Darknet Diaries

The word Conti struck fear in IT departments across the world. It's a type of ransomware that you hope to never come across. Like most ransomware gangs, the Conti group fell apart. But what's special about this story is how it fell apart. Because it fell apart in a very public, messy, scandalous way. Featuring investigative journalist Geoff White and cyber threat researcher Alex Holden. Sponsors This show is brought to you by Doppel . Doppel stops AI attacks with digital risk protection, human risk management, and email security on a unified social engineering defense platform.  doppel.com This show is sponsored by Maze . Maze uses AI agents to triage and remediate cloud vulnerabilities by figuring out what’s actually exploitable, not just what’s theoretically risky. They remove the noise, prioritize vulns that matter, and manage remediation, so your team stops wasting time on meaningless vulns. Visit MazeHQ.com/darknet for more information. Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker . ThreatLocker is a Zero Trust Platform that gives organizations control over what can run and what users and devices can access. It combines prevention with real time detection and automated response, helping security teams stop unauthorized activity and quickly contain compromised machines. Learn how ThreatLocker can strengthen your defenses at threatlocker.com/Darknet . View all active sponsors. Sources Full list of sources on the show page: https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/180/

After 8 years, LOW is finally here. A story about the weight of being and the wreckage of waking up. Five episodes. Five descents. LOW is an audio journey into the unlit corners of human experience. Choices we made in the dark, the silences we carry, and what remains when we stop running from ourselves. LOW a new Limited Series from the Jack Rhysider is now available for everyone to hear, where ever you get your podcasts.

In this episode we follow up with Gabby and Justin from Episode 59 - two seasoned penetration testers who tell us a story about the time when they tried to break into a courthouse but it went all wrong, and what happened in the aftermath. Sponsors This show is brought to you by Doppel. Doppel stops AI attacks with digital risk protection, human risk management, and email security on a unified social engineering defense platform. doppel.com This show is brought to you by Sinch. Sinch is the cloud communications platform businesses build on to send SMS, make calls, and verify identity at scale — including the one-time codes and two-factor prompts that stand between an account and whoever’s trying to get into it. Learn more at https://s.sinch.com/4xc8dnz Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker. ThreatLocker is a Zero Trust Platform that gives organizations control over what can run and what users and devices can access. It combines prevention with real time detection and automated response, helping security teams stop unauthorized activity and quickly contain compromised machines. Learn how ThreatLocker can strengthen your defenses at threatlocker.com/Darknet. Sources Original Episode: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/11/how-a-turf-war-and-a-botched-contract-landed-2-pentesters-in-iowa-jail/ https://krebsonsecurity.com/2020/01/iowa-prosecutors-drop-charges-against-men-hired-to-test-their-security/ https://www.coalfire.com/News-and-Events/Press-Releases/Coalfire-CEO-Tom-McAndrew-statement https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2019/09/11/men-arrested-burglary-dallas-county-iowa-courthouse-hired-judicial-branch-test-security-ia-crime/2292295001/ https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2019/09/13/men-arrested-burglary-polk-dallas-county-iowa-courthouse-hired-judicial-branch-test-security-crime/2312340001/ https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2019/09/18/iowa-courts-dallas-county-courthouse-coalfire-contract-judicial-branch-test-security-ia-crime-arrest/2356047001/ https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2019/09/19/iowa-state-senator-calls-oversight-committee-investigate-courthouse-break-ins-crime-polk-dallas/2374576001/ https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2019/10/10/iowa-supreme-court-justice-cady-policies-courthouse-break-ins-senate-polk-dallas-burglary-ia-cyber/3930656002/ https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2019/10/28/iowa-courthouse-break-ins-men-security-firm-plead-not-guilty-trespassing/2488314001/ https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2019/10/30/courthouse-break-in-ceo-cyber-security-coalfire-charges-dropped/4097354002/ https://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/crime-and-courts/2020/01/30/courthouse-break-ins-charges-dropped-against-coalfire-employees/4611574002/ https://www.iowacourts.gov/collections/445/files/919/embedDocument/ https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/6420368-Approved-attacks.html#document/p1 Updated Episode: https://arstechnica.com/security/2026/01/county-pays-600000-to-pentesters-it-arrested-for-assessing-courthouse-security/ https://awarenesscon.com/ Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. Episode artwork by odibagas. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme song created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript JACK: I just came back from DEFCON, and it was so wonderful meeting so many of the listeners there. Many of you asked how my dad is doing, and I’ll tell you; he’s struggling with the modern world. Let me show you what I mean. So like, I call my dad a few times a week just to check in on him, but he only calls me when he’s got computer problems.

Before the world had teeth, he was only a child. Carefree, unguarded, alive in the soft illusion that life isn't so bad. Then he started to see the cruelness of life and it started to change him. Then something awful happens, a rupture that divides everything into before and after. Alone now, he mistakes independence for freedom. He gets lost in a chemical oblivion, into violence, into the strange comfort of becoming someone hardened by the streets. For a time, it gives him purpose and belonging, until the thing that made him feel alive begins to show him how close he is to death. He rides off, in search of a new life. He learns new skills, new rhythms, new ways of seeing beauty in the ordinary. But still, he is drifting more than choosing, watching the sun pass over him rather than truly meeting it. Then, just as he starts to find meaning in his work, it all falls apart and he is catapulted into the next life waiting for him. He's far from home now. In a place that doesn't know his name. He tries to remake himself from fragments of his past. For a moment, adaptation almost feels like rebirth. Then tragedy arrives, and his foundation is shattered. He desperately looks for possibilities. But somewhere inside the wreckage, he makes a decision: if he must continue, he will no longer be carried by the weight of his past. But his awakening does not come gently. He's new now. He's meeting the world now. He has a purpose now. He feels it in his bones. He doesn't want to do it, but feels that he must do it. There's no one else who will do it. So he must. He's no longer drifting. He moves with precision, with confidence that what he's doing, is helping the world. But the closer he gets to his goals, the closer he feels to the end. The smallest decision can become a staircase, a trapdoor, or a grave. 01 / 03 The future is not waiting for you. It's being written by you. 02 / 03 Death stands at the edge of every plan. Daring us to live big. 03 / 03

Nickolas Sharp worked for Ubiquiti, a company that makes networking equipment. He noticed that there were some security problems at work. He tried to point them out, but didn't feel like he was being listened to enough. What do you do when the company you work for isn't securing their software up to your standards? Well, he thought he needed to teach them a lesson, but in the end, he learned an even bigger lesson. Sponsors This show is brought to you by Drata . Drata is the trust management platform that uses AI-driven automation to modernize governance, risk, and compliance, helping thousands of businesses stay audit-ready and scale securely. Learn more at drata.com/darknetdiaries . This show is sponsored by Material Security . Your cloud office (think Google Workspace or Microsoft 365) is the core of your business, but it’s often protected by scattered tools and manual fixes. Material is a purpose-built detection and response platform that closes the gaps those point solutions leave behind. From email threats to misconfigurations and account takeovers, Material monitors everything and steps in with real-time fixes to keep your data flowing where it should. Learn more at https://material.security . Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker . ThreatLocker is a Zero Trust Platform that gives organizations control over what can run and what users and devices can access. It combines prevention with real time detection and automated response, helping security teams stop unauthorized activity and quickly contain compromised machines. Learn how ThreatLocker can strengthen your defenses at threatlocker.com/Darknet . View all active sponsors. Sources Full list of sources on the show page: https://darknetdiaries.com/episode/178/

This is the story of the hacker known as “USDoD”. When he was young he had a vengeance on the US, and this lead him down a road of continual data breaches, until he hacked into National Public Data, which is when his spree went one step too far. Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker. ThreatLocker is a Zero Trust Platform that gives organizations control over what can run and what users and devices can access. It combines prevention with real time detection and automated response, helping security teams stop unauthorized activity and quickly contain compromised machines. Learn how ThreatLocker can strengthen your defenses at threatlocker.com/Darknet. This show is sponsored by Maze. Maze uses AI agents to triage and remediate cloud vulnerabilities by figuring out what’s actually exploitable, not just what’s theoretically risky. They remove the noise, prioritize vulns that matter, and manage remediation, so your team stops wasting time on meaningless vulns. Visit MazeHQ.com/darknet for more information. This show is sponsored by Sentry.IO. Sentry wants to help you monitor your environment for problems. They do error tracking, stack tracing, debugging, all so that your developers can diagnose, fix, and optimize the performance of their code. This makes it so developers ship more reliable code faster. Learn more at sentry.io. Sources https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2024-04-09/william-woods-identity-theft-social-security-matthew-david-kierans https://predictalab.medium.com/how-to-discover-a-major-hackers-identity-with-osint-solution-1-625deff0f0ac https://databreaches.net/2023/09/17/im-not-pro-russia-and-im-not-a-terrorist-infragard-and-airbus-hacker-usdod-unveils-his-new-campaigns/ https://cyble.com/blog/u-s-armed-forces-and-defense-industrial-base-under-cyber-attack/ https://krebsonsecurity.com/2022/12/fbis-vetted-info-sharing-network-infragard-hacked/ https://krebsonsecurity.com/2024/08/national-public-data-published-its-own-passwords/ https://www.hudsonrock.com/blog/an-avoidable-breach-fbi-hacker-leaks-sensitive-airbus-data https://www.gov.br/pf/pt-br/assuntos/noticias/2024/10/pf-prende-hacker-suspeito-de-invadir-sistemas-da-pf-e-de-outras-instituicoes-internacionais https://ritchietorres.house.gov/posts/congressman-ritchie-torres-releases-investigative-report-on-last-months-national-public-data-breach https://krebsonsecurity.com/2024/08/nationalpublicdata-com-hack-exposes-a-nations-data/ https://www.tecmundo.com.br/seguranca/288570-hacker-roubou-3-bilhoes-dados-eua-descoberto-brasileiro.htm https://hackread.com/usdod-hacker-ssn-leak-reveals-brazilian-citizen/ https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/story/2022-10-26/identity-theft-nightmare https://www.akleg.gov/basis/get_documents.asp?session=29&docid=65936 https://abc7news.com/post/oakland-ransomware-attack-identity-theft-mayor-sheng-thao-fraud/14227735/ Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. Written by Nate Nelson. Assembled by Tristan Ledger. Sound Design by Garrett Tiedemann. Episode artwork by odibagas. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme song created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript JACK: So, back in 1988 there was this identity theft incident that happened which, when I read it, it infuriated me so badly and, well, now I want to infuriate you. So, check this story out. [Music] This all started in Albuquerque, New Mexico, like I said, 1988, and there was a hot dog stand there which seemed to hire people who were really down and out.

One day Nick got a visit from the FBI demanding he give them data on one of his customers. They asked for it in the form of a National Security Letter or NSL. Something wasn’t right about this letter. It seemed to violate the constitution. So he set out to change the law. Learn more about Nicks work at calyxinstitute.org and phreeli.com . Check out Cindy’s book Privacy’s Defender: My Thirty-Year Fight Against Digital Surveillance (https://amzn.to/4gXuK2J). Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker® . ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com . Support for this episode comes from NetSuite . NetSuite gives you visibility and control of your financials, planning, budgeting, and of course - inventory - so you can manage risk, get reliable forecasts, and improve margins. NetSuite helps you identify rising costs, automate your manual business processes, and see where to save money. KNOW your numbers. KNOW your business. And get to KNOW how NetSuite can be the source of truth for your entire company. Visit www.netsuite.com/darknet to learn more. This show is sponsored by Maze . Maze uses AI agents to triage and remediate cloud vulnerabilities by figuring out what’s actually exploitable, not just what’s theoretically risky. They remove the noise, prioritize vulns that matter, and manage remediation, so your team stops wasting time on meaningless vulns. Visit MazeHQ.com/darknet for more information. View all active sponsors. Sources https://www.democracynow.org/2010/8/11/gagged_for_6_years_nick_merrill https://globalfreedomofexpression.columbia.edu/cases/u-s-nicholas-merrill-v-loretta-e-lynch-14-cv-9763-vm/ https://clearinghouse.net/case/12966/ https://www.theguardian.com/law/2015/dec/06/fbi-national-security-letter-gag-order-nick-merrill https://www.aclu.org/documents/national-security-letters https://www.eff.org/cases/re-matter-2011-national-security-letter Cindy’s Book: Privacy’s Defender: My Thirty-Year Fight Against Digital Surveillance

It started with a fake car listing on eBay. What looked like a simple online scam quietly grew, over more than a decade, into one of the most sophisticated cybercrime operations the FBI had ever traced. Custom malware. Opsec off the charts. Fleets of infected computers mining cryptocurrency for someone else. Millions of dollars siphoned from victims who had no idea. This is the story of Bayrob and the three men from Romanian who were behind it. And the long, strange road that led American investigators to their door. Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker® . ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com . This show is sponsored by Meter , the company building networks from the ground up. Meter delivers a complete networking stack - wired, wireless, and cellular - in one solution that’s built for performance and scale. Alongside their partners, Meter designs the hardware, writes the firmware, builds the software, manages deployments, and runs support. Learn more at meter.com . This show is sponsored by Maze . Maze uses AI agents to triage and remediate cloud vulnerabilities by figuring out what’s actually exploitable, not just what’s theoretically risky. They remove the noise, prioritize vulns that matter, and manage remediation, so your team stops wasting time on meaningless vulns. Visit MazeHQ.com/darknet for more information. Support for this episode comes from NetSuite . NetSuite gives you visibility and control of your financials, planning, budgeting, and of course - inventory - so you can manage risk, get reliable forecasts, and improve margins. NetSuite helps you identify rising costs, automate your manual business processes, and see where to save money. KNOW your numbers. KNOW your business. And get to KNOW how NetSuite can be the source of truth for your entire company. Visit www.netsuite.com/darknet to learn more. This episode is sponsored by Chainguard . Chainguard builds container images the right way — minimal, hardened, and built from source every single day. We’re talking images with zero known CVEs, designed from the ground up for production. No bloat. No mystery packages. No 2 a.m. patching marathons because some transitive dependency lit up your dashboard. Stop patching images that are insecure. Start shipping clean. Head to chainguard.dev to see how secure your software supply chain can really be.

For six years, Sophos fought a secret cyber war against a state-backed hacking group targeting its firewalls. This forced Sophos to drastically change tactics to properly secure their firewalls. Was it ethical? Was it effective? They disrupted nine zero-day attacks, exposed who was hacking them, and forced the hackers to change tactics. But at what cost? You have to listen to one of the most audacious corporate cyber defenses ever conducted. Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker® . ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com . This show is sponsored by Meter , the company building networks from the ground up. Meter delivers a complete networking stack - wired, wireless, and cellular - in one solution that’s built for performance and scale. Alongside their partners, Meter designs the hardware, writes the firmware, builds the software, manages deployments, and runs support. Learn more at meter.com . Support for this show comes from Drata . Drata is the trust management platform that uses AI-driven automation to modernize governance, risk, and compliance, helping thousands of businesses stay audit-ready and scale securely. Learn more at drata.com/darknetdiaries . Sources https://news.sophos.com/en-us/2024/10/31/pacific-rim-timeline/ https://www.justice.gov/archives/opa/pr/seven-hackers-associated-chinese-government-charged-computer-intrusions-targeting-perceived https://www.fbi.gov/wanted/cyber/guan-tianfeng

In the streets of the Dominican Republic, a new economy thrives in the shadows. It’s built not on tourism or sugar, but on stolen data. They call them tarjeteros. And they are making a lot of money from stolen credit cards. This is a story about one group of tarjeteros who came to the US, and let loose on New York city. Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker®. ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com. This show is sponsored by Maze. Maze uses AI agents to triage and remediate cloud vulnerabilities by figuring out what’s actually exploitable, not just what’s theoretically risky. They remove the noise, prioritize vulns that matter, and manage remediation, so your team stops wasting time on meaningless vulns. Visit MazeHQ.com/darknet for more information. Support for this show comes from Privacy.com. Privacy allows you to create virtual spending cards instantly to use for purchases. Get your $5 sign-up bonus at privacy.com/darknet. You can use it on your first purchase! Privacy has a free plan with no transaction fees for domestic purchases. Protect your financial identity online with virtual cards. Sources https://www.justice.gov/usao-edny/pr/eight-members-new-york-cell-cybercrime-organization-indicted-45-million-cybercrime https://www.justice.gov/usao-edny/pr/leader-three-worldwide-cyberattacks-sentenced-8-years-computer-intrusion-and-access https://www.justice.gov/usao-edny/pr/three-members-new-york-cell-international-cybercrime-organization-sentenced-roles-45 https://westchestermagazine.com/publications/2-guys-from-yonkers-2-dozen-countries-and-a-45-million-atm-heist/ https://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/11/nyregion/atm-robbery-suspects-may-have-caused-own-undoing.html https://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/10/nyregion/eight-charged-in-45-million-global-cyber-bank-thefts.html https://www.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/hackindict0509.pdf https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2322062/Seven-cyber-hackers-caught-stealing-45-million-10-hours-second-biggest-bank-robbery-history-New-York.html https://www.cbsnews.com/newyork/news/8-accused-of-stealing-millions-in-global-cyber-attacks-on-banks/ https://www.cnbc.com/video/2013/05/09/new-york-cybercrime-cell-busted.html https://www.foxnews.com/us/bank-heist-impressed-cybercrime-experts-with-its-technical-sophistication-effectiveness https://www.wired.com/2013/11/five-arrested-in-bank-heist/ http://lanaciondominicana.com/ver_noticia.php?id_noticia=40002&sesion_periodico=41 http://www.telenord.com.do/index.php/noticias/locales/29537-pn-investiga-asesinato-de-hombre-y-heridas-de-dos-en-la-calle-salcedo-de-esta-ciudad Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. Assembled by Tristan Ledger. Sound design by Andrew Meriwether. Episode artwork by odibagas. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme song created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript JACK: This story takes place in Yonkers, which is about thirty minutes north of New York City, and what I learned about Yonkers is that almost 15% of the people who live there have ancestry that traces back to the Dominican Republic. Apparently, a lot of people migrate from the DR to Yonkers, New York, which made me wonder why.

What if there was a device which gave you endless movies and TV shows without ads? Ok great sign me up! In this episode we interview “D3ada55”, who found such a device, but as she gazed into it, she discovered it gazing back at her. Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker®. ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com. This episode is sponsored by Meter, the company building networks from the ground up. Meter delivers a complete networking stack - wired, wireless, and cellular - in one solution that’s built for performance and scale. Alongside their partners, Meter designs the hardware, writes the firmware, builds the software, manages deployments, and runs support. Learn more at meter.com. This episode is sponsored by Exaforce. Exaforce was created to handle the complete security operations workflow - detect, triage, investigate, respond. Exabots autonomously manage every stage, eliminating gaps between alert and action that slow down traditional security operations. And how it works is simple too: the exabots ingest all security data and then semantically connects it to understand the full context of security events and how they relate to each other. Learn more at exaforce.com/darknet-diaries. Sources Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. Assembled by Tristan Ledger. Episode artwork by odibagas. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme song created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript [Start of recording] JACK: Hey, hey, it’s Jack, host of the show. I went to IKEA the other day to buy a lamp, and when I went in, I saw that they had a recall notice on the bulletin board. Their garlic press was getting recalled. They said that ten people got injured using it, and I think little metal bits would fall off and cut some fingers. So, they stopped selling it and were issuing full refunds to anyone who bought one. It made me think, hold on; [music] has this ever happened with computers? Like, has a store ever recalled a computer because it was dangerous? What does dangerous mean?

What if the music charts you see aren’t real? What if the numbers that define success can be manufactured? We talked to Andrew, a man who has spent his career on both sides of this battle. He once profited from the loopholes in streaming platforms, but now, his job is to close them. This episode will change the way you understand music streaming platforms from now on. Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker®. ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com. Support for this show comes from Adaptive Security. Deepfake voices on a Zoom call. AI-written phishing emails that sound exactly like your CFO. Synthetic job applicants walking through the front door. Adaptive is built to stop these attacks. They run real-time simulations, exposing your teams to what these attacks look like to test and improve your defences. Learn more at adaptivesecurity.com. This episode is sponsored by Meter, the company building networks from the ground up. Meter delivers a complete networking stack - wired, wireless, and cellular - in one solution that’s built for performance and scale. Alongside their partners, Meter designs the hardware, writes the firmware, builds the software, manages deployments, and runs support. Learn more at meter.com. Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. Assembled by Tristan Ledger. Episode artwork by odibagas. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme song created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript [Start of recording] JACK: I’ve always like the idea of fake it ‘til you make it, where you act like someone you want to be until you become them. This sometimes comes with imposter syndrome, but I think the antidote to that is just more experience. But how do you go from being a total beginner to confidently doing something? I often turn to the book store to help me there. But you know a book that’s always bothered me? It’s those For Dummies books, like the C Programming For Dummies, or The Complete Idiot’s Guide. Even if I don’t have a clue where to start, I would never buy one of those books because I don’t consider myself a dummy or an idiot, because I want to fake it ‘til I make it, and I don’t want to fake being a dummy. I want to be a great programmer. So, A Dummy’s Guide to Programming is not the direction I want to be going. I think what those books fail to do is they seem to target who you are now, not what you want to become, and that was their failure, at least for me.

Phrack is legendary. It is the oldest, and arguably the most prestigious, underground hacking magazine in the world. It started in 1985 and is still running today. In this episode we interview the Phrack staff to hear some stories about what it’s like running a hacker magazine for 40 years. Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker®. ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com. Support for this show comes from Drata. Drata is the trust management platform that uses AI-driven automation to modernize governance, risk, and compliance, helping thousands of businesses stay audit-ready and scale securely. Learn more at drata.com/darknetdiaries. This episode is sponsored by Meter, the company building networks from the ground up. Meter delivers a complete networking stack - wired, wireless, and cellular - in one solution that’s built for performance and scale. Alongside their partners, Meter designs the hardware, writes the firmware, builds the software, manages deployments, and runs support. Learn more at meter.com. Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. This episode was written by Nate Nelson. Assembled by Tristan Ledger. Episode artwork by odibagas. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme song created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript [Start of recording] JACK: Hey, it’s Jack, host of the show. So, the last two episodes talked about hacking in the eighties and nineties, which was primarily phone phreaking. In those episodes I talked about a digital magazine called Phrack, which was incredibly influential to the hacking scene. It wasn’t uncommon to be in a chat room and someone come in and ask, ‘How do I get started as a hacker?’ and then someone else simply say, ‘Go to Phrack’s site, start reading it at Issue #1. By the time you’re all caught up, you’ll be a great hacker.’

Legion of Doom, step aside. There’s a new elite hacker group in town, and they’re calling themselves Masters of Deception (MoD). With tactics that are grittier and more sophisticated than those of the LoD, MoD has targeted high-profile entities and left an indelible mark on the internet. This is part 2 of the LoD/MoD series. Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker® . ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com . This show is sponsored by Red Canary . Red Canary is a leading provider of Managed Detection and Response (MDR), helping nearly 1,000 organizations detect and stop threats before they cause harm. With a focus on accuracy across identities, endpoints, and cloud, we deliver trusted security operations and a world-class customer experience. Learn more at redcanary.com . This show is sponsored by [Maze][http://mazehq.com/darknet]. Maze uses AI agents to triage and remediate cloud vulnerabilities by figuring out what’s actually exploitable, not just what’s theoretically risky. They remove the noise, prioritize vulns that matter, and manage remediation, so your team stops wasting time on meaningless vulns. Visit [MazeHQ.com/darknet][http://mazehq.com/darknet] for more information. Sources Book: Masters of Deception Book: The Hacker Crackdown https://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,982254-1,00.html https://www.nytimes.com/1995/01/14/nyregion/reprogramming-convicted-hacker-his-line-friends-phiber-optik-virtual-hero.html https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/101/pg101-images.html https://phrack.org/issues/31/5 https://www.thisamericanlife.org/2/small-scale-sin

The Legion of Doom (LoD) wasn’t just a “hacker group”, it captured the essence of underground hacking in the 80s/90s. BBSes, phreaking, rival crews, and the crackdowns that changed everything. From those humble beginnings came a legacy that still echoes through modern security culture today. This is part 1 of the LoD/MoD saga. Part 2 is episode 169: “MoD”. Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker®. ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com. This show is sponsored by Rippling. Rippling is the unified platform for Global HR, Payroll, IT, and Finance. They’ve helped millions replace their mess of cobbled-together tools with one system designed to give leaders clarity, speed, and control. With Rippling, you can run your entire HR, IT, and Finance operations as one, or pick and choose the products that best fill the gaps in your software stack. Learn more rippling.com/darknet. This show is sponsored by Meter, the company building networks from the ground up. Meter delivers a complete networking stack - wired, wireless, and cellular - in one solution that’s built for performance and scale. Meter’s full-stack solution covers everything from first site survey to ongoing support, giving you a single partner for all your connectivity needs. Go to meter.com/darknet to book a demo now! Sources Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. This episode was written by Nate Nelson. Assembled by Tristan Ledger. Episode artwork by odibagas. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme song created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript [START OF RECORDING] JACK: I want to play for you a narration of a piece of classic hacker literature. Everyone should be familiar with this. Some of you may even have parts of this memorized. Here, take a listen from the author himself. LOYD: Another one got caught today that’s all over the papers. Teenager arrested in computer crime scandal. Hacker arrested after bank tampering. Damn kids, they’re all alike. I’m a hacker. Enter my world. I made a discovery today. I found a computer. And then it happened; a door opened to a world, rushing through the phone line like heroin through an addict’s veins. This is it. This was where I belong. But this is our world now, the world of the electron and the switch, the beauty of the baud. We make use of a service already existing without paying for what could be dirt cheap if it wasn’t run by profiteering gluttons, and you call us criminals.

A manufacturer gets hit with ransomware. A hospital too. Learn how Threatlocker stops these types of attacks. This episode is brought to you by Threatlocker. Sponsors This episode is sponsored by ThreatLocker®. ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com. Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme song created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript [START OF RECORDING] JACK: Hello, hello! Today is a great day, isn’t it? In this episode I’m gonna gush about ThreatLocker. Why? Well, currently they’re my biggest sponsor, which makes them my favorite sponsor. But what I’m saying is that this whole episode is brought to you by ThreatLocker. But don’t worry, I found some pretty great stories from them that I think you’ll find interesting and educational. So, let’s go.

Maxie Reynolds loves an adventure, especially the kind where she’s breaking into buildings (legally). In this episode, she shares stories from her time as a professional penetration tester, including high-stakes physical intrusions, red team chaos, and the unique adrenaline of hacking the real world. Her book: The Art of Attack: Attacker Mindset for Security Professionals Her data center: www.subseacloud.com/ Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker®. ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com. This episode is sponsored by Hims. Hims offers access to ED treatment options ranging from trusted generics that cost up to 95% less than brand names to Hard Mints, if prescribed. To get simple, online access to personalized, affordable care for ED, Hair Loss, Weight Loss, and more, visit https://hims.com/darknet. This show is sponsored by Rippling. Rippling is the unified platform for Global HR, Payroll, IT, and Finance. They’ve helped millions replace their mess of cobbled-together tools with one system designed to give leaders clarity, speed, and control. With Rippling, you can run your entire HR, IT, and Finance operations as one, or pick and choose the products that best fill the gaps in your software stack. Learn more rippling.com/darknet. Books Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. Assembled by Tristan Ledger. Episode artwork by odibagas. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme song created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript [START OF RECORDING] JACK: The Cardiff Giant is an interesting story. In the Bible, Genesis 6:4, it says there were giants on the Earth in those days, and they mated with people and created mighty men of renown.

Tanya Janca is a globally recognized AppSec (application security) expert and founder of We Hack Purple. In this episode, she shares wild stories from the front lines of cybersecurity. She shares stories of when she was a penetration tester to an incident responder. You can sign up for her newsletter at https://newsletter.shehackspurple.ca/ Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker® . ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com . This episode is sponsored by Hims . Hims offers access to ED treatment options ranging from trusted generics that cost up to 95% less than brand names to Hard Mints, if prescribed. To get simple, online access to personalized, affordable care for ED, Hair Loss, Weight Loss, and more, visit https://hims.com/darknet . Support for this show comes from Drata . Drata is the trust management platform that uses AI-driven automation to modernize governance, risk, and compliance, helping thousands of businesses stay audit-ready and scale securely. Learn more at drata.com/darknetdiaries . View all active sponsors. Books Alice and Bob Learn Secure Coding by Tanya Janca Alice and Bob Learn Application Security by Tanya Janca

He started small, swiping cards, buying gift cards, and cashing out. It spiraled into a full‑blown criminal enterprise. Dozens of co‑conspirators, stacks of stolen plastic, and a lifestyle built on chaos. Meet Nathan Michael, leader of Oak Cliff Swipers. Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker®. ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com. Support for this show comes from Pantheon. Pantheon keeps your site fast, secure, and always on. That means better SEO, more conversions, and no lost sales from downtime. But this isn’t just a business win; it’s a developer win too. Your team gets automated workflows, isolated test environments, and zero-downtime deployments. Visit Pantheon.io, and make your website your unfair advantage. Support for this show comes from Adaptive Security. Deepfake voices on a Zoom call. AI-written phishing emails that sound exactly like your CFO. Synthetic job applicants walking through the front door. Adaptive is built to stop these attacks. They run real-time simulations, exposing your teams to what these attacks look like to test and improve your defences. Learn more at adaptivesecurity.com. Sources Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. Assembled by Tristan Ledger. Episode artwork by odibagas. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme music created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript [START OF RECORDING] JACK: Man, have I got a story for you. Where did this one even come from? Oh yeah, it was Twitter. I got a Twitter DM, and this guy’s like, hi, I’m Nathan. I’m like, okay. He was like, yeah, I’ve done some stuff, and you might want to interview me. I should note right here that this episode has a lot of swear words, and I would say it’s for mature audiences. So, if you have some sensitive ears around you, I recommend listening to this one with headphones or whatever you need to do. That’s your warning. That’s your graphic warning for this one. So, typically, when someone DMs me and says, hey, you know, you should interview me for your show, my first response without even knowing anything about them is, can I see your police report?

In 2019, Ola Bini, a Swedish programmer and privacy advocate, was arrested in Ecuador for being a Russian hacker. Find Ola on X: https://x.com/olabini . Or visit his website https://olabini.se/blog/ . Or check out his non-profit https://autonomia.digital/ . Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker® . ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com . This show is sponsored by Miro . AI doesn’t have to be intimidating—in fact, it can help your team thrive. Miro’s Innovation Workspace changes that by bringing people and AI together to turn ideas into impact, fast. Whether you’re launching a new podcast, streamlining a process, or building the next big thing, Miro helps your team move quicker, collaborate better, and actually enjoy the work. Learn more at https://miro.com/ . This show is sponsored by Thales . With their industry-leading platforms, you can protect critical applications, data and identities – anywhere and at scale with the highest ROI. That’s why the most trusted brands and largest banks, retailers and healthcare companies in the world rely on Thales to protect what matters most – applications, data and identities. Learn more at http://thalesgroup.com/cyber . View all active sponsors. Sources https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/08/ecuador-political-actors-must-step-away-ola-binis-case https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/04/six-years-dangerous-misconceptions-targeting-ola-bini-and-digital-rights-ecuador https://peoplesdispatch.org/2019/04/12/ola-bini-detained-in-ecuador-for-90-days/ https://globalvoices.org/2022/10/21/ola-bini-the-cyberactivist-who-causes-panic-in-ecuador/ https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2019/09/ecuador-allanamiento-violento-pone-en-riesgo-juicio-justo-ola-bini-2/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ola_Bini

All Hieu Minh Ngo wanted was to make money online. But when he stumbled into the dark web, he found more than just opportunity, he found a global dark market. What started as a side hustle turned into an international crime spree. Find Hieu on X: https://x.com/HHieupc . Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker® . ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com . Support for this show comes from Drata . Drata is the trust management platform that uses AI-driven automation to modernize governance, risk, and compliance, helping thousands of businesses stay audit-ready and scale securely. Learn more at drata.com/darknetdiaries . This show is sponsored by Red Canary . Red Canary is a leading provider of Managed Detection and Response (MDR), helping nearly 1,000 organizations detect and stop threats before they cause harm. With a focus on accuracy across identities, endpoints, and cloud, we deliver trusted security operations and a world-class customer experience. Learn more at redcanary.com .

In this episode we talk with MG (https://x.com/MG), the brilliant (and notorious) hacker and hardware engineer behind the OMG Cable. A seemingly ordinary USB cable with extraordinary offensive capabilities. Learn more about MG at: O.MG.LOL Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker®. ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com. Support for this show comes from Axonius. Axonius transforms asset intelligence into intelligent action. With the Axonius Asset Cloud, customers preemptively tackle high-risk and hard-to-spot threat exposures, misconfigurations, and overspending. The integrated platform brings together data from every system in an organization’s IT infrastructure to optimize mission-critical risk, performance, and cost measures via actionable intelligence. Covering cyber assets, software, SaaS applications, identities, vulnerabilities, infrastructure, and more, Axonius is the one place to go for Security, IT, and GRC teams to continuously drive actionability across the organization. Bring truth to action with Axonius. Learn more at axonius.com. Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. Assembled by Tristan Ledger. Episode artwork by odibagas. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme music created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript [START OF RECORDING] JACK: Hey, hey, it’s Jack, host of the show. I am feeling good. I am feeling healthy, strong, fit. I’m in the game. So, I’m coming at you with a second episode this month. Let’s go! Defcon is coming up in a few weeks. I’ll be there. I wouldn’t miss it. You know me. If you don’t know, it’s the premiere hacking conference in Vegas, and I love going because every year something crazy happens. You don’t always know what it’ll be, but you know something is going down somewhere. Like, maybe someone will drop a zero-day live on stage, which will suddenly make us all panic and call home; shut everything down! Or maybe the FBI breaks into someone’s hotel room and arrests someone who they’ve been chasing for a decade. Or maybe someone gives a talk that makes history.

Greg Linares (AKA Laughing Mantis) joins us to tell us about how he became the youngest hacker to be arrested in Arizona. Follow Greg on Twitter: https://x.com/Laughing_Mantis. Sponsors Support for this show comes from ThreatLocker®. ThreatLocker® is a Zero Trust Endpoint Protection Platform that strengthens your infrastructure from the ground up. With ThreatLocker® Allowlisting and Ringfencing™, you gain a more secure approach to blocking exploits of known and unknown vulnerabilities. ThreatLocker® provides Zero Trust control at the kernel level that enables you to allow everything you need and block everything else, including ransomware! Learn more at www.threatlocker.com. This show is sponsored by Red Canary. Red Canary is a leading provider of Managed Detection and Response (MDR), helping nearly 1,000 organizations detect and stop threats before they cause harm. With a focus on accuracy across identities, endpoints, and cloud, we deliver trusted security operations and a world-class customer experience. Learn more at redcanary.com. This show is sponsored by Miro. AI doesn’t have to be intimidating—in fact, it can help your team thrive. Miro’s Innovation Workspace changes that by bringing people and AI together to turn ideas into impact, fast. Whether you’re launching a new podcast, streamlining a process, or building the next big thing, Miro helps your team move quicker, collaborate better, and actually enjoy the work. Learn more at https://miro.com/. Attribution Darknet Diaries is created by Jack Rhysider. Assembled by Tristan Ledger. Episode artwork by odibagas. Mixing by Proximity Sound. Theme music created by Breakmaster Cylinder. Theme song available for listen and download at bandcamp. Or listen to it on Spotify. Transcript [START OF RECORDING] JACK: [App beeping] Hey. DAD: Man, I don’t see you. JACK: Yeah, my tape is usually over my camera. DAD: Why don’t I see you? JACK: I got my tape on my camera. One second. DAD: Ah. I can’t even hear you. JACK: You can’t hear me? DAD: My sound… JACK: [Background talk] There’s a story I had that I totally forgot about but I remembered recently, and I wanted to call up my dad and walk through it again with him to try to remember how it went.