Chris Tarbell: FBI Agent Who Took Down Silk Road | Lex Fridman Podcast #340

you could by literally whatever else you. wanted you could post things drugs you. could buy heroin write it from. Afghanistan the good stuff hacking tools. you could hack for hire you could buy. murders for hire. the following is a conversation with. Chris Tarbell a former FBI special agent. and cyber crime specialist who tracked. down and arrested Russ Albert the leader. of Silk Road the billion dollar drug. Marketplace and he tracked down and. arrested Hector massager AKA Sabu of.

lolsek and Anonymous which is some of. the most influential hacker groups in. history he is co-founder of naxo a. complex cyber crime investigation firm. and is a co-host of a podcast called The. Hacker and the Fed. this conversation gives the perspective. of the FBI cybercrime investigator both. the technical and the human story I. would also like to interview people on. the other side the Cyber criminals who.

have been caught and perhaps the Cyber. criminals who have not been caught and. are still out there. this is Alex Friedman podcast to support. it please check out our sponsors in the. description and now dear friends here's. Chris Tarbell. you are one of the most successful cyber. security law enforcement agents of all. time you tracked and brought down Russ. Albrecht AKA dread pirate robbers who. ran Silk Road and. Sabu of LOL SEC and Anonymous who was.

one of the most influential hackers in. the world so first can you tell me the. story of jacking down Ross Albrecht and. Silk Road let's start from the very. beginning and maybe let's start by. explaining what is the Silk Road it was. really the first uh dark Market website. um you literally could buy anything. there well. to go back you could there's two things. you couldn't buy there you couldn't buy. guns because that was a different. website uh and you couldn't buy fake. degrees so no one could become a doctor.

but you could buy literally whatever. else you wanted you could post things. drugs you could buy a heroin right from. Afghanistan the good stuff uh hacking. tools you could hack for hire you could. buy murders For Hire if you wanted. someone killed now so. when I was an FBI agent I had to kind of. sell some of these cases and this was a. big drug case you know that's the way. people saw Silk Road so internally to. the FBI how I had to sell it I had to. find the worst thing on there that I. could possibly find and I think one time.

I saw a posting for uh baby parts. so let's say that you you know had a. young child and that needed a liver you. could literally go on there and ask for. a six month old liver uh if you wanted. to for like surgical operations versus. something darker yeah I never saw. anything that dark as far as people like. wanted to eat body parts yeah um I did. interview a cannibal once when I was in. the FBI that's another crazy story but. uh but that one actually weirded me out. so I just watched uh Jeffrey Dahmer uh.

documentary on Netflix and it just. changed the way I see human beings. because it's a it's a portrayal of a. normal looking person. doing uh really dark things and doing so. not out of a place of insanity seemingly. but just because he has almost like a. fetish for that kind of thing he's. disturbing the people like that are out. there. so people like that would then be using. Silk Road not like that necessarily but. people of different walks of life.

abusing Silk Road to primarily what was. the Prime primary thing drugs it was. primarily drugs and that's where it. started it started off with Ross. Albrecht growing mushrooms out in the. wilderness of California and selling. them but really his was more of a. Libertarian Viewpoint I mean it was like. you choose what you want to do for. yourself and do it and in the way Silk. Road kind of had the anonymity is it. used what's called Tor or the onion. router which is an anonymizing uh. function on uh on the Deep Web it was. actually invented by the U.S Navy back.

in the mid 90s or so but it also used. cryptocurrency so it was the first time. like we saw this birth on the internet. uh mixing cryptocurrency uh and uh an IP. blocking software so you know in cyber. crime you go after one the IP address. and trace it through the network or two. you go after the cash and this one kind. of blocked both cash me meaning the flow. of money physical or digital and then IP. is the some kind of identifying thing of.

the computer it's your telephone number. for on your computer so yeah all. computers have you know a unique uh for. octet uh numbers you know it's a one two. three dot one two three dot one two. three dot one two three and you know the. computer uses DNS or domain name. services to to render that name so if. you're looking for you know CNN.com your. computer then translates that to that IP. address or that telephone number where. it can find that information didn't sell. called used to have guns in the. beginning or was that considered to have.

guns or was did it naturally emerge and. then Ross realized like this is not good. it went back and forth uh I think there. were guns on there and he tried to. police it. um you know he uh he told himself the. captain of the boat so he had to follow. his rules so you know I think you took. off those posts eventually and moved. guns elsewhere what was the system of. censorship that he used like selecting. what is okay and not okay I mean it's. alone he's the captain of the boat do.

you know by chance if there was uh a lot. of debates and criticisms internally. amongst the criminals of what is and. isn't allowed I mean it's interesting to. see a totally different moral code. emerge that's outside the legal code of. society we did get the the server and. was able to read all of the chat logs. that what that happened I mean all the. records were there. um I don't remember big debates I mean. there was a clear leadership yeah and. that was the final decision that was the. the CEO of Silk Road and so primarily.

was drugs and primarily out of an. ideology of Freedom which is uh if you. want to use drugs you should be able to. use drugs you should put in your body. what you want to put in your body and. when you are presenting a case of why. this should be investigated you're. trying to find as you mentioned the. worst possible things on there is that. what you were saying so we had arrested. a guy named Jeremy Hammond and he hit. himself he was a hacker and he this. would be arrested him it's the second.

time he had been arrested for for. hacking uh he used Tor. um and so that kind of brought us to a. point. um the FBI has a computer system where. you look up things uh you know you look. up anything I can look up your name or. whatever if you're associated with my. case. and we were finding at the time a lot of. things in you look it up the case would. end be like oh this is tor it just. stopped like we didn't get any further. yeah so you know we had just had this. big arrest of uh Sabu and took down.

Anonymous and and sometimes in the FBI. um the way it used the old school FBI. when you had a big case and you're. working seven days a week and 14 hours. 15 hours a day. you sort of take a break the boss kind. of said yeah I've seen a few months go. go get to know your family a little bit. you know and come back but. the group of guys I was with was like. let's find the next big Challenge and. that's when we were finding you know. case closed it was tour case closed it. was tour so said let's take a look at. touring let's see what we can do maybe. we'll take a different approach and Silk.

Road was being looked at by other law. enforcement. um but it was taking like a drug. approach where I'm going to find a drug. buyer who got you know the drug sent to. them in the mail and let's arrest up. let's go up the chain but the buyers. didn't know their dealers they never met. them and so you were taking a cyber. security approach yeah we said let's try. to look at this from a cyber approach. and see if we can uh gleam anything out. of it so I'm actually. indirectly connected. to I'm I'm sure I'm not admitting.

anything that's not already on my FBI. file oh I can already tell you what. you're going to tell me though what's. that the when you were at College you. wrote a paper and you're connected to. the person that started you said I'm a. bitch you clever son of a bitch I'm an. FBI Jenner a former FB agent how would I. not no but I could have told you other. stuff is what you were about to tell me. I was looking up his name because I. forgot it so one of my advisors for my. PhD was Rachel greenstat and she is. married to Roger Dingle dine which is.

the co-founder of the tour project and. actually reached out to him last night. to do a hotel podcast together I don't. know these uh. no it was a good it was a good party. trick I mean it was just cool that you. know this and the timing of it it was. just like beautiful but. um just a link around the on the tour. project. so we understand it's a tour is this um. black box that people disappear in.

uh in terms of like the when you were. tracking people. can you paint a picture of what tours. used in general other. it's like uh when you talk about Bitcoin. for example cryptocurrency especially. today much more people use it for legal. activity versus illegal activity what. about tour. was originally invented by the U.S Navy. so that like spies inside countries. could talk to spies and no one could. find them. um there was no way of tracing them and.

then they released that information free. to the world so Tor has two different. versions of not versions two different. ways it can be utilized there's dot. onion sites which is like a normal. website a.com but it's only found within. the Tor Browser you can only get there. if you know the whole address and get. there the other way Tor is used is to go. through the internet and then come out. the other side if you want a different. IP address if you're trying to hide your. identity so if you were doing like say. cyber crime I would have the victim. computer and I would trace it back out.

to a tour relay and then because you. don't have an active connection or. what's called a circuit at the time I. wouldn't be able to trace it back but. even if you had an active circuit I. would have to go to each machine. physically live and try to rebuild that. which is literally impossible so what do. you feel about Tor ethically. philosophically as a human being on this. world that uh spent quite a few years of. your life and still trying to protect. people. so part of my time in the FBI was. working on child exploitation Kitty porn.

as they call it. um that really changed my life in a way. and so anything that helps facilitate. the exploitation of children. fucking pisses me off and I I I and that. sort of jaded my opinion towards towards. tour because that because it it helps. facilitate those sites so this ideal of. Freedom that Russell Albert for example. uh tried to embody is something that you. um don't connect with anymore because.

of what you've seen that ideal being. used for. I mean the child exploitation is a. specific example for it you know and. it's I can it's easy for me to sit here. and say child expert child porn because. no one listening to this is ever going. to say that I'm wrong and that we should. allow child porn. um should because some people utilize it. in a bad way should it go away. um no I mean I'm a technologist I want. technology to move forward. um you know.

people are going to do bad things and. they're going to use technology to help. them do bad things. well let me ask you then oh we'll jump. around a little bit but the things you. were able to do. in tracking down information and we'll. get to it there's some suspicion that. this was only possible with mass. surveillance like with NSA for example. first of all is there any truth to that. and second of all what do you feel are. the pros and cons of mass surveillance.

there is no truth to that and then my. feelings on mass surveillance if there. was would you tell me probably not but. I love this conversation so much but. what do you feel about the given that. you said child porn. what are the pros and cons of. surveillance at a society level. I mean nobody wants to give up their. privacy I say that I say no one wants to. give up their privacy but I mean I used. to have to get a search warrant to look.

inside your house yeah or I can just log. on to your Facebook and you've got. pictures of all inside your house and. what's going on I mean it's not you know. so people like the idea of not giving up. their privacy. um but they do it anyways they're giving. away their freedoms all the time they're. they're carrying watches that gives out. their heartbeat a weight of companies. that are storing that I mean what's more. personal than your heartbeat so I I. think people. and mass really want to protect their. privacy and I would say most people. don't really need to protect their.

privacy but the case against Mass. surveillance is that if you want to. criticize the government. in a very difficult time you should be. able to do it. so when you need the freedom you should. have it so when you wake up one day and. realize there's something going wrong. wrong with the country I love I want to. be able to uh to help the the one of the. great things about. the United States of America is there's. that individual revolutionary Spirit.

like so that the the government doesn't. become too powerful you can always. protest there's always the best of the. ideal of freedom of speech you can. always say fuck you to the man and I. think there's a concern of direct or. indirect suppression of that through. Mass surveillance you might not. is that that little subtle fear that. grows with time that uh why you know why. bother criticizing the government it's. going to be a headache I'm going to get.

a ticket every time I say something bad. that kind of thing so it gets out you. can get out of hand the bureaucracy. grows and the freedom slip away because. that's the that's the criticism right I. completely see your point I agree with. it I mean but I mean on the other side. people criticize the government of these. freedoms but I mean tech companies are. talking about destroying your privacy. and controlling what you can say I. realize they're private platforms and. you they can decide what's on their. platform but you know they're taking. away your freedoms of what you can say.

and we've heard certain some things. where maybe government officials were in. line with uh with tech companies to take. away some of that freedom and that's I. agree with you that gets scary yeah. there's something about government that. feels. maybe because of the history of human. civilization maybe because tech. companies are a new thing but just. knowing the history of abuses of. government. if there's something about government. that enables the corrupting nature of. power to take hold at scale more than.

tech companies at least what we've seen. so far. yeah I agree I agree but I mean we. haven't had a voice like we've had until. recently I mean anyone that has a. Twitter account now can speak and become. a news article. um you know my parents didn't have that. didn't have that voice if they wanted to. speak out against the government or do. something they had to go to a protester. organize a protester you know do. something along those lines so you know. we have more of a place to put our voice. out now yeah it's incredible but that's.

why it hurts and that's why you notice. it when certain voices get removed the. president of the United States of. America was removed from one such or all. such platforms. and that hurts yeah that's crazy to me. that's insane that's insane that we we. took that away but. let's return to uh to still growing so. how did your path with this very. difficult very fascinating case uh cross.

we were looking to open a case against. Tor because it was a problem all the. cases were closing uh because Tori so we. went on tour and we we came up with 26. Web different onion dog onions that we. targeted we were looking for nexuses to. hacking because I was on a squad called. cy2 and we were like the premier. um Squad in New York that was working uh. uh criminal cyber intrusions. and so you know any website that was.

offering hackers for hire or. um hacking tools for free you know or. paid Services uh you know like now we're. seeing ransomware for the paid service. and phishing as a paid service. um anything that offered that so we. opened this case on on I think we called. it we so you have to name cases one of. the fun things in the FBI is if you. start a case you get to name it you. would not believe how much time is spent. in coming up with the name yeah um you. know Casey goes by I think we called. this onion peeler because of the yeah so.

a little bit of humor a little bit of. wit and some profundity to the language. yeah yeah yes you're gonna have to work. with this for quite a lot so yeah this. one had the potential of being a big one. you know because I think I think Silk. Road was like the sixth on the list uh. for that case but we all knew that was. sort of the golden ring if you could. make the splash that that onion site was. going down then it would probably get. some publicity and that's part of you. know law enforcement is getting some. publicity out of of it that you know.

that makes others think not to do it I. always just say that tour is the name of. the project the browser what is the. onion technology behind Tor let's say. you want to go to a DOT onion site. you'll you'll put in the dot done you. want to go to and your computer will. build uh Communications with a tour. relay which are all publicly available. out there but you'll encrypt it you'll. put a package around your data and so. it's encrypted and so can't read it it. goes to that that first relay that first.

relay knows about you and then knows. about the next relay down the chain and. so it takes your data and then encrypts. that on the outside and sends it to. relay number two now relay number two. only knows about relay number one it. doesn't know who you are asking for this. and it goes through there adding those. layers on top layers of encryption until. it gets where it is that and then even. the onion service doesn't know except. for the the relay it came from who it's. talking to and so it peels back that. gives you the information puts another.

layer back on and so it's it's layers. like you're peeling an onion back of the. different relays and that encryption. protects uh who the sender is and what. information they're saying the more. layers there are the more exponentially. difficult it is to decrypt it. I mean you get to a place where you. don't have to have so many layers. because it doesn't matter anymore it's. mathematically impossible to decrypt it. but yeah um you know the more relays you. have the slower it is I mean that's one. of the big drawbacks on tour is is how.

slow it operates. so how do you peel the onion. so what what are the different. methodologies for trying to get. some information from a cyber security. perspective on these operations like the. Silk Road it's very difficult people. have come up with different techniques. they're um there's been techniques to. put out in the in the news media about. how they do it um running like massive. amounts of relays and you're controlling. those relays I think I believe someone. tried that once so there's a technical.

solution and and what about social. engineering what about trying to. infiltrate. the actual humans they're using. Nah The Silk Road and trying to get in. that way. yeah I mean I I definitely could see the. way of doing that and then in this case. uh in our takedown we use that. um there was one of my partners uh Jared. Dairy again he was an HSI investigator. and he had worked his way up to be a. system admin on the site.

um so that did glean quite a bit of. information because he was he was inside. and talking to uh you know at that time. we only know it is DPR or dread pirate. Roberts uh we didn't know who who that. was yet but but we had that open. communication. um you know and one of the things you. know the technical aspects on that is. there was a jabber server that was uh. that's a communication type of. communication server. um that was being used and we knew that. Ross had his jabber set to Pacific time.

so we had a pretty good idea what what. part of the we what part of the country. was in. I mean isn't that from From dpr's. perspective from Russ's perspective. isn't that clumsy he wasn't a uh he. wasn't a big computer guy do you notice. that aspect of like the technical Savvy. of some of these guys doesn't seem to be. quite. why weren't they good at this well the. real techy Savvy ones we don't arrest we. don't get to them we don't find them.

shout out to the techie uh criminals. they're probably watching this I mean. yeah I mean you were getting a. low-hanging fruit I mean we're getting. the ones that can be caught I mean they. you know I'm sure we'll talk about it. but the anonymous case there was a guy. named AV unit he still I lose sleep over. him because I we didn't catch him we. caught everybody else we didn't catch. him. he's good though. he pops up too once in a while on the. internet and it pisses me off yeah. what's his name again AV unit that's all. I know is his AV unit AV unit yeah I got.

a funny story about about him and what. who people think he is can I actually. can we go on that brief tangent sure I. love tangents. [Laughter]. well let me ask you uh. since he's probably he or she who knows. that he we have no idea okay I mean. that's another funny story about hackers. the he she issue what's the funny story. there well one of the guys in lulsec was. a was a she was a 17 year old girl yeah. uh and uh my source in the case the the. guy Sabu that I arrested and part of it.

and you know we sat side by side for. nine months and then took down you know. the case and all that he was convinced. she was a girl and we said you know and. he was in love with her almost as at one. point it turns out to be a 35 year old. guy living in England oh so he was. convinced there's a uh yes he was. absolutely based on what exactly by. linguistic like human-based linguistic. analysis or what she she he uh whatever. you know Kayla which ended up being like.

a modification of his sister's name the. real guy's sister's name was so good at. building the backstory all these guys. and it's funny like these guys are part. of a hacking crew they social engineer. the shit out of each other yeah just to. build if one of them ever gets caught. they'll convince the everybody else that. you know they're a Brazilian uh you know. ISP owner or something like that and. that's how I'm so powerful well yeah. that social engineering aspect is part. of living a life of cyber crime or cyber. security and the offensive or defensive.

so AV unit. casca also just uh attention of. attention first that's my favorite. tangent okay. um is it possible for me to have a. podcast conversation. was somebody who hasn't been caught yet. and because they have the conversation. they still won't be caught. and is that a good idea meaning is there. a safe way for a criminal to talk to me. at a podcast. I would think so.

I would think they that someone could I. mean someone who has been living a. double life for for long enough where. you think they're not a criminal. um no no no they would have to admit. that they would say I am AV unit oh you. would want to have a conversation with. AV unit yes. um is there a way I'm just speaking from. an FBI perspective technically speaking. because I I so let me explain my. motivation or I think.

I would like to be able to talk to. people from all walks of life and. understanding criminals. understanding their mind I think is very. important. and I think there's fundamentally. something different between a criminal. who's still active versus one that's. been caught the mind just from observing. it changes. completely once you're caught you you. have a big shift in your understanding. of the world. um I mean that I do have a question.

about the ethics of having such. conversations but first technically uh. is is that is it possible. if I was technically advising you I. would say first off don't advertise it. don't the fewer people that you're gonna. tell that you're having this. conversation with the better. um and yeah you could if you do it in. person are you doing it in person would. be amazing yeah but they their face. would not be shown face would not be. yeah I mean you couldn't publish a show. for a while they'd have to put a lot of. trust in you that you are not going to.

you're going to have to alter those. tapes uh I say tapes because it's old. school you know exactly I'm sure a lot. of people just said that like oh shit. this old guy just said tape I heard of. VHS was in the 1800s I think. um but yeah yeah you could do it they'd. have to have complete faith and trust in. you that you destroy the originals after. you've altered it what about if they. don't have faith is there a way for them. to attain security.

um so uh like for me to go through some. kind of process where I meet them. somewhere where I mean you're not going. to do it without a bag over your head I. don't know if that's the life you want. to live I'm fine with a bag over my head. that's gonna take get taken out of. context but I just I think it's a worthy. effort it's a word it's worthy to go. through the hardship of that to. understand the mind of somebody I think. fundamentally conversations are a. different thing than the operation of. law enforcement understanding the mind. of a criminal I think is really.

important I don't know if you're going. to have the honest conversation that. you're looking for I mean it may sound. honest but it may not be the truth I. found most times when I was talking to. criminals it's lies mixed with half. truce uh and you you kind of it's if. they're good they can keep that story. going for long enough uh if they're not. you know you kind of see the relief in. them when you finally break that wall. down. that's the job of an interviewer if the. interviewer is good then perhaps not.

directly but through the gaps seeps out. the truth of the human being so not. necessarily the details of how they do. the operations and so on but just who. they are as a human being what their. motivations are what their ethics are. how they see the world what is good what. is evil do they see themselves as good. what do they see their motivation as do. they have a resentment what do they. think about love for the people within. their small community do they have for. example for the government or for other. nations or for other people to the.

childhood issues that led to to a. different view of the world than others. perhaps have do they have certain. fetishes like sexual and otherwise that. led to their construction of the world. they might be able to reveal some deep. flaws to the cyber security. infrastructure of our world not in. detail but like philosophically speaking. they might have. I I know you might say it's just a. narrative but they might have a kind of.

ethical concern for the well-being of. the world that they're essentially. attacking the weakness of the cyber. security infrastructure because they. believe ultimately that would lead to a. safer world. so the attacks will reveal the. weaknesses. and if they're stealing a bunch of money. that's okay because that's going to. enforce you to invest a lot more money. in defending. um yeah defending things that actually. matter you know nuclear warheads and all.

those kinds of things I mean I could I. could see if you know it's fascinating. to explore the mind of a human being. like that because. um I think it will help people. understand now of course. uh. it's still a person that's creating a. lot of suffering in the world which is a. problem so do you think ethically it's a. good thing to do. I don't I mean I I feel like I have a. fairly High. ethical bar that I have to put myself on.

and I don't think I have a problem with. it I would love to listen to it okay. great I mean not that I'm your ethical. culture here yeah but uh well that's. interesting I mean so because I thought. you would have become jaded and. exhausted by the criminal. um mind. it's funny. um you know I I'm I'm you know fast. forwarding our story I'm very good. friends with with Hector monster or the. Cebu the guy arrested.

um and he tells stories of what he did. in his past and I'm like um that actor. you know. you know but then I listened to your. episode with Brett Johnson and I was. like ah this guy's stealing money from. from the US government and Welfare fraud. and all that sort of things it just. pissed me off and I don't know why I. have that. differentiation in my head I don't know. why I think one's just oh Hector will be. Hector and then this guy just pissed me. off well you didn't feel that way about.

Hector until you probably met him well I. didn't know Hector I knew Sabu so I. hunted down Sabu and I learned about. Hector over those nine months we'll. we'll talk about this let's finish with. yeah let's return tangent to back to. attention oh. one tangent up who's AV unit I don't. know interesting so he's at the core of. anonymous he's one of the critical. people Anonymous what is known about him. there's what's known in public and what. was known because uh side with Hector.

and um he was sort of like the the set. things up guy. um so if. littlesec had like their hackers which. was Sabu and Kayla and they had their uh. their their media guy this guy topiary. uh he lived up in the northern end of. England and uh they had a few other guys. but but AV unit was the guy that set up. infrastructure so if you need a VPN in. Brazil or something like that to pop. through. um. one of the first things Hector told me. after we arrested him is that heavy unit.

was the secret service agent. and I was like oh shit. um just because he kind of lived that. lifestyle he'd be around for a bunch of. days and then all of a sudden gone for. three weeks. um and I tried to get more out of Hector. but that early on in that relationship. um you know I'm sure he was a little bit. guarded uh and maybe trying to social. engineer Me Maybe he wanted that uh that. oh shit there's law enforcement involved. in this. um and and not to say I mean I I was in. over my head with that case just the.

amount of work that was going on. um so to track them all down. um plus the 350 hacks that we came in. about just military institutions. um you know it was swimming in the deep. end. um so it was just at the end of the case. I looked back and I was like oh fuck. heavy unit I could have had them all uh. you know maybe that's the perfectionist. in me oh man well reach out somehow I. can't I won't say how right we'll have. to figure would you have them on yeah oh. my God if you just let me know just just.

talk this shit about you the whole time. that's perfect he probably doesn't even. care about me but well now he will oh. yeah because there's a certain pleasure. of a guy who's extremely good at his job. not catching another guy who's extremely. good at his job obviously better he got. away better there you go he's still. eating at you I love it you or she if I. could meet that guy one day that he or. she that'd be great I mean I have no. power. so yes Silk Road can you speak to the. scale of this thing what what just for.

people who are not familiar uh how big. was it. um and any other interesting things you. understand about its operation when it. was active so it was uh when we finally. got looking through the books and you. know the the numbers came out it's about. 1.2 billion dollars in sales it's kind. of hard with the fluctuation value of. Bitcoin at the time to come up with a. real number so you kind of pick a daily. average you know and go across so most. of the operation was done in Bitcoin. it's all done Bitcoin you you couldn't.

you had escrow accounts on you know you. came in and you put money in an escrow. account and you know it the transaction. wasn't done until the client got the the. drugs or whatever they had bought. um and then the drug dealers had sent it. in there was some talk at the time that. that the cartel was starting to sell on. there. um so that started getting a little. hairy there at the end what was the. understanding of the relationship. between organized crime like the cartels. and this kind of more ad hoc.

new age. uh Market that is the Silk Road I mean. it was all just chatter it was just you. know because like I said Jared was the. inside so we saw some of it from for the. admin sides and Ross had a lot of. private conversations with the different. people that he had advised him. um but no one knew each other I mean the. only thing the only thing that they knew. with the admins had to send an ID to. Ross had to send a picture of their. driver's license or passport which I.

always found very strange because if you. are an admin on a site that sells fake. IDs why would you send your real ID and. then why would the guy running the site. who profits from selling fake IDs. believed that it was. but fast forward tangent they were all. real IDs all the IDS that we found on. Ross's computer as the admins were the. real people's IDs what do you make of. that because I have other clumsiness. yeah low hanging fruit I guess I guess. that's what it is I mean I mean I would. have bought I mean even Ross bought.

fake IDs off the site he had federal. agents knock on his door. um you know and then he got a little. cocky about it the landscape the. Dynamics of trust is fascinating here so. you trusts certain ideas or like who do. you trust in that kind of Market what. was your understanding of the network of. trust. I have nothing anyone trust anybody you. know I mean I think Ross had his. advisors of trust but outside of that I. mean he required people to send their ID. for their trust he you know people stole.

from him uh there was there's open cases. of that. um. it's a criminal world you can't trust. anybody. what was his life like you think. lonely. can you imagine being trapped in. something like that where you the your. whole world focus on that and you can't. tell people what you do all day. could he have walked away. like someone else take over the site. just shut down either one just you. putting yourself in his shoes the. loneliness the the anxiety the just the.

growing immensity of it so walk away. with some kind of financial stability I. couldn't have made it past two days I. don't know I don't like loneliness yeah. I mean my my wife's away I probably call. her 10 12 times a day we just talk about. things you know I just you know. something crossed my mind I want to talk. about it and I'm sure she and you like. to talk to her like honestly about. everything so if you were running Silk. Road you would you wouldn't be able to. like uh hopefully I'd have a little.

protection I'd only mention to her when. we were in bed. um to have that marital uh connection. but but who knows I mean she's gonna. question why the Ferrari is outside and. things like that yeah. well I'm sure you can come up with. something why didn't he walk away it's. another question why don't criminals. walk away in these situations well I. mean I don't know every Criminal Mind. and some do I mean AV unit walked away I. mean not to go back to that son of a. bitch but there's a theme to this but.

you know uh Ross started counting his. dollars I mean he really kept track of. how much money he was making and it. started you know getting exponentially. growth I mean he I mean if he would have. stayed at it he would have probably been. one of the richest people in the world. and do you think he liked the actual. money or the fact of the number growing. I mean have you ever held a Bitcoin yeah. oh you have well he never really held. the Bitcoin can't hold it it's not real. it's not like I can give you a briefcase. of Bitcoin right like you know or. something like that like he liked the.

idea of it growing he liked the idea I. mean I think it started off as sharing. this idea but then he really did turn to. like I am the captain of the ship and. that's what goes and he was making a lot. of money and again. my interactions with Ross was about. maybe five or six hours over uh over a. two day period. um I knew DPR because I read his words. and all that I didn't really know Ross. um there was a journal found on his.

computer and so it sort of kind of gave. me a little insight. um so I don't like to do a playbook for. criminals but I'll tell you right now. don't write things down. um there was a big fad about people like. remember kids going around shooting. people with paintballs and filming it I. don't know why you would do that why. would you videotape yourself committing. crime and then publish it like if. there's one thing I've taught my. children don't record yourself doing bad. things it never goes but goes well so. you actually give advice in the other. end of logs being very useful for the. defense perspective uh for.

you know if information is useful for. being able to figure out what the. attacks were all about Vlogs are the. only reason I found Hector monstergar I. mean the the one time his uh VPN dropped. during a fox act and he says he did it. wasn't even hacking he just was sent a. link and he clicked on it and then 10. million lines of uh of logs there was. one IP address that stuck out. this is fascinating we'll explore. several angles of that so. um.

uh what was the process of bringing down. Ross and uh the Silk Road all right so. that's a long story you want the whole. thing you want to break it up let's. start at the beginning. once we had the information of the chat. logs and all that from the server. we found the server what's a chat log so. the dot onion was uh running the the. website the Silk Road was running on a. server in Iceland. how did you figure that out that was one. of the uh claims that the NSA yeah.

that's that's the one that we said that. yeah I wouldn't tell you if it was the. it's on the internet I mean the internet. has their conspiracy theories and all. that so but you figure out that's the. part of the thing you do you it's puzzle. pieces you have to put them together. yeah and look for different pieces of. information and figure out okay so you. figure out the servers in Iceland we get. a copy of it and so we start getting. clues off of that with the physical copy. of the server yeah we flew you fly over. there so you you go if you've been. Iceland if you've never been you should. definitely go to Iceland uh is it. beautiful or I love it I love it it was.

what so I'll tell you this so sorry. tangents I love this yeah so I went to. Iceland for the anonymous case then I. went to Iceland for the Silk Road case. and I was like oh shit all cyber crime. goes through Iceland. um it was just my sort of thing and I. was over there for like the third time. and I said if I ever can bring my family. here like so there's a place called. thingovar and I'm sure I'm fucking up. the name the icelandics are pissed right. now but it's where the the North. American continent play in the European. Continental plane are pulling apart and.

it's being filled in with the volcanic. uh material in the in the middle and. it's so cool like it's like one day I'll. be able to afford to bring my family. here. um and once I left just like The. Humbling and the beauty of nature just. everything man it was a different world. it was it was it was insane how great. Iceland is and so we went back and we we. rented a van and we took friends and. um we drove around the entire country. uh absolutely like a beautiful place.

like reykjavik's nice but get out of. Reykjavik as quick as you can and see. the countryside how is this place even. real well it's so new I mean that's so. you know our Rivers have been going. through here for millions of years and. flattened everything out and all that. these are these are new this is new land. being carved by these Rivers you can. walk behind a waterfall in one place. um it's it's the most beautiful place. I've ever been you understand why this. is a place where a lot of hacking is. being done because the energy is free. and it's it's cool so you have a lot of.

servers going on there server Farms you. know they're they're the energy has come. up out everybody out of the ground. geothermal. um and so and then it keeps all the. servers nice and cool so why not keep. your computers there at a cheap rate uh. I'll definitely visit for several. reasons including to uh talk to AV unit. yeah. well the servers are there but they. don't probably live there I mean that's. the interesting I mean the Pacific uh. the PST the time zones there's so many. fascinating things to explore here but.

so you I mean the European internet. cable goes through there so you know. across the Greenland then down through. Canada and all that so they have. backbone access with cheap energy and uh. free cold weather you know and beautiful. oh and beautiful yes. so chat logs on that server what what. are the. what what was in the chat logs. everything he kept them all that's. another issue if you're writing a. criminal Enterprise please don't keep up. again I'm not making a guidebook of how. to commit the perfect crime uh but you.

know we every chat he ever had and. everyone's chat it was it was like going. into Facebook of criminal activity yeah. I'm just looking at texts with Elon Musk. being part of the conversations uh I. don't know if you're familiar but. they've been made public. for the court cases going through what's. going through is going through what's. going through with Twitter I don't know. where it is. um but it made me realize that oh okay. I'm generally that's my philosophy on.

life is like anything I text or email or. say publicly or privately I should be. proud of. so I tried to kind of do that because. you basically you say don't keep chat. logs but it's very difficult. to erase chat logs from this world like. I guess if you're a criminal that should. be um. like you have to be exceptionally. competent at that kind of thing to erase. your Footprints is very very difficult. can't make one mistake all it takes is. one mistake of keeping it but but yeah I.

mean not only do you have to. be whatever you put in chat log or. whatever put an email it has to hold up. and you have to be stand behind it. publicly when it comes out but it has if. it comes out 10 years from now you have. to stand behind it I mean we're seeing. that now in today's society yeah but. that's a responsibility you have to take. really really seriously if like if I was. a parent an advising teens like you kind. of have to teach them that I I know. there's a sense like no we'll become. more accustomed to that kind of thing. but in reality nope I think in the.

future we'll still be held responsible. for the weird shit we do yeah a friend. of mine his daughter got kicked out of. college because of something she posted. in high school and the shittiest thing. for him but great for my kids great. lesson look over there and you don't. want that to happen to you yeah okay so. in the chat logs was uh useful. information like uh uh breadcrumbs of. what of information that you can then. pull out yeah great evidence and stuff. you know I mean obviously yeah a lot of.

evidence. here's a sale of this much air win. because you know Ross ended up getting. charged with Czar status on certain. things and that's there's it's a certain. weight in each type of drug that you had. like I think it was it's four or five. employees of your Empire and that you. made more than 10 million dollars and so. it's it's it's you know it's just like. the Narco track feeders get charged with. their you know uh anybody out of. Colombia you know and so and that was. primarily what he was charged with doing.

when he was arrested is the drug yeah. and he got charged with some of the. hacking tools too okay because he's in. prison what for two life sentences plus. 40 years and no possibility of parole in. the federal system there's no. possibility of parole when you have life. the only way you get out is if the. president pardons you. there's always a chance there is I think. it was close uh I heard I heard rumors. there was close uh well right so it.

depends given it's fascinating but given. the political the ideological ideas that. he represented and espoused it's it's. not out of the realm of possibility. yeah I mean I've been asked before who. you know who does he get out of prison. first or does Snowden come back into. America and I I don't know I have no. idea it just became a Russian citizen I. saw that and I said yeah I've heard a. lot of good weird theories about that. one well actually uh on another tangent. let me ask you do you think Snowden. is um.

a good or a bad person a bad person. can you make the case that he's a bad. person there's ways of being a. whistleblower and and there's there's. rules set up on how to do that. um. he didn't follow those rules I mean they. you know I'm red white and blue so I'm. pretty you know so you think his actions. were anti-American I think the results. of his actions were anti-American I. don't know if his actions or anything do. you think he could have anticipated the.

the negative consequences of his action. should we judge him by the consequences. or the ideals. of the intent of his actions I think we. all get to judge him by base our own. beliefs but I believe what he did was. wrong can you still man the case that. he's actually. a good person and good for this country. for the United States of America. as a flag bearer for the the. whistleblowers the the check on the. power of government.

yeah I mean I'm not a big government. type guy uh you know so uh you know even. that sounds weird coming from a. government guy for so many years. um but there's rules in place for a. reason I mean he put you know some of. our best capabilities. um he made them publicly available. um they really kind of set us back in. the and this isn't my world at all but. the offensive side of cyber security. right so he revealed stuff that he. didn't need to reveal in order to make. the point correct the so so you if you.

can imagine a world where he leaked. stuff that revealed the mass. surveillance efforts. and not reveal other stuff. is the mass surveillance I mean that's. the thing that uh of course there's in. the interpretation of that there's. fear-mongering but at the core that was. a real shock to people that. um it's possible for government to. collect data at scale.

it's surprising to me that people are. that shocked by it. well there's conspiracies and then. there's like actual uh evidence that. that is happening I mean it's it's a. real there's a lot of reality that. people ignore but when it hits you in. the face you realize holy shit we're. living in a new world this is this is. the new reality and we have to deal with. that reality just like you work in cyber. security I think it really hasn't hit.

most people. how fucked we all are in terms of cyber. security okay let me rephrase that how. many dangers there are in the digital. world how much under attack we all are. and how more uh intensity attacks are. getting and how difficult the defense is. and how important it is and how much we. should value it and all the different. things we should do at the small and. large scale to defend like most people. really haven't woken up they think about. privacy from tech companies they don't.

think about attacks cyber attacks people. don't think they're a Target and it's it. that message definitely have to get out. there I mean you know if you have a. voice you're a Target if of the place. you work you might be a Target you know. your husband might work at some place. you know and because now people are. working from home so they're going to. Target you know Target you to get access. to to his Network in order to get in. when that same way the idea that the US. government or any government could be. doing Mass surveillance on its citizens. is um is one that was a wake-up call.

because you could imagine the ways in. which that could um. be a uh like you could abuse the power. of that to control a citizenry for. political reasons and purposes. absolutely you know you could abuse it I. I think during in the part of the. Snowden League saw the two NSA guys were. uh moderating like their girlfriends and. there's rules in place for that those. people should be punished and for. abusing that but how else are we going.

to hear about you know terrorists that. are in the country talking about. birthday cakes. uh and you know that was a case where. that that was the trip word that that. you know we're gonna go and bomb New. York City's Subway yeah it's complicated. but it just feels like there should be. some balance of transparency there. should be a check in that power. because like you you know in the name of. the war on terror. you can sort of uh sacrifice it there is. a trade-off between security and freedom. uh but it just feels like there's a.

giant slippery slope on the sacrificing. of freedom in the name of security it's. I hear you and and you know we we live. in a world where well I live in a world. where I had to tell you exactly how when. I arrested someone I had to write a. 50-page document of how I arrested you. uh and all the probable cause I have. against you and all that well you know. bad guys are reading that they're. reading how I caught you and they're. changing the way they're doing things. they're changing their MO. um you know they're doing it to be more. secure if you know we tell people how.

we're monitoring you know how what we're. surveilling we're going to lose that I. mean the the terrorists are just going. to go a different way and I'm not trying. to again I'm not big government I'm not. trying to say that you know it's cool. that that we're monitoring the US. government's monitoring everything um. you know big text Monitor and everything. they're just monetizing it versus uh. possibly using it against you but there. is a balance and those 50 pages just. they have a lot of value. if they make your job harder. but they prevent you from abusing the.

power of the job yeah there's a balance. yeah that's a tricky balance. so the chat logs in Iceland. give you evidence of the heroin and all. the the large-scale Czar level drug. trading what else did it give you in. terms of the how to catch I gave us. infrastructure so the onion name was. actually running on a server in France.

so if you like and it only commuted. through a back Channel a VPN to connect. to the Iceland server. um there was a. Bitcoin like kind of Vault server there. was also in Iceland and I think that was. so that the admins couldn't get into the. Bitcoins the other admins that were. hired to work on the site so you could. get into the site but you couldn't touch. the money only Ross had access to that. and then you know another another big. mistake on Ross's part is he had the.

backups for everything at a data center. in Philadelphia. they'll put your infrastructure in the. United States. I mean again. let's not make a Playbook but you know. well I think these are low-hanging food. that people of confidence would know. already I agree but it's interesting. that. he wasn't competent enough to make he so. he was incompetent in certain ways yeah. I know I don't think he was a mastermind. of setting up an infrastructure that. would protect his uh his his online.

business because you know keeping chat. logs keeping a diary putting. infrastructure where it shouldn't be. um. bad decisions. how did uh you figure out that he is in. San Francisco. so we had that part with Jared that he. was on the west coast and then who again. is Jared Jerry Reagan was a he was a. partner. um in uh he he was a DHS agent. um worked for HSI Homeland Security.

investigations in Chicago uh he started. his Silk Road investigation because he. was working at O'Hare and a weird. package came in I'm coming to find out. he traced it back to Silk Road so he he. started working a Silk Road. investigation long before I started my. case and he made his way up undercover. all the way to be an admin on Silk Road. um so he was talking to Ross on a jabber. server the private jabber server private. chat communication server and uh we. noticed that Ross's.

um Time Zone on that Jabra server was. set to the West Coast so we we had. Pacific Time on there so we had a a. region 124th of the world was covered of. where we thought we might be and from. there how do you get to San Francisco. there was another guy an IRS agent that. was part of the team and he used a. powerful tool. um to find uh his clue he used the world. of Google he simply just went back and. Googled around for uh Silk Road at the.

time it was coming up and found some. posts on like some help forums that this. guy was starting an onion website and. wanted some cryptocurrency help and if. you could help him please reach out to. ross.albrick gmail.com in my world. that's a clue. so okay so that that's as simple as that. yeah and the the name he used on that. post was Frosty yeah so he had to. connect Frosty and other uses in Frosty.

and here's a Gmail and the Gmail has the. name the Gmail posted that that I need. help under the name Frosty on this forum. so what's the connection of Frosty. elsewhere. the person logging into the Philadelphia. backup server the name of the computer. was Frosty yeah. another clue in my world and that's it. the name is there the connection to the. Philadelphia server and then to Iceland. is there and so the rest is small.

details in terms of uh or is there. interesting details no I mean there's. some electronic surveillance the find. Ross Albrecht living in a house and is. there you know is a computer on his. house attaching to uh uh you know does. it have tour traffic at the same time. the dpr's on. um another big clue. matching up time frames. again just putting your email out there. putting your name out there like that. like what I see from that just at the.

scale of that market what would I what. it just makes me wonder how many. criminals are out there that are not. making these little hanging fruit. mistakes and are still successfully. operating it to me it seems like you. could be a criminal. much it's much easier to be a criminal. on the internet. what else to you is interesting to. understand about that case of Ross and. a Silk Road and just the history of it. from your own. relationship with it from a cyber.

security perspective from an ethical. perspective all that kind of stuff like. when you look back what's interesting to. you about that case. I think my views on the case have. changed over time I mean it was my job. back then. um so I just looked at it as of you know. I'm going after this I sort of made a. name for myself in the Bureau for the. anonymous case and then this one was. just I mean this was a bigger deal I. mean they flew me down to DC to meet. with the director about this case.

um the president United States was going. to announce this case the arrest. unfortunately the government shut down. two days before so it was just us and. that's really the only reason I had any. publicity out of it is because the. government shut down and the only thing. that went public was that affidavit with. my signature at the end otherwise it. would have just been the the attorney. general and the president announcing the. rest of this this big thing and you. wouldn't have seen me did you understand. that this is a big case yeah I knew them. all yeah they knew at the time was it. because of the scale of it or what it.

stood for. I just knew that the public was going to. react in a big way like the media was. now did I think that it was going to be. on the front page of every newspaper and. the day after the arrest no but I could. sense it like I went like three or four. days without sleep. um when I was out in San Francisco to. arrest Ross I had sent three guys to. Iceland to um so it was a three-prong. approach for the takedown it was get. Ross get the Bitcoins and seize the site. like we didn't want someone else taking. control of the site and we wanted that.

big splash of that Banner like look look. the government found this site like you. might not want to think about doing this. again. so and you were able to pull off all. three maybe that's my superpower I'm. really good about putting smarter people. on than I am uh to gathering on the. right things. um you know the only way to do it in the. business I formed that's what I did I. hired only smarter people than me and I. you know I'm not that smart but you know. uh smart enough to know who the smart. people are the team was able to do all. three yeah we were able to get all three. done.

um yeah and the one guy one of the guys. the main guys I sent to Iceland man he. was so smart like I sent another guy. from the FBI to. um. to France to get that part and he. couldn't do it so the guy in Iceland did. it from from Iceland he had to pull some. stuff out of memory on a computer. um you know he's it's live process stuff. I'm sure you've done that before but. uh I'm sure you did look look what. you're doing you're this is like a. multi-layer interrogation going on uh.

was there a concern that somebody else. would step in and control the site. absolutely we we didn't have Insight on. who exactly I control so it turns out. that Russ had like dictatorial control. so he it wasn't easy to delegate to. somebody else he hadn't I think he had. some sort of ideas I mean his diary. talked about walking away and giving it. to somebody else but he didn't uh he. couldn't give up that control on anybody. apparently. which makes you think that power. corrupts and his ideals were not as.

strong as he espoused about because if. if it was about the freedom of being. able to buy drugs. if you want to. then he surely should have found ways to. delegate that power we changed over time. you could see it in his writings. um that he changed like so. people will argue back and forth that. there was never murders on Silk Road. when we were doing the investigation to. us there were six murders. um so there there was the way we see him.

saw him at the time was Ross ordered. people to be murdered. um you know somebody people stole from. him and all that it was sort of an. evolution from oh man I can't deal with. this I can't do it it's too much to the. last one was like the guy said uh well. he's got three roommates uh it's like oh. we'll kill them too was that ever proven. in court no the murders never went. forward because there was some uh some. stuff problems in that case so there was.

a separate case in Baltimore uh that. they had been working on for a lot. longer and so you know during the. investigation that caused a bunch of. problems because now we have multiple. federal agencies a case against the same. thing how do you decide not to push. forward the the the the murder. investigations so there was a. deconfliction meeting that happened in. DC see I didn't happen to go to that. meeting but Jared went this is before I. ever knew Jared and. um we have like um televisions where we.

can just sit in a room and sit in on the. meeting. um but it's all you know security. network and all that so we can talk. openly about uh secure things. um and we sat in on the meeting and. people just kept saying the term Sweat. Equity I've got Sweat Equity meaning. that they had worked on the case for so. long that they deserve to take them down. um and the by this time you know no one. knew about us but we told them at the.

meeting that we had found the server and. we have a copy of it and we have the. infrastructure. um and and these guys had just had. Communications Undercovers they didn't. really know what was going on and this. wasn't my first deconfliction meeting we. had a huge deconliction meeting during. um during the anonymous case what's the. deconfliction mean agents within your. agency or other other federal agencies. these have an open investigation that if. you expose your case or took down your. case would hurt their case or the other. call so you kind of have a it's like the.

rival gangs meet at the table in a. smoke-filled room and uh less bullets at. the end but yes. oh boy with the Sweat Equity yeah so I. mean there's I hope careers at stake. right yeah you hate that idea yeah I. mean why would you why is that a stake. just because you've worked on it long. enough longer than I have that means you. get you you you did better yeah that's. that's insane to me the the that's. rewarding bad behavior and so that one. of the part of The Sweat Equity.

discussion was about murder and this was. here's a chance to actually bust them. and be given the data you have from. Iceland and all that kind of stuff so. why well they wanted us to turn the data. over to them to them yeah thanks thanks. for getting us this far here it is I. mean it came to the point where they. sent us like they they had a picture of. what they thought Ross was and it was an. internet meme it really was a meme it. was a photo that we could look up like. it was insane all right so there's. different degrees the competence all.

across the world between different. people yes okay uh does part of you. regret because you push forward the the. heroin and the drug trade we never got. to the murder discussion I mean the only. regretting is that the the internet. doesn't seem to understand like they. they just kind of blow that part off. that that he literally paid people to. have people murdered it didn't result in. a murder and I thank God no one resulted. in a murder but that's where his mind. was his mind and where he wrote in his.

diary was that I had people killed and. here's the money he paid it he he paid a. large amount of Bitcoins uh to for that. murder didn't just even think about it. he actually took action but the murders. never happened he took action by paying. the money correct and the people came. back with results he thought they were. murdered. that said can you understand and steal. me on the case for the drug trade on. Silk Road. like making can you make the case that. it's a net positive for society.

so there was a time period of when we. found out the infrastructure. and when we built the case against Ross. I don't remember exactly. six weeks a month two months I don't. know somewhere in there. um but then at Ross ascendancing there. was a father that stood up and talked. about his son dying and I went back and. kind of did the math and it was between. those time periods of when we knew we. could shut it down we could have pulled. the plug on the server and gone and when. Ross was arrested uh his son died from.

buying drugs until ground and. I still think about that father a lot. but if we look at scale at the War on. Drugs. let's just even outside of Silk Road do. you think the War on Drugs. by the United States. has caused. has alleviated more suffering or caused. more suffering in the world. that might be above my pay scale I mean. I understand the other side of the. argument I mean people said that I don't.

have to go down to the corner to buy. drugs I'm not going to get shot on the. corner buying drugs or something I can. just have them sent to my house people. are going to do drugs anyways I. understand that argument. um from my personal standpoint if I made. it more difficult for my children to get. drugs that I'm satisfied so your. personal philosophy is that if we. legalize all drugs including heroin and. cocaine that that would not make for a. better world. I don't no personally I don't believe. legalizing all drugs would make make for.

a better world can you imagine. that it would. do you understand that argument sure I. mean as I've gotten older I've started. to I like to see both sides of an. argument and when I can't see the other. side I that's when I really like to dive. into it and I can see the other side I. can see the why people would say that. um but I don't want to be my group race. children in a world where where drugs. are just free for for use well and then. the other side of it is with Silk Road.

did uh. you know taking down Silk Road did that. increase or decrease the number of uh. drug trading criminals in the world it's. unclear online I think it increased I. think uh you know that is one of the. things I think about a lot with Silk. Road was that no one really knew I mean. There Was You Know thousands of users. but then after that it was on the front. page of the paper and there was millions. of people that knew about Tor and onion. sites it was an advertisement.

um you know I would have thought I. thought crypto was going to crash right. after that like I don't know like what. people are now see that bad people are. doing bad things with crypto that'll. crash well I'm obviously wrong on that. one uh and I thought you know Ross was. sentenced to two life sentences plus 40. years no one's gonna start up these dark. markets exploded after that yeah. um you know some of them started as you. know opportunistic I'm gonna you know. take those escrow accounts and I'm gonna. steal all the all the money they came in. you know they were for that but you know. but there were a lot of dark markets.

that popped up after that now we put. playbook out there. yeah. yeah but and also there's a case for uh. do you ever think about not taking down. if you have not taken down Silk Road you. could use it because it's a market. it itself is not necessarily the primary. criminal organization it's a market for. criminals so it could be used to track. down criminals in the physical world. so if you don't take it down given that.

it was you know the central how. centralized it was it could be used as a. place to find criminals right as opposed. to dealers the drug dealers yeah so if. you have the card get the cartels start. get to involved you go after the dealers. it would have been very difficult. because it tore and because of all the. Productions anonymity de-cloaking all. that would have been. drastically more difficult and a lot of. people in upper management the FBI.

didn't have the appetite of running. something like that that would have been. the FBI running a drug Market how many. how many kids how many fathers would. have to come in and said my kid bought. well the FBI was running a site a drug. site my kid died so I didn't know. anybody in the FBI in management they. would have the appetite to let us run. what was happening on Silk Road. um you know because remember that time. we still believe in six people are dead. we're still investigating you know where. the hell are these bodies. um you know that's pretty much why we.

took down Ross when we did I mean we had. to jump on it fast. what else can you say about this. complicated world that has grown of the. dark web. I don't understand it I I like it would. have been a something for me I I thought. I thought it was going to collapse but. I mean it's just gotten bigger in what's. going out there now I'm really surprised. and that it hasn't grown into other. networks or people haven't developed. other networks but but you mean like. instead of tour yeah tor's still the.

main one out there I mean there's some. there's a few others and I'm not gonna. put an advertisement up for them but uh. but you know I thought that market would. have grown yeah my sense was when I. interacted with Tori was that there's. huge usability issues but that's for. like legal activity yeah because like if. you care about privacy it's just not as. good of a browser like uh it's to to to. to look at stuff no it's way too slow. it's way too slow but I mean you can't. even like I know some people use it to.

like view movies like Netflix so you can. only view certain movies in certain. countries you can use it for that but. it's it's too slow even for that so. were you ever able to hold in your mind. the landscape of the dark web like what. what's going on out there it's a to me. as a human being it's just difficult. to understand the digital world like. these Anonymous usernames. like doing Anonymous activity it's just. it's hard to um. what am I trying to say it's hard to.

visualize it in the way I can visualize. like I've been reading a lot about. Hitler I can visualize meetings between. people military strategy uh deciding on. uh certain evil atrocities all that kind. of stuff I can visualize the people. there's agreements hands handshakes. stuff signed groups built like in the. digital space like with Bots with. anonymity anyone human can be multiple. people uh it's just yeah it's all lies.

it's all lies like yeah it feels like I. can't trust anything no you can't you. honestly can't and like you can talk to. two different people and it's the same. person like like there's so many. different you know Hector had so many. different identities online that you. know of things that the you know the. lies to each other I mean he lied to. people inside his group uh just to use. another name to spy on make sure what. they're you know we're talking shit. behind his back or weren't doing. anything. um it's all lies and people that can. keep all those lies straight it's. unbelievable to me Ross Albrecht.

represents the very early days of that. that's why the the competence wasn't. there. just imagine how good the people are now. the kids that grow up oh they've learned. from his his mistakes. just the extreme competence you just see. how good people are in video games like. the level of uh play in terms of video. games like I I used to think I sucked. and now I'm not even. like I'm not even in the like.

consideration of calling myself shitty. at video games I'm not even I'm like. non-existent I'm like uh the mold yeah I. stopped playing but it's so embarrassing. it's embarrassing it's like wrestling. with your kid and you finally beats you. and he's like well fuck that I'm not. wrestling my kid anymore ever again and. in some sense hacking uh at its best and. it's worse is a kind of game and you can. get exceptionally good at that kind of. game. and you get the accolations of it I mean. there's you know there's power that. comes along if you have success I look.

at the kid that was hacking into Uber. and Rockstar Games he put it out there. that he was doing it I mean he used the. name. um whatever hacked into Uber was his. screen name he was very proud of it I. mean one building evidence against. himself uh but you know they he wanted. that slap on the back like look at what. a great hacker you are yeah what do you. think is in the mind of that. guy what do you think is in the mind of. of us do you think they see themselves. as good people. do they do you think they acknowledged.

the bad they're doing around to the. world. so so that Uber hacker I think that's. just youth I mean not realizing what. consequences are I mean based on his. actions Ross was a little bit older. um I think I'd Rush truly. is a Libertarian he was truly had his. beliefs that that he could provide. the Gateway for other people to live. that libertarian lifestyle and put in. their body what they want uh I I don't. think that was a front or a lie what's. the difference between uh DPR and Rossi.

said like I have never met Ross until I. have only had those two uh to two days. of worth of interaction yeah it's just. interesting given how long you've chased. him and then having met him what was the. difference to you as a human being he. was a human being he was he was you know. he was an actual person he was nervous. when we arrested him. um so one of the things that that I I. learned through my law enforcement. career is if I'm going to be the case. Asian I'm going to be the one in charge. of you know dealing with this person I'm. not putting handcuffs on it someone else.

is going to do that like I'm gonna be. there to help him uh you know I'm your. conduit to help and so you know right. after someone's arrested you obviously. you've had him down for weapons to make. sure for every safety but then I just. put my hand on their chest just feel. their heart feel their breathing you're. gonna it's I'm sure it's the scariest. day but then to have that. human contact kind of settles people. down and you can kind of let's start. thinking about this I'm going to tell. you you know I'm going to be open and. honest with you you know there's a lot. of cops out there and federal agents.

cops that just go to the hard ass tactic. you don't get very far with that you. don't get very far being a mean asshole. to somebody you know be compassionate be. human uh and it's going to go a lot. further so given everything he's done. you are still able to have a compassion. for him yeah we took him to the jail and. we we so he it was after hours so he. didn't get to see a judge that day so. you stick we stuck him in the San. Francisco jail. um I hadn't slept for about four days. because I was dealing with people in.

Iceland bosses in DC bosses in New York. so I and I was in San Francisco so time. frame like like the Iceland people were. calling me when I was supposed to be. sleeping it was insane but I still went. out that night while Ross sat in jail. and bought him breakfast I said what do. you want for breakfast I'll have a nice. breakfast for you because we picked him. up in the morning and took him over to. the FBI to do the the FBI booking the. fingerprints and all that and and I got. him breakfast I mean and you don't get. paid back for that sort of thing I'm not. looking but out of my own did he make.

special requests for breakfast yeah he. asked for certain things like team. mentioners that top secret FBI not top. secret I I think you want us some. granola bars like and and you know but I. mean he already had lawyered up so we. you know which is his right you can do. that so I I knew we weren't gonna work. together you know like I did with Hector. um but I mean this is. most of the conversations have to be. them with lawyers from that point on I. can't question him yeah when he asked. for a lawyer.

um or if I did it wouldn't be used. against him. um so we just had conversation where I. talked to him yeah you know he could you. know could say things to me but then I. would remind him that he asked for a. lawyer and he'd have to waive that and. all that but we didn't talk about his. case so much we just talked about like. human beings did he um. with his eyes with his words. um reveal any kind of regret or did you. see a human being changing understanding. something about themselves in the. process of being caught. no I don't think that I mean he did.

offer me 20 million dollars to let him. go when we were driving to the the jail. oh no and I asked him what I was gonna. we were gonna do with the agent that sat. in the front seat the money really broke. him huh I think so I think he kind of. got caught up in how much money it was. and and how you know when crypto started. it was pennies and by the time he got. arrested it was 120 bucks and you know I. mean 177 000 Bitcoins even today you. know that's a lot of Bitcoins so you.

really could have been if you continued. to be one of the richest people in the. world I I possibly could have been if I. took that that 20 million then I could. have been living we could have this. conversation in Venezuela uh. in a castle in a palace yeah until it. runs out and then uh and then the. government storms the castle Yeah. have you talked to Russ since no no I I. would I'd be open to it I don't think he. probably wants to hear from me and do. you know where in which prison he is. I think he's somewhere out in Arizona I.

know he was in the one next to super max. for a little while like the the high. security one that's like shares the. fence with super max but I don't think. he's there anymore I think he's out in. Arizona I I haven't seen in a while I. wonder if you can do interviews in. prison that'll be nice some some people. are allowed to so I don't I've not seen. an interview with him I know people have. wanted to interview him about books and. that sort of thing right because the. story really blew up did it surprised. you how much the story. and many elements of it blew up movies.

it did surprise me like it my wife's. uncle who I didn't I've been married my. wife for 22 years now I don't think he. knew my name and he was excited about. that he reached out when Silk Road came. out so he you know that was surprising. to say did you think the movie was uh on. the on the topic was good I didn't have. anything to do with that movie I've. watched it once it was kind of cool that. Jimmy Simpson you know was my name in. the movie but outside of that I thought. it sort of missed the mark on some. things when Hollywood I don't think they.

understand what's interesting about. these kinds of stories and there's a lot. of things that are interesting and they. missed all of them so for example I. recently talked to John Carmack all. right who's a world-class developer and. so on so Hollywood would think that the. interesting thing about John Carmack is. some kind of like. uh shitty like a parody of a hacker or. something like that that would show like. really uh crappy like uh emulation of.

some kind of Linux terminal thing the. reality is like the technical details. for five hours with him for 10 hours. with him is what people actually want to. see even people that don't program they. want to see a brilliant mind the the. details that they're not they even if. they don't understand all the details. they want to have an inkling of the. genius there that's just one way I'm. saying like that you want to reveal the. the genius the complexity of that world. in interesting ways and to make a. Hollywood almost parody caricature of it.

it just destroys the spirit of the thing. so one. um. the operation FBI is fascinating. just tracking down these people do on. the cyber security front is fascinating. the other is just how you run. tour how you run this kind of. organization the trust issues of the. different criminal entities involved the. anonymity uh the. uh the law hanging fruit being shitty at. certain parts on the technical front all.

those are fascinating things and you. know that's that's what a movie should. reveal should probably be a series. honestly a Netflix series than a movie. yeah maybe one on an fx show or. something like that because it was kind. of gritty you know yeah yeah pretty yeah. exactly gritty I mean uh shows like. Chernobyl from HBO made me realize okay. you can do a good job of a difficult. story and and like reveal the human side. but also reveal the technical side and. have some deep profound understanding on. that case on the bureaucracy of a of a.

of a Soviet regime in this case you. could reveal the bureaucracy the chaos. of a criminal organization of uh law. enforcement organization I mean there's. so much to like explore it's fascinating. I don't know yeah I like Chernobyl when. I re-watch it I can't watch episode. three though the the the animals the. episode they go around shooting all the. dogs and all that I gotta skip that part. big soft yeah I really am yeah I'm sure. I'll probably cry at some point. I love it I love it listen don't get me.

talking about that episode you made. about your grandmother oh my God that. was rough just to linger on this ethical. versus legal question what do you think. about people like Aaron Schwartz I don't. know if you're familiar with him but uh. he was somebody. uh who broke the law in the name of an. ethical ideal he uh downloaded and. released. um academic Publications that were. behind a paywall and. um he was arrested for that and then.

committed suicide and a lot of people. see him certainly in the MIT Community. but throughout the world as a hero. because. you look at the way knowledge scientific. knowledge is being put behind paywalls. it does seem somehow unethical. and he basically. broke the law. to do the ethical thing. now you could challenge it maybe it is.

unethical but that you know there's a. gray area and to me at least it is. ethical to me at least he is a hero. because I'm familiar with the paywall. created by uh the institutions that hold. these Publications they're adding very. little value. so it is basically holding hostage the. work of millions of brilliant scientists. um for for some kind of honesty a a.

crappy capitalist institution like. they're not actually making that much. money it doesn't make any sense to me it. should to me it should all be open of. Public Access uh there's no reason it. shouldn't be all publication should be. so he stood for that ideal. and um. and was punished harshly for it that's. the other criticism was too harshly and. of course. uh deeply unfortunately that also led to.

a suicide because he was also tormented. on many levels I mean do you are you. familiar with him what do you think. about that line between what is legal. and what is ethical. so it's tough It's a tough case I mean. the the outcome was tragic obviously. um. unfortunately when you're in law. enforcement you you have to your job is. to enforce the laws I mean you just not. if if you're told that you have to do a. certain case you know and there is a. violation of at the time you know 18 USC.

10 10 30 computer hacking. um. you have to press forward with that I. mean that you have to charge the you you. bring the case to the university office. and whether they're going to press. charges or not you know you can't. you can't really pick and choose what. you press and don't press for it I never. felt that at least that flexibility not. in the FBI I mean maybe if you when. you're a street cop and you pull. somebody over you can let them go with a. warning so the FBI you're sitting in a. room but you're also you're also a human.

being you have compassion you're. arrested Ross and the hand on the chest. I mean that's that's a human thing sure. so there's a but I'm I can't be the jury. for whether it was a good hack or a bad. hack. it's all someone a victim has come. forward and said we're the victim of. this and I agree with you because again. I like the basis of the internet was to. share academic thought yeah I mean. that's where the internet was born but. it's not it's not up to you so the the. role of the FBI.

is to enforce the law correct. and you know there's a there's a limited. number of tools on our on our Batman. belt that we can use. um you know not to get into all the. aspects of the Trump case in Mar-A-Lago. and the documents there I mean the the. FBA has so many tools they can use in a. search warrant is the only way they. could get in there I mean that's it it's. a you know there's no other legal. document or legal way to enter and get. those documents what do you think about. the.

the FBI and Mar-A-Lago and the FBI. taking the documents for Donald Trump. you know it's a tough spot I it's a. really tough spot the the FBI's got a. lot of black guys. um you know recently. um and I don't know if it's the same FBI. that I I remember when I was there do. you think they deserve it in part. was it done clumsily the the their. rating of uh the former president's. residence. yeah. um. it's tough It's you know because again.

they're only limited to what they're. allowed what they're legally allowed to. do in a search warrant is the only legal. way of doing it. um I have my personal and political. views on certain things. um you know and and I think it might yes. it might be surprising to somewhere. those political. point stand but uh you told me Offline. that you're a hardcore communist that. was very strange very surprising to me. well that's only you try to bring me. into the Communist Party exactly I was. trying to recruit you giving you all.

kinds of Flyers. um. okay but. um you said like you know people in the. FBI is just following the law but. there's a chain of command and so on uh. what do you think about the conspiracy. theories that people some small number. of people inside the FBI conspired to. undermine the presidency of Donald Trump. if you would have asked me when I was. inside and before all this happened I. would say it could never happen I I. don't believe in conspiracies you know. there's too many people involved that. somebody's going to come out with some.

sort of information but I mean from the. more the stuff that comes out it's. surprising that you know agents are. being fired because of certain actions. they're taken inside. um and being dismissed because of. politically motivated actions. so do you think it's explicit or just. pressure just do you think there could. exist just pressure at the higher ups uh. that has a political leaning and you. kind of maybe don't explicitly order any. kind of thing but just kind of pressure. people to lean one way or the other and.

and then create a culture that leans one. way or the other based on political. leanings you would really really hope. not but I mean that's seems to be the. narrative that's being written. but when you were operating you didn't. feel that pressure. man I was searched at a low level you. know I had no aspirations of being a. boss I wanted to be a case agent my. entire life she loved the puzzle of it. by the the chase I love solving things. yeah yeah to be management and manage. people and all that and like no desire.

whatsoever. what do you think about Mark Zuckerberg. on Joe Rogan's podcast saying that the. FBI warned Facebook about potential. foreign interference. uh and then Facebook. inferred from that that they're talking. about Hunter Biden laptop story and. thereby censored it what do you think. about that whole story. again you asked me when I was in the FBI. I wouldn't believed it from being on the. inside I wouldn't believe these things.

but there's a certain narrative being. written that is surprising to me that. the FBI is involved in these stories so. but the interesting thing there is. the FBI is saying that they didn't. really make that implication they're. saying that there's interference. activity happening just watch out and. it's a weird relationship between FBI. and Facebook you could see from the best. possible interpretation that the FBI. just wants Facebook to be aware because. it is a powerful platform a platform for. viral spread of misinformation so.

in the best possible interpretation of. it it makes sense for FBI to send some. information saying like we we're seeing. some shady activity absolutely but it. seems like all of that somehow escalated. to a political interpretation I mean. yeah it sounded like there was a wink. wink with it. um the the I don't know if Mark. meant for that to be that way you know. like again are we being social. engineered or was that a true uh you. know expression that Mark had and I.

wonder if the wink wink is direct or. it's just culture really you know maybe. certain people responsible on the. Facebook side and lean have a certain. political lean and then certain people. on the FBI side have a political lean. when they're interacting together and. it's like literally has nothing to do. with the giant conspiracy theory but. just with a culture that has a. particular uh political lean during a a. particular time in history and so like. uh maybe it could be a hunter buying.

laptop one time and then it could be uh. whoever uh Donald Trump Jr's uh laptop. uh another time it's a tough job I mean. if you're the liaison if you're the. FBI's liaison to Facebook uh uh you know. there there's certain people that I'm. sure they were offered a position at. some point it seems we you know there's. FBI agents say goat I know I know a. couple that's gone to Facebook there's a. really good Agent that now leads up. their child exploitation stuff.

um. another Squad mate runs their internal. investigations both great investigators. so you know there's good money. especially when you're an FBI agent. that's capped out at a you know a 1310. or whatever whatever pay scale you're. capped out at. um it's it's alluring to to be you know. maybe want to please them and uh and and. be asked to to join them yeah. and over time that corrupts. I think there has to be an introspection. in tech companies about the culture that.

they develop about the um the political. ideology the bubble it's interesting to. see that bubble like I've um asked. myself. a lot of questions I've interviewed the. Pfizer CEO. um what seems now a long time ago. and I've gotten a lot of criticism uh. the positive comments but also criticism. from that conversation and I did a lot. of soul searching about the kind of. bubbles we have in this world and it.

makes me wonder. pharmaceutical companies. they all believe. they're doing good. and I wonder. because the the idea they have is to. create drugs that help people and do so. at scale. and it's hard to know at which point. that can be corrupted it's hard to know. when it was corrupted and if it was. corrupted and where which which drugs.

and which companies and so on. and I don't know I don't know that. complicated it seems like inside a. bubble you can convince yourself if. anything is good uh people inside the. the Third Reich regime were able to. convince themselves I'm sure many just. um bloodlands is another book I've been. really recently reading about it and the. ability of humans to convince they're. doing good when they're clearly. murdering and torturing people in front. of their eyes. is fascinating.

they're able to convince themselves. they're doing good it's crazy. like there's not even a inkling of Doubt. um yeah that I don't I don't know what. to make of that so. um it has taught me to be a little bit. more careful when I enter into different. bubbles. to um. be skeptical about what's taken as an. assumption of Truth. like you always have to be skeptical. about like what's assumed is true is it. possible it's not true.

um you know if you're doing if you're. talking about the America. uh it's assumed that uh you know in. certain places that surveillance is good. well let's let's question that uh that's. that assumption. um yeah and I I also it inspired me to. question my own assumptions that I I. hold this true. constantly uh constantly it's tough it's. tough but you don't grow I mean do you. want to be just static and not grow you. have to question yourself on some of.

these things if you want to grow as a. person. yeah for sure uh one of the tough things. actually of being a public personality. when you speak publicly is you get. attacked. all along the way as you're growing. right and and um uh in part a big softy. as well if I may say and those heart it. hurts it hurts it hurts do you pay. attention to it. yeah. um yeah yeah yeah it's very hard like I. have two choices one you can uh shut.

yourself off from the world and ignore. it I've I never found that compelling. this kind of idea of like Haters Gonna. Hate yeah like uh. this idea that uh anyone with a big. platform or anyone's ever done anything. was always gotten hate you know okay. maybe but like I still want to be. vulnerable where my heart and my sleeve. really show myself like open myself to. the world really listen to people and. that means every once in a while.

somebody will say something that touches. me in a way that's like. what if they're right do you let that. hate influence you I mean can you be. bullied into a different opinion than. you think you really are just because of. that hate no no I believe not but. it hurts in a way that's hard to explain. like um. yeah it just it gets to like a. it shakes your faith in humanity. actually is is probably why it hurts. like um.

people that um. call me a Putin apologist or as a. landscape apologist which I'm currently. getting almost an equal amount of. but it hurts. it hurts because I. um it hurts because it like it it. damages slightly my faith in humanity to. be able to see. um. the love that connects us and then to. see that I'm trying to find that.

and that's I'm doing my best in the in. the limited capabilities I have to find. that and so to call me something uh like. a bad actor essentially from whatever. perspective it just makes me realize. well. um people don't have empathy and. compassion for each other it makes me. question that for a brief moment and. that that's like a crack and it hurts. how many people do this to your face. foreign.

I have to be honest that uh it's it. happens yeah because I've hung around. with uh with Rogan enough. when your platform grows there's people. that will come up to Joe and say stuff. to his face. that they forget they they still. um they forget he's actually a real. human being. they'll they'll make accusations about. him so does that cause him to wall. himself off more no he's uh he's pretty. gangster on that but uh yeah it still.

hurts if you're if you're human if. you've really um. feel others I think that's also the. difference with with Joe and me he has a. his family that he deeply loves and. that's an escape from the world form. um there's a loneliness in me that's I'm. always longing to connect with people. and with like regular people and like. just to to learn their stories and so on. and so if you open yourself up that way. the things they tell you can really hurt.

in every way like uh just have me going. to Ukraine just seeing so much loss and. death. some of it is like. uh is I mean unforgettably haunting not. in some kind of political way activist. way or uh who's right who's wrong way. but just like. man like so much pain you see it just. stays with you when you see a human. being bad to another human you can't get.

rid of that in your head. you can't imagine that you that that we. can treat each other like that that's. the hard part I think I mean it is it. that for me it is. when I saw parents like when I did the. child exploitation stuff when they. rented their children out they literally. rented infant children out to others for. sexual gratification. like I don't know how a human being. could do that to another human being. and that that sounds like the kind of. thing you're going through I mean I went. through a huge Funk when I did those.

cases afterwards I should have talked to. somebody but in the FBI you have to keep. that machismo up or they're gonna take. your gun away from you well I think. that's examples of evil. um. that that's like the worst of human. nature but I just like just because I. have war is just as bad I mean somehow. War. it's somehow understandable given all. the very intense propaganda that's. happening.

so it's you can understand. um. that there is love in the heart of the. soldiers on each side given the. information they're given there's a lot. of people on the Russian side believe. they're saving these Ukrainian cities. from Nazi occupation. uh now there is stories. uh there is a lot of evidence of people. for fun murdering civilians now that. that is closer to the things you've.

experienced of like evil yeah. um of evil embodied and I haven't. interacted with with that directly with. people who for fun murdered civilians. which you know it's there in the world I. mean you're not naive to it yes but if. you experience that directly if somebody. shot somebody for fun in front of me. that would probably break me yeah like. seeing yourself knowing that it exists. is different than seeing it yourself. now I've interacted with victims of that.

and they tell me stories and you see. their homes destroyed destroyed for no. good military reason it's civilians with. civilian holes being destroyed that. really lingers with you but some yeah. the people that are capable of that but. that goes with the propaganda I mean if. you were to build a story you have to. you know you have to have on the other. side you know the homes are going to be. destroyed the non-military targets are. going to be destroyed to put it in.

perspective I'm not sure a lot of people. understand the Deep human side or even. the military strategy side of this war. there's a lot of experts outside of the. situation that are commenting on it with. certainty and that kind of hurts me. because I feel like there's a lot of. uncertainty there's so much propaganda. it's very difficult to know what is true. yeah so so my whole Hope was. to travel to Ukraine to travel to Russia. to talk to soldiers to talk to leaders.

to talk to real people that have lost. homes that have lost family members that. uh who this war has divided who this war. changed completely how they see the. world uh whether they have love or hate. in their heart to understand their. stories. um I've learned a lot on The Human Side. to things by having talked to a lot of. people there but it has been on the. Ukrainian side for me currently. traveling to the Russian side is more. difficult. foreign. let me ask you about your now friend can.

we go as far as it says friend uh in. asabu and Hector massager. what's the uh what's what's the story. what's your long story with him can you. tell me about. what is LOL sec. who is Sabu. and who's Anonymous what is anonymous. where's the right place to start that. story probably anonymous anonymous is a. was a decent it still is I guess a. decentralized organization uh they call.

themselves headless but once you look. into them a little ways they're not. really headless. um the the power struggle comes with. whoever has a hacking ability. um that might be you're a good hacker or. you have a giant bot net used for DDOS. um so so you're gonna wield more power. if you can control where it goes. Anonymous started doing their like. hacktivism stuff in 2010 or so. um the word hack was in the media all. the time then.

um and then right around then there's a. federal contractor named HB Gary Federal. the the CEO is Aaron Barr and Aaron Barr. said he was going to come out and. de-anonymize anonymous. he's gonna come out and talk at. blackhead or Defcon or one of those and. say you know who they are he figured it. out or so he could figure it out by. based on uh you know when people are. online when people were in IRC when. tweets came out it was there was no. scientific proof behind it or anything. uh so he's just gonna falsely name. people that were that were in anonymous.

so Anonymous went on the attack they. went and hacked an ATV HPA Federal and. they turned his life upside down they. took over his Twitter account and all. that stuff. um pretty quickly so I have very mixed. feelings about all of this okay I get. like part of me. admires the positive side of the. hacktivism okay. is there no room for admiration there of. the fuck you to the man not at the time.

again it was the violation the 18 USC 10. 30. so it was my job that's what I you. know so at the time no in retrospect. sure. yeah but uh uh what was the philosophy. of the hacktivism was it the. philosophically were they at least. expressing it for the good of humanity. or no they outwardly said that they were. going to go after people that they. thought were corrupt so they were. judging jury on corruption they were to. go after it. once you get on inside and realize what.

they were doing they were going after. people that they had an opportunity to. go after. um so maybe someone had a zero day and. then they searched for servers running. that zero day and then from there let's. find a Target I mean one time they went. after a toilet paper company I still. don't understand what that toilet paper. company did but it was an opportunity to. make a splash is there some somewhere. for the joke for the lulls it developed. into that so I think the hacktivism and. the anonymous stuff wasn't so much for. the LOLs.

um but from that HP gear Federal hack. then there were six guys that worked. well together and they formed a crew a. hacking crew and they kind of split off. into their own private channels and that. was lol SEC or laughing at your security. was their motto. so that's. l-u-l-z-s-e-c Luz SEC of course it is. sex and uh. who founded that organization so Kayla. and Sabu were the hackers of the group.

and so they really did all the work on. HP Gary so these are code names yeah. they're online names they're they're. Knicks. um and so you know they they and they. that's all they knew each other as. you know they talk to us as those names. um and they worked well together and so. they formed a hacking crew and that's. when they started the the at first they. didn't name it this was the 50 days of. LOLs where they would just release. major major breaches. um and it stirred up the media I mean it.

put hacking in on in the media every day. uh they had 400 or 500 000 Twitter. followers. um you know and it was kind of. interesting. um but then they started swinging at the. Beehive and they they took out some FBI. Affiliated sites uh and then they. started uh fuck FBI Fridays uh where. every every Friday they would release. something and we waited it for baited. breath I mean they had us alkaline and. sinker pissed uh we were waiting to see. what was going to be dropped every. Friday here it was.

it's a little embarrassing looking back. on it now and this is in the early 2010s. yeah this was 2010 2011 around there so. I actually Linger on um. Anonymous what do you still understand. what the heck is anonymous it's just a. place where you hang out I mean it's. just to start on 4chan with Han and then. it's really just anyone you could be an. anonymous right now if you wanted to. just you're in there hanging out in the. channel now you're probably not going to. get much cred until you work your way up. and prove who you are someone vouches. for you uh but anybody can be an.

anonymous and if we can leave Anonymous. what's the leadership of anonymous do. you have a sense that there is a. leadership there's a power play you know. it's not someone that you know that says. this is what we're doing all we're doing. I love the. the philosophical and the technical. aspect of all of this but I think there. is a slippery slope to where for the. laws you can actually. really hurt people. that's that's the terrifying thing when. you attach. I'm actually really terrified of the.

power of the lull. it's the fun thing somehow becomes a. slippery slope I haven't quite. understood the Dynamics of that but even. in myself if you just have fun with a. thing you lose track of the ethical. grounding of the thing and so like it. feels like hacking for fun can just turn. it like literally lead to nuclear war. like literally destabilize yeah like. yada yada yada nuclear war I could see. it yeah.

and so I've been more careful with the. lull uh uh I I'm very yeah I've been. more careful about that and I wonder. about it because an internet speak. somehow ethics can be put aside. uh through the slippery slope of. language. I don't know everything becomes a joke. if everything's a joke then everything. is allowed and everything's allowed then. you don't have a sense of what is right. and wrong you lose sense of what is. right and wrong you still have victims I. mean you're laughing at someone. someone's the butt of this joke.

you know whether it's major corporations. or the individuals I mean some of the. stuff they did was just you know. releasing people's pii and their. personal identifying information and. stuff like that I mean is it a big deal. I don't know maybe maybe not but you. know if you could choose to not have. your information put out there probably. wouldn't. we do have a sense of what Anonymous is. today is it has it ever been one stable. organization or is it a collection of. hackers that kind of emerge. for particular tasks for particular uh.

like a hacktivism task and that kind of. stuff it's a collection of people that. has some hackers in it there's not a lot. of big hackers in it I mean there are. some that have come bounce in and bounce. out even back then there's probably just. as many reporters in it people the media. in it with the than hackers at the time. just trying to get the inside scoop on. things. you know some giving the inside scoop. you know we arrested a reporter that. gave over the uh username and password.

to his newspaper and uh you know just so. he could break the story. he trusted him. speaking of trust reporters boy there's. good ones there's good ones there are. but boy do I have a complicated. relationship with them how many stories. about you are completely true. you can just make stuff up on the. internet and one of the things that. I mean there's so many fascinating. psychological sociological elements of.

the internet uh to me one of them is. that you can say that. um Lex is a lizard right and if it's not. funny uh so lizard is kind of funny what. should we say. um Lex has admitted to being an agent of. the FBI okay you can just say that right. right and then the response that the. internet would be like oh is that true I. didn't realize that they won't go like.

provide evidence please right they'll. just say like oh that's weird I didn't I. kind of thought he might be kind of. weird and then it piles on it's like hey. hey guys. like here's a random dude on the. internet just said a random thing you. can't just like pile up as and then. Johnny 6969 is now a source that says. and then like the thing is I'm I'm a. tiny guy but when it grows uh if you're. like have a big platform I feel like. newspapers will pick that up and then.

they'll like start to build on a story. and you never know where that story. really started it's so cool I mean to me. actually honestly it's kind of cool that. there there's a viral nature of the. internet that can just fabricate truth. completely I think we have to accept. that new reality and try to deal with it. somehow you can't just like complain. that Johnny 69 can start a random thing. but I I think in the best possible world. it is the role of the journalist to be. the adult in the room and put a stop to.

it versus look for the sexiest story so. that they could be click bait that can. generate money a journalism should be. about. sort of slowing things down thinking. deeply through what is true or not and. showing that to the world I think. there's a lot of hunger for that and I. think that would actually get the most. Clicks in the end I mean it's that same. pressure I think we're talking about. with the FBI and with the the tech. companies about controls I mean the. editors have to please and get those. clicks I mean they're measured by those.

clicks so you know I'm sure the. journalists the true journalists the. good ones out there want that but they. want to stay employed too can I actually. ask you really as another tangent the. Jared and others uh they're doing. undercover in terms of the tools you. have. for catching cyber security criminals. how much of his undercover undercover is. a high bar to jump over you have to do a. lot to start an undercover in the FBI.

there's a lot of thresholds. um so it's not your first investigative. tool step you have to identify a problem. and then show that the lower steps can't. get you there. um but I mean I think we we had an. undercover going on the squad about all. times when one was being shut down or. taken down we were spinning up another. one so it's a good tool to have. um you know and utilize they're a lot of. work I don't think if you run one you'll.

never run another one in your life. oh so it's like psychologically is it. there's all a lot of work just. technically but also psychologically. like you have to really uh it's 24 7. you're inside that world like you have. to know what's going on and what's. happening you you know you're taking on. you have to remember who you are when. you're because you're you're a criminal. online. you have to go to a special school for. it too was that ever something. compelling to you I went through the. school but I'm pretty open and honest. guy and so it's tough for me to to Build.

That Wall of Lies. um it's maybe I'm just not smart enough. to keep all the lies straight yeah but a. guy who's good at building up a wall of. Lies would say that exact same exactly. it's so annoying the way truth Works in. this world it's like uh I think people. have told me like because I'm trying to. be honest and transparent that's exactly. what an agent would do right. um but I feel like an agent would not. wear a suit and tie. I wore a suit and tie every day. I was a suit and tie guy you were yeah. every day I remember one time I wore.

shorts in and the sac came in and this. was when I was I was a rock star at the. time in the bureau and I had shorts in. and uh. um I said sorry ma'am I apologize for my. attire and she goes you could wear bike. shorts in here I wouldn't care I was. like oh shit that sounds nice. I never wore the bike shorts but yeah. but see I don't I see a suit and ties. constraining I think it's it's. liberating and so it's it's like uh. shows that you're taking the moment. seriously well not just that people. wanted it I mean people expected when. you knock you you are dressed like the a.

perfect FBI agent When someone knocks on. their door that's what they want to see. they want to see what Hollywood built up. is what an FBI agent is you show up like. my friend no one he was dressed always. in t-shirts and shorts people aren't. going to take him serious they're not. going to give them what they want I. wonder how many police I can just show. up and like Sam from the FBI start. interrogating them like at a bar. probably like definitely if they've had. a few drinks you could definitely well. but people are going to recognize you. that's the only problem that's another. thing you start taking out a big big. cases you can't wear cases anymore in. the FBI your face gets out there and.

your name too yeah yeah. well actually let me ask you about that. before we return to our friend Sabu okay. um you've you've tracked and. worked on some of the most dangerous. people in this world. um have you ever feared for your life. so I had to make a really really shitty. phone call one time. um I was sitting in the bureau and this. was right after Silk Road.

um and Jared called me he was back in. Chicago and he called me and said hey. your your name and your kid's name were. on a website for an assassination. they're they're paying to have you guys. killed. now these things happen on the black. market they come up you know and when. you know people debate whether they're. real or not but we have to take it. serious someone's paying to have me. killed me so I had to call my wife and. we have a word. um and that if I said this word and we. only said it one time to each other if I.

said this would this is serious drop. what you're doing and get to the kids. um and so I had to drop the word to her. um and. I could feel the breath come out of her. because her she thought her kids were in. danger and when they then at the time. they were. um. I wasn't in a state of mind to drive. myself so a an agent on the squad and a. girl named Evelina she drove me lights. and Sirens all the way to my kids school. um and. we had locked I called the school we.

were in a lockdown. um nobody should get in or out. especially someone with a gun. um the first thing they did was let me. in the building with a gun so I was a. little disappointed with that. um my kids were I think kindergarten and. fifth grade or somewhere around there. maybe they're closer second year I'm not. sure where. um but all hell broke loose and we had. to from there go move into a safe house. I live in New York City NYPD surrounded. my house the FBI put cameras outside my. house you couldn't drive in my.

neighborhood without like uh your. license plate being read uh hey why is. this person here why is that person. there. I got to watch my house on an iPad while. I sat at my desk. um but you know again I put my family. through that and it scared the shit out. of them. um and that that's to be honest I think. that's sort of uh my mother-in-law's. words were I thought you did cyber crime. and because during Silk Road I didn't. tell my family what I was working on. I'll talk about that so like I want to.

escape that I don't want to be there you. know I remember that like so when I was. in the FBI like driving in I used to go. in at 4 30 every morning. um because I like to go to the gym. before I hit go to the desk I would be. at the desk at seven so in the gym at. five a couple hours and then then go. the the best time I had was that. Drive-In in the morning where I could. just be myself I listened to a sports. podcast out of DC. um and I I we talked about sports and. you know the Nationals and whatever it.

was the capitals like you know it was. great to not think about Silk Road for. 10 minutes. so but that was my best time but but. yeah again so yeah I I've had that. moving to the safe house I left my mb5. at home that's the the bureau's machine. gun. um showed my wife to just pull pull and. spray so uh but how often did you live. or work and live with fear in your heart. it was only that time I mean in my for. actual physical security.

um then I mean after the anonymous stuff. I you know I really tightened down to my. cyber security. um you know I don't have social media I. don't have pictures of me and my kids. online I don't really if I go to a. wedding or something I say I don't take. my picture with with my kids you know if. you're gonna post it someplace or. something like that. um so that sort of security I have. um but you know just like everybody you. start to relax a little bit and security. breaks down because it's not convenient. but it's also part of your job so you're.

you're much better at. um let me your job now in your job. before so you're probably much better. taking care of the low hanging fruit at. least. I understand the threat and I think. that's what a lot of people don't. understand is understanding what the. threat against them is so so I'm aware. of that what what possibly and I think. about it you know I think about things I. do remember so you you tripped a memory. in my my mind. um I remember a lot of times and I had a.

gun on my hip I still carry a gun to. this day. opening my front door and being. concerned what was on the other side. leave walking out of the house yeah. because I couldn't see it I remember. when those four o'clocks get into the. car. I I I was literally scared yeah. I mean having seen some of the things. you've seen it makes you perhaps. question. how much evil there is out there in the. world how many dangerous people there. are there out there. crazy people even.

but there's a lot of crazy there's a lot. of evil most people I think get into. like cyber crime or just opportunistic. not necessarily evil they don't really. know maybe think about the victim they. just do as it's a crime of opportunity. you know. I I don't label that as evil and one of. the things about America that I'm also. very happy about. is that rule of law despite everything. we talk about there is it's tough to be.

a criminal in the United States. so like if you walk outside your house. you're much safer you than you are in. most other places in the world you're. safer and and the system's tougher uh I. mean uh low SEC six guys one guy in the. United States Five Guys other places. um Hector was facing 125 years those. guys got slaps on the wrist and went. back to college. you know different laws different places. so who's Hector.

tell me the story of Hector so this. lawsack organization was started so. Hector was before that in uh. he was he was in part Anonymous here's. all the kids doing all kinds of hacking. stuff but then he launched wall SEC he's. old school hacker I mean he he's he. learned how to hack and I don't want to. tell his story but he he learned to hack. because he grew up in the Lower East. Side of New York and uh and picked up. some NYPD computers that were left on. this on the sidewalk for trash yeah. taught himself how to it doesn't exactly. look like a hacker for people don't know.

he he looks I don't know exactly what he. looks like but not not a not like a. technical not what you would imagine. uh but perhaps that's that's uh that's a. Hollywood portrayal yeah I think you get. in trouble these days saying that uh. that what a hacker looks like I don't. know if they have a traditional look. just like I said Hollywood has an idea. of an FBI looks like yeah I don't think. you can do that anymore I don't think. you can say that anymore well he uh. certainly has a big personality and. Charisma and all that kind of stuff. that's taboo I can again I can see him.

selling me anything that's convincing me. of it you know they're two different. people they're Sabu and there's Hector. Hector Hector is a sweet guy that he he. likes to have intellectual conversations. and like that's just a thing he he'd. rather you know just sit there and have. a one-on-one conversation with you but. saboo that that's a ruthless. motherfucker and you first met Sabu I. was tracking all I knew was that boo I. didn't know Hector so when did your. paths cross well in terms of tracking.

when did you first take on the case the. spring of a 11. . so it was through Anonymous through. Anonymous but then really kind of a. little SEC. um we were low SEC was a big thing and. it was pushed out to all the Cyber you. know 56 field offices in the FBI. um most of them have cyber squads or. cyber units and so you know it was being. pushed out there and it was in the news. every day but it really wasn't ours so. that we didn't have a lot of victims in. our aor area of responsibility.

um and so we just kind of pay attention. to it then I got a tip that a local. hacker in New York had broken into AOL. and so. Olivia Olivia Olson and I she's another. agent who she's still in she's a. supervisor out in La she's a great agent. we went all around New York looking for. this kid. um just to see what we can find and. ended up out in Staten Island uh at his. grandmother's house she didn't know. where he was obviously why would she. um but I left my card.

um he gave me a call that night started. talking to me and I said let's just meet. up tomorrow at the McDonald's across. from 26 fed and he came in and three of. us sat there and talked and you know. gave me a stuff he started telling me. about all the felonies he was committing. those days including that break into AOL. um and then he finally says you know you. know I can give you Sabu and Sabu to us. was the Kaiser so stay back and he was. our guy uh you know he was the guy that. was in the news that was pissing us off.

so so he was part a part of the FBI. Fridays that we was yeah oh he led it. yeah he was the leader of fuck FBI. Fridays so yeah. what was one of the more memorable uh F. the triple F's. I said what how how do you get why how. and why do you go after the Beehive. that's kind of intense you get you on. the news it gets you it's the it's the. the lulls it's funnier to go after the. big ones you know and they weren't.

getting like real FBI they weren't. breaking into FBI mainframes or anything. but they you know they were uh you know. affiliate sites or anything that I do a. lot of law enforcement stuff was coming. out so but you know. we looked back and so if this kid knew. that Sabu we maybe there was a chance we. could use them a little to lure Sabu out. but we also said well maybe this kid. knows Cebu in real life and so we went. looked through the IPS and 10 million. IPS we find one and it belonged to him. and so. that that day Sabu um someone had doxxed.

Sabu. um and uh we were a little afraid he was. gonna be on the Run we had a. surveillance team and FBI surveillance. teams are awesome like you cannot even. tell their FBI agents it's it's in it's. they are really that good I mean there's. baby strollers and all whatever you. wouldn't expect an FBI agent to have so. that's a little like the movies a little. bit yeah I mean it is true but and but. they fit into the area so now they're on. the Lower East Side which is you know. you know a baby stroller might not fit. in there as well as you know somebody's.

laying on the ground or something like. that. um they really get play the character. and get into it so now I I can never. trust a baby stroller Yeah well yeah. probably shouldn't every every baby I'm. just like look at stare at them. suspiciously especially if the mom's. wearing cargo pants while she pushes it. so yes if it's like a verse. stereotypical Mama stereotypical baby. I'm gonna be very suspicious I'm gonna. question the baby that baby's wired. you know we raced out there and like our. squad's not even full there's only a few.

guys there and like I said I I was a. suit guy but that day I had shorts and a. t-shirt on I had a white T-shirt on. um and I only bring it up because Sabu. makes fun of me to this day so I had a. bulletproof vest and a white T-shirt on. and that was it like shorts tune and all. that but. um raced over to there we didn't have. any equipment. um we brought our bosses bosses boss he. stopped off at NYPD got us like a. ballistic shield uh and a battering ram. if we needed it. um and then we get to Hector's house. sabu's house and he's on the sixth floor.

um and so normally you know we're the. the Cyber dork Squad. um we'll hop in the elevator six floors. is a long ways to go up and bulletproof. vest and a ballistic shield but but we. had been caught in an elevator before on. a search so we we didn't took the stairs. um. we get to the top uh Tad winded. um but uh knock on the door in this big. towering guy opens the door just. slightly and he sees the green vest with. big yellow letters FBI and he steps.

outside. um yeah can I help you you know it tries. to social engineer US uh but eventually. we get our way inside the house. um you know I noticed a few things that. are kind of out of place. um there's a laptop charger and a. flashing modem and I said well do you. have a computer here and he said no. there's no computer here. um so we we knew the the truce and then. the half-lies and all that sort of thing. so it took us about another two hours. and finally he gave up that he was that. boo he was the guy we were looking for.

uh so we sat there and we kind of showed. him sort of the evidence we had against. him. um and you know from his words we sat. there and talked uh talked like uh two. grown adults and you know I gave him the. options and he said well let's uh let's. talk about working together. so he chose to become an informant. I don't think he chose that night but. that's where it kind of went to. um so the the we brought him down to the. FBI that night.

um which was it was a funny trip because. I'm sitting in the back seat of the car. with him. um and I was getting calls from all over. uh the US from different FBI agents. saying that we arrested the wrong guy. I was like I don't think so and they're. like why do you think so I was like. because he says it's him uh and they. still said not the wrong guy so I said. well we'll see how it plays out that's. so interesting because it's it's such a. strange world it's such a strange world. because it's it's tough to because you. still have to prove it's the same guy. right.

because the anonymity yeah I mean we had. his laptop by the you know by that point. yeah I know he was saying that helped. again I'm a clue in my world. yeah yeah but yeah if he would have. fought it I mean that definitely would. have come in as evidence that ever FBI. agents are saying it's not him you have. to disclose that stuff so he had a lot. of stuff on him. um what was he facing if um he was. raised 125 years 125 years in prison. that's that now that's if you took every. charge we had against him and put him.

you know uh consecutively no no one ever. gets charged that but yeah he had. essentially it would have been under 25. years you know fast forward to the end. he got thanked by the judge for his. service after nine months. and he walked out of the court of free. man. but that's being while being an. informant. well so. the word informant here really isn't. that good it does it's not fitting that.

technically I guess that's what he was. but he didn't know the other people it. was all not he knew Nicks and all that. um he really gave us the Insight of what. was happening in the hacker world like I. said he was an old school hacker he back. when hackers didn't work together with. Anonymous even though he was down you. know Cult of dead cow and those type. guys like way back. um and he was around for that he's like. an encyclopedia of hacking but you know. we just kissed Prime was in the 90s. for Terror hack but yeah he kind of came.

back when uh when Anonymous started. going after MasterCard and PayPal and. all that do the wikileak stuff. but even even that little interaction. being an informant he probably made a. lot of enemies does how do you protect a. guy like that he made enemies after it. was revealed yeah. how does the FBI protect him yeah good. luck. uh I mean perhaps I'll talk to him one. day uh but uh is that guy afraid for his. life. I I again I think it doesn't seem like.

it he has very good security uh for. himself cyber security. um but you know I I yeah he doesn't like. the negative thing said about him online. uh I don't think anybody does. um but you know I think it's so many. years of the internet kind of. bitching at you and all that you get. Callister it's just internet bitching. and also the the hacking world moves on. very quickly he he is kind of um he's. yeah like they're they're have their own.

Wars to fight now and he's not part of. those Wars anymore there's still people. out there that that bitch and moan about. him but but yeah I think it's less. um I I think you know he has a good. message out there of you know. he he trying to keep kids from making. the same mistakes he made. he tries to really preach that. how do people get into this line of work. is there all kinds of ways being uh not. not not your line of work his line of.

work it's just all the stories you've. seen of people that are in Anonymous and. LOL sick and Silk Road and all the Cyber. criminals you've interacted with what's. uh what's the profile of a cyber. Criminal I don't think there's a profile. anymore you know I used to be able to. say you know the kid in your mom's. basement or something like that but it's. not true anymore. you know like it's it's it's wide it's. like I've arrested. I've arrested people that you wouldn't. expect would be cyber criminals.

and it's in the United States it's. International it's everything oh it's. International I mean we're seeing a lot. of the big hackers now the big arrests. for hackers in England so surprisingly. you know there's you know you're not. going to see there's a lot of good. hackers like down in Brazil but I don't. think Brazil law enforcement is as good. as hunting them down so you're not going. to see the big arrests how much. state-sponsored. uh cyber attacks are there do you think. more than you can imagine.

and what wait what do you want to say an. attack you had a successful attack or. just a probing probing for information. just like feeling you know testing that. there's where the attack factors are. trying to collect all the possible. attacks put a Windows 7 machine on the. internet forward-facing and put a put a. packet sniffer on there and look at. where the driver comes from I mean it's. been 24 hours you were going to fill up. a hard drive with packets just coming at. it yeah I mean it's it's not hard to to. know I mean it's just constantly probing. for entry points into things you know.

you could you could go mad put up. Honeypot draws intrusions should I see. what messages to see what's out there. yeah and it doesn't go anywhere it maybe. has fake information and stuff like that. um you know it's just kind of to see. what's going on and judge what's. happening uh the internet gonna you know. lick your finger and test the wind of. what's happening these days the funny. thing about like because I'm at MIT that. attracted even more attention for the. not for the laws but for the technical. challenge it seems like people enjoy.

hacking MIT it's just the amount of. traffic MIT was getting for that in. terms of just the sheer number of. attacks from different places is crazy. yeah like just like that putting up a. machine seeing what comes NASA used to. be the golden ring now everybody got. NASA that was like the early 90s if you. could hack NASA that was the now yeah. MIT is a big one yeah it's fun it's fun. to see. uh respect. uh because I think in that case it comes. from a somewhat good place because you. know they're not getting any money for.

my ID it's more for the challenge. let me ask you about that about this. world of cyber security. um how big of a threat are cyber attacks. for companies and for individuals like. let's lay out where are we in this world. what's out there it's the Wild Wild West. and it's it's it's. uh I mean. people want the idea of security but. it's inconvenient so they don't they.

push back on it. um and there are a lot of opportunistic. nation-state financially motivated. hackers hackers for the lulls you got. three different tiers there. um and and they're they're on the prowl. they have tools they have really good. tools that are being used against us. and I would scale so when you're. thinking of. I don't know what's let's talk about. companies first so say you're you're. talking to um a mid-tier.

I wonder what the more most interesting. business is so Google let's let's we can. look at large tech companies and we can. look at. medium-sized tech companies and like you. were sitting in a room with a CTO with a. CEO. and the the question is how fucked are. we and what should we do what's the low. hanging fruit what's what what are the. different strategies and uh those. companies should consider I mean the. problem is they want a push button they. wanna they wanna out of the box solution. that I'm secure you know they want to.

tell people they're secure but and. that's very challenging to have it's. impossible but like if I could if. someone had it they'd be a billionaire. uh you know they'd be Beyond a. billionaire you know because that's what. everybody wants so it's you know you can. buy all the tools you want it's. configuring them the proper way and. there's if anyone's trying to tell you. uh that there's one solution that fits. all their snake hole salesman and. there's a lot of people in cyber. security that are staying all salesmen. yeah and I feel like there's tools if. they're not configured correctly.

they uh they just introduce. they don't increase security. significantly and they introduce a lot. of pain for the people they uh decrease. efficiency of the actual work you have. to do so like uh we had um I was at. Google for a Time. and. I think mostly I want to give props to. their security efforts. but user data so like data that belongs. to users is like the holy.

like the amount of security they have. around that is incredible so most any. time I had to work with anything even. resembling user days I never got a. chance to work with actual user data. anything resembling that first of all. you have no access to the internet it's. impossible to even come close to the. access to the internet and there's so. much pain to actually like interact with. that data where it I mean it's it was. extremely inefficient in places where I.

thought it didn't have to be that. inefficient the security was too much. but I have to give respect to that. because you in that case you want to err. on the side of security but that's. Google yeah they were doing a good job. of this the reputational harm if it got. out I mean Google you know why is Google. Drive free you know because they want. your data they want you to park your. data there so you know if the re if they. got hacked or leaked information the. reputational harm would be tremendous. but you know for a company that not it's.

really hard to do that right and the. company's not as big as Google or not as. tech savvy as Google might have a lot of. trouble with doing that kind of stuff. instead instead of increasing security. they'll just decrease the efficiency. well yeah so so there's a big difference. between I.T and security and. unfortunately like these mid-side. companies they try to stack security. into their I.T Department your it. department is about business continuity. they're about trying to move business. forward they want their users to get the.

data they need to do their job so the. company can grow security is not that. they don't want you to get the data they. you know but there's there's fine tuning. you can do to you know ensure that I. mean as simple as like having good. onboarding procedures for employees like. like you come into my company you don't. need access to everything maybe you need. access to something for one day turn the. access on don't leave it on I mean I was. the victim of the OPM act the office of. personnel management because old. credentials from a third-party vendor. were sitting there and active and the.

Chinese government found those. credentials and were able to log in and. steal all my information so a lot could. be helped if you just control the. credentials the access the access. control how long they last and people. who have who need access to a certain. thing. only get access to that thing and not. nothing else and then and it just gets. refreshed like that access control you. know like we said setting up people. leaving people leaving the company get. rid of their they don't need control. two-factor authentication you know. that's a big thing you know we it's it's.

I mean I sound like a broken record. because this isn't anything new this. isn't rocket science the problem is. we're not implementing it and we're not. if we are we're not doing it correctly. uh because these guys are taking taking. us well two-factor authentication is a. good example of something. that I just was annoyed by for the. longest time because yes it's very good. but like it's it seems that it's pretty. easy to implement horribly to where it's. like it's not convenient at all for the. for the legitimate user to use it should. be trivial to to do uh like to.

authenticate yourself twice should be. super easy if security if it's slightly. inconvenient for you it's think about. how inconvenient is for a hacker and how. this is just going to move on to the. next person yes yes in theory when. implemented extremely well yeah but I I. just don't think so I think actually if. it's. inconvenient it shows that system has. been thought through a lot do you know. why we need two-factor authentication. people using the same password across.

the same site so when one site is. compromised people just take that. username and password it's called. credential stuffing and just stuff it. across the internet so if 10 years ago. when we told everybody don't use the. same fucking password across the. internet across the frontal sites maybe. two-factor wouldn't be needed yeah so. you would need to factor if everyone did. a good job with passwords yeah. right but I'm saying like the two Factor. authentication it should uh it should be. super easy to authenticate myself uh in.

some with some other device really. quickly like there should be it should. be frictionless like you just hit okay. okay and anything that belongs to me. yeah and like I should it should very. importantly be easy to set up what. belongs to me uh I don't know the full. complexity of the cyber attacks these. platforms are under they're probably. under insane amount of attacks yeah. you've got it right there that people. have no idea these large companies how. often they're attacked you know on a per.

second basis and they have to fight all. that off and pick out the good traffic. in there so yeah I would there's no way. I'd want to run a large tech company. what about protecting individuals for. individuals. what's good advice for to try to protect. yourself from this increasingly. dangerous world of cyber attacks again. educate yourself that you understand. that there is a threat first you have to. realize that then then you're going to. step up and you're going to do stuff a.

little bit more sometimes I guess think. I could take that to a little bit. extreme I remember one time uh uh my mom. called me and she was uh screaming that. uh I woke up this morning and I just. clicked on a link and now my phone is. making weird noises and I was like. throw your phone in a glass of water. just put in a glass of water right now. and she's I made my mom cry it was not a. pleasant thing. um so sometimes I go to a little. extremes on those ones but but. understanding is a risk and making it a.

little bit more a little more difficult. to become a victim I mean just. understanding certain things. um you know simple things like you know. as we add more internet of things to. people's houses I mean how many Wi-Fi. networks do people have it's normally. just one and you're bumping your phones. and giving your password to be able to. come to visit. set up a guest Network set up something. you can change every 30 days simple. little things like that. um you know I hate to remind you but. change your passwords I mean I feel like. I'm a broken record again but just make. it more difficult for others to. victimize you and then don't use the.

same password everywhere that that yes I. mean I still I still know people that do. that I mean ask.fm got popped last week. two weeks ago and that's 350 million. username and passwords with connected. Twitter accounts Google accounts uh you. know all the different social media. accounts you know that is a treasure. Trove for the next two and a half three. years of just using those credentials. everywhere using you'll learn even if. it's not the right password you learn.

people's password Styles you know bad. guys are making portfolios out of people. uh you know we're figuring out how. people generate their passwords and kind. of you know figuring and then it's. easier to crack their password. you know we're making a dossier on each. person it's 350 million dossiers just in. that one hack Yahoo there was a half a. billion. so the the thing a hacker would do with. that is try to find all the link low. hanging fruit like have some kind of. program that. yeah evaluates the strength of the. passwords.

and then finds the weak ones and that. means that this person is probably the. kind of person that would use the same. password across multiple or even just. write a program and do that remember the. ring hack a couple a year ago that's all. it was is credential stuffing so ring. the security system by default had to. factor but didn't turn it on and they. also had a don't try unlimited tries to. log into my account you can lock it out. after 10. by default not turned on. because it's not convenient for people. you know ring you know it's like I want. people to stick these little things up.

and have Security in their house uh but. you know cyber security don't make it. inconvenient then people will not buy. our product. that's how they got hacked they want to. say that it's insecure and got hacked. into reputational harm right there for. ring but they didn't it was just. credential stuffing people bought. username passwords on the black market. and. just wrote a bot that just went through. ring and used every one of them to maybe. one percent hit but that's a big hit. to the number of ring users you know you. can use also password managers to make. to make the changing of the passwords.

easier. um. to make you can choose the difficulty. the number of special characters the. length of it and all that. um my favorite things on websites. yell at you for your password being too. long or having too many special care or. like uh or yeah you're not allowed to. have this special character or something. you can only use these three special. characters it's a you know do you. understand how password cracking works. if you specifically tell me which past.

which special characters I can use I. want like I honestly just want to have a. one-on-one meeting like late at night. with the engineer that programmed that. because that's that's like an intern I. just want to have a sit down meeting. yeah I made my parents switch Banks once. because the security was so poor I was. like you just you can't have money here. but then there's also like the zero day. attacks like uh we mentioned mentioned. before the uh the qnep nas that got. hacked uh luckily I didn't have anything. private on there.

um but it really woke me up to like okay. so like if you take everything extremely. seriously. unfortunately for the end users there's. nothing you do about zero day it's you. know there's this you have no control. over that I mean it's a it's a the. engineers that made the software don't. even know about it now let's talk about. one days. um so there's a patch now out there for. the security so if you're not updating. your systems for these security badges. if it's just not on you. um my father-in-law has such an old. iPhone you can't security patch it.

anymore so you know and I tell him I. said you know this is what you're. missing out on this is what you're. exposing yourself to because. um you know we talked about that. powerful tool that uh the the how we. found Ross Albrecht gmail.com well bad. guys are using that too it's called you. know it used to be called Google Dorking. now it's I think it's named kind of. Google hacking by the community. um you can go in you know and find a. vulnerability read about the white paper. what's wrong with that that software and. then you can go on the internet and find.

all of the computers that are running. that outdated software and there's your. list there's your target list yeah I. know the vulnerabilities they're running. I again not making a Playbook here but. you know that's how easy it is to to. find your targets and that's what that's. what the the bad guys are doing then the. reverse is tough it's much tougher but. it's still doable which is like the. first find the target like if you have. specific targets. uh to to you know hack into a Twitter. account for example much harder that's. probably social engineering right that's.

probably the best way probably if you if. you wanted something specific to that I. mean if you really want to go far you. know. if you're targeting a specific person. you know how hard is it to get into. their office and put a you know a little. device USB device in line with their. Mouse who checks how their Mouse is. plugged in and you can for 40 bucks on. the black market you can buy a key. logger that just USB then the mouse. plugs right into it it looks like an. extension on the mouse if you can even. find it you can buy the the stuff with a. mouse inside of it uh and just plug it. into somebody's computer and there's a.

key logger that lives in there and calls. home sends everything you want so I mean. and it's cheap yeah in grad school. um a program to build a bunch of key. loggers it was fascinating tracking. Mouse just for uh what I was doing as. part of the research uh I was doing. to uh uh to see if by the Dynamics of. how you type. and how you move the mouse you can tell. who the person is oh wow that's like. um it's called the active authentication.

like it's basically Biometrics that's. not using bio uh just to see how. identifiable that is so it's fascinating. to study that but it's also fascinating. how damn easy it is to install key. loggers so I I think is is in natural. what happens is you realize how many. vulnerabilities there are in this world. you do that when you understand bacteria. and viruses you realize they're. everywhere in the same way with uh I'm. talking about biological ones and then. you realize that all the vulnerabilities.

that are out there one of the things. I've noticed quite a lot is. how many people don't log out of their. computers. just how easy physical access the. systems actually is. uh like in a lot of places in this world. and I'm not talking about private homes. I'm talking about companies especially. large companies it seems quite trivial. in certain places that I've been to to. walk in and have physical access to a. system and that's depressing to me it is. it just I laugh because uh one of my my. partners at naxo that I work at now.

um he worked at a big company like you. would know the name as soon as I told. you I'm not going to say it um but the. guy who owned the company and the. company has his name on it. um didn't want to ever log into a. computer just annoyed the shit out of. him so they hired a person that stands. next to his computer when he's not there. and that's his physical security. see that's good that's that's pretty. good actually so yeah I mean I guess if. you could afford to do that at least. you're taking your security seriously I. feel like there's a lot of people in. that case would just not have a login.

yeah no the security team there had to. really work around to make that work uh. non-compliant with company policy but. that's that's interesting the the key. log is there's there's a lot of there's. just a lot of threats yeah I mean a lot. of ways to get in yeah I mean so you. can't sit around and worry about someone. physically gaining access to your. computer with keylogger and stuff like. that. um you know if you're traveling to a. foreign country and you work for the FBI. then yeah you do you pick little you. know sometimes some countries you would.

bring a fake laptop just to see if they. stole it or accessed it I really want. especially in this modern day to just. create a lot of clones of myself that. generate. Lex sounding things and just get put so. much information out there actually. docks myself. all across the world and then you're not. a Target I guess you just put it out. there I've always said that though like. we do these searches in FBI houses and. stuff like that if someone just got like. a box load of like 10 terabyte drives.

and just encrypted them oh my God you. know how long the FBI would spin their. wheels trying to get that data off there. be insane also so just give them you. don't even know which one you're looking. for yeah. that's true that's true so it's like uh. me printing like a treasure map to a. random location just get people to go on. Goose goose chases. yeah uh what what about operating system. what what have you found uh what's the.

most secure and what's the least secure. operating system Windows Linux. is there no Universal there's no. Universal Security I mean it changed you. people use anything Max for the most. secure just because they just weren't. out there but now kids have had access. to them so you know it is you know I. know you're a Linux guy I I like Linux. too but you know it's tough to have run. a business on on Linux you know people. want to move more towards the microsofts. and the Googles just because they don't. it's easier to communicate with other. people though maybe our computer guys so.

you have to just take what what's best. what's easiest and secure the shit out. of it as much as you can and just think. about it what are you doing these days. in Axel so we just started nexos uh so I. left the government and uh went to a. couple consultancies and I started. working uh really all the people I I I. worked good in the government with. um I brought them out with me. um and now you used to work for the man. and now you're the man exactly so but. now we formed a partnership and it's. it's just a it's a new cyber security.

firm that we our launch party is. actually on Thursday so it's going to be. exciting do you want to give more. details about the party so that somebody. can hack into it no I don't even tell. you where it is you can come if you want. but don't don't bring the hackers well. that's the center will be there I can't. believe you invited me because you also. say Insider threat is is the is the. biggest threat uh by the way can you. explain what the inside arthritis the. biggest Insider threat in my life is my. children. um my son's big into Minecraft and we'll.

download executables mindlessly and just. run them on the network so do you. recommend against marriage and family. and kids nope nope from a security. perspective from a security perspective. absolutely but uh no I just uh. segmentation uh I mean we do it in off. businesses for years. um started segmenting networks different. networks I just do it at home my kid's. on his own network. um it makes it a little bit easier to. see what they're doing too you can. monitor traffic and then also throttle. bandwidth if uh if your Netflix isn't.

playing fast enough or buffers or. something so you can obviously change. that a little too you know they're going. to listen to this right uh you're gonna. get your tricks yeah that's true they'll. definitely will listen but there's. nothing more humbling than your family. you think you've done something big and. you go on a big podcast and talk to Les. Freeman they don't they don't care. unless unless you're on Tick Tock or. yeah you you'll show up on a YouTube. feed or something like that and I'll be. like oh yeah this guy's boring yeah my. son does a podcast uh for his school and.

um it's still I still can't get him to. telling so so one of the Hector and I. just started a podcast uh talking about. cyber security we we do a podcast called. hacker in the FED it just came out. yesterday so uh the first episode so. yeah we got 13 uh 13 1300 downloads the. first day so pretty we were at the top. of Hacker News which is a big website in. our world so it's called hacker and the. FED hacker in the fed's demo so go. download and listen to hacker and if I I. can't wait to see what because I don't. think I've seen a video of YouTube. together so I can't wait to see what the.

the chemistry is like. we're I mean it's not weird that you. guys used to be enemies and now you're. friends so yeah I mean we just did some. a trailer and all that and uh the the. our producer we have a great producer. got him Phineas and he kind of pulls. things out of me and I said I said okay. I got one. my relationship with Hector is you know. we're very close friends now and and. he's like oh I arrested one of my. closest friends yeah which is a very. strange relationship yeah.

um you know but but he he says that I. changed his life I mean he was going. down a very dark path and I gave him an. option that one night and he he made the. right choice I mean he's he now does. penetration testing he does a lot of. good work and uh you know he's turned. his life around. do you worry about. cyber war in the 21st century absolutely. yeah if there is a global war it'll. start with cyber you know if it's not. already started. do you feel like there's a. like a boiling like the the drums of War.

beating what's happening in Ukraine with. Russia it feels like the United States. is becoming more and more involved in. the conflict in that part of the world. and China is watching very closely is. starting to get involved geopolitically. and probably in terms of cyber. um do you worry about this kind of thing. happening in the next decade or two like. where it really escalates you know. people in the in the 1920s.

were completely terrible at predicting. the World War II. do you think we're at the precipice of. War potentially I think we could be I I. mean I I would hate to just be. you know just fear-mongering out there. um you know and kovid's over so the next. big thing in the media is war and all. that but I mean there's some some Flags. going up that are that are very strange. to me is there a ways to avoid this I.

hope so I hope smarter people and I are. figuring it out I hope people are. playing their parts and and talking to. the right people. um because that's the war is the last. thing I want well there's two things to. be concerned about on the Cyber side one. is the actual defense. on the technical side of cyber and the. other one is the Panic that might happen. when something like some dramatic event. happened because of cyber some major. hack that becomes public. I'm honestly more concerned about the.

panic because. I feel like if people don't think about. the stuff the Panic can hit harder. like if they if they're not conscious. about the fact that we're constantly. under attack I feel like it'll come like. a much harder surprise. yeah I think people will be really. shocked on things I mean so we talked. about low SEC today and low sick was. 2011. they had access into a Waters the. water supply system of a major U.S city. they didn't do anything with it they. were sitting on it in case someone got.

arrested and they were gonna maybe just. expose that it's there's insecure maybe. they were gonna do something to fuck. with it I don't know but you know that. that's that's 2011. you know I don't. think it's gotten a lot better since. then. and there's probably nation states or. major organizations that are sitting. secretly on Hacks like 100 a hundred. percent they're sitting secretly waiting. to expose things.

I mean I again I don't want to scare. this shit out of people but people have. to understand the Cyber threat I mean. there are you know they are there are. thousands of nation-state hackers in. some countries I mean we have them too. we have offensive hackers you know the. the terrorist attacks of 9 11. there's planes that actually hit actual. buildings and it was visibly clear and. you can trace the information with cyber. attacks say something that would result. in the ex in a major explosion in New.

York City. how the hell do you trace that. like. if it's well done it's going to be. extremely difficult the problem is. it there's so many problems one of which. the US government in that case has. complete freedom to blame anybody they. want true. and then to to go start war with anybody. anybody that actually see uh all right. that's sorry that's one cynical take on. it of course no but you're going down.

the right path I mean the guys are the. fluid planes in the buildings wanted. attribution they took credit for it when. we see the Cyber attack I doubt we're. gonna see attribution maybe the victim. side the US government on this side. might come out and try to blame somebody. but you know like you've brought up like. they could blame anybody they want. there's no really a good way of. verifying that. can I just ask for your advice so in my. personal case am I being tracked how do. I know. how do I protect myself should I care.

you are being tracked. um I wouldn't say you're being tracked. by the government you're definitely. being tracked by big Tech uh no I mean. me personally Lex and an escalated level. so like uh. um. like you mentioned there's an FBI file. on people sure I'd love to see what's in. that file. uh. uh who would have the argument oh let me. ask you FBI yeah. um how's the cafeteria food in FBI at.

the Academy it's bad yeah. um what about like at headquarters. headquarters a little bit better because. that's what the director I mean he he. eats up on the seventh floor have you. been like a Google have you been in the. uh Silicon Valley those cafeteria like. those I've been to the Google in Silicon. Valley I've been to the Google in New. York yeah the food is incredible it is. great so if FBI is worse well when. you're going through the academy they. don't let you outside of the building so. you have to eat it. um and I think that's the only reason. people eat it okay.

um it's it's pretty bad. I got it okay but there's also a bar. inside the FBI Academy people don't know. that. yes alcohol bar wow and if you as long. as you've passed your PT and uh and and. going well you're allowed to go to the. bar nice it feels like if I was a hacker. I'll be going after like celebrities. because they're a little bit easier like. celebrity celebrities like Hollywood the. Hollywood nudes were a big thing there. for a long time but not even yeah I.

guess news that's what they went after I. mean all those guys they socialized they. did they they social engineered Apple to. get backups to get the recoveries for. backups and then they just pulled all. their nudes and I mean whole websites. were dedicated to that yeah see that see. I wouldn't do that kind of stuff it's. very creepy I I would go if I was a. hacker I would go after. um. like. major like powerful people and like. tweet something from their account and. like something that like positive like.

loving. but like for the for the walls that. obviously it's a troll god you get. busted so quick by what a bad hacker. really but why because hackers never put. things out about love oh God Oh you mean. like this is clearly yeah this is. clearly Lex what the fuck it's about. love and every podcast he does I'll just. be like no oh God damn it now somebody's. gonna do it and you'll blame me it. wasn't me. looking back at your life is there.

something you. I'm only 44 years old I'm already. looking back is there stuff that. um you regret. AV unit yeah he got away so is The One. That Got Away uh yeah I mean it took me. a while into my law enforcement career. to learn about like the compassionate. side and and it took Hector Monster Gear. to make me realize that criminals aren't. really criminals they're human beings. um that really humanized the whole thing. for me sitting with him for for nine.

months. um I think that's maybe why I had a lot. more compassion when I arrested Ross. probably wouldn't have been so. compassionate if it was before Hector. but but yeah he changed my life and. showed me that that Humanity side of. things so would it be fair to say that. all all the criminals or most criminals. are. uh just people that took a wrong turn at. some point they all have the capacity. for for good and for evil in them. uh I'd say 99 of the people the.

criminals that I've interacted with yes. the the people with the child. exploitation no I don't have any place. in my heart for them. what advice would you give to to people. in college people in high school trying. to figure out what they want to do with. their life how to have a life they can. be proud of how to have a career they. can be proud of. all that kind of stuff in the U.S budget. that was just put forward there's 18. billion dollars for cyber security uh. we're about a million people short of.

where we really should be in the. industry if not more. um if you have want job security and. want to work and see exciting stuff uh. head towards cyber security it's a it's. a good career. um and you know one thing I dislike. about like uh cyber security right now. is they expect you to come out of. college and have 10 years experience in. protecting and knowing every different. python script out there and everything. available. um you know the industry needs to change. and let the lower people in in order to. to broaden and get those billion jobs.

filled but as far as their personal. security. just remember it's all going to follow. you I mean I I you know there's laws out. there now there you have to turn over. your social media accounts in order to. have certain things. um they just change that in New York. state if you want to carry a gun you. have to turn over your social media to. to figure if you're a good social uh. character. um so hopefully you didn't say something. strange in the last few years and it's. going to follow you forever. um I I bet Ross Albrecht would tell you.

the same thing when not don't put Ross. albrecha gmail.com on things because. it's going to last forever yeah people. sometimes uh for some for some reason. they interact on social media as if. they're talking to a couple of buddies. uh like just shooting shit and mocking. and and like um you know what is that. busting each other's chops like making. fun of yourself like being uh especially. gaming culture uh like people who stream. thank God that's not recorded oh my God.

the things people say on those streams. yeah but a lot of them are recording. yeah so there's there's a whole twitch. thing where people stream for many hours. a day. and uh. I mean just. outside of the very offensive things. they say. they just swear a lot they're not the. kind of person. that I would want to hire yeah I want to. want to work with now I understand that. some of us might be that way privately I.

guess when you're shooting shit with. friends like uh playing a video game and. talking shit to each other maybe yeah. but like that's all out there you have. to be conscious of the fact that that's. all out there and it's just not it's not. a good look it's not like you're you. should it's complicated because I'm like. against hiding Who You Are. but like an asshole you should hide some. of it yeah but like I just feel like. it's going to be misinterpreted when you. talk shit to your friends while you're. playing video games.

it doesn't mean you're an asshole. because you're an asshole to your friend. but that's how uh a lot of friends show. love Yeah an outside person can't judge. how I'm friends with you but if I want. to be this is our relationship if that. person can say that I'm an asshole to. them uh then that's fine I'll take it. but you can't tell me I'm an asshole to. them just because you saw my interaction. I agree with that they'll take those. words out of context and now that's. that's considered who you are is. dangerous and people take that very. nonchalant like people treat their.

behavior on the internet very very. carelessly that's definitely something. you need to learn and take extremely. seriously also I think like taking that. seriously will help you figure out who. you what you really stand for if you use. your language. carelessly. you never really ask like what do I. stand for I feel like it's a good. opportunity when you're young to ask. like what are the things that are okay. to say. what are the things what are the ideas I.

stand behind. like what especially if they're. controversial and I'm willing to say. them because I believe in them versus. just saying random shit for the for the. laws because for the random shift the. laws keep that from off the internet. that said man I was an idiot for most of. my life and I'm constantly learning and. growing it I'd hate to be responsible. for the kind of person. uh I was in my teens oh in my in my 20s. I didn't do anything offensive but it.

just I changed as a person like I used. to I guess I probably still do but I. used to you know I used to read so much. existential literature uh that was that. was a phase there's like phases yeah you. grow and involve as a person that. changes you in the future yeah thank God. there wasn't social media when I was in. high school thank God. oh my God I would never be on the FBI. would you recommend that people consider. a career as at a place like the FBI. I loved the FBI I never thought I would.

go anyplace else but the FBI I thought I. was going to retire with the the gold. watch and everything from the FBI that. was my plan now but you know what it is. it's a oh it's an example. um you get a gold badge you actually get. your badge in the lucite and your creds. they put in lucite and all that so does. it does it by the way just on a tangent. since we like those. does it hurt you that the FBI. by certain people is distrusted or even. hated 100 it kills me I I like I've.

never until recently not I I sometimes. be embarrassed. about the FBI sometimes which is really. really hard for me to say because I love. that place I love the people in it I. love the the Brotherhood that you have. with you know all the guys in your squad. you know guys and girls I just use guys. you know you know we. I I developed a real drinking problem. there because we were so social of going. out after after work and and you know. continuing on it really was a family.

um you know so I do miss that. um. but yeah I mean if someone could become. an FBI agent I mean it's pretty fucking. cool man so the day you graduate and. walk out of the academy with a gun and a. badge and you know the the power to. charge someone with a misdemeanor for. flying a United States flag at night. that's awesome. so you so there is a part of like. representing and loving your country and. especially if you're doing cyber. security so there's a lot of technical. Savvy in the uh in different places in.

the FBI yeah I mean there's different. pieces sometimes you know you'll see an. older agent that's done you know not. cyber crime come over to cyber crime at. the end so he can get a job once he goes. out uh but there's also some some guys. that come in. um you know I won't name his name but. there was a guy I think he was a hacker. when he was a kid and now he's been an. agent now he's way up in management. um great guy I love this guy and he. knows who he is if he's listening. um you know that that you know he had. some skills but we also lost a bunch of.

guys that had some skills because uh we. had one guy in the squad um that he had. to leave the FBI because his wife became. a doctor and she got a residency down in. Houston and and she couldn't move uh he. he wasn't allowed to transfer so he. decided to keep his family versus the. FBI so there's some stringent rules in. the FBI that that need to be relaxed a. little bit yeah I love hackers turned. like leaders like oh one of my quickly. becoming good friends is much. he was a big hack in the 90s and then uh.

now was recently. Twitter. Chief security officer CSO but he had a. bunch of different leadership positions. including being my boss at Google but. um but originally a hacker it's cool to. see like hackers become like leaders I. just wonder what would cause him to stop. doing it why he would then take like a. like a managerial route very high-tech. companies I think a lot of those guys so. this is like the 90s they really were.

about like the freedom. uh there's like a philosophy to it and. when I think the hacking culture evolved. over the years and I think when it. leaves you behind you start to realize. like oh actually what I want to do is I. want to help the world and I can do that. in legitimate routes and so on but. that's the story that and yeah I would I. would love to uh talk to him one day but. I I wonder how common that is to like. young hackers turn turn good you're. saying it like pulls you in it's if.

you're not careful it can really put you. in yeah you know you're good at it you. become powerful you become you know. everyone's slapping on the back and say. what a good job and all that you know at. a very young age yeah so yeah I would. love to get into my buddy's mind on why. he stopped hacking and moved on Ah. that's gonna be a good conversation in. in his case maybe it's always about a. great woman involved. family and so on yeah that grounds you. um. uh because like we have there is a.

danger to hacking that that uh once. you're in a relationship once you have. family maybe you're not willing to. partake in. what's your story what uh from childhood. what are some fun memories you have fond. memories where did you grow up. well I don't give away that information. in the United States yeah yeah yeah in. Virginia in Virginia yeah what are some. rough moments what are some beautiful. moments that you remember. I had a very good family growing up.

um the the like rough moment and I'll. tell you a story that just happened to. me two days ago and it fucked me up man. it really didn't you'll be the first. I've never told that I tried to tell my. wife this two nights ago and I couldn't. get it out. so my father uh he's a disabled. veteraner he was a disabled veteran he. was in the Army and got hurt and uh it. was in a wheelchair his whole life. um for all my growing up. he uh he was my biggest fan he just.

wanted to know everything about you know. what's going on in the FBI my stories. um I was a local cop before the FBI and. I got to a high-speed car chase uh you. know foot chase and all that and kicking. doors and he he wanted to hear another. stories and at some points I was kind of. too cool for school and ah Dad I just. want to break and all that and things. going on uh I we we lost my dad during. covid. um not because of Kobe but it was around. that time but but it was right when. cover was kicking off and so he died in. the hospital by himself and I didn't get.

to see him then. um and then uh. my mom had some people visiting her the. other night and uh the Tom and Karen. rogerberg and I'll say they're my second. biggest fans right behind my dad. um they they always asking about me and. in my career and they've read the books. and seen the movie they'll even tell you. that Silk Road movie was good. they'll hide again on that but and so. they came over and uh and I helped them. with something and uh my mom was that. called me back a couple days later and.

she said I appreciate you helping them. you know I know you know fixing. someone's Apple phone over the phone. really isn't what you do for a living. it's not it's kind of an easy and all. that and uh but but I appreciate it uh. and she said oh they they loved hearing. the stories about you know Silk Road and. all those things and she goes you know. your dad he loved those stories he just. I just wish he could have heard him like. he even would tell me he would say uh. you know maybe maybe Chris will come. home and uh I'll get him drunk and he'll. tell me the stories. um but and then she goes maybe one day.

in heaven you can tell them those. stories and I fuck lost it. I literally stood in my shower sobbing. yeah like like a child like it just. thinking about like all my dad wanted. was those stories yeah. and now I'm on a fucking podcast telling. stories to the world and yeah and I. didn't tell them yeah so did you ever. have like a long heart to heart with him. about like. about such stories he was in the.

hospital one time and I went through and. uh I want to know about his history like. his life what he did and I think he may. be sensationalize some of it but that's. what you want your dad's a hero so you. want to hear those things it's a good. Storyteller. um yeah again I don't know what was true. and not true but you know. some of it was really good. um and it was just good to hear his life. but you know we lost him and and now. those stories are gone. you miss him yeah.

what did he teach you about what it. means to be a man. so my dad. um. he was an engineer and so part of his. job we worked for Vermont. Power and electric or whatever it was I. mean he when he first got married to my. mom and all that um like he flew around. a helicopter I'll check out like power. lines and dancing he would he used to. swim inside to scuba into dams to check.

to make sure like they were functioning. properly and all that pretty cool shit. yeah. and then he couldn't walk anymore. I probably would have killed myself if. my life switched like that so bad and my. dad probably went through some dark. points but he had that from me maybe. um and so to to get through that. struggle to teach me like you know you. you press on you have a family people. count on you you do what you got to do. um that was that was big.

yeah. I'm sure you make him proud man I I I'm. sure I do but. I don't think he knew that that I knew. that. well you get to pass on that love to. your kids now I try I try but I I can't. impress them as much as uh my dad. impressed me. I can try all I want but well what do. you think is the role of love. because you uh you you gave me some. grief you busted my balls a little bit. for talking about love a lot what do you.

think they're all love in The Human. Condition I think it's the greatest. thing I think everyone should be. searching for and if you don't have it. find it get it as soon as you can. um I love my wife I really do. I had no idea what love was until my. kids were born my son came out and um. this is a funny story he came out and uh. you know I just wanted to be safe and be. healthy and all that and I said to the. doctor I said uh 10 and 10 doc you know. 10 fingers ten toes everything good and. he goes ah Nine and Nine. I was like what the fuck I said oh this.

is gonna suck though okay we'll deal. with it and all that uh he was talking. about the app in the car cord or some. scoring about breathing and color and. all that and I I was like oh shit but no. one told me this. um but so I'm just sobbing I couldn't. even cut the umbilical cord like it just. fell in love with my kids when I saw. them and and that to me really is what. love is like just for them man and and I. see that through your career that love. developed which is awesome the the the. the the being able to see the humanity.

in people. I didn't when I was young the the. foolishness of Youth yeah you know I I. needed to learn that lesson hard I mean. you know when I was young in my career. it was just about career goals and you. know and resting people became stats you. know you arrest someone you get a good. stat you get out of boy you know maybe. you know the boss likes you and you get. a better job or you get you move up the. chain. it took it took a real change in my life. to see that Humanity. and uh I can't wait to listen to this. into your talk was just uh.

probably hilarious and insightful. um given the life of the two of you. lived and given how much you've changed. each other's lives. um I can't wait to listen brother and. thank you so much this is a huge honor. to your amazing person with an amazing. wife this is an awesome conversation. you're a huge fan I love the podcast. glad I could be here thanks for the. invite so uh exercise in the brain too. it was great a great conversation and. the heart too right oh yeah yeah you got. you got some tears there at the end.

thanks for listening to this. conversation with christabel to support. this podcast please check out our. sponsors in the description and now let. me leave you with some words from. Benjamin Franklin. they can give up essential Liberty to. obtain a little temporary safety deserve. neither Liberty nor safety. thank you for listening and hope to see. you next time.