It's going to be weird.
It's going to be weird.
It just limits a whole lot of like the sort of gray area of what that all was for so long.
Uh, as far as drones just being kind of a, an emerging sort of free for all thing.
Go ahead, Rob.
I mean, I'm thinking about, uh, all the apps that you can get for computers and mobile devices that do things like randomize your Mac address, uh, whenever you hook to a network somewhere.
Uh, and, uh, things of that sort.
And if, if you could get like a small, uh, a small board together to just randomize the ID number that it sends out or, you know, at least have it, uh, um, settable by the user, um, that would probably be something, uh, looked down upon by the authorities, but probably technically trivial.
Right, right.
I mean, like, let's speak to that.
I mean, why they're implementing this is to sort of streamline the airspace and make it, um, a, a, uh, functional, um, uh, but safe area for these kinds of vehicles to be used more, I guess, in, in industry, uh, for hobbyists having some abilities.
And then also, um, you name the purpose, uh, whether it's, uh, realtors or, or other sorts of service and, and, um, or inspection, whatever it is, there's just going to be, or that think of that layered with like delivery.
And I think that's where a lot of the concern is, but also of course, in, um, overall security, I think there's just this yearning to know what's flying, um, real low and, and, um, at other altitudes and, and those sort of in-between spaces as well.
And, uh, uh, a bit of a panic even given how it's, uh, being used in war.
So those are all things to confront, but it's, um, it's going to be interesting.
It's going to be interesting because I think a lot of people will have to navigate this just to continue to enjoy what they are, are getting out of that.
And it is really kind of a useful, useful tool and, and an interesting vantage, uh, whatever and however people are using them.
Even for fun.
Is anyone else here?
Am I alone?
Did everyone walk out?
I'm so sorry, YouTube.
I feel really left.
Uh, does anyone else want to talk about something other than drones or shall I drone?
The, the conversation is kind of droning on and on, but, uh, you can join the conversation by giving us a phone call 802-321-4225.
That's 802-321-HACK.
Or you could, uh, if you're in the United States, get us toll free at 833-755-2600.
We have no callers.
Yeah, if we did, we'd be talking to them, not ourselves.
Well, as much as we love this YouTube chat, this is primarily a telephone call-in, uh, show that we have.
So, uh, I think we would like to get some callers.
So don't be shy.
Give us a, give us a call.
We want to hear your voice.
Yeah, this is what happens when you open up the chat.
People chat to each other and forget about us.
And, uh, your comments don't have to be about remote ID or drones.
They can be about anything.
What you hacked, uh, what you hacked for breakfast.
Um, I don't know.
Okay.
Um, well, here's a story that I think might be a little interesting about something that was hacked.
A Brazilian phone spyware, um, uh, application was hacked and victims' devices deleted from the server.
Uh, this is considered a good thing, uh, because, um, it's stalkerware.
Now, uh, it's, it's called Web Detective without a C.
C. Yeah, so imagine the word detective and take the C out.
That's, that's, I don't know how to pronounce that.
Web Detective?
Uh, I, I don't know what that means, but, uh, probably Web Detective was taken, so they got that one.
Um, it's been used to compromise more than 76,000 Android phones in recent years across South America, largely in Brazil.
Uh, Web Detective is also the latest phone spyware company in recent months to have been hacked.
Now, uh, TechCrunch reports this, an undated note that they saw.
Uh, the unnamed hackers described how they found and exploited several security vulnerabilities
that allowed them to compromise Web Detective's servers and access its user databases
by exploiting other flaws in the spyware maker's web dashboard used by abusers to access the stolen
phone data of their victims.
The hackers said they enumerated and downloaded every dashboard record, including every customer's
email address.
Uh, the hackers said that dashboard access also allowed them to delete victim devices
from the spyware network altogether, effectively severing the connection at the server level
to prevent the device from uploading new data, uh, which we definitely did because we could.
And, yeah, um, sounds like a good thing.
Sounds like if you're going to hack something, hack something that's abusive and, and disable
it.
Although I'm sure there's somebody who would object to this.
Probably, um, um, governments following people that they suspect of doing something bad and,
uh, they use the stalkerware software as well or something like that.
Um, but I think it's a good thing.
Yeah, it's, it's, it's a good thing.
It's a socially responsible thing.
And I love when the hacker spirit, um, is turned to making things safer and nicer for everybody.
At, um, at the time of this hack, um, Web Detective had compromised 76,794 devices.
Um, the data also contains 74,336 unique customer email addresses.
Uh, the Web Detective doesn't verify a customer's email address when signing up, preventing any
meaningful analysis of the spyware's customers.
Um, yeah.
So, uh, it's not known who did this, but somebody with, um, with good motives, supposedly.
I believe we have a phone call.
Is that right?
We do.
Okay.
Let's see who's out there.
Good evening.
You're on off the cover time.
Go ahead.
Good evening, gang.
How are you tonight?
Good.
How are you?
Not too bad.
This is Tim in Connecticut.
Hi, Tim in Connecticut.
Let's see.
Yeah, I was calling him originally to respond to the drones, but, uh, if you're, if we've
switched over to the, oh, the hacker thing, well, throw quotations, of course, around that.
Just recently I heard of the FBI takes down notorious, uh, quack bot hacking network.
Yeah, I was just going to mention that story.
Do you want to tell people about that?
Oh, I'd have to pull it up in an article, but sure.
I mean, you know, not being in the group, theoretically.
Uh, FBI takes down notorious quack bot hacking network that used 700,000 infected computers worldwide
to steal hundreds of millions from unsuspecting targets in ransomware and financial fraud attacks.
And it goes on to basically say that, you know, most of these are because somebody replied
to a link or, uh, you know, an inappropriate, um, URL that popped up in an email thing, and
that's how they got into the company's network.
Yeah.
That's the usual, you know, you can take, you can have a whole bunch of security and somebody's
going to either lose the keys or, you know, uh, uh, leave the door unlocked or there's
always the human element that's going to allow anybody to get a, you know, a foothold in your
system.
Sure.
Yeah.
In this case, I think what they did is, uh, they stopped it, uh, communicating with the
network itself, um, from the controller side.
They basically hacked that and were able to, uh, uh, basically just disrupt or totally, um,
uh, cut off communications with, uh, affected machines, essentially disabling it in the same
way this, this other, uh, detective stuff, detective, uh, software.
I don't know how to say it.
Yeah.
They said after gaining access, uh, hacker gangs would then extort their victims seeking
ransom payments in Bitcoin or other crypto before returning access to the encrypted computer
networks.
Technically some were not.
Some were just simply take the money and run.
Right.
And, uh, also apparently the FBI did get to reverse a, in the millions of crypto coins, uh,
payments that were stolen before shutting down the network.
Yeah.
I mean, that, that's like, uh, nice, uh, technique, right?
I mean, pretty, pretty smooth.
And it's like, well, you know, well, yeah, you would have to have a, a sandboxed, uh, system.
Right.
That you could respond with and play with so you don't, uh, allow, uh, your, uh, system
to perpetuate the problem.
Right.
I, I, I would think it would be very hard to make sure that your machine at work is the
only machine that's communicating with the hackers or, or the fact that you'd have to
know that you're compromised without alerting the people doing the compromising.
Oh, sure.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Like, um, yeah, like, like basically, um, incubating an effect, infected system and then,
um, uh, sort of, uh, or, or having enough information to, to, um, access the control
infrastructure.
So like that would take a lot of other techniques, maybe some monitoring, maybe somebody talks,
maybe somebody got paid.
I don't know, you know, the, that's kind of their technique, but it would be important
in getting to the point where you can actually be effective.
I, I, unfortunately, I think the whole thing is a little bit like table scraps.
This is good work, but it's, it's like, I mean, I'm not, I don't want to be too thankful.
The only way you can really make a big headway and do some damage is you've got to find out
who has been infected.
So, uh, not only are you securing your own and cutting your own off and then killing the
source, but everybody who's infected, you have to, I don't know, clean or disable them.
So they don't propagate once everything gets, you know, rebooted.
I'm sure they have backups.
So in other words, you're saying that, um, the network may have been, the control may
have been shut down, but it, it may be something that is still spread because it's not functionally
disabling what code or, or, uh, vulnerability is still out there.
Okay.
Replicating itself.
I mean, if it's out there and it's still replicating and your source is down, somebody within that
group, it was a few people would have backups.
And I'm sure if it's, you know, their cash cow, they would certainly want to bring up another
system, maybe in a different place.
You're talking controller side.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Um, that, that is, I think a part of it too.
Yeah.
Like what, but, but it would be something that I think people this deep in investigating
it would probably be well, well attuned to.
Um, but also, but you don't know, they, they don't know, uh, who exactly they're dealing
with just because they disrupt a machine doesn't mean they've actually affected the human side
of that.
Unless that's part of the announcement.
I don't know much more about the story.
Like if they've implicated anything, I mean, other than what the operation involved authorities
from France, Germany, Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Romania, and Latvia.
Sounds like a fun bunch.
Um, cool.
Was Croatia in there?
No, that's the only one that they had here.
Alex, check in on that.
Are you okay, Alex?
Oh, he's there.
There he is.
Yeah.
Oh yeah.
I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm here.
I'm here.
Listening intently.
Rob, you had something to add?
I'll tell you.
Yeah, I, I'll hang on.
Sorry, go ahead, Alex.
I didn't know you had more to say, Alex.
Go ahead.
Oh, I do.
I, I, I want to say, I think these coordinated takedowns are, are really interesting in,
in how they, they combine an understanding of the technical infrastructure of the threat
actor together with the use of legal process.
And that's actually, it's something that, um, that, that my firm has actually been doing
for Microsoft for, for some time in that, um, we also have an active case right now in
the Eastern district of New York, whereby we have dismantled a lot of the backend infrastructure
for, uh, domains that have been hosting cracked versions of cobalt strike.
Cobalt strike for, for people that are listening and don't know what it is.
I imagine many, many of our listeners probably do cobalt strike is penetration testing software
that's really effective at simulating the types of tools that threat actors would use.
And because of that cobalt strike is very often used, uh, to compromise organizations and
is, and is also very often a precursor to ransomware events.
So by using the same type of investigative techniques, uh, together with legal process,
we were able to dismantle these huge networks of threat actors utilizing crack, cobalt strike
infrastructure and thereby actually make a dent in the amount of ransomware, uh, instances
that have been popping up over the last, let's say seven, eight months.
So we're, we're doing similar stuff to what law enforcement is doing, but, uh, on the civil side.
Interesting.
Rob, you had something?
Yeah.
Um, I wanted to relate the information given further down in this tech crunch article,
which is, um, how easy it is to detect the web detetive, uh, app.
If it's, uh, it's sold on your Android phone.
Um, the app apparently, uh, appears on your desktop, uh, on your phone's desktop or on your
apps list as, uh, wifi it's named wifi.
And the icon is just a blue and white wifi symbol.
But if you long press on it and get the app info, it gives the name Sistema, which is,
uh, system in Portuguese.
And, uh, that is this app, uh, this piece of, uh, stalkerware, uh, poorly disguising itself
as a system app.
And if you have, if you find you have this, or you suspect that there's other stalkerware
on your phone, um, I just wanted to give a shout out to the site stopstalkerware.org,
which, uh, has a lot of, uh, resources and guides on how to check your phone for spyware,
what to do if you find it, how to get rid of it, and, uh, everything else.
And it's very, uh, user-friendly and, uh, you don't have to be technical to, uh, benefit
from the info on there.
So that's stopstalkerware.org.
Anything else, caller?
Uh, no, not at all.
I just, uh, don't foresee myself putting any, um, ID on my drone just simply because of the
age.
And, uh, I think a lot that took the, um, look, the things that happened that made me lose
interest in flying out my DJI Phantom drone is simply that they've, they've reduced the areas
that you can do so legitimately, legally, state parks.
Um, I mean, you know, some, some are fine.
Like I can't fly within five miles of an airport.
That sort of makes sense.
But, uh, you know, you just can't take it anywhere and, uh, just put it up and fly around and use
your camera and look at things.
I just thought it was a very good thing for photography purposes.
Yeah.
I mean, there's, um, I mean, so much of the country's got wildfire and you can't, um,
fly around that.
Obviously, like there's a pretty strict rules around emergencies and disasters, although
they've, they've been using them commercially.
And I think that's, that's kind of the point I was making too, is just this huge emphasis
on commercial use, but even small entrepreneurs or my, uh, 107 license, uh, you know, I just
didn't see the need to put the money into that.
And because I'm not going to be a commercial pilot, I'm not going to, uh, surveys and things
like that.
Correct.
Correct.
Uh, different levels of, uh, training and they've changed it a little bit and, um, and,
uh, been overall, like, I think pretty upfront about what you have to do to, to, uh, set up
and to be aware of where exactly you're operating.
And they very much treat you like you're a pilot sort of, which, I mean, of course, what
do you expect from the FAA, but it's definitely like they're clamping down.
It's definitely, it's less desirable.
And it just seems like it is not the free for all, as I mentioned, or, and Rob was alluding
to where you can, I think just go and, and feel free to enjoy these things that, um, uh,
with no kind of bound and, and there've been accidents.
There's, there's good reason for all of this.
And, and they do want to actually mature that sort of concept of like getting a pizza with
a drone or whatever, you know, the ideal is with all of this, but they're just sort
of, I think, mostly anticipating a lot more of them in the future and how to get some kind
of, um, strictures around their use and just pre overall presence and prevalence.
So it's very interesting, but I, I share where you're coming from fully, you know, it's, it's,
uh, it's going to be, uh, it's a little weird.
Well, I would think that if I wanted to get back into the hobby, I'd, I would just have
to buy a new device if I wanted to be fully legal because the amount of money that I would
have to take and spend on an old unit.
Sure.
Since they've come down in price so much, it's probably just easier to pick up something
new than it has all the information in it.
Yeah.
I mean, I feel like more and more I have mixed feelings about so many things.
I think that's true, but I think there's also this like life cycle.
Like it's, it, they are sort of expensive, but not at the same time.
And I mean, if you want something that's all in one and I mean, I, you can go into this.
I mean, it's a whole market and, and so forth.
And, um, it is, I think it's an appreciable cost for most people.
So you have to kind of, um, you know, weigh that and, and the total expense of it.
Um, and of course you want to avoid accidents and, and not be like a risk to the public.
But like you said, just taking a picture, all of a sudden someone complains.
Go ahead.
I'm sorry.
The, the hard part is to stay within line of sight of everything.
Well, that too.
Unless you're in a big flat field.
Yeah.
And I just think that like, okay, the new drones that people can, that have the flight
time and that people, you know, people that have money can go and buy that and run their
autonomous, you know, run their maps and do, do all that stuff unattended.
And, um, I just don't know that like, you're really growing something that's emerging in
an, in, in a very fair way.
If, um, you know, those are the actors that, um, are free to do that kind of thing.
But I mean, again, this was all like discussed, so there's probably some safety reason.
So the older ones with these beacons will, yes, have to be line of sight.
So it's sort of building in this thing of like, well, you got to spend a, spend on the
beacon and then you got to, you know, plan your sort of use.
And, and if you're a photographer or you just, um, are just learning and so forth, um, all
of a sudden diving into thousands or, you know, even more money, it just, it might turn people
off, uh, that would otherwise have a lot of fun with it or, you know, be into, get turned
onto it or be, uh, more interested after getting a chance to, to try it out.
And I just, I'm worrying that there's going to be so much emphasis on the commercial that
it's going to alienate a lot of people that are really new to it and don't have that much
practice, so to speak.
Hey, uh, Kyle, you said you might, um, uh, reveal the name of the, uh, the drone that
the company, uh, stopped showing any support for, to shame them and to, uh, no, I don't
want to shame them.
Why not?
I don't.
It's, um, so it doesn't have a set of initials, does it?
No, no, no, no.
It's not one of those.
We've got a parrot.
Um, so we've got one of the, um, early, early models of that, not the, um, the, what
is it?
The AR, a dot R, uh, one, a couple after that, uh, one of the B-Bop.
I had a parrot once.
Yeah.
But you can't even get a battery for it, right?
It's, it's so.
I couldn't find out anything about the thing until I, I found an old, um, uh, talk about
how vulnerable they were to being hacked.
And it was really interesting.
It talked about it, um, running, uh, a variant of, I believe Linux or Unix and, um, how the
sort of camera sensors oriented, just all the details for actually playing with it.
And I just think in the context of other conversations we have, not just getting away
from privacy for a moment, but like right to repair and like keeping stuff from just
being junk or truly, you know, uh, sunk costs.
Um, there ought to be like at least information.
If the company is going to move on and declare that life cycle over, that's fine.
But like, why do, why I found it sort of fitting that, that the hacker, uh, uh, angle was the
only place that I could get information about this sort of forgotten model that I wanted to
play with and never really felt like I got that much out of it.
Uh, no sooner do you like register it and do all this stuff.
Um, I, I felt contained then like, kind of like, wow, this is, this is a lot.
I haven't even really gotten started.
And now they're, they're doubling down with more of that.
And yeah, the manufacturer is, is making all kinds of defense and other kinds of commercial
stuff.
And you can't find anything about this model at all on their site.
And, um, they, they were the same kind of apathetic around battery replacement.
So I've made my own adapter and matched the batteries and done a lot of other customizing.
I have my own strobe with made out of a ping pong ball.
I'm ready.
Wow.
All right.
I hear you.
Now you just, you know, you've got to stay under a certain feeling.
Can't be by an airport or allopat or.
Yep.
At a state park.
I wanted to try it out.
I wanted to have fun.
And, you know, you know, you'll have people that'll be like, well, that's a lithium battery.
They'd fly around.
What if it crashes?
Starts a fire.
Well, right.
I mean, I learned about that sizing and trying to like come up with a solution for like,
what are drone people doing as far as power supplies?
Like what's, where's that at?
And I had to figure out, um, connectors I'd never seen before and all of that and solder and,
you know, get really into all of that.
And, um, just, just like deciding where you're going to operate the thing, you know, you're
now going to be like considering the privacy thing just on top of all the planning you have
to do just to try it out.
And I don't know.
I don't know if it's worth it anymore.
Yeah.
That's what it always comes down to.
Lots of, you know, what's the, uh, trying to remember the very, very small ones, the
whirly hoops or, or whatever they're.
Oh yeah.
I've looked at those.
Yeah.
Those are great to train with.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I mean, I'm high really in the air.
It's just that a gust of wind would, you know, make it go away forever.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I read some reviews about those being good to learn on.
I'm also curious about like some of the fancy controllers, like, can I get one of those
to add this older drone?
Cause a lot of those store different profiles.
You can like keep multiple drones, but I don't know if it will associate with one that
is for all intents and purposes, proprietary.
The synchronization.
Exactly.
The learning protocols, what language they talk.
Yeah.
So anyway, um, we're going to move on.
I'll, I'll, um, I'll, I'll get, um, I'll get, um, I'll get, um, I'll get, um,
some more thoughts on this and, and keep updating on the, uh, perils of flying a drone.
Yeah.
I'm sure there's more to come in this, in this saga.
Okay.
I'll let you guys go and get onto the next caller.
All right.
Thanks.
Thanks for your call.
Take care.
Right.
Oh, bye-bye.
So Alex, I know, um, you said you had to, uh, to run, but I'd like you to describe, uh,
some of Croatia for us first, before you do and what your, what your, uh, travel plans
are next.
Yeah, sure.
Um, yeah, I'll be, I'll be here for a couple more days and then, uh, heading back to Italy
for a few days with some colleagues and friends and then, uh, and then back to New York.
So, um, uh, also, by the way, one interesting thing about Croatia is, you know, we can play
a little bit of trivia here, um, does anybody without Googling it or know what the CCTLD
uh, is for the country of Croatia, uh, dot HR, dot HR.
You're right.
Okay.
Yep.
You got it.
Yep.
Very good.
Remember who you're talking to, Alex.
Got any more brain busters?
Yep.
All right.
But why is it dot HR?
Can you explain that?
That's how you say Croatia and Croatia.
It's a Gavinia.
Uh, yes.
How do we, what's go, right?
This is how you say Croatia, Croatia, which, yes, uh, H the, how you spell Croatia in Croatian
is H-R-B-A-T-S-K-A, right?
Where I believe the V is pronounced almost like the Latin V as a, as a W.
And the name comes from, I think, the late medieval Latin, uh, for, for Croatia.
I don't understand why we don't say the names of countries the way they say the name of their
country.
Why do we have to rename it?
I, yeah, yeah, I know.
It's tricky, isn't it?
Um, I, I, I couldn't answer that enough, but man, it's just too late for me.
I mean, you know, to say, well, France is a bad example.
Um, but Italy, you know, how do you say Italy in Italian?
Italia.
Yeah.
How hard would that be?
Come on.
I can say Italia.
Yeah.
And Roma.
Instead of Rome, it's Roma.
Right?
Uh, yes, that's right.
Roma.
I know a lot of it already.
Yeah.
Napoli instead of Naples, Milano instead of Milan.
Moscow is Moskva.
You know, it's, there's so many, there's so many.
And, uh, I don't know.
It just would make things a lot easier to understand people.
We'll see instead of Russia.
Sure.
You know, you know, uh, you know, it, uh, it's a good point.
But to go back to your other question, um, I think Crowish is just an extraordinary place.
someplace i wanted to visit for a while and it has this you know really majestic beauty in terms of
of having these uh scattered islands um wonderful parks natural um i'm sorry national parks kind of
littered all around the landscape um i don't know emmanuel when you were in croatia if you went to
the pletvice by any chance i don't believe a national park no um that that was a little uh
a couple hours away from from where i am now more in the mainland of croatia but also way up in the
mountains and there's this series of lakes and massive waterfalls uh that are fed by glacial
waters actually on the unesco heritage site and we spent the day walking around all of these
waterfalls and and essentially these glacial lakes that are just just beautiful blue that um and and
clearest water that you could absolutely imagine with it was just extraordinary i've never seen
anything like it uh but you know it's it's a slavic place and people are different um you know it's very
close to italy but the food and the culture and the history is completely different i think from
a lot of what we would ordinarily consider to be western european countries
um and and and because of the the slavic uh culture here i think people are not necessarily
as open or as warm as as you would expect in in kind of other other bits of europe um but it's you
know it's it's different it's a it's a different culture i think that the slavic people there they may
not they may be tough nuts to crack in in the sense of they're not always outwardly very friendly
or helpful but once you get past that shell um they are you know extraordinarily warm and friendly
people and and i think they are will be loyal friends for life and that's so it's it it's been
a very very interesting uh experience here well i've heard the same thing said about new yorkers
so um and you know i i i don't think i found friendlier people than when i was in uh croatia
and serbia and in fact that whole region bosnia and macedonia or however you're supposed to say it
now north macedonia um yeah it's it's fascinating to simply go from one place to another and see all
the differences um it's it's really uh a fascinating part of the world with so much history so much history
yeah and and the food is extraordinary here too i mean the the meats the stews the you know the one
thing that i've been trying to do is you know we eat out most nights that we're here and it's really
just to try to order the local stuff off of the menu you know not go to the touristy places and eat
the local foods drink the local beers and i feel like i i have just not been able to go wrong ordering
any of the local stews uh they're really kind of extraordinary what they're able to do here um
in terms of their cuisine and um i've i've been really impressed by it this is a great place i'm
going to definitely be back here i hope many times in the future cool and what time is it there now
it is 2 42 a.m so with that i'm going to take my leave and let you guys uh finish up the rest of
overtime okay but it's been an absolute pleasure and i'll uh i'll see everybody next week all right
have a good time there all right i will talk to everybody soon have a good one take care good night
alec our phone number 802-321-4225 is anyone else out there who wishes to um say something on the air
as it were um we have a quick question from youtube participant checkers lane who says this
is just a quick one for you emmanuel i see these many w usb radio videos posted on off the hook youtube
channel what radio station was that you just said what radio station that was i i i know that well then
you know the answer well i mean i'm not trying to be a wise guy here but uh you just asked me uh
what um you mentioned w usb videos and asked what radio state w usb is a radio station i mean is this a
trick question checkers lane does that answer your question uh please reply in the chat um also
uh youtube participant dory points out something very interesting that has happened um in michigan
this week uh in response to a cyber attack the university of michigan took their entire network
for other campuses offline which would not have been a problem had the fall semester not started on
monday so they've been running the first week of the semester functionally offline good for them good
for them give that a try you know cut yourself off in the net every now and then and see if you've
got anything of value and uh odds are you'll discover that you do it's interesting they've had
to waive some fees um things are not getting it's things that are normally now taken care of on the
internet obviously are not happening people are not being charged to withdraw or register late at this
point um some things have gone back online others are taking more time but it's very interesting
um story to watch go by so thank you dory for bringing that to our attention yeah yeah you know
you could still be um uh connected on campus without being connected to the outside net you could still
have you know your own local network right the campus internet the campus um what's the word i'm
looking for intranet thank you the intranet is also gone down yeah the ftp server yeah just everything is
is the the freshmen are having a hard time let's put it that way it's finally eternal september ends
yeah college is supposed to be challenging so uh here's your first challenge all right do we have
a phone call we do all right let's uh see who's out there good evening you're on off took overtime go
ahead hi it's johnny fusion hey how you doing i'm doing great my last uh clinic appointment they said i
was the healthiest and strongest they ever saw me cool and my transplanted lungs are now in the
normal range for lung capacity wow first time okay that's that's something to be happy about
yeah so i wanted i wanted to kind of tell maybe right for the magazine an old story about
basically my first online intrusion
okay go ahead yeah so you know so johnny was a young teenage hacker looking for guidance found a
hacker bbs and someone said sure i'll teach you first war dial this exchange right
and i'm like okay and funnily enough i never heard from them again but i found some interesting
stuff and i found this one system didn't quite work with my terminal program it was like weird noise and
stuff it was just a login prompt and nothing else and you know i'm trying all the usual
things like help login admin
admin sysop because i mean this was like the early 90s so those were still account names you might get
on dial up
and one time i had a friend over that was you know like one of the computer nerds from my high school
and i told him look at this weird system i found he goes wait a minute and i see him and he types in
his name and then he types in the password and he gets in and he disconnects right away and he says
lose this number this is a government system that i work on you really don't want to be messing with
this so of course i had to hack it oh boy right
but now i knew that logins were
first names so like i'm just trying to think of names and every once in a while i get a name i get a password
prompt and i write it down okay that's an account with with this system
and it gets to the point where i'm just using
names from television shows that i watched as a kid you know i go i go through the brady bunch
greg marcia jan cindy bobby peter wow don't forget alice don't forget alice she's important
and alice yeah and and then i get to leave it to beaver and i'm like ted theodore wally
wallace eddie june ward and when i type ward i don't get a password prompt i get access
there was an account named ward that didn't have a password and you just happened to type that
yeah just just persistence and dumb luck because i knew logins were first names i was just trying to
map what the account names were so i have this system completely open and the first thing i do
is i download and print out a user list
and i find all the other accounts without passwords
so if ward ever goes away i have all these backups
and i so i completely own this system i didn't do any vandalism
you know there was like appointment calendars and mail that i could read and stuff like that
but that's just that's just that's just how it was done like in 1991 92 dialing random numbers
systematically finding modems and seeing what was on the other side
wow uh yes rob go ahead um without uh without going into more information than uh you're comfortable
with uh did you ever find out exactly what this system was yes i did um i'm not gonna say uh what it
was but it was a little state agency that gives resources to um families and kids
that have developmental disabilities and stuff like that
yeah um johnny fusion i just wanted to let you know that the chat is everybody is thrilled for you
and just sending you their very best wishes um everyone is thrilled to hear your news and i just
wanted to pass that along to you oh thank you chat i'm not looking at the chat right now because i want
to pay attention to the call right i pay attention to the chat that's you know how everybody yeah
everybody's got something to do here but yes everybody's thrilled for you and i just wanted to
let you know yeah i mean it's been a long journey i mean what you know when i first started calling in
the show i wasn't doing too hot you know i was institutionalized and you know in medical care
and now i'm living my best life probably going to the 2600 meeting uh this friday because it's this
friday right yes it is and and which meeting is that san francisco okay let us know how that is
i went last month and only three of us showed up and we were all there for the first time so
that can happen but that that is a meeting you know two people is a meeting um they don't always
occur when when you expect them to but um they they occur more times than not yeah one guy was
visit was a regular at the austin 2600 meeting and he said attendance is since the pandemic since the
restart has been really low and sometimes it's only three people yeah and i know there are a lot more
meetings that are happening that we don't know about because for some reason they have meetings and
they don't tell us and and we can't list them if we don't know about them but they assume we do i
think yeah the the funny thing is um many years later when i was married and i hung up my black hat
because there was there was a specific event that made me hang up my black hat and that's when my
partner said i'm pregnant i'm like okay now it's the risk is too high
to be doing this kind of hacking and eventually we got services from that same state organization for
our kids wow so and i would and i was and i was just curious someone like i wonder if it still works
so i put on my black hat just for a little bit and i dialed into the number still had a modem there
board's account still didn't have a password and i could see our workers calendar
and i thought hey if we ever want to be seen i could just make our own appointment
oh my god i i can't believe there's a system out there that doesn't have a password on an account
i didn't know that was even possible still well if you remember like clifford soul doesn't like
passwords he he recommends that clifford soul um who's the the free software guy uh richard stallman
yeah but you know they're not replacing it with nothing they're replacing it with some other
form of um of confirmation yeah i i remember like there was there was a time maybe 20 30 years ago
where he was anti-password just just have your account open because it was all about being free
and open right yeah and i i know the machine that he ran had no password on it and of course
uh all kinds of crazy things happened as a result but i you know i i understand and respect that that
position but for you know a state agency yeah you got to have passwords yeah well it was the wild
wooly time i mean home internet was still dial up well actually when i first breached it there was
home internet wasn't a thing yet it's still a year or two away
and then even then home internet was very different it was you got a shell account and you have a unix shell
and you run unix programs to get on irc to read usenet to do your mail
that's probably that's how i got my start with getting really savvy with with unix-like operating
systems and i eventually when i was in amsterdam the hacktick guys who were then
excess for all because the netherlands finally got around to making hacking illegal
they set me up they said do you know unix i'm like well yeah and a bit like okay we got
you can have this system in job that one of our people wants to quit
and they hooked me up with a job doing system in they gave me
a manual and said here's the manual and they said it's a very hacker thing to get a job
that you barely know how to do and learn as you go
and that was my first system in job
interesting
of many
wow
well sounds like you've had a you've had a good week a good couple of weeks
and uh we hope things continue to go well
thanks i just want i just wanted to share some stories from the olden days yeah well that
definitely was a good one wonder who uh who ward is or was that would work in article form
like a tale from the old hat well yeah but a different tale because you already told this
one unless there's new details that you want to add
oh okay i'm sure there there are many stories though just capturing the whole mood of the uh
of that time is is a valuable thing to do yeah i mean i was a baby hacker you know it just like
and it and it was wild then you know things were things were a lot different like we didn't have
this connected world we have today where computers and access with few and far between
very true
all right look good hearing from you and uh we're gonna probably head out now right
okay thanks all right we'll talk to you again soon be well
bye-bye
wow
so
yes indeed
rob go ahead
before before we do head out for the night uh kyle i want to go go back to something
you said earlier what what did i say what did you say kyle um when you were when you were talking
about the the drone you've got the dead drone um you mentioned it's a parrot yeah so you're saying
you have a dead parrot i do here we go a rest of life it rests in peace it's pushing up the daisies
it's off the twig it's kicked the bucket shuffled off this mortal coil
yeah it's a dead parrot
yeah and he's married to me and no one else
it's not talking much
and all we just want it replaced that's all
wait what replaced
well you know
it's it's a dead parrot it's yeah
it's
alive when we came in here i'm sure
yeah well they'll replace it with some like sentient
ai thing that is really not just for you know taking fun pictures and learning how to fly so
back to the drawing board
if you want anything done in this country you have to do it yourself
all right with that i think we're done
oth
you all right there gila
yeah it's gonna take me a second
literally rolling on the floor
oh we have another phone call should we take that one phone call let's make it a quick phone call
because we only took two
all right
uh good evening you are the last phone call and hopefully a quick phone call
yeah hi i just wanted to pass along a uh a guest suggestion
uh jonathan taplin he has a new book coming out it's called the end of reality
how four billionaires are selling a fantasy future of the metaverse mars and crypto
uh-huh and he focuses on uh elon musk mark zuckerberg mark andreessen and peter teal
and um i read some advanced reviews and it's getting uh very favorable coverage
and um i thought that might be something of interest to you guys
okay well we'll keep that in mind for sure
yeah thanks for that um we're always interested in learning about how the super class is not so super
right and uh one other thing i noticed the volume um on the uh the callers that uh called in before
me um the the audio was terrible i could barely hear them i mean i hear you guys your volume isn't
great but it's coming in but the callers it sounded almost as if they were whispering
really okay we'll look into that because it sounded fine on this end how did it sound to you guys
rob gila we heard it fine yeah all right we'll look into that see if that's something that's on
the archive something may have come loose yeah well uh we'll check yeah all right thanks all right
have a great night you too take care and with that we are done for the night thanks everyone for
listening uh again we'll be back next week for another um uh show on wbai again the bai buddy week
they expect us to get at least 10 bai buddies so please spread the word we could be in a lot of
trouble uh yeah and then we'll be giving out all the details then write to us oth at 2600.com
we'll see you next week good night see you
you