[00:00.000 --> 00:13.520]  How is it that Americans feel it's just so natural and normal for people to walk around with rifles, pistols, shotguns on their belt and their arms through the middle of demonstrations through downtown of any town they want to?
[00:13.820 --> 00:22.560]  Why do people... and nowhere in the world do I ever go, that's not a war zone, that people just like are nonchalant about that and say, oh, he has the right.
[00:23.300 --> 00:24.680]  Say something, please.
[00:25.220 --> 00:26.300]  Can I please say... Say it.
[00:26.340 --> 00:26.620]  Go ahead.
[00:27.280 --> 00:27.740]  Go ahead.
[00:27.740 --> 00:28.060]  All right.
[00:28.360 --> 00:31.160]  First of all, we know guns don't grow out of the ground.
[00:31.800 --> 00:36.180]  Second of all, who checked his age, right?
[00:36.460 --> 00:47.500]  I'm saying that in terms of just common sense, if you see someone walking around with a gun, you do not attack unless you are similarly armed.
[00:47.500 --> 00:48.420]  Thank you.
[00:48.860 --> 00:58.900]  Next time, I would say to the person who Gage, who was terribly wounded but survived, he might have saved some lives.
[00:59.120 --> 01:04.700]  And also, let us not forget that Kyle Rittenhouse was antagonizing people as well, too.
[01:04.900 --> 01:11.380]  To say that somehow he was a peaceful person carrying a deadly weapon, it is so ridiculous.
[01:11.380 --> 01:21.840]  I can't believe... I can't believe... I want to know, and we have to come to the end here, but why, how is this narrative getting out there that somehow he had some right to go sashaying through a protest with a rifle?
[01:21.960 --> 01:27.100]  I mean, no wonder this country is such in a state of mental illness.
[01:27.700 --> 01:28.060]  I'm sorry.
[01:28.060 --> 01:30.120]  It never used to be like this, as bad as it was.
[01:30.120 --> 01:35.340]  I never remembered being approved for people to go wandering around with machine guns like it is today.
[01:35.340 --> 01:54.640]  I'm sorry to break in on this, Paul, but I just found this so ridiculous, this argument, I just found this so ridiculous that I had to chime in, as being a person of color, as being a black man in this country, to hear some nonsense, straight up.
[01:54.840 --> 01:56.760]  I'm calling you out, caller.
[01:57.340 --> 01:57.860]  Nonsense.
[01:59.160 --> 01:59.900]  That's it.
[01:59.900 --> 02:16.300]  Well, we are too easy with these guns, and I'm in favor of, as any person in this country, with a person's right to self-defense and even the Second Amendment, but it's another thing to go in the middle of a protest to shoot people on the other side and call it self-defense.
[02:17.460 --> 02:19.140]  Anyway, we're going to leave it at that.
[02:19.280 --> 02:23.960]  We can solve all the problems of the world here on the air at WBAI, and maybe one day we will.
[02:23.960 --> 02:25.260]  I'm Paul Durianzo.
[02:25.340 --> 02:33.560]  This has been the WBAI News, our engineer, Reggie Johnson, and all you great callers out there who keep us on our toes with your great questions and comments.
[02:33.560 --> 02:37.020]  Thanks so much for joining us, and I will see you the day after tomorrow.
[02:37.020 --> 02:45.020]  So enjoy your Thanksgiving, whatever it is, if it's a vegan or a vegetarian or just a traditional meat eating, turkey eating day.
[02:45.520 --> 02:46.240]  Enjoy it.
[02:46.340 --> 02:46.840]  Have fun.
[02:46.940 --> 02:47.700]  Love your families.
[02:48.160 --> 02:49.860]  And we'll see you on the other side.
[03:03.680 --> 03:09.560]  And this is WBAI New York, 99.5 FM and WBAI.org online.
[03:09.940 --> 03:11.620]  The time now is 7 p.m.
[03:11.700 --> 03:13.680]  Stay tuned for Off the Hook coming up.
[03:25.290 --> 03:28.630]  Hello, you're listening to WBAI New York.
[03:29.410 --> 03:30.690]  It's 7 o'clock.
[03:30.890 --> 03:34.750]  Time for another edition of Off the Hook.
[03:40.420 --> 03:42.440]  The telephone keeps ringing.
[03:42.740 --> 03:44.880]  So I ripped it off and off.
[03:46.220 --> 03:47.980]  I cut myself off shaving.
[03:48.480 --> 03:50.500]  Now I can't make a cut.
[03:51.220 --> 03:53.240]  We couldn't get much worse.
[03:53.880 --> 03:55.820]  But if they could, they would.
[03:56.080 --> 03:58.740]  But maybe we're on for the best, it's paid for worse.
[03:59.300 --> 04:01.220]  I hope that's understood.
[04:01.580 --> 04:02.280]  Come make me move!
[04:33.040 --> 04:37.320]  And the Very Good Evening Cardlight program is Off the Hook.
[04:37.460 --> 04:41.600]  Emmanuel Goldstein here with you on this Wednesday evening.
[04:42.040 --> 04:43.720]  Joined tonight by Kyle.
[04:44.300 --> 04:45.380]  At the ready.
[04:45.760 --> 04:47.700]  And over in Skyplan, we have Rob T.
[04:47.800 --> 04:48.340]  Firefly.
[04:49.000 --> 04:49.940]  Good evening.
[04:50.420 --> 04:51.360]  And we have Gila.
[04:51.880 --> 04:52.660]  Good evening.
[04:53.140 --> 04:54.660]  And we also have Alex.
[04:56.260 --> 04:57.620]  I like at the ready.
[04:58.420 --> 04:59.220]  Better than good evening.
[04:59.520 --> 05:00.440]  I'm going to say at the ready.
[05:01.020 --> 05:03.060]  You know, let's let the bander levels up a little bit.
[05:04.300 --> 05:06.500]  Maybe you could bring your microphone up a little bit, Alex.
[05:06.700 --> 05:07.700]  We could barely hear you there.
[05:09.140 --> 05:10.080]  Yeah, is this any better?
[05:10.220 --> 05:10.960]  That is much better.
[05:11.060 --> 05:11.720]  Much, much better.
[05:12.060 --> 05:15.360]  You know, I really want to be able to take phone calls again like the previous show I was doing.
[05:15.520 --> 05:18.160]  I was engaging.
[05:18.320 --> 05:18.780]  I was engaging.
[05:18.920 --> 05:20.920]  And I really, I miss those days.
[05:21.120 --> 05:22.900]  And we'll figure out how to do that.
[05:23.040 --> 05:25.100]  We don't have an overtime tonight because of the holidays.
[05:25.100 --> 05:29.180]  And a lot of us have things we have to do in preparation for that.
[05:29.180 --> 05:37.080]  But we will have overtime next week where you can call us after the show and discuss various things.
[05:37.760 --> 05:39.260]  But yeah, it's the day before Thanksgiving.
[05:39.260 --> 05:42.980]  So it's a little hectic in various places.
[05:44.120 --> 05:48.560]  Last week, there was a story that we didn't get to, that I really wanted to get to.
[05:48.600 --> 05:50.460]  And that was about the FBI's email system.
[05:50.720 --> 05:51.500]  Remember this, Alex?
[05:51.940 --> 06:02.840]  Not that you know anything about it specifically, but you heard the story about the FBI's email system being hacked and a couple hundred thousand messages being sent out in their name.
[06:03.160 --> 06:03.600]  Yes.
[06:03.820 --> 06:05.280]  That was embarrassing, wasn't it?
[06:06.820 --> 06:08.580]  Yeah, I guess it could be.
[06:08.680 --> 06:10.760]  It could also be a bit of a disaster.
[06:13.300 --> 06:14.140]  Right, right.
[06:14.220 --> 06:21.660]  Well, what happened was basically their email servers were targeted, apparently.
[06:22.480 --> 06:31.740]  And thousands, maybe it wasn't hundreds of thousands, but definitely thousands of phony messages basically were sent out.
[06:34.080 --> 06:46.200]  And the emails claimed that somebody named Vinny Troia was behind the fake attacks and also falsely stated that Troia was associated with the infamous hacking group, the Dark Overlord.
[06:47.060 --> 06:49.680]  Is that the name of the hacking group or is that the name of the hacker?
[06:50.520 --> 06:53.080]  Seems like a weird name for a hacker group, the Dark Overlord.
[06:53.080 --> 07:01.920]  But basically, they're the same, if you recall, they're the same bad actors who leaked the entire fifth season of Orange is the New Black.
[07:02.160 --> 07:03.300]  Ruined it for everybody.
[07:04.380 --> 07:04.940]  Yeah.
[07:05.140 --> 07:16.020]  In reality, Vinny Troia is a prominent cybersecurity researcher who runs two dark web security companies, Night Lion and Shadowbite.
[07:16.440 --> 07:19.760]  But I can imagine something like this happening.
[07:19.760 --> 07:27.560]  You know where you get the emails where somebody says, hey, look, I'm emailing you from your own address, therefore I've hacked your system.
[07:27.760 --> 07:33.820]  And it's invariably some kind of mail spoofing that basically makes it seem that way.
[07:33.900 --> 07:37.460]  But in this particular case, it really was coming from the FBI.
[07:38.560 --> 07:40.840]  So that's hard to recover from.
[07:42.760 --> 07:54.620]  Yeah, I mean, and the connection to this Vinny Troia character and the Dark Overlord is apparently a hacker group as well.
[07:55.080 --> 08:10.200]  Various members of the Dark Overlord have been charged with hacking related offenses involving, I believe, the targeting of celebrity iCloud accounts.
[08:10.320 --> 08:14.200]  I'm looking for celebrity information, celebrity photos and things like that.
[08:14.620 --> 08:19.820]  But the focus on this Vinny Troia character is really concerning.
[08:20.040 --> 08:23.400]  And this could have really happened to anybody.
[08:23.740 --> 08:44.080]  I mean, I think about how much worse this could have been if that email system was abused to send out some kind of false notification about a disaster or some kind of false accusation against perhaps, you know, a member of somebody's organization or company or request for information or request for a meeting.
[08:44.820 --> 08:50.780]  This could have gone very, very horribly wrong in so many other ways.
[08:50.780 --> 08:55.660]  Or perhaps it could have been used to communicate with other governmental agencies.
[08:56.620 --> 09:16.440]  I think the important thing, though, to remember is that within FBI and within most components of the government that handle classified information, there are usually two separate email systems, one for public communications and the other for communications that would involve classified or more sensitive information.
[09:16.440 --> 09:20.260]  And this breach relates only to those public communications.
[09:20.640 --> 09:39.180]  But those public communications, as we just discussed, can be very sensitive and public communications from FBI can really, you know, cause absolute chaos if they are operated by threat actors and drafted for malicious purposes.
[09:39.440 --> 09:43.920]  But Alex, how do we know that that other system wasn't also compromised?
[09:43.920 --> 09:45.060]  Would they tell us?
[09:48.180 --> 09:49.340]  Good question.
[09:49.360 --> 09:52.580]  I don't think that we would know if the other system wasn't compromised.
[09:52.840 --> 10:04.640]  But I think it's not a rational leap of logic for us to assume that because the public system was compromised and the classified system probably was as well.
[10:05.560 --> 10:09.620]  Those two systems are generally on entirely different networks.
[10:10.960 --> 10:11.540]  Okay.
[10:11.720 --> 10:13.740]  Well, that actually happened a couple of weeks ago.
[10:13.740 --> 10:16.840]  So they're probably still licking their wounds over that.
[10:18.300 --> 10:21.400]  But boy, you got to wonder, you got to...
[10:21.400 --> 10:25.680]  Do we know how specifically they were compromised?
[10:25.680 --> 10:34.600]  Because by sending out all these thousands and thousands of emails, they obviously got access to a contact list of sorts.
[10:34.600 --> 10:37.000]  And I imagine a number of people...
[10:37.000 --> 10:44.700]  I've even heard from people that say, yeah, I got the email because apparently they're on an FBI email list of one sort or another.
[10:45.500 --> 10:46.600]  You know, that's...
[10:47.680 --> 10:55.840]  You have to wonder how much personal information, even though perhaps they don't have actual addresses and phone numbers and things like that.
[10:55.900 --> 10:56.920]  They do have email addresses.
[10:56.920 --> 10:59.860]  They do know who is on that particular list.
[10:59.860 --> 11:03.080]  That must be really disturbing to some people.
[11:06.120 --> 11:07.160]  Oh, yeah.
[11:07.320 --> 11:08.160]  I mean, no doubt.
[11:08.500 --> 11:09.800]  Absolutely it is.
[11:10.020 --> 11:27.880]  And if they were able to access and abuse an inbox or various inboxes from FBI.gov, I think it's quite possible then that they had reviewed other communications to FBI.gov as well within those inboxes.
[11:27.880 --> 11:45.600]  So that's problematic, I think, on many, many levels because those communications between FBI and the public could have implicated things like, you know, confidential informants and other people that need actual physical protection because they may be cooperating with FBI.
[11:45.880 --> 11:48.900]  Do we know how specifically the system was compromised?
[11:49.940 --> 11:51.520]  I don't know.
[11:52.260 --> 12:02.700]  I don't think it's publicly out there, but it seems like, you know, it was obviously some credentials seem to have been compromised.
[12:02.740 --> 12:04.680]  I don't know off the top of my head.
[12:04.800 --> 12:13.980]  I don't know if it was some unpatched email server that was out there that was then exploited or if it was a spear phishing attack or some kind of other credentials harvesting attack.
[12:14.140 --> 12:15.360]  That I'm not entirely sure.
[12:15.360 --> 12:23.660]  Well, knowing that, obviously, we'd be able to tell how much information potentially could have been compromised, how much private information might be out there.
[12:24.320 --> 12:25.420]  And that's pretty serious.
[12:25.600 --> 12:27.460]  That's something, you know, you have to...
[12:27.460 --> 12:28.920]  It's the FBI, for God's sake.
[12:29.200 --> 12:38.740]  If they can't do a decent job protecting their email systems, what can be said for, you know, the rest of corporate America or even us as individuals?
[12:39.080 --> 12:39.280]  Kyle?
[12:39.280 --> 13:07.340]  Especially us as individuals because there are so many different places where our data is vulnerable, is waiting for, to be compromised and could be in some way over a simple security malfunction or some kind of grand, wider network compromise that a company is totally unaware of and,
[13:07.340 --> 13:11.300]  you know, had mitigated and tried their best to secure against.
[13:11.700 --> 13:15.160]  But this is the critical thing.
[13:15.260 --> 13:22.900]  Any one company, they have a limited set of information about a whole lot of individuals.
[13:23.660 --> 13:49.040]  They have different concerns and personal data for that individual could be so many different things in so many places that are leaky or just completely, like, kind of forgotten about and go unnoticed as far as taking seriously as a priority and being secured or destroyed.
[13:49.340 --> 13:51.080]  Rob Gila, any thoughts from you guys?
[13:52.360 --> 13:54.420]  I'm just, I'm kind of entertained by it.
[13:54.540 --> 14:02.940]  I mean, something about this that's interesting is, you know, this was, they sent out a bunch of junk emails, which is kind of a harmless act.
[14:03.100 --> 14:05.880]  I mean, it's not completely unannoying.
[14:06.440 --> 14:07.240]  It's aggravating.
[14:07.380 --> 14:09.020]  But, you know, they didn't damage anything.
[14:09.180 --> 14:12.780]  They didn't go in there and deleting things that we know of.
[14:12.780 --> 14:28.900]  This seems to be more of a prank than anything actually malicious, which is always, you know, I kind of like hearing about when these things happen, people are just having a bit of fun and not necessarily smashing anything as the, you know, pop culture definition of a hacker would have you believe.
[14:29.980 --> 14:34.560]  And also, yeah, the FBI, the feds themselves took a bit of a black eye.
[14:35.020 --> 14:38.220]  And that is of interest to me.
[14:38.320 --> 14:40.800]  That sparks my curiosity a little.
[14:41.980 --> 14:43.000]  Yes, go ahead, Alex.
[14:44.100 --> 14:51.960]  I do note here that there was, from several days ago, an updated FBI statement on this incident that I've been able to turn up.
[14:52.040 --> 15:00.460]  And it seems like the threat actor was able to leverage or compromise something called LEAP or the Law Enforcement Enterprise Portal.
[15:00.740 --> 15:05.500]  And he used that portal to send fake emails, the fake emails in question.
[15:06.180 --> 15:12.700]  That LEAP portal, however, according to FBI, was not part of FBI's corporate email service.
[15:12.880 --> 15:18.020]  So the actor was likely not able to mine other emails.
[15:18.020 --> 15:27.620]  It was probably able to send emails from that LEAP server, but probably not compromise or mine any other data on the FBI's email servers.
[15:27.800 --> 15:40.620]  But what's interesting is, they say this specifically, once we learned of the incident, we quickly remediated the software vulnerability, warned partners to disregard fake emails and confirm the integrity of our network.
[15:40.880 --> 15:50.640]  So it sounds to me like there was some kind of vulnerability either within that LEAP system or on the system that hosted the LEAP data.
[15:50.920 --> 16:00.220]  So perhaps it was something as simple as an unpatched server that caused a vulnerability to remain.
[16:00.460 --> 16:03.120]  And that vulnerability was then exploited by the threat actor.
[16:03.520 --> 16:04.540]  Happens all the time.
[16:04.700 --> 16:08.980]  I guess the message then to the FBI is keep up to date on those patches.
[16:09.720 --> 16:11.540]  Like you're always telling us.
[16:11.660 --> 16:14.540]  Maybe you should follow your own advice there.
[16:14.540 --> 16:21.280]  Okay, well, moving on, we talked about the death of the Hotel Pennsylvania last week.
[16:21.380 --> 16:27.560]  We've had several people write in and tweet us about various updates to that.
[16:28.280 --> 16:36.920]  The hotel is still slated for demolition starting in January, and they're emptying out the insides of it from the last I could hear.
[16:37.660 --> 16:47.160]  But there is some kind of an Urban Development Corporation hearing taking place on December 8th, 2021.
[16:47.460 --> 16:50.660]  Could somebody out there tell me what day of the week that is, December the 8th?
[16:50.920 --> 16:51.780]  It's a Wednesday.
[16:52.180 --> 16:53.400]  Of course it's a Wednesday.
[16:53.560 --> 16:54.820]  Everything always happens on Wednesday.
[16:55.140 --> 16:57.020]  Well, it starts two hours before our show.
[16:57.820 --> 16:58.760]  Actually, you know what?
[16:58.780 --> 17:01.380]  That might be the week we're preempted, or it might be the week afterward.
[17:01.380 --> 17:03.800]  I'm not sure, but 5 p.m.
[17:03.880 --> 17:11.820]  to 8 p.m., and the link is just so incredibly long that what we did was we made a tiny URL for everybody.
[17:12.220 --> 17:17.440]  So all the details, we go to tinyurl.com slash save the hotel.
[17:18.540 --> 17:20.540]  Hopefully that's easy enough for people to remember.
[17:20.780 --> 17:23.300]  That has all the meeting info.
[17:23.680 --> 17:25.340]  I can give you the dial-in number.
[17:25.340 --> 17:28.240]  It's 646-558-8656.
[17:28.620 --> 17:32.740]  Meeting ID, 896-5886-3486.
[17:32.740 --> 17:34.660]  In case you haven't guessed, this is Zoom.
[17:35.340 --> 17:43.680]  It's Pennsylvania Station Area Civic and Land Use Improvement Project, formerly known as the Empire Station Complex Civic and Land Use Project.
[17:43.780 --> 17:45.480]  Wait, when did they rename it and why?
[17:46.140 --> 17:47.680]  Is this a Cuomo thing?
[17:48.140 --> 17:49.200]  It might be.
[17:49.800 --> 17:53.960]  So again, that's December 8th, Wednesday, December 8th, from 5 p.m.
[17:54.300 --> 17:57.540]  to 8 p.m., and it's a Zoom meeting.
[17:57.680 --> 18:01.940]  You can get all the details by going to tinyurl.com slash save the hotel.
[18:03.180 --> 18:08.880]  And, you know, I don't know how realistic saving the hotel is at this point, but there's no harm in trying.
[18:09.000 --> 18:12.180]  There's no harm in trying to get somebody to listen to reason.
[18:12.760 --> 18:15.680]  Whether or not you like the hotel, a couple of things to keep in mind.
[18:16.480 --> 18:17.920]  It's a cheap-ass hotel.
[18:18.000 --> 18:19.580]  There's no question about that.
[18:20.140 --> 18:26.540]  But for people who are visiting New York City for the first time, for younger people visiting, it's a godsend.
[18:26.680 --> 18:27.420]  It's a place to stay.
[18:27.560 --> 18:28.200]  It's close by.
[18:28.340 --> 18:30.020]  It's across the street from Penn Station, for God's sake.
[18:30.140 --> 18:31.920]  It can't be any more convenient than that.
[18:32.200 --> 18:37.700]  And it's affordable, so that means people will come to New York City and see it for maybe the first time.
[18:38.240 --> 18:39.240]  So there's that.
[18:39.420 --> 18:46.340]  There's the fact that there's a place that doesn't cost 400 bucks a night for people to stay.
[18:47.100 --> 18:54.520]  And also, keep in mind, people in New York don't really care about this because most people in New York don't tend to stay in hotels in New York.
[18:54.820 --> 18:57.180]  You know, it doesn't really make much sense to do that.
[18:58.940 --> 19:00.460]  It's an historical building.
[19:00.680 --> 19:03.500]  It was built over 100 years ago.
[19:04.440 --> 19:06.660]  Once the biggest hotel in the world.
[19:06.660 --> 19:12.840]  And what they want to replace it with are just a bunch of office towers.
[19:13.720 --> 19:20.800]  Now, you know, I don't know if other people have been paying attention with this pandemic the last couple of years, what's been going on.
[19:21.360 --> 19:23.620]  A lot of people aren't going into the office anymore.
[19:24.060 --> 19:25.940]  So I don't think we need new offices.
[19:26.080 --> 19:27.720]  I really don't think we need that.
[19:28.620 --> 19:33.160]  And it will transform the neighborhood into kind of a ghost neighborhood.
[19:33.160 --> 19:43.080]  You know, if a lot of modern-looking structures that are basically empty or maybe filled with Facebook servers or something like that, it'll be depressing.
[19:44.780 --> 19:53.440]  It won't be filled with jubilant people who are arriving from all sorts of foreign lands and parts of the country and things like that.
[19:53.680 --> 19:56.580]  So consider that.
[19:56.660 --> 20:02.320]  Consider that before dismissing the idea of a cheap-ass hotel being torn down.
[20:02.320 --> 20:08.120]  It's no longer our home because the Hope Conference has moved on to greener pastures, literally.
[20:09.380 --> 20:11.540]  And we'll have more details on that in the weeks ahead.
[20:11.660 --> 20:12.740]  But we still...
[20:12.740 --> 20:15.040]  We weren't trying to save it just for us.
[20:15.120 --> 20:16.760]  We were trying to save it for everybody.
[20:18.480 --> 20:21.320]  And it's just really terrible that they basically...
[20:22.220 --> 20:28.840]  Steve Roth and Vornado took advantage of the pandemic to come up with an excuse to not reopen.
[20:29.360 --> 20:40.780]  Thousands of people put out of work and tens of thousands of people traveling to New York will have to stay in an expensive place or will not come at all.
[20:41.500 --> 20:44.940]  So again, tinyurl.com slash save the hotel for details on that.
[20:45.020 --> 20:46.020]  Do you guys have any comments?
[20:47.480 --> 20:51.980]  Just that December 8th is indeed a night when we're preempted, so we won't be on the air.
[20:51.980 --> 20:57.420]  But maybe that'll free some of us up to join in on this, which is 5 to 8 p.m.
[20:57.840 --> 20:58.720]  December 8th.
[20:58.820 --> 20:59.760]  It is a Zoom meeting.
[20:59.940 --> 21:05.600]  Go to tinyurl.com slash save the hotel and you'll get a PDF with all the info there.
[21:06.000 --> 21:08.580]  Yeah, maybe we'll drop in and liven things up a bit.
[21:08.700 --> 21:09.320]  Go ahead, Alex.
[21:10.760 --> 21:22.160]  Yeah, you know, in light of all of the history associated with the hotel, Pennsylvania 65,000, and all the wonderful things that have happened within that hotel.
[21:22.400 --> 21:33.020]  I cannot take, or rather, I cannot miss the opportunity once again this week to slam the Landmark Preservation Commission in the city of New York for not doing their job.
[21:33.120 --> 21:45.940]  And frankly, I'm flabbergasted that they would allow a building of this magnitude and of such historical significance to be unceremoniously demolished.
[21:45.980 --> 21:47.380]  And what are we going to have in its place?
[21:47.380 --> 21:50.560]  You know, another glass tower just like Hudson Yards.
[21:50.740 --> 22:05.480]  I mean, I hate to say it, but if we allow this to happen as regularly as we are doing, and if commissions like the LPC, the Landmark Preservation Commission, don't step up and do their job, New York is going to start to look a hell of a lot like Dubai.
[22:05.760 --> 22:21.840]  And if you headed over to the west side of Manhattan recently and you've wandered around Hudson Yards and seen all of the soulless luxury boutiques one after another in the lobbies of these massive glass towers, that's what we're headed towards.
[22:22.160 --> 22:28.520]  And I like old New York better than, you know, new Dubai, you know, and it's very unfortunate.
[22:28.620 --> 22:36.700]  Well, the thing about New York is that, you know, if you don't like old New York, there's also new buildings like you just described over there in Hudson Yards.
[22:36.840 --> 22:38.720]  Okay, go be over in that universe.
[22:40.180 --> 22:42.320]  But the old needs to also be preserved.
[22:42.440 --> 22:43.840]  Seems to be a theme we keep coming back to.
[22:44.020 --> 22:49.500]  We're talking about preserving payphones and landlines and things like that because they do serve a purpose.
[22:49.500 --> 22:55.320]  They are a link to our past and they serve a very valuable purpose in the present.
[22:55.500 --> 22:57.620]  So I think it's very important.
[22:57.780 --> 22:57.940]  Kyle?
[22:58.040 --> 23:08.240]  I hope that history is taken into account like everybody else and just think that it's a shame that we can't integrate into new designs some of that history at the very least.
[23:08.240 --> 23:27.760]  So I hope there's some kind of creative element and we think very, very, very carefully about how we're using space because like you said, there's all kinds of change and transformation in the kind of units or whatever they're looking at, the thing they're going to create.
[23:28.740 --> 23:30.880]  Is that really something that's desirable?
[23:31.300 --> 23:45.500]  And as Alex implicates, it's going to change the entire terrain the more you build these things that are monuments to something that wasn't really as stay...
[23:45.500 --> 23:50.840]  had as much staying power and magic as an old place like the hotel.
[23:50.980 --> 23:53.860]  Let me just tell you, nobody is asking for this.
[23:54.160 --> 23:54.420]  Nobody.
[23:54.480 --> 24:06.780]  This is a result of backroom deals and all kinds of basically deal-making, corruption, that kind of thing.
[24:06.840 --> 24:10.020]  The things you always read about and hear about decades later.
[24:11.760 --> 24:16.940]  And it's the reason why the old Penn Station was destroyed back in the early 60s.
[24:17.040 --> 24:18.300]  Same thing, same mentality.
[24:18.460 --> 24:18.980]  It's greed.
[24:19.300 --> 24:20.820]  Make no mistake about that.
[24:21.500 --> 24:22.380]  Prove me wrong.
[24:22.480 --> 24:23.200]  Convince me otherwise.
[24:23.200 --> 24:30.140]  Any good is going to come from putting office towers where this popular hotel is now.
[24:31.140 --> 24:32.060]  It's just a shame.
[24:32.240 --> 24:32.700]  It really is.
[24:32.820 --> 24:37.800]  Once again, final time, tinyurl.com slash save the hotel for that information.
[24:37.920 --> 24:41.280]  I don't even know how much they're going to be talking about that in the first place.
[24:42.140 --> 24:44.220]  It may already be a done deal.
[24:44.360 --> 24:46.420]  Alex, why do you keep coming on and off?
[24:46.520 --> 24:48.860]  I keep seeing you popping up on the screen and disappearing.
[24:49.980 --> 24:53.220]  Is somebody hitting the disconnect button on you over and over again?
[24:54.540 --> 24:56.720]  No, I'm multitasking.
[24:56.920 --> 24:57.860]  I'm in the office here.
[24:58.100 --> 25:02.400]  So I'm on my phone connected via Skype into the station.
[25:02.740 --> 25:09.660]  And so anytime that I'm outside of the Skype application, it actually shuts down your camera.
[25:09.900 --> 25:11.980]  So I'm going to be flipping in and out.
[25:12.120 --> 25:12.920]  You're able to hear us.
[25:13.080 --> 25:13.680]  Don't be too distracted.
[25:13.980 --> 25:14.480]  I know you're...
[25:14.480 --> 25:15.460]  I see his eyebrows.
[25:16.120 --> 25:17.260]  Yeah, you're able...
[25:17.260 --> 25:24.040]  It's weird how you're in an office and your technology has plummeted than when you're in your cabin in Pennsylvania.
[25:24.760 --> 25:27.160]  But you're able to hear us when you do drop off.
[25:27.260 --> 25:28.320]  I just wanted to make sure of that.
[25:29.120 --> 25:29.600]  Absolutely.
[25:29.840 --> 25:29.980]  Okay.
[25:30.060 --> 25:31.620]  I hate repeating myself.
[25:32.000 --> 25:32.400]  I can hear you loud and clear.
[25:32.440 --> 25:33.860]  I don't like repeating myself.
[25:35.420 --> 25:36.660]  But another story.
[25:36.720 --> 25:37.240]  We have to move on.
[25:37.880 --> 25:41.960]  This is from DeKalb County in Georgia.
[25:42.140 --> 25:46.620]  DeKalb County School District virtual meeting was disrupted by hackers last Wednesday evening.
[25:47.380 --> 25:48.220]  You guys know about this?
[25:48.560 --> 25:55.160]  The S-PLOST E-S-P-L-O-S-T E-S-P-LOST I don't know what it means.
[25:55.400 --> 26:03.420]  The S-PLOST advisory committee was hosting a virtual meeting through a personal Zoom account when it was hijacked by hackers.
[26:04.320 --> 26:05.620]  Yeah, hijacked by hackers.
[26:05.800 --> 26:07.460]  That's a good name for a film, isn't it?
[26:08.180 --> 26:12.260]  Nearly 81 people were on the call during the incident.
[26:12.540 --> 26:15.580]  And the school district has released the following statement.
[26:15.700 --> 26:18.840]  We apologize to those who saw the obscene images that were displayed.
[26:19.300 --> 26:23.580]  Moving forward, the district will host all meetings in district secured accounts.
[26:25.480 --> 26:30.660]  The recording of the S-PLOST advisory committee meeting will be published by the end of the week.
[26:31.800 --> 26:33.060]  Okay, I've got a question.
[26:34.900 --> 26:37.360]  It's going to be published by the end of the week.
[26:37.360 --> 26:41.220]  Are you publishing it as it transpired?
[26:41.240 --> 26:43.380]  Because I'd be curious to see what that was like.
[26:44.500 --> 26:48.340]  Or are you censoring it and keeping it from the people?
[26:48.440 --> 26:48.880]  Which is it?
[26:49.280 --> 26:50.900]  So let us know, DeCobb County.
[26:51.560 --> 26:53.180]  Yeah, these things happen all the time.
[26:53.380 --> 26:53.880]  All the time.
[26:54.000 --> 26:55.580]  And I don't think we're getting any better at it.
[26:55.740 --> 27:05.880]  It just seems like our inboxes are flooded with all these notices of school board meetings on Zoom being disrupted by kids that are posting obscenities and things like that.
[27:07.520 --> 27:09.040]  I don't even know if it's news.
[27:09.760 --> 27:13.420]  It's funny, but it seems to go with the territory.
[27:13.800 --> 27:14.460]  Go ahead, Rob.
[27:15.080 --> 27:23.240]  The funny bit of this is we've all been using this stuff now for those of us who weren't using it before have been using it since the pandemic.
[27:23.460 --> 27:26.240]  That's a year and a lot of change.
[27:26.380 --> 27:34.040]  And we've all had time to get used to this, how this works and the functionality behind it and how you need to moderate them.
[27:34.040 --> 27:51.780]  So people who are still failing at it, especially organizations that are still failing this hard at it, especially organizations like schools who are dealing with kids pulling pranks and all kinds of stuff, we should know better than this by now and they should know better than this by now.
[27:52.240 --> 28:00.180]  And all it takes is one person whose job it is to sit in front of the thing and press the button if anything goes wrong and you'll be fine.
[28:00.180 --> 28:04.060]  So, you know, get some moderation going and you're okay.
[28:04.580 --> 28:14.300]  I also would just stress like more device and software literacy and tools.
[28:14.580 --> 28:23.280]  These were mostly employed for sort of stopgap and emergency use as it were.
[28:23.460 --> 28:36.400]  And that's, you know, evolved where, yes, now understanding we have to moderate but they were never in many cases designed the way we're all accustomed to now.
[28:36.680 --> 29:08.340]  So that, I think for an educational environment where they have specific user groups and ways of authenticating, you know, who is in charge and in what context and who belongs where, when, they have other well, pioneered the way and other tools at their disposal but maybe stuff that's better developed for that environment and each environment or at least stuff that's more customizable might be in
[29:08.340 --> 29:08.540]  order.
[29:10.540 --> 29:11.200]  Okay.
[29:11.400 --> 29:12.120]  Well, moving on.
[29:12.360 --> 29:20.180]  Rob, you sent something to our list about the next chapter in the McDonald's ice cream machine hacking saga.
[29:20.780 --> 29:23.260]  Is there something you want to tell us about this?
[29:24.060 --> 29:28.580]  Yeah, there was a great piece in Wired about this and I think it was in the print magazine too.
[29:29.560 --> 29:32.920]  Yeah, some background first for people who might not know what we're talking about.
[29:33.640 --> 29:40.200]  Well, the McDonald's ice cream machine has been the center of actually a couple of independently different and weird tech stories.
[29:40.780 --> 29:52.880]  The first is that there were people who had set up a thing called McBroken which was an online resource where people could keep track of which McDonald's near them had working ice cream machines and which ones were broken.
[29:52.880 --> 29:57.960]  because apparently it's such a big thing for the ice cream machine at McDonald's to be broken.
[29:58.980 --> 30:06.540]  And so people put together a volunteer-based project to track this stuff and McDonald's tried to squash it.
[30:06.580 --> 30:08.060]  We spoke about that earlier on this program.
[30:08.620 --> 30:25.680]  And this story which I love so very, very much is because these machines apparently they need maintenance and the franchisees who run these restaurants who own these restaurants can't always get them fixed because it's a proprietary system.
[30:26.260 --> 30:34.720]  So about six months ago a little startup called Kitch that's K-Y-T-C-H developed basically a man-in-the-middle box.
[30:34.820 --> 30:47.620]  This is a box that would attach between the machine and the machine's net connection to the outside world and intercept the messages that it was phoning home with and decode them so the franchisees could see what was going on with their machine.
[30:47.760 --> 30:54.760]  They would get the messages that I guess the home office of this company Taylor who makes these machines would use.
[30:55.560 --> 30:57.220]  This is a good man-in-the-middle.
[30:58.740 --> 31:00.300]  We hear about man-in-the-middle attacks.
[31:00.380 --> 31:01.820]  We never hear about a good man-in-the-middle.
[31:02.180 --> 31:03.280]  So that's what this is.
[31:03.600 --> 31:14.600]  No, this was a helpful man-in-the-middle attack and what's great about it is it freed these franchisees up who had to use these machines because they have to run things according to how McDonald's says.
[31:15.660 --> 31:23.300]  They offered them the chance to do a little better maintenance of them and hopefully get away from that the ice cream machine is always broken cliche.
[31:23.820 --> 31:26.300]  But Taylor themselves didn't like this.
[31:26.460 --> 31:30.000]  They didn't like somebody else making a gadget that helped people fix their thing.
[31:30.200 --> 31:47.900]  So they had McDonald's, the corporation, tell the franchisees, no, you can't use these little boxes from Kitsch because it breaks DRM, it intercepts proprietary info, and then Taylor themselves started basically instead making their own clone of this machine,
[31:48.160 --> 31:56.960]  stealing basically Kitsch's idea to the extent that Taylor's version is also a man-in-the-middle attack on their own machine.
[31:57.420 --> 32:11.540]  The technically literate in the audience will probably be rolling their eyes back and laughing or both at this point, but what that means is basically they copied the hacker's hack on their machine rather than put something together.
[32:11.600 --> 32:15.060]  that actually had access to their own proprietary stuff.
[32:15.360 --> 32:17.760]  And then they tried to say they didn't steal it from Kitsch.
[32:18.300 --> 32:29.820]  Yeah, they really went after them with the backing of the corporate entity of mention, which is McDonald's in this case.
[32:29.960 --> 32:40.440]  And that retribution, they were really out for all that this small startup had been doing.
[32:40.440 --> 32:56.180]  And that's insane that they didn't even really know how to speak and understand and interpret the signals from their own stuff, or rather, use the same technique to get the information into a new form.
[32:56.180 --> 32:57.300]  Okay, so let me see if I understand this.
[32:57.540 --> 33:16.520]  So McDonald's has ice cream machines that are made by this company called Taylor, which is not very open in communications with McDonald's, with the franchisees, and they're not able to fix the machines very easily without Taylor being involved.
[33:16.620 --> 33:20.360]  And the result is that there are many, many ice cream machines at McDonald's that don't work.
[33:20.460 --> 33:31.500]  So this company, Kitsch, comes along and says, hey, we can we can communicate this to the franchisees so that they can take control of these devices that they're paying for.
[33:32.060 --> 33:37.680]  Taylor doesn't like that convinces McDonald's to tell Kitsch to stop helping them.
[33:38.080 --> 33:43.240]  And now Taylor comes along and is doing the same thing that Kitsch did.
[33:43.560 --> 33:46.300]  So I assume Kitsch is taking them to court.
[33:47.160 --> 33:59.480]  Kitsch actually did sue Taylor for this, and through the discovery in that case, got hold of internal Taylor emails that completely contradict Taylor's insistence that they weren't stealing anything from Kitsch.
[33:59.600 --> 34:08.380]  Their own internal communications show them posting screenshots of Kitsch's user interface and other things and saying, we have to do better like this.
[34:08.620 --> 34:16.040]  And showing their level of concern over this, their awareness of Kitsch, and their eagerness to basically do that same thing.
[34:16.040 --> 34:25.040]  So from Kitsch's point of view, Taylor is trying to put them out of business because they're better at doing the thing than Taylor is.
[34:25.240 --> 34:36.440]  And so this is going to be a really interesting case to keep an eye on, not only if you like fast food and their bad ice cream, but if you're interested in right to repair rules, because this is now a heavy right to repair case.
[34:36.600 --> 34:38.280]  How does this put Kitsch out of business?
[34:38.560 --> 34:40.340]  Are they making money off of this somehow?
[34:41.340 --> 34:44.280]  Apparently, they were selling the boxes that they made.
[34:44.540 --> 34:56.880]  And, you know, they are not able to do so because Kitsch then had McDonald's tell franchisees, well, if you do this, you're basically breaking all kinds of corporate agreements.
[34:57.080 --> 34:58.620]  How about you just stop selling ice cream?
[34:58.760 --> 35:00.700]  Who goes to McDonald's for ice cream in the first place?
[35:01.640 --> 35:02.500]  You do, Gila?
[35:04.000 --> 35:04.400]  Yeah.
[35:04.920 --> 35:06.480]  I like McDonald's ice cream.
[35:06.800 --> 35:10.080]  Well, you have to travel pretty far to find a working machine, right?
[35:11.200 --> 35:14.220]  I mean, I will admit I haven't looked in a long time.
[35:14.440 --> 35:17.620]  But yes, I am a fan of McDonald's ice cream cones.
[35:18.300 --> 35:19.540]  I like a McFlurry.
[35:19.860 --> 35:20.800]  I'm not going to lie.
[35:20.920 --> 35:21.600]  I like a McFlurry.
[35:22.220 --> 35:22.620]  Wow.
[35:22.940 --> 35:23.680]  Alex, go ahead.
[35:25.420 --> 35:37.580]  I have to say, I have personal familiarity with tailor machines in that I have taken several of them apart, put them back together probably hundreds of times.
[35:37.580 --> 35:39.380]  Wait, you just walk in and do this?
[35:39.560 --> 35:43.400]  Oh, this is his illustrious, his previous life.
[35:43.600 --> 35:44.020]  Yes.
[35:44.540 --> 35:45.680]  He was a connoisseur.
[35:45.780 --> 35:49.900]  He was a frozen yogurt...
[35:50.580 --> 35:51.380]  Oh, that's right.
[35:51.380 --> 35:53.340]  Right, you used to work at the frozen yogurt shop.
[35:53.460 --> 35:54.980]  So they made machines for them too?
[35:55.160 --> 35:56.600]  An artist of the yogurt.
[35:57.300 --> 35:59.520]  Yeah, frozen yogurt artist.
[35:59.560 --> 36:00.560]  Is that what you said, Kyle?
[36:00.820 --> 36:04.340]  I think that's what it's called, the technical title, yes.
[36:05.540 --> 36:06.820]  Yeah, that's exactly right.
[36:06.980 --> 36:12.600]  Did they have the same lousy deal with that place as they did with McDonald's where they wouldn't give them any information?
[36:13.340 --> 36:29.860]  Well, I will say, I mean, it is probably fairly obvious to the listeners too that, you know, it was a long time ago that I worked at TCBY, and not surprisingly, none of those machines were connected to the internet or had any kind of onboard diagnostic system.
[36:30.100 --> 36:31.680]  No, it was just you.
[36:32.000 --> 36:33.900]  It was, they were connected to you.
[36:34.800 --> 36:35.520]  The artist.
[36:35.800 --> 36:36.080]  That's right.
[36:36.340 --> 36:36.940]  That's right.
[36:37.080 --> 36:49.700]  But that being said, I did have to take them apart every single night in order to clean them, get the yogurt out, clean them, take the blades off, sanitize the machines, and then in the morning, you'd have to put them all back together.
[36:49.960 --> 36:52.100]  But back then, they never broke down.
[36:52.300 --> 36:55.920]  I don't remember any of these Taylor machines ever breaking down.
[36:56.100 --> 37:02.700]  Not once in my entire career at TCBY, which did span several years, I have to say.
[37:03.080 --> 37:08.240]  Maybe the way you were maintaining them is of a quality that is unknown today.
[37:08.240 --> 37:13.260]  Maybe you should go on a lecture circuit and tell people at McDonald's how to maintain their Taylor machines.
[37:13.780 --> 37:13.960]  Yeah.
[37:14.500 --> 37:18.740]  Given the shenanigans that happened in that store, I think that's entirely unlikely.
[37:19.840 --> 37:21.800]  When is the book coming out, though?
[37:21.960 --> 37:22.900]  We're all curious.
[37:23.060 --> 37:25.320]  We want to hear the book about TCBY and your exploits.
[37:26.400 --> 37:28.920]  Yeah, well, there's quite a few of them.
[37:30.640 --> 37:35.840]  Maybe on overtime one night when we can use expletives.
[37:36.000 --> 37:37.980]  It sounds like they're definitely getting lectured.
[37:39.200 --> 37:40.180]  Yeah, yeah.
[37:40.460 --> 37:41.460]  But I will say this, though.
[37:41.560 --> 37:50.220]  With respect to this, what we're considering an exploit of the machine, I don't really see this as an attack, as a man-in-the-middle attack or anything bad.
[37:50.220 --> 38:11.080]  I see an analog here to the diagnostic machines that we would connect to our cars, something that would hook into the ODB2 port or the onboard diagnostics 2 port to access the vehicle's computer and figure out, let's see why our check engine light is on or why one of the other dummy lights is on in the dashboard.
[38:12.760 --> 38:29.260]  Because what you're talking about here is analyzing some kind of fault with the system, which is exactly what you do with these devices that you can buy at AutoZone or any auto store and connect into your ODB2 port on your car and read these types of messages about malfunctions.
[38:29.260 --> 38:40.040]  So I see it less as an attack and more of just reading the output of whatever the communication is about the fault or the error in the system.
[38:40.200 --> 38:43.500]  I want to get back to that in a second, but you mentioned ODB ports and all that.
[38:43.600 --> 38:48.640]  I want to ask Kyle, because I know that you work with these devices with cars.
[38:48.860 --> 38:57.320]  How hard is it for the average consumer to get one of these off the shelf and plug it in and read error codes when the check engine light comes on?
[38:57.320 --> 39:00.020]  Is that something that's beyond the average person's ability?
[39:00.400 --> 39:02.100]  There's a lot of options.
[39:02.100 --> 39:05.880]  I think it's something I'm still learning.
[39:06.200 --> 39:20.400]  There are tools that have different levels of ability and, of course, newer systems that are coded and use various kinds of what we might recognize as certificate systems.
[39:20.400 --> 39:30.040]  And you have stuff that only certain types of maintainers and technicians are allowed to do.
[39:30.180 --> 39:35.380]  And then more consumer-grade diagnostic tools that, of course, allow you to have a much more intelligent conversation.
[39:35.380 --> 39:42.740]  I urge people to always try to get as much information, just like you would maintain any other kind of utility system.
[39:42.980 --> 39:48.600]  But just to read an error code that shows up, that makes a check engine light come on, is that something complicated to be able to read that?
[39:49.400 --> 39:50.280]  No, no.
[39:50.400 --> 40:02.320]  There's plenty of tools and adapters and just find out what era, what generation of your car and what kind of tool you would need to interface with it.
[40:02.520 --> 40:05.180]  What do you generally plug into to get that information?
[40:05.180 --> 40:13.340]  Oh, well, it would be some kind of port in the older vehicles.
[40:13.540 --> 40:16.840]  It's referred to as an OBD-2.
[40:17.660 --> 40:21.800]  And the more modern systems use what's called a CAN bus.
[40:22.940 --> 40:26.440]  There are specific ones for each generation.
[40:26.620 --> 40:41.820]  I'm sure even the newer vehicles that I have less experience with use maybe apps, of course, whatever kind of software comes with your key fob and authenticates you to drive.
[40:42.040 --> 40:49.980]  We noticed this when we were driving cross-country in a fairly modern minivan, that cars make a lot of assumptions these days.
[40:50.120 --> 40:51.280]  And you can't really override them.
[40:51.360 --> 40:53.560]  For instance, our minivan made the assumption.
[40:53.560 --> 40:58.540]  And if we were standing near it, the side door, the one that slides, should be unlocked.
[40:58.540 --> 41:06.480]  So it's impossible to lock the car and check to see if it's really locked, because it'll open if you pull the handle, because you're standing right there.
[41:06.800 --> 41:17.220]  So basically, we realized that you could easily rob somebody from a minivan, because if they're standing next to it, all you have to do is walk up behind them and open the door, and it's going to open.
[41:17.380 --> 41:22.360]  Or walk around to the other side where there's another door, and that door will open, because they're standing so close to it.
[41:22.360 --> 41:24.860]  But there is no way to override this, because we tried.
[41:25.600 --> 41:36.940]  It's just the way the cars are engineered these days, you have less and less say in the features and in the ability to analyze them.
[41:37.080 --> 41:39.320]  And there's so much more waste as a result.
[41:39.680 --> 41:43.520]  I think that's where it goes, is that things don't get maintained.
[41:43.660 --> 41:44.380]  They don't get repaired.
[41:44.480 --> 41:49.280]  You have worse maintenance issues, because they take longer to get addressed.
[41:49.280 --> 41:56.600]  The user isn't empowered to know exactly what's going on with any one part that might need attention.
[41:56.980 --> 41:58.640]  That is a huge, huge loss.
[41:58.740 --> 42:02.820]  That takes so much out of the longevity of a product.
[42:02.820 --> 42:04.100]  Yeah, the user's not empowered, period.
[42:04.500 --> 42:05.180]  Totally, totally.
[42:05.360 --> 42:05.660]  That's what it is.
[42:05.720 --> 42:06.380]  It's taken away.
[42:06.760 --> 42:07.300]  Yeah, yeah.
[42:07.980 --> 42:09.820]  So is it ODB or OBD?
[42:10.800 --> 42:11.800]  ODB is a wrapper.
[42:14.500 --> 42:16.320]  OBD2, I believe, is what it is.
[42:16.400 --> 42:16.620]  Right, okay.
[42:16.660 --> 42:17.620]  I keep mixing those up.
[42:17.840 --> 42:18.080]  ODB.
[42:18.080 --> 42:19.540]  But, Alex, get back to you.
[42:19.600 --> 42:28.900]  As far as the Taylor machines, at least when you were working in the yogurt shop, were they owned by the shop, or were they owned by Taylor?
[42:30.900 --> 42:32.660]  You know, that's a good question.
[42:32.720 --> 42:45.300]  I don't know if they were leased from Taylor, but I would presume that the store owned those particular machines, given the care and attention that we were...
[42:45.800 --> 42:52.980]  Well, if they own them, and if that's the case with McDonald's today, if they own those machines, then they should be able to do whatever they want with them.
[42:53.120 --> 42:55.800]  If Taylor owns them, they should come by and clean them every night themselves.
[42:56.660 --> 42:57.420]  That's my opinion.
[42:57.480 --> 42:57.840]  Well, think about this.
[42:57.940 --> 42:59.780]  I mean, another analogy here, right?
[42:59.780 --> 43:02.420]  I mean, we talk about this all the time with respect to Tesla.
[43:02.840 --> 43:10.520]  You know, you own that car, but they are able to disable certain functionalities, you know, based on software updates and whatnot.
[43:10.520 --> 43:19.400]  And so, you know, I think the same thing is applying to the hardware that is dispensing ice cream these days, that, you know, everything can be remotely controlled.
[43:19.400 --> 43:23.860]  And if you fail to pay for a certain feature, it can be remotely disabled.
[43:24.540 --> 43:29.640]  And that's the scary thing, that even when you own the hardware, you may not own all the functionality of that hardware.
[43:29.740 --> 43:32.020]  And that's the unfortunate world we live in.
[43:32.200 --> 43:33.180]  Oh, well, it's unfortunate.
[43:33.180 --> 43:49.820]  And we have to really, really demand that there's attention paid to this and that we aren't abused as consumers, because I really feel a lot of emphasis needs to be put on this.
[43:50.120 --> 43:51.640]  We're realizing it more and more.
[43:51.780 --> 44:03.280]  Every turn, there's this one more of these right to repair cases that reinforces how important the ability to maintain and repair stuff is.
[44:03.460 --> 44:31.140]  And across the board, whatever the case is, whenever we've seen it, it's been glaring just how crucial it is to support the people that take an interest in fixing something and keeping it out of the waste stream and keeping it safe and not falling for these things where only select groups of affiliates can have access to things.
[44:31.140 --> 44:50.820]  We need to unlock stuff so that the owner, the person who put down for the equipment in the first place, is at the center of access to the tools and information on how to use them safely to keep the equipment in a repaired state.
[44:50.940 --> 45:05.540]  This is going to become more and more of an issue, not only in the hacker world, but in the technology world in general, as more and more things that we use have this kind of mentality surrounding them that you're not actually buying the device.
[45:05.540 --> 45:18.820]  You're leasing it, or you're licensing it, and you have to accept whatever the company that made it tells you, and basically never sever that connection.
[45:19.120 --> 45:20.780]  We have more sensors than ever.
[45:21.000 --> 45:22.860]  It's the complete antithesis.
[45:23.000 --> 45:24.860]  It's the opposite of where we should be.
[45:24.980 --> 45:30.620]  We should know all of the information, not be walled off from it.
[45:30.720 --> 45:30.980]  No.
[45:31.160 --> 45:31.620]  Go ahead, Alex.
[45:35.080 --> 45:45.960]  I think it might be a good time, when we're talking about access to information, the free flow of information, to transition to something of a more somber topic, if you don't mind.
[45:46.200 --> 45:46.980]  Oh, absolutely.
[45:47.360 --> 45:47.720]  Somber.
[45:47.940 --> 45:48.340]  Go ahead.
[45:49.140 --> 45:49.340]  Yeah.
[45:50.040 --> 45:58.180]  Well, something we've talked about quite a bit is, or rather someone we've talked about quite a bit, a friend of the show, is Dr. Virgil Griffith.
[45:59.360 --> 46:03.200]  And Virgil is a very unique character.
[46:03.440 --> 46:06.600]  He's a past guest of Off the Hook.
[46:06.760 --> 46:19.360]  He is a speaker at the Hackers on Planet Earth Conference, I think probably multiple times, a writer for 2600, and most importantly, I think a very good and genuine friend of the community.
[46:20.860 --> 46:35.040]  Now, as I've also mentioned, in September of 2021, to get right to it, he pleaded guilty to conspiring to evade sanctions that the US government had imposed on North Korea.
[46:37.840 --> 46:47.980]  And over the last two decades, Dr. Griffith, and I call him Dr. Virgil Griffith, because Virgil has a PhD from Caltech.
[46:48.260 --> 46:55.020]  Yeah, that's no small order to obtain a PhD in Caltech in neuroscience.
[46:55.920 --> 46:58.980]  And this is a guy who has helped innumerable people.
[46:58.980 --> 47:04.600]  He's shown many people in our community kindness, charity, support.
[47:04.860 --> 47:10.440]  And with that in mind, the sentencing in Virgil's case is going to happen in mid-January.
[47:10.460 --> 47:17.820]  And the judge is going to be considering statements from colleagues, from friends, members of the community, people who knew Virgil.
[47:17.820 --> 47:37.700]  And as part of his defense team, somebody who's working on his behalf, and I was engaged, and so was my law firm engaged to help in some matters leading up to trial, and now with the sentencing, we are not seeking any statements about the merits or the demerits of the charges.
[47:37.700 --> 47:41.000]  That stage is over and done with.
[47:41.240 --> 47:55.860]  But if you have something you'd like to say about Virgil's character or an anecdote about how he helped you or some kind of reflection on him as a person, we would welcome submissions from the community on this particular point.
[47:56.440 --> 48:04.040]  And you can send them directly to me, or you can contact me, and I'm happy to discuss this with you.
[48:04.320 --> 48:16.140]  I can share with you certain guidelines about how to write this letter and how to submit it, and what should or should not go into it, things like that.
[48:16.820 --> 48:30.980]  Again, my contact details, you can email me at aherbelis, A-U-R-B-E-L-I-S, at kroll.com, which is C-R-O-W-E-L-L dot com.
[48:31.120 --> 48:37.680]  So that's aherbelis, A-U-R-B-E-L-I-S, at C-R-O-W-E-L-L dot com.
[48:37.680 --> 48:46.480]  And I'd be happy to field any questions that you have about writing a support letter or the support process, or what would happen to your letter if you submit it.
[48:46.920 --> 48:53.540]  But please do contact me if you have anything good to say about Virgil, his character, because this is the kind of thing that really can make a difference.
[48:54.000 --> 49:11.180]  And I think that showing Virgil to the judge for who he is as the multifaceted and multi-talented and kind character that Virgil is, is going to be incredibly important to him and to the community over the next few months.
[49:11.320 --> 49:13.100]  So please don't hesitate to be in touch.
[49:13.280 --> 49:21.940]  And, you know, I'm tempted to go into more detail when you say something like, you know, conspiring, pleading guilty to conspiring to evade sanctions.
[49:22.120 --> 49:25.840]  It sounds so, so terrible, but there is more to the story.
[49:25.980 --> 49:28.460]  We've talked about this in previous months.
[49:28.460 --> 49:32.320]  I believe we talked about it in July on this show, and I think in September as well.
[49:32.320 --> 49:36.340]  Well, and we're not going to get into all that again.
[49:36.480 --> 49:42.460]  As you said, that part is past, and now we have to look to the future.
[49:42.700 --> 49:46.520]  And somebody like Virgil absolutely should not be in prison.
[49:46.620 --> 49:53.200]  He should be in a university giving lectures and answering questions and helping people because he has so much to offer.
[49:53.800 --> 49:59.000]  Suffice to say, this is not somebody that was plotting anything evil.
[49:59.000 --> 50:02.640]  And, you know, I can go into a lot more detail than that, but I've already done it.
[50:03.420 --> 50:06.000]  And that's not the point of what you're asking right now.
[50:06.100 --> 50:13.500]  The point is to not destroy somebody's life, somebody who is an incredible person and, you know, quirky in his own way.
[50:14.200 --> 50:16.660]  You know, think Big Bang Theory type personalities.
[50:17.140 --> 50:18.940]  You know, people who just are...
[50:20.200 --> 50:26.700]  They don't work the same way that somebody else might work, but you have to respect.
[50:26.700 --> 50:30.380]  You have to respect their process and, you know, their mind.
[50:30.680 --> 50:31.660]  We're all different.
[50:31.660 --> 50:32.580]  We're all unique.
[50:32.740 --> 50:35.780]  But trust me when I say he is one of the best of us.
[50:35.840 --> 50:37.500]  He is a good person.
[50:38.500 --> 50:44.460]  I've never known him to say he was a doctor either, which is kind of funny that, you know, you're mentioning that, but it is true.
[50:44.580 --> 50:45.880]  He earned a doctorate.
[50:47.360 --> 50:54.760]  And there's just so much that I can say about him that, you know, is enlightening and interesting and positive.
[50:55.680 --> 51:00.220]  And it's just, it's terrible to see, to see this happen to him.
[51:00.400 --> 51:06.240]  It could have happened to so many people because, you know, when you say things literally, you know, I went to North Korea.
[51:07.220 --> 51:08.820]  I wasn't helping the regime.
[51:08.820 --> 51:20.320]  I was there as an explorer, but you can easily twist things and make people look a lot guiltier than they ever would have imagined themselves to be.
[51:21.860 --> 51:30.320]  So anything we can do at this point to help this person before it's too late, I think, is worthwhile.
[51:30.320 --> 51:32.600]  And it's such an unusual experience.
[51:32.880 --> 51:46.420]  It's a hard backdrop to create a positive experience out of because there's so little that has been normalized in a positive light around that place.
[51:46.760 --> 51:55.220]  So by doing that, just the location and country alone is so unusual.
[51:55.220 --> 52:06.020]  It is often hard to fight against that kind of stereotype and attitude towards it.
[52:06.320 --> 52:07.340]  You know, I faced that myself.
[52:07.500 --> 52:10.080]  When I went to North Korea, people said, well, why would you go there?
[52:10.200 --> 52:12.260]  You know, why would you want to help those people?
[52:12.460 --> 52:15.340]  It's not helping a regime to go over there.
[52:15.460 --> 52:16.200]  It's curiosity.
[52:16.440 --> 52:19.360]  And that's something that hackers possess in great abundance.
[52:19.680 --> 52:21.080]  We want to see different things.
[52:21.080 --> 52:25.860]  We want to see how their world works, their society.
[52:26.040 --> 52:29.800]  And when you're there, you damn well better be polite.
[52:30.020 --> 52:31.180]  You need to...
[52:31.180 --> 52:36.860]  You can't, you know, say anti-North Korean things in North Korea.
[52:36.960 --> 52:38.040]  It's not a good idea.
[52:38.640 --> 52:40.680]  Bad things happen to people who do that.
[52:40.800 --> 52:51.220]  And if you understand that, then you have an amazing story to tell and an amazing experience to share and, you know, knowing these things, that's how you conquer them.
[52:51.340 --> 52:53.440]  That's how you get past them.
[52:53.580 --> 52:54.880]  That's how you make a better world.
[52:55.760 --> 52:59.180]  And, um, but that's, you know, that's, that's my experience.
[52:59.380 --> 53:05.340]  And, and many other people in the hacker world have, um, have also been very curious about that place because it's like going to another planet.
[53:05.560 --> 53:06.080]  It really is.
[53:06.080 --> 53:07.200]  And not just hackers.
[53:08.360 --> 53:09.100]  No, absolutely.
[53:09.240 --> 53:10.640]  So many people have taken an interest.
[53:10.840 --> 53:11.020]  Right.
[53:11.140 --> 53:21.200]  It's been, uh, uh, uh, something that has drawn people, uh, explorers and, um, people, Americans and, and, uh, people from all over.
[53:21.320 --> 53:27.820]  Well, the thing is, you know, it was never illegal for Americans to go there until Trump decided that it was.
[53:28.040 --> 53:28.940]  That's it.
[53:29.360 --> 53:32.500]  You know, and if it wasn't for that, I don't think any, any of this would be happening.
[53:32.540 --> 53:34.980]  But again, uh, that's not the point now.
[53:34.980 --> 53:44.160]  The point now is to, to, to help Virgil and Alex, I want you to give the information out one more time and, and, uh, just very briefly, uh, tell people what, what we're looking for.
[53:46.200 --> 53:47.180]  Absolutely, Emmanuel.
[53:47.380 --> 53:55.880]  The, uh, you know, we're looking for letters of support and these are letters of support that are going to go into, uh, the sentencing memorandum that the defense team is going to submit.
[53:56.320 --> 54:04.440]  And those support letters will be read by the judge and, uh, and taken into account when, when Virgil is sentenced in, in mid January.
[54:04.980 --> 54:14.560]  And so what we're looking for is any kind of statement of, about Virgil's character and anecdote or, or something about how he helped you.
[54:14.800 --> 54:28.020]  And, you know, if, if you know Virgil and you know the type of person that he is, uh, and, and if you have something positive to say about, um, him as a person really.
[54:28.020 --> 54:41.960]  Um, and, and again, I think anecdotes could be really effective, some kind of charity that he might've given, something that gives insight into Virgil as a person, not the two dimensional character that we know from these, uh, court pleadings that have been,
[54:42.160 --> 54:46.000]  that have been filed for the last, um, God, I guess it's Jesus.
[54:46.360 --> 54:47.320]  It's two years, isn't it?
[54:47.320 --> 54:55.380]  And he's been in prison most of that time, uh, and simply because he's involved with cryptocurrency and the legal system does not understand cryptocurrency.
[54:55.380 --> 54:59.740]  And they think he's a lot more evil than anybody could possibly be.
[55:00.200 --> 55:00.640]  Yeah.
[55:00.820 --> 55:03.480]  But so he's already lived through a lot of, he's lived through a lot of hell.
[55:03.680 --> 55:08.180]  It's, it's not like he has not been, been, uh, paying a price for, for mistakes.
[55:08.780 --> 55:09.640]  Oh my God.
[55:09.800 --> 55:10.840]  He, he absolutely has.
[55:10.920 --> 55:13.840]  And it's, uh, it's, uh, it's, uh, it's absolutely horrific.
[55:14.380 --> 55:22.540]  Um, uh, I, I think what, what he's had to endure, but, uh, it also, it's almost two years to the day that he was arrested.
[55:22.540 --> 55:24.940]  I believe it was on Thanksgiving day.
[55:24.940 --> 55:32.400]  It was while he was trying to visit his family for Thanksgiving that, uh, the FBI after, after interview, we can get into this whole thing.
[55:32.560 --> 55:37.740]  They interviewed him and they were all friendly and he thought he was giving them information that would help them.
[55:37.960 --> 55:42.180]  It was, uh, again, it's, it's, we're past that part of the story right now.
[55:42.320 --> 55:45.960]  We need to help save him from, uh, from more hell.
[55:46.580 --> 55:49.340]  And, uh, just please give out your, your email one more time.
[55:49.480 --> 55:50.440]  Cause we are out of time.
[55:51.440 --> 55:51.920]  Absolutely.
[55:51.920 --> 56:12.400]  If you want, if you're interested in submitting a support letter to talk about Virgil or his character, email me please, uh, a or Bellis, that's a U R B E L I S that's a U R Bravo, echo, Lima, India, Sierra at crawl.com, which is C R O W E L L.com.
[56:12.820 --> 56:18.580]  Uh, and I'm happy to have a conversation with you to walk you through this process, uh, send you over some guidelines.
[56:18.980 --> 56:23.860]  Uh, but time is running short because, you know, all of this needs to be done within the next few weeks.
[56:24.000 --> 56:26.260]  And if you have something to say, now's the time to do it.
[56:26.680 --> 56:40.360]  And if you want to, um, uh, see one of Virgil's lectures at, at one of the hope conferences, uh, just, uh, look for his name, Virgil Griffith at a G R I F F I T H, uh, on channel 2600 on YouTube.
[56:40.760 --> 56:42.220]  Um, all the talks are there.
[56:42.340 --> 56:50.980]  Uh, you can also, uh, look him up, um, on off the hook, just go to 2600.com and, uh, search there for his name and you'll see all the episodes of off the hook.
[56:50.980 --> 56:58.260]  He was on, uh, Rob, you had something, um, Alex, I know there was a, uh, web-based, uh, page for people to get more information about this.
[56:58.340 --> 56:59.180]  Is that link public yet?
[57:00.280 --> 57:11.600]  Uh, it is, but I don't want them to, I think if people are going to, are interested in putting in a support letter, email me and, and, and we'll be able to field it and vet it.
[57:12.040 --> 57:12.440]  Okay.
[57:12.640 --> 57:16.780]  And, uh, telling that, uh, if you go on Wikipedia and look up Virgil Griffith, it's a good article about him.
[57:17.200 --> 57:17.340]  Yeah.
[57:17.340 --> 57:25.600]  Uh, if you want to write to us, our email address, O-T-H at 2600.com and that's going to do it for us, uh, tonight.
[57:25.780 --> 57:37.480]  I know not everybody, uh, celebrates Thanksgiving, but I think everybody has something to be thankful for, whether it's a person, uh, whether it's a place, whether it's just themselves, just take a moment, think of positivity.
[57:37.520 --> 57:38.420]  We need that.
[57:38.860 --> 57:40.060]  We will see you next week.
[57:40.220 --> 57:40.900]  Have a good night.