The number you dialed is not a working number.
Please check the number and dial again.
Message 3. BAL6.
The telephone keeps ringing, so I ripped it off the wall.
I cut myself while shaving, now I can't make a call.
We couldn't get much worse, but if they could, they would.
Bum Diddly Bum for the best, expect the worst.
I hope that's understood.
Bum Diddly Bum!
Bum Diddly Bum
Bum Diddly Bum
And a very good evening to everybody.
The program is off the hook.
Emmanuel Goldstein here with you, joined tonight by Kyle.
Hi, I'm Kyle.
And out in Signal Land, we have Rob T. Firefly.
Hi, I'm not Kyle.
We have Gila.
Hi, I'm also not Kyle.
And we have Alex.
I'm not joining in on that.
I'm Alex.
Hello, everybody.
And somehow you're still clever.
Okay, great.
We're all here.
Can I just say, I just want to stop everything just for one moment, just to proclaim one thing.
Pam Bondi is a horrible human being.
I'm sorry.
I just have to say that.
I have to say that over New York City airwaves because it just needs to be said over and over and over again.
And if you don't know what I'm talking about, go fire up the C-SPAN archives.
Go to YouTube.
It's all on there, today's hearings.
The hostility, the contempt that she holds towards lawmakers and democracy and freedom and the people and all that.
It's just, it's just, it's unreal.
You know, historians of the future.
Hey, how you doing?
Boy, what a time we're living through right now.
Please continue to document it.
All right, we have a lot to talk about because a lot has been going on.
Okay, so you know what the number one news story has been, right?
The number one news story.
Anybody want to take a stab at it?
No?
Number one?
Let me guess.
Is it the social media trials with respect to children and harm to children?
Is that what?
Bingo.
Bingo.
That is what the top rated news story should be, but it's not.
So, who wants to guess?
Rob?
Was it about the FBI not being able to unlock a journalist's iPhone?
Oh, that's a damn good story, isn't it?
That's a really good story.
Very relevant.
Very much of interest to people like us and, you know, in the media, journalism.
Yes, that is a great story, but no, it's wrong.
It's totally wrong.
Gila, it looks like you might have an answer.
Yeah, and I kind of hate myself for, A, knowing this, and B, what I'm about to suggest.
You have it.
Okay, go ahead.
Is it Savannah Guthrie's mom?
Yes, you got it 100%.
That is what everybody is talking about.
Look, I am not in favor of missing grandmothers, of kidnapping, of whatever is going on over there.
But, for God's sake, people, the only reason that the media is focusing on this is because it's a celebrity's mom.
That's the only reason.
And I sure hope that they find her and that they bring whoever did this to justice.
But I'm also thinking about the many other people who are missing, many other people who are victims of crimes who get completely ignored.
I can list people who are, you know, within 10 miles of where I'm sitting right now, and I'm sure all of you could as well, who have not gotten anything near the attention, who have suffered all kinds of horrors.
That said, there is a technological aspect to this story that is of interest to us.
And that's why, in addition to focusing on the unfairness of how we choose what stories to cover, that's why we're focusing on it just for a moment anyway.
And it's about how Google had played a key role in recovering the video from the cameras at Nancy Guthrie's house.
Now, those of you who weren't paying attention, what happened last night was that the pictures and some video from a camera that was not recording pictures or video was somehow obtained by Google.
A major breakthrough, they're calling it.
And it came down to Google's technical expertise in one of these ass-kissing articles about Google that CNN has printed.
The mother of today's host, Savannah Guthrie, disappeared over a week ago in Arizona.
But on Tuesday, authorities revealed footage of a masked and armed person outside her door on the day she went missing after initially saying the video was not able to be recovered.
And the reason there's no video is because, well, they didn't subscribe to the Google Nest service where you pay for that.
So, yeah, there should be any video there.
Now, engineers at Google, which owns Nest, as we have discussed many times on this particular program, were able to recover data after several days.
Can someone first clear up some confusion for me?
Because I thought that the doorbell camera was Ring, not Nest.
So, does anybody know what the difference is?
Yes.
Google owns Nest.
Amazon owns Ring.
Okay.
So, does Nest have doorbell cameras as well?
Yeah.
Really?
So, you could have either Nest or Ring?
I think Nest has a lot of, like, interior cameras.
Ring, you know, has doorbells with the function in it.
And I think Nest just has cameras.
I think you still have to have a separate doorbell and a camera.
Right.
With a Nest.
All right, fine.
Whatever works.
The task was so technically complex that investigators didn't know if it would be successful.
An FBI official said on Twitter that the Bureau released the images within hours of obtaining them and made a false arrest very quickly after that, apparently, as well.
Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos initially said there was no video available because Guthrie had no subscription to Google's video recording service.
Yeah, bear that in mind, people.
You might be kidnapped one day.
And if you haven't paid for Google's subscription, you might regret it.
In this particular case, they were able to get past that.
Because apparently, Nest still saves around three hours of event-based video history for free before being deleted.
Aha, you may say.
Well, a lot more than three hours had passed in that period of time.
So how on earth were they able to get that video recovered?
Well, hang on a second.
Let me finish the story.
That data lives in Google's cloud and servers.
Even if the data had been deleted from Google's systems, it could still exist somewhere and be recoverable because even files slated for deletion can exist until they are overwritten by new data.
That's something we all know.
It's the garbage file.
Yeah, it's a garbage file.
Exactly, yeah.
Except it was really in a lot of garbage because they had to track it down and it's somewhere in the cloud.
So, yeah, a delete function is just telling the file system to ignore that data and feel free to use that space on the hard drive for new data until it's actually used again.
That old data is still recoverable.
That's an explanation from the 1980s, which still applies today.
FBI Director Cash Patel.
I know, I know.
But we're going to quote him anyway, okay?
Let's just do this.
FBI Director Cash Patel wrote on social media yesterday that authorities, working closely with our private sector partners, recovered some video from residual data located in back-end systems.
Actually, only two words of that sentence were his words, so it wasn't so bad.
Investigators had sent a search warrant to Google for the Nest cameras at the Guthrie residence last week.
Such a move is common in a criminal investigation.
So, basically, they say they had to go through layers and layers of components to make the application work and to figure out just where this video might be hiding.
And the footage and its underlying data could go through hundreds of thousands of servers, hundreds of thousands of servers and systems all over the world, increasing the chance of residual data being left behind.
All those layers have code, and as data moves around to be processed and made available to the customer, it will move through different layers of sub-applications, sub-servers, sub-storage components.
How do you feel about all your images that you do want to save being passed through all of these servers all around the world, hundreds of thousands?
And each of these components present an opportunity for data recovery.
Now, we don't always want to recover the data.
Lots of times, there's private information that's being recorded, but yet it's still up there in the cloud.
In this particular case, yeah, good thing they were able to do this, but not in every case is it a benefit.
So, any thoughts on if this is a good or a bad thing?
Alex?
Yeah, well, I love that you just call on me.
I wasn't raising my hand or anything.
I thought your hand was up.
Sure, it looked like it.
That's fine.
Just put me on the spot.
That's fine.
I'm happy to talk about this in great detail.
I think that there are a lot of implications here, too, because this notion of residual back-end storage that's recovered from essentially unallocated space but is extraordinarily difficult.
And I think Google is being deliberately descriptive about the difficulty in obtaining this data because what they don't want is law enforcement continually pounding on their door to ask for this particular data over and over and over again.
Because it could be used in wide-ranging investigations or it could be subpoenaed by divorce attorneys, for God's sakes, or in civil suits.
And Google does not necessarily want to be on the hook for providing this information for any particular case.
I mean, they pulled out all the stops here because it's the, as you correctly know, Emmanuel, the mother of a celebrity.
So what Google will probably try to do later on is to just claim that, well, it's an undue burden for us to do this.
We did it in this one particular case because there was a threat to life and it was an abduction case and we were able to do it, but it's not something we're going to pull out all the stops for.
Or if you're just some random person who does not happen to be the mother of a famous person, then, you know, you're kind of, you know, you're out of luck.
You're up that creek that we can't talk about on the air here.
So there's that aspect of it, too.
But then you have this notion of user control over that particular type of data.
And there really is none, you know, and all of the dashboards and all of the settings that you can control, you may be able to have some kind of control over how long the data is retained, what is recorded, where it's sent.
Maybe, if you're lucky, you have access to those types of control.
But you certainly don't have any control over how Google is treating the back-end residual data.
So long as they disclose within their privacy policies and their user contracts that there is a potential that their camera can be recording even when you don't know it's recording and then that data is sent back to their servers, well, you've agreed to that processing of that data.
I think that's problematic here.
I think that's problematic, and I think that we should be really wary of the extent to which Google and other services are retaining this particular type of data over time, because obviously it can be recovered.
Go ahead, Rob.
Yeah, exactly.
I mean, somebody could conceivably, if they were concerned about their own data privacy, but they had one of these cameras lying around, they're like, well, maybe I'll get some use out of it.
I just won't subscribe to the service, so my data is safe.
And it would be very easy and reasonable to think that.
And the story proves that Google decides to still keep a little of your data as a treat, and there you are.
It's the sheer volume of things that depend on the cloud and that run things through the cloud, whether or not you want them, and the cloud being just other people's computers you don't control, it's a really insidious part of our current technological and media environment.
And it behooves all of us to be aware of that and to make each other aware of that.
I mean, if they'd had some local security system, which was not a Google thing or an Amazon thing, but just your standard cameras that would record to something in the building or maybe something off-site that you controlled, they would have all the footage they want.
But they would also have complete and total granular control over where that footage goes and how long it stays around.
Would it not be possible, as someone who knows virtually nothing about how this all pieces together, but would it not be possible to encrypt the data before it goes on its journey into the cloud?
And then as a default, you know what, just record it, record it for a day.
That way, if something happens and you're not a subscriber, you can say, okay, I'll subscribe now.
Let me see what just happened because I wasn't expecting that.
But you maintain control of it because only you have the password to decrypt the data that was sent up into the cloud.
Does that sound reasonable or crazy?
Alex, your hand is definitely up this time.
Yeah, I think it sounds reasonable.
I think it could be.
It would require more processing power because these are video files, so they're larger files.
So encrypting them is going to take some non-trivial amount of processing power.
But I think even more to the point, you could do that.
That would be one kind of privacy-enhancing technology.
And another thing that you could do is potentially for all of these files that are stored,
if they ever need to be recovered again in a way that makes it easier,
you could hash them, you know, have some kind of hash and track which hashes belong to which cameras
and then just recover the file through identification of that particular hash.
You know, or maybe those hashes would be stored for a small period of time,
like two weeks or three weeks or something like that.
I don't want to give them too many ideas, but because I do think it is, to a certain extent,
privacy eroding to have these types of things continually occur,
that the devices that we put in our house to answer our doors and whatnot
just continually record and monitor us and send that data to a third party
for some kind of back-end processing about which we have no control and have no idea.
Well, we have control in that we don't have to put a camera there.
But I do think it can be helpful in certain situations,
and you never know when that situation will strike.
So it's a tough one.
It really is.
It's weird to me that, as I understand it, they weren't subscribing.
I think that's the crux of this.
Yet it was storing something off-site.
To my mind, that seems like, okay, it's dishonesty in what the product's doing
because I might choose something that I don't want to have
storing something at a third party or multiple third party places
I don't really have control over,
but I still want it to function in a way that records,
which I think is still a good solution
because running your private residence, however you design it,
you could come up with your own strategy to have copies go places
or be viewable,
but you're not necessarily losing control over it.
So in the event that there's something of this level of severity,
that stuff can be potentially found and covered, but within limitations.
But I don't know.
It's this revealing the trust level that we really don't have
or shouldn't have, like a false sense of trust.
Well, I mean, let's say somebody commits a crime and it's their house,
but they commit a crime in front of their own camera,
but they're not subscribed.
Can that evidence be grabbed by Google
at the behest of some law enforcement agency
and used against them?
Alex, I think that's a good question for you.
Yeah, why wouldn't it be?
I mean, they're using it in this particular situation.
There's literally nothing stopping them from doing that.
I'm saying legally they have the right to do that.
Sure, absolutely.
It's a record in the possession of a third party
that you voluntarily created.
Google can hand that over.
Except you didn't want Google to save it.
You explicitly said,
I don't want to subscribe to the service being saved.
You're saying they can save it anyway and use it against you.
Well, that depends.
If when you sign up for the service,
you are giving authorization to Google
that they can record even when you aren't subscribed,
and that's okay.
Like, if you've given your consent
to having that device on your property
and recording it in a way,
even if you're not subscribed,
then yes, they can certainly hand that data over to law enforcement.
Is that in the agreement?
I think it is.
I think it has to be in the agreement
because otherwise this would be a big problem for Google
if it wasn't in the agreement
that they have the right to record
even when you're not subscribed.
Yeah, that's the key.
Kila, go ahead.
Exactly.
And the other thing that was making me think of
along these lines is
there was an ad on the Super Bowl
that people are kind of up in arms about.
That was my next story, the ring ad, yes.
I'm so sorry, the ring ad.
But I think it's an interesting kind of tie-in here
because this idea of the search party thing,
and if everybody in the neighborhood
has the same kind of doorbell camera,
then we can all search for lost dogs together.
Does that not sound utterly dystopian?
Of course it does, yes.
The ad in question, by the way,
it was basically a couple of lost dog ads in the Super Bowl,
but this lost dog got out somehow,
and I guess an alert was posted,
and every ring camera in the neighborhood,
you could see it graphically represented,
started searching for the dog,
and of course the dog was found
and reunited with its owner,
so why would anybody criticize this?
But apparently a lot of people were upset
when they realized,
hey, my ring camera is recording
when I don't want it to record
and sharing information,
and yeah, okay, you can retrieve a lost dog,
but you can also track down a dissident this way
and all kinds of other privacy horrors.
Yeah, and the whole idea
that if you give it a picture,
then the AI that's everywhere can look for this one thing,
and let's not even talk about
where the footage from your cameras might be ending up.
Imagine that you spend millions of dollars
on a Super Bowl ad
to bolster the image of your company,
and you wind up making people want to leave in droves.
I mean, someone's having a bad week.
Kyle, did you have something else?
Sure, I just am imagining,
I think that feature was like search party,
and it was using, of course,
the buzzword AI, right?
Everything's got it now,
so it uses that and can easily find this shape
and size and particular specific dog,
but replace dog with anything, I guess,
is the subtext there,
and that was, I think,
a largely good reaction by people,
like just understanding what
and how these things are being packaged,
and I think that what's being lost
is that before these entrants,
these tech companies,
I think the cost of the components
and the pieces and parts
both got better and cheaper,
but people forget that like many of these platforms
and different types of technology,
there was stuff before this
and many different types and schemes of camera setups
that without being hosted
by one of these large companies
does practically the same thing.
In fact, those companies still exist today,
and in the back of my mind,
I'm kind of laughing, thinking,
yeah, right, I can imagine all the little Nest cams
inside Google's data centers
protecting all of their equipment and stuff.
Like, I highly doubt that's the kind of platform
they run their own security cameras with,
and I'm thinking to myself,
imagine the crimes that go on
within some of these tech firms
that we'd love to see subpoena
and review all of their video camera footage
of premises and various protected sites.
That'd be such a joy, wouldn't it?
And it's the same thing,
except these are private individuals
versus corporate individuals.
Shall we stick with Google sharing information?
Because that seems to be a popular topic.
Well, Google fulfilled an ICE enforcement
or an ICE subpoena
that demanded a wide array of personal data
on a student activist and journalist,
including his credit card
and bank account numbers.
That's according to a copy of an ICE subpoena
obtained by The Intercept.
Amandla Thomas-Johnson
had attended a protest
targeting companies that supplied weapons to Israel
at a Cornell University job fair in 2024
for five minutes.
Five whole minutes.
But the action got him banned from campus.
When Trump assumed office
and issued a series of executive orders
targeting students
who protested in support of Palestinians,
Thomas Johnson and his friend,
Mamadou Tal,
went into hiding.
Google informed Thomas Johnson
via a brief email in April
that it had already shared his metadata
with the Department of Homeland Security
as The Intercept previously reported.
But the full extent of the information
the agency sought,
including usernames, addresses,
itemized list of services,
including any IP masking services,
telephone or instrument numbers,
subscriber numbers or identities,
and credit card and bank account numbers,
that was not previously known.
I'd already seen the subpoena requests
that Google and Meta had sent to Mamadou
and I knew that he had gotten in touch
with a lawyer
and the lawyer successfully challenged that,
Thomas Johnson said.
I was quite surprised to see
that I didn't have that opportunity.
The subpoena provides no justification
for why ICE is asking for this information,
except that it's required,
quote,
in connection with an investigation
or inquiry related to the enforcement
of U.S. immigration laws, unquote.
In the subpoena,
ICE requests that Google not disclose
the existence of this summons
for indefinite period of time.
Thomas Johnson, who is British,
believes that ICE requested
that information to track
and eventually detain him,
but he had already fled to Geneva, Switzerland,
and is now in Dakar, Senegal.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation
is representing Thomas Johnson,
the ACLU of Northern California,
sent a letter to Google, Amazon,
Apple, Discord, Meta, Microsoft,
and Reddit last week calling on tech companies
to resist similar subpoenas in the future
from DHS without court intervention.
The letter asks the companies
to provide users with as much notice as possible
before complying with a subpoena
to give them the opportunity to fight it
and to resist gag orders
that would prevent the tech companies
from informing targets
that a subpoena was issued.
Your promises to protect the privacy of users
are being tested right now
as part of the federal government's unprecedented campaign
to target critics of its conduct and policies.
Agencies like DHS have repeatedly demanded access
to the identities and information
of people on your services.
Based on our own contact with targeted users,
we are deeply concerned your companies
are failing to challenge unlawful surveillance
and defend user privacy and speech.
That's according to that letter.
Any thoughts on this concern, such subpoenas?
Are they legal?
Are they not legal?
Does Google have more of a responsibility
to its users to let them know
and not hand over all this private information?
Alex, that's your hand.
Sure, I'll jump right in here.
I mean, this was also, by the way,
an administrative subpoena.
So that means that this isn't a subpoena
that is approved by a judge.
It's not a subpoena
that even resembles a warrant in any way, right?
Sometimes you have subpoenas
that are so ordered by a judge
or you have an active case
or something like that.
Administrative subpoenas
subpoenas are basically
just like just something
that comes on ICE letterhead.
Like ICE can issue
these administrative subpoenas
and tech companies
and any entity that houses
massive amounts of our personal information,
kind of like a dossier on us,
should really be very skeptical
and look scant at these administrative subpoenas
in any context,
especially coming from an organization like ICE.
I think they have a duty to push back on these.
They have a duty to try to narrow them.
They don't want to be bothered by doing that
because it takes time and effort and money
and it undermines their bottom line.
They don't want to be on the hook for that.
But at least push back in some way
on the notice provision
so that you could give your users the opportunity
to step up before their information is handed over
and before you just voluntarily hand over that information.
I mean, at least be something of a bulwark.
I mean, that's what I find so disheartening here.
And that, in another sense too,
like this is exactly what the administration wants.
It's exactly what ICE wants.
I mean, this is the system that they want in place.
I mean, your Google account has your whole life in it, right?
It's got your payment methods in it.
It's got your IP addresses.
It has your subscriber identities.
It's got all the sites into which you log.
I mean, it's all sitting there.
And it's just one administrative subpoena
with ICE's letterhead away from disclosure.
You have to understand that.
Like, this is not a technical exploit.
This is a procedural exploit.
And this exploit allows ICE or the government
to essentially dox you to steal your data.
There's no patch for that.
This is something that can only be solved with legislation.
So I think it's particularly problematic.
I'm sorry, you're going to have to say that.
It's very disheartening that our massive companies,
particularly problematic and really disheartening.
Yeah.
Yeah, okay.
Yeah.
I think they're trying to silence you there.
Let me just ask you a couple of stupid questions, if I may.
So administrative subpoena, what does that look like?
You say it's on letterhead.
Well, who signs it?
Does anybody sign it?
Yeah, I mean, it's an ICE officer that will sign it.
You know, somebody with authority to issue
these administrative subpoenas from ICE.
So are they trying to look like a judge when they sign it?
Is there a stamp next to their name?
I don't know if there's a stamp.
There's probably, it's got to be on ICE letterhead,
but they're just agency issued.
There's no prior judicial review.
Could someone forward us an administrative subpoena,
please?
There are so many of them floating around.
I just want to see what one looks like.
I want to see if they're trying to make themselves look like judges,
see how official it actually seems.
Who can issue administrative subpoenas?
Is that something anyone can do?
Only government agencies?
How does that work?
Yeah, certain government agencies will have authority
to issue administrative subpoenas like this.
And ICE would be one of them.
Other law enforcement agencies.
I mean, sometimes even like, you know,
housing-related agencies and things
will be able to issue administrative subpoenas
to require landlords to produce certain records
and documents, that type of thing.
But it's obviously right for abuse.
And that's what we're seeing here.
I mean, these administrative subpoenas
that have no judicial oversight
and no accountability mechanisms associated with them
are going to be abused.
And that's what we see happening.
Can anyone just ignore one of these things
or do they have any kind of legal standing?
But they can try to compel.
They can try to compel your disclosure there.
But generally, you don't have to automatically comply, right?
You will have an opportunity generally
to narrow or constrain the scope of the disclosure.
And we don't see any pushback
on these types of administrative subpoenas
from the tech companies, as I understand it,
and especially based on these stories.
Is it possible they don't know
it's an administrative subpoena?
Are they labeled on top,
this is an administrative subpoena?
I would think that they would know
that they are an administrative subpoena
because subpoena processing,
especially at any big tech company
like Google, Meta, TikTok, et cetera,
it's a big deal, right?
Like there are a lot of people
that are associated with that particular function
because they get subpoenaed all the time
for different documents and records.
So they would certainly know the difference
between a subpoena that relates
to an active litigation,
a subpoena that's so ordered by a judge,
a warrant that's issued from law enforcement
that also has undergone judicial review.
And I would certainly hope
that they would understand the difference
between those on the one hand
and administrative subpoenas
that are issued basically
just as a matter of agency practice
by agencies like ICE.
But maybe I am expecting too much of them.
I don't know.
Now that I mentioned it.
Yeah, I think you might be
because in this day and age
with the amount of fear-mongering
that's out there
and the way the tech companies
have let us all down,
I think they could just write
a handwritten note saying,
hey, could you please give us
what you got on this Alex guy
who's on the radio?
And they'd fall over themselves
because they don't want to be
on the bad side of Trump or ICE.
You know, I don't think it really matters
how they ask.
I think, you know,
they're demonstrating how easily
they can be convinced
just to turn over all our info.
Rob, go ahead.
Yeah, and the double talk
that Google's doing around this
is interesting
because as noted in the story,
an attorney for Google
told Thomas Johnson's lawyer,
Google has already fulfilled
this subpoena.
Production consisted
of basic subscriber information.
That's what Thomas Johnson
was told about.
The info requested about him.
But as the story points out,
this isn't basic subscriber information
in terms of like,
oh, what's it's your name
and email address.
Maybe that's it.
No, it's usernames, addresses,
lists of services
that he was subscribing to.
Telephone or instrument numbers,
subscriber numbers or identities,
the credit card
and the bank account numbers,
all of that.
And as you mentioned,
your whole life is wrapped up
in a Google account nowadays
down to like where you travel
if you keep that info
in Google Maps.
You know, where you are step by step,
minute by minute, day by day,
all of that is in there.
And all of that is apparently
just basic information
that Google will drop on a whim.
Wow.
We could talk about this all night.
And, you know,
we have conversations like this
whenever we have
one of our conferences
at wherever they happen to be.
Enough people have been writing to us
asking this question
where I feel we should address it.
Hope does not have a home.
We don't have a conference
at the moment for this year.
And Hope is also now
a 501c3 nonprofit organization
independent of 2600,
independent of us.
And I just wanted to
let people know where we stand.
We're going to be talking
about this more on Overtime.
But we want to have
conversations like this.
But it's partially
because of conversations
like this that we got
kicked out of St. John's
because it gets
a little controversial.
It gets a little,
you know, edgy.
And so many people
don't want to have
those kinds of conversations
associated with them.
You think Google
are acting like cowards.
They're not alone.
They're so far
from being alone on this.
We're seeing so many people cave.
We're seeing so many organizations,
college campuses especially.
I am so disappointed
in how they have caved
and bent over
to do whatever
they are told to do
by this administration.
These are tough times.
These are very
dangerous times.
We are committed here
on WBI
to have these conversations,
to point these things out,
to give our listeners
a voice
and to support
wherever possible
this kind of dialogue.
So while it might be
a difficult situation
right now,
we know it's not
going to stay that way.
And we know that
because you're out there
and you're supporting
places like WBAI.
Please support
the radio station.
Give to WBAI.org
or go to
buddy.wbai.org.
Pledge whatever you can.
And having this place
for people to speak out
and stand up
to oppression,
which I think we all
can see now,
is so vital.
You either get
your top 40 music
or your state-sponsored
propaganda
or you get individuals.
And we might not always
agree with each other,
but we certainly have
a lot to say
and a lot to make you
think about.
And if that matters to you,
if you want to preserve that,
please go to that website.
Support this place.
Keep it going.
We've been on the air
since 1960.
And we haven't stopped
complaining yet
because there's so much
out there
that needs attention
drawn to it.
And this is,
you know,
I wish there were
48 hours in the day
because there is so much
now to devote
attention to.
And,
you know,
it feels terrible
to see so many things
that we were worried
about come true,
but that's what's happening.
That's exactly
what's happening.
So join us.
Keep this place
on the air.
Make it stronger
and support everything
that fosters free speech.
It is vital.
It is so vital.
Alex.
And we do speak
very freely
about all things.
And I know
certain people
will complain about
the political nature
of what we talk about
sometimes,
but I go back
to this a lot.
You know,
look,
we don't pull any punches
if it's a Democrat
or if it's a Republican
or not one-sided.
I think we're rather
independent
on all these issues
and we just never
shut up about it.
And we haven't shut up
for a really long time.
And especially
this radio show,
which,
Emmanuel,
remind me again
what year it started?
Well,
the first episode
of Off the Hook
was 1988,
but that was
a one-time thing.
And it actually
had been preempted
once
and rescheduled
for a nighttime show.
So the initial one
was three hours long
because it was a special.
We had no idea
it was going to turn
into a series.
That didn't really start
until 1991.
And then it was
a bi-weekly series.
And then shortly after that,
it became a weekly series
and the rest is history.
Wow.
So 30,
35 years
is,
is it?
There's no need to say
how many years it's been.
Yeah,
it's been on the air
for a while.
Yeah,
it's a long,
that's a long time.
That's a long,
that's a lot of words
on the air here.
And look,
you know,
I think,
you know,
to bring it back
to the story
that we were talking about,
right,
I mean,
there's a big
contradistinction here.
I mean,
in that particular story
with Google and ICE,
I mean,
ICE slapped a gag order
in that subpoena.
You didn't hear Google
saying a damn word
about this,
right?
And those gag orders
and administrative subpoenas,
they have literally
no teeth,
right?
Google did not have
to comply with that.
Google could have notified
the subscriber
about this.
They chose silence.
And when a corporation
like that voluntarily
adopts a secrecy posture
of law enforcement,
you have to wonder
whose side they're on.
You never have to wonder
whose side we're on.
Yeah,
like you said,
we can't shut up.
Google had no trouble
shutting up.
That's right.
Yeah,
that's right.
We keep talking.
That's a good way
of phrasing it,
of illustrating
just what the people
affiliated with a station
like WBAI
are all about
or the various projects
that we get involved in.
Yeah,
people who can't shut up,
people who keep
spouting forward.
It can be a pain sometimes,
especially if you disagree,
but that's part of the process
and we welcome it all.
Kyle,
go ahead.
I just wanted to point out
that,
yeah,
those contributions
and keeping the station here
and being a listener,
just your listenership alone
advances so much
in society,
so much in your world,
in our world,
and gets the message
out to people
if what we're talking
about resonates,
if you give us feedback,
we become better
at sharing news stories
and giving our own
perspective on it
and that is really symbiotic.
We don't really know
who's out there
at any one time,
but it is truly
an honor
and a big responsibility.
I think we've taken seriously
since way back
in getting that message out,
your listenership.
It basically,
you become better informed
by listening to WBAI.
You become someone
that people share
their perspectives on
in your community
and you can put people
onto things
that you've heard about
that might be affecting them
in ways they don't even realize
and that is incredible
and what we've noticed
in my experience
being on the air
and I don't know
if the people
who have been around longer
share this,
but what we've noticed
with technology,
what we've noticed
with hacking,
with people
that are curious
about it,
that notice the flaws,
notice how it breaks,
how it doesn't really
suit humans
in some ways
or how it's really,
truly magical
and transformative.
What we've noticed
is that it really
pervades
all aspects of life.
It really affects
so many different things,
especially as more
is adopted
and it becomes
more capable
and something
and something
that everybody
has experience
with so many
different types
of interfaces
and devices
down to software
or firms
that are managing
it all
and somehow
people are
making it work
and jettisoning
the things
that are
cumbersome
and flawed
and we want
to elevate
those observations.
We want to share
that and get it out
and then your
listenership,
what I'm saying
at its core
is that that gets
it out further
to the places
that matter,
to representatives
when you
register your
distaste
with elected
officials.
all of that
is connected
and that's
the metaphor
of this
computer network
we call the internet
that we are
really truly connected
so share in that,
listen,
and give us
your feedback.
Yeah,
I think you touched
upon something
really important
that we have
no idea
who's out there
and that's
the beauty
of radio.
You don't know
who's out there.
There could be
10 people,
there could be
100 people,
it could be
a million people.
You do not know
because radio
is anonymous,
it's passive,
you turn on the radio,
there's no record
of that,
you know,
on the internet,
yes,
you can keep track
of how many people
are there
but the other thing
that we have
is an archive
and you have no idea
how many people
are hearing the archive.
We're talking now live
on February 11,
2026
but somebody
could be hearing this
years from now
because we have
an archive
on our site
which is
2600.com
slash off the hook
of every show
ever made
and boy,
there is such
history there.
So many different
things to talk about
but also so many
different sound effects
of technology,
how things used to be
and it's important
to document all that.
That's what the conversation
also does.
If we were just
talking about
exploits
and the latest version
of Windows
or something boring
like that,
I don't think
you would appreciate
it as much
in the future.
However,
if you listen
to the show
decades from now
and you tune
back onto this
era or the
era before it,
you'll see
how things
have changed
and you might
see how things
might change
more in the future.
So it's vital
to document,
to save,
and to keep
listening
and I hope
people do.
Okay,
we have another
interesting story
kind of related
to what we're
talking about.
The FBI
has so far
been unable
to access data
from a Washington
Post reporter's
iPhone.
Why?
Because it
was protected
by Apple.
Yes,
Apple steadfastly
refuses to cooperate.
Well,
actually,
no,
not entirely.
It's Apple's
lockdown mode.
So when agents
seized the device
from the reporter's
home,
Apple's lockdown
mode kicked in.
They were able
to access the reporter's
work laptop
by telling her
to place her index
finger on the
MacBook Pro's
fingerprint reader.
I would have
placed a different
finger in a different
position,
but everyone does
it differently.
This occurred
during the
January 14th
search at the
Virginia home
of reporter
Hannah Natanson.
But as previously
reported,
the FBI executed
a search warrant
at her home
as part of an
investigation into
a Pentagon
contractor accused
of illegally
leaking classified
data.
It's really kind
of unprecedented.
FBI agents
seized an
iPhone 13
owned by the
Post,
one MacBook
Pro owned
by the Post,
and another
MacBook Pro
owned by Natanson,
a one-terabyte
portable hard drive,
a voice recorder,
and a Garmin
watch.
Government
investigators
want to read
Natanson's
signal messages
and were able
to view at least
some of them
on her work
laptop.
The reporter
has said she
has a contact
list of 1100
current and
former government
employees in
Signal,
which she uses
for encrypted
chats.
The iPhone
was found
powered on
and charging.
Its display
noted that the
phone was in
lockdown mode,
the government
filing said.
After the seized
devices were
taken to the
FBI's
Washington field
office,
the computer
analysis response
team,
known as
CART,
began processing
each device
to preserve
the information
that was
there.
CART couldn't
get anything
from the iPhone
because the
iPhone was in
lockdown mode.
They could not
extract that
device.
The government
also submitted
a declaration
by FBI
Assistant
Director
Roman
Rajaski
that said
the agency
has paused
any further
efforts to
extract this
device because
of the
court's
standstill
order.
I'd never
heard of
that.
The FBI
did extract
information
from the
SIM card
with an
auto-generated
HTML report
created by
the tool
utilized by
CART,
but the
data contained
in the
HTML was
limited to
the telephone
number.
Apple says
that lockdown
mode helps
protect
devices against
extremely rare
and highly
sophisticated
cyber attacks,
i.e.
what the FBI
is trying to
do.
And it's
designed for
the very few
individuals who
because of
who they
are or
what they
do might
be personally
targeted by
some of the
most sophisticated
digital threats.
Again,
FBI.
Yeah,
introduced in
2022,
lockdown mode is
available for
iPhones,
iPads,
and Macs.
It must be
enabled separately
for each
device.
To enable
it on an
iPhone or
iPad,
a user would
simply open
the settings
app,
tap privacy
and security.
Just waiting
for people to
catch up.
Got that?
Okay.
Scroll down
and tap
lockdown
mode and
then tap
turn on
lockdown
mode.
Process is
similar on
Macs in
the system
settings app
that can be
accessed via
the Apple
menu.
A user would
click privacy
and security,
scroll down
and click
lockdown
mode,
and now
click
turn on.
When lockdown
mode is
enabled,
your device
won't
function like
it typically
does,
says Apple,
to reduce
the attack
surface that
potentially could
be exploited
by highly
targeted
mercenary
spyware.
Certain apps,
websites,
and features
are strictly
limited for
security,
and some
experiences
might not
be available
at all.
All right,
well,
you know,
that's kind
of a happy
note to end
on,
I think.
They can't
get everything
they want.
Yeah,
go ahead,
Rob.
Yeah,
no,
I was just
going to
agree as
well,
absolutely,
and it's
kind of
really great
that this
is available
as part
of the
stock OS
in these
things.
Yeah,
I would just
say,
has anybody
taken a
look at
their phones
and looked
at features?
I've personally
looked at a
lot of the
features on
different devices
that I've
accessed to,
and yeah,
a lot of
it's come a
long way.
There is a
lot more
stuff built
in,
and I
think that
you don't
have to
be totally
going overboard
and becoming
really unusable
in your
digital world,
but if you've
got features
that you're
not really
checking out
on your
phone that
might help
you in
certain
situations,
check them
out,
try them
out,
test them
out,
see what
works for
you.
There's a
lot of
ability
that is
built in
now,
and it
reminds me,
I have a
fingerprint story,
but we'll
get back to
that.
Do that on
overtime.
Alex,
10 seconds,
go ahead.
Sure,
I think this
is...
I'm sorry,
Alex,
that counts.
for journalists
to keep
sensitive
reporting.
Oh,
okay,
we're going
to have
to continue
that later.
Yeah,
you froze.
I'm sorry.
Is that it?
Well,
we'll continue
this on
overtime,
but I did
want to
point out
that hackers
are breaking
into Jeffrey
Epstein's
personal email
accounts after
finding passwords
in some of
the files
that have
been released
in the
latest
document.
Yeah,
that's a lot
of fun here,
but if you
go to a
site called
jmail.world,
have any of
you been to
this site?
You can act
like you are
Jeffrey Epstein's
Gmail.
Don't act
like Jeffrey Epstein.
No,
no,
you can be
his Gmail
user and
be able to
see who
mail was sent
to,
who mail was
received from,
and catalog
it.
jmail.world.
I didn't know
world was a
top-level
domain.
It's a lot
of fun for
the whole
family,
and
a way
of finding
out more
things that
are being
hidden and
obscured.
It's
fascinating,
fascinating to
see.
Hey,
we are
out of
time.
Join us
on
Overtime,
youtube.com
slash
channel 2600.
Good night.
Allah,
Allah,
Christ,
don't you
understand?
I'm nervous
waiting for
my baby's
plane to
land.
Returning
with the
family from
the Holy
land.
Allah,
Allah,
Christ,
don't you
understand?
I walked
direct in
my brain,
I ran.
I can't
find my
people,
got this
travel ban.
I didn't
see them
pass through
the customs
gate.
I checked
the screen
and the
plane ain't
late.
flowers that
I bought
are beginning
to wilt
and the
frango
mincer
turned to
chocolate
milk.
I walked
direct in
my brain,
I ran.
They got a
handcuff to a
rail down in
carousel town.
I knew I'd
need help to
break her free,
so I gave a
shout out to
my local
DJ.
I made a
song request,
confess my
sins to the
only friend I
got,
knows the
shape I'm
in.
Hey,
Mr.
DJ,
help me break
her chains.
Get your
pole cutters
and meet me
down in
baggage claim.
Off the
Hook will be
back on
WBAI New
York next
Wednesday night,
7 p.m.
Join us now on
YouTube on
Channel 2600 at
8 o'clock for
Off the Hook
Overtime.
Where we
would need a
diversion before
we made a
break.
I threw
myself on
the ground
and I began
to shake.
The DJ cut
my baby and
her mama's
chains and
said,
welcome pretty
ladies to
the USA.
The car was
at the curb
and I threw
in the keys.
We went to
Gene and
George Eddie's
with the
Refugees.
Well, make no
mistake about
it, we got
a civil war.
My eyes have
seen the cracks
in the glory
of our
lords.
Golden
showers from
golden towers
rained down
upon us at
the midnight
hour.
I walked
out wreck
of my
brain, I
ran.
Allah, Allah
Christ stole
our dreams
again.
The dreams
of the
daughters and
the mothers
and the
family that
you thought
you'd never
see again.
the dreams
of the
dogs, the
Irish and
the blacks,
the refugees
and the
immigrants,
the dreams
of our
DJ and
his deepest
tracks.
When your
dreams get
stole, you
gotta steal
them back.
Yeah!
Yeah!
Fly!
Fly!
Fly!
Fly!
guitar solo