Episode 62
The Hacker Who Moved to Mexico City
I met Ted in Spanish class. He grew up across the bridge from Boston in a neighborhood where, as he puts it, everybody was a car thief, and that's where he says his fascination with beating the system started. It took him onto the internet before most people knew what it was, and into a career spent hiring people to hack into Boston's biggest investment firms.
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Transcript
We grew up in the streets.
Speaker:I mean, it was- Wow … it was rough.
Speaker:So, like, gunfire?
Speaker:Gunfire.
Speaker:We, we started carrying knives at age seven.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:But that was a good thing because then people were reluctant to beat the
Speaker:shit out of each other 'cause, that they knew everybody might have one.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So it was like detente.
Speaker:It was like the cold, cold war with, like, Gorbachev and Reagan.
Speaker:Everybody's carrying weapons that nobody's… Like, so it
Speaker:was actually an improvement.
Speaker:Problem solved.
Speaker:This
Speaker:is episode 62 of onefjef.
Speaker:Episode
Speaker:62. Episode 62.
Speaker:Episode 62.
Speaker:Hello de nuevo, mis amigos.
Speaker:Hello again, my friends.
Speaker:Here we are again.
Speaker:Here we are.
Speaker:Aqui estamos.
Speaker:I hope you're thriving, as I always do, and happy beginning
Speaker:of autumn to those who celebrate.
Speaker:Autumn in Mexico City feels much like the summer, except that the nearly
Speaker:daily rainstorms are no more, which is good, although I now have to water
Speaker:the plants on my terrace instead of letting Mother Nature take care of them.
Speaker:I'll get through this.
Speaker:Honestly, the rainy season here didn't feel as rainy as I thought it
Speaker:would, although it was apparently one of the rainiest summers ever here.
Speaker:Mexico City is very large, though, and so I guess it rained more in
Speaker:other areas than it did in mine.
Speaker:Or maybe I'm just not a good gauge of rainfall totals.
Speaker:Whatever.
Speaker:I will miss autumn in Ohio, though, what with the changing of the leaves and
Speaker:all, but I won't miss the eerie dread of another Ohio winter approaching.
Speaker:Not at all.
Speaker:It's gonna be a bit strange to not experience a horrible,
Speaker:cold winter this year.
Speaker:Good strange, though.
Speaker:Not bad strange.
Speaker:But I digress.
Speaker:I met today's guest in a Spanish class this past spring.
Speaker:The very same class that I met Jonathan the Hitchhiking German in episode
Speaker:58, which you should go back and listen to if you haven't yet, after
Speaker:you listen to this one, of course.
Speaker:Ted is not a hitchhiking German.
Speaker:He is, in fact, a retired computer hacker from Boston, which is why he asked that I
Speaker:don't use his last name in this podcast.
Speaker:I obliged.
Speaker:My conversation with Ted proves my theory that expats are an
Speaker:inherently fascinating bunch.
Speaker:Because this conversation is truly, well, fascinating, and I'm willing
Speaker:to bet you're gonna think so too.
Speaker:But before that conversation, might I remind you of the Patreon page that I have
Speaker:been reminding you of for 62 episodes.
Speaker:Well, 61 episodes, but now this is the 62nd time.
Speaker:But there's bonus episodes I've reminded you in, so quite a few times.
Speaker:Some of you, the elite, have heeded my Patreon call and gone to
Speaker:patreon.com/onefjef and signed up.
Speaker:Others of you have not.
Speaker:So once again, I humbly ask you, go to patreon.com/onefjef and sign up for as
Speaker:little as $5 a month, and support this fledgling little wee baby of a podcast
Speaker:as it tries to find its feet, tries to find its audience, and tries to find some
Speaker:money for all the hard work that I put into it every single week just for you.
Speaker:Go to patreon.com/onefjef and sign up.
Speaker:Thank you very much.
Speaker:And to my ongoing Patreon subscribers, the elite, the best of the best,
Speaker:I love you all, I appreciate you all, and thank you once again.
Speaker:Thank you for listening.
Speaker:Thank you for being here.
Speaker:Here is my conversation with Ted from my Spanish class
Speaker:My girlfriend got pulled over by the policia.
Speaker:Oh, really?
Speaker:And she, uh, she held her ground.
Speaker:She, quote-unquote, "ripped them a new one," as we say in the States.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:What,
Speaker:what did she get pulled over for?
Speaker:Um, allegedly, like, the little frame around the license plate.
Speaker:Oh.
Speaker:But she got pulled over for a bribe, or she w- they wanted a bribe.
Speaker:How much did
Speaker:she have to pay?
Speaker:Nothing.
Speaker:She said, "Tow my car.
Speaker:I'm not paying a bribe." And, uh, the guy went back to his car and came back and
Speaker:said, "Well, we'll just give you a warning this time." 'Cause she called his bluff.
Speaker:That was here in Veracruz?
Speaker:That was about 10 miles outside- Wow … the city.
Speaker:Uh, so Ted, we met in, uh, Spanish class.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Uh, one of the stranger
Speaker:I mean, I haven't taken a lot of Spanish classes, but that class
Speaker:is, uh, it's got some character.
Speaker:Oh, yeah.
Speaker:It's got some … Yeah, yeah, has some spice.
Speaker:Anyway, what, uh, what brought you to Mexico City, Ted?
Speaker:Uh, I retired around four years ago.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Early retirement.
Speaker:Ah, very well.
Speaker:I highly encourage it if folks can do it.
Speaker:I'm doing my best, Ted.
Speaker:Let me
Speaker:tell you.
Speaker:Um, and, uh, I never wanted to, uh, experience a Boston winter again.
Speaker:That was one of my- Totally,
Speaker:yes
Speaker:… uh, must, must avoid things.
Speaker:And I had a friend, uh, Juan-
Speaker:Hmm
Speaker:… who went to MIT m- many years ago.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And we were having dinner, and, uh, Juan said, "Hey, I grew up and my
Speaker:family still lives in Mexico City.
Speaker:Why don't you check out Mexico City?"
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:" The climate is perfect, and it's a great place." Hmm.
Speaker:So about four years ago, I, uh, hopped on an airplane and came here and-
Speaker:Huh … rented a couple of Airbnbs-
Speaker:Huh
Speaker:… and, uh, instantly fell in love with the city.
Speaker:What was your first impression of the city?
Speaker:I think, uh, in this area especially, just the, uh, I d- you, you s- you think
Speaker:of a large city and 20 million people.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:But then the green.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Just the- Yeah, yeah … the, the beautiful, you know-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… floras and-
Speaker:It's like we're in a forest.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:In a, in a, in a very urban city.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So, yeah.
Speaker:It's very, very lush.
Speaker:So you came to Mexico City for, for how long?
Speaker:Um, I think the first time was, uh, I, I spent a couple weeks in Cancun
Speaker:'cause I just wanted to lay on a beach.
Speaker:Of course,
Speaker:right, right.
Speaker:And then a couple of weeks here.
Speaker:I met up with my friend Juan-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… and his wife Carol, and, uh, they showed me around a bit.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And, uh-
Speaker:And that was what year?
Speaker:This was … So four years ago, I guess.
Speaker:2018.
Speaker:Okay, so right after COVID.
Speaker:So the- Yeah … flood had begun by this point.
Speaker:Yeah, exactly.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:Uh, there were, uh, muy, muy Americanos there.
Speaker:Muchos Americanos,
Speaker:si, si.
Speaker:Um,
Speaker:so yeah.
Speaker:What did you do?
Speaker:Were you just a tourist?
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:I just walked around, and it's, it's interesting.
Speaker:The f- the first Airbnb I got was in, uh, Juarez.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um-
Speaker:Same
Speaker:… and, uh, I'm a book lover.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And I was looking for some books in English-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:which sometimes can be a little challenging.
Speaker:For sure, for sure.
Speaker:Or you get, like, one shelf-
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… which is understandable.
Speaker:And I googled this bookstore called Under the Volcano-
Speaker:Uh-huh
Speaker:… based on a Malcolm Lowry novel- Uh-huh.
Speaker:Okay … which I actually read this year.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:Yeah, it was pretty cool.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:And I said, "Well, gee."
Speaker:So I wandered down from Juarez-
Speaker:Uh-huh
Speaker:… and I found the bookstore, which is a, a highly recommended bookstore.
Speaker:It's in an old American Legion-
Speaker:Oh,
Speaker:cool … kind of stucco building- Oh … with all these World War II-
Speaker:Right on
Speaker:… pictures and stuff.
Speaker:Huh.
Speaker:And it's got big, uh, big iron grates.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And there was a sign outside to say, "If you're coming for the bookstore,
Speaker:yell into the gates, 'Books.
Speaker:Books.
Speaker:I want books.'"
Speaker:Is it just an English bookstore?
Speaker:It's a all English used bookstore- All English, all right … used bookstore.
Speaker:Oh, right on.
Speaker:By the o-
Speaker:You have to, I have to get that address, 'cause that's,
Speaker:uh- Yeah … that's amazing.
Speaker:It's a gem.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And, uh, so I yelled upstairs, and, uh, this young woman came down and let me up.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And she said, "Have you been here before?" And I said, "No." And she basically
Speaker:said, "Okay, all the books are used.
Speaker:The prices are marked." Hmm.
Speaker:"We take, uh, efectivo, cash." Yeah, right, right, right.
Speaker:"Or PayPal." And then she picked up her book and started reading.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And I, this bookstore was just ama- I'm a bookstore guy, and this- Tons,
Speaker:big, big?
Speaker:Uh, no, just one large room.
Speaker:Oh, just full of books.
Speaker:But full of just amazing fic- I'm a fiction guy too- Yeah … so
Speaker:this was, this was very near- Oh … and dear to my heart.
Speaker:Books,
Speaker:man
Speaker:So, so what happened, I, I bought… Uh, let's think.
Speaker:I think I picked up, uh, Salman Rushdie's first book.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Midnight's Children.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:Good book.
Speaker:And then, uh, so I, I get out of the bookstore, and I say, "Well, I'd like
Speaker:to read this book." And I looked at the map, and there was Parque Mexico- See?
Speaker:… for my first time.
Speaker:And, uh, they have those nice little reading areas.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:And I sat there and read this book and wandered around that
Speaker:park and, and, and I was sold.
Speaker:Magic.
Speaker:I was sold.
Speaker:Magic.
Speaker:For sure.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So how many times have you been back?
Speaker:Uh, every year since then.
Speaker:Every year since then
Speaker:for the- Every year.
Speaker:And then you're gonna move here.
Speaker:Uh, I'm thinking of moving here.
Speaker:Absolutely.
Speaker:W- what do you think it is?
Speaker:Like, for me, I think it's the, um, the, the randomness of it, right?
Speaker:The architecture's amazing, but it just like one street to the next it'll
Speaker:be these crazy old colonial houses, and then suddenly you're seeing like
Speaker:modern buildings, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker:I kinda love that.
Speaker:It feels very like, uh, you never know what you're gonna find.
Speaker:You know what I mean?
Speaker:I see.
Speaker:Plus the food.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Uh, I, I, the, the architecture- Yeah, yeah … as you
Speaker:mentioned, is just amazing.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You got the Spanish architecture- Yeah, yeah … then a modern duplex.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And then cru- some crumbling building that just has so much character.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Or you, you peek down a little, uh, eh, through somebody's, uh, doorway
Speaker:and there's this huge courtyard-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:that they have.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, I g- I, one thing that always gets me is is I kind of think of the city,
Speaker:I guess this is a, a metaphor perhaps, if you go to Parque Mexico, there's a
Speaker:big kind of, um, amphitheater there.
Speaker:Yep, yep.
Speaker:And if you go, the, I think the best time is Sun- Sunday evening.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:There's no rules.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:If you have a pu- pit bull and you wanna play catch with the pit bull
Speaker:in the middle- Do whatever you want … there's, there's little four-year-olds
Speaker:l- learning how to ride bikes.
Speaker:There's guys whipping Frisbees across- Oh, yep … maybe 100
Speaker:yard, you know, the amphitheater.
Speaker:Right, right,
Speaker:right.
Speaker:Guys doing tarot card readings.
Speaker:There's chara- Yeah, yeah … tarot card.
Speaker:And then a- around the, uh, perimeter there's salsa dancing.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You can pay for those classes.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Incredibly sensual, too.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I mean, it's just like you, you- It's a vibe … you w- I always joke, I
Speaker:say, "This is like, this is hotter than porn." Just watching, watching these
Speaker:people do this amazing, exotic- Yeah
Speaker:sensual- Yeah … um, salsa dance.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So, yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, it really, it is a vibe, uh, Mexico City, and I don't really
Speaker:know how else to describe it.
Speaker:And, and, and Parque Mexico is really, the dog park there is,
Speaker:there's like, I watch it for hours.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, so many dogs.
Speaker:Have you been mugged?
Speaker:I have never been mugged.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Uh, I've never had a problem with, uh, anybody.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I've been on, I've been on beaches around Mexico, and I leave my bag there.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I leave the passport in the hotel.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah, that's a good idea.
Speaker:But-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… I have never had, uh, remotely any problem.
Speaker:And I, I often tell folks when they, uh, mention the dangerous, the alleged
Speaker:dangerous factor- Yeah … I said, "I honestly feel safer on a Saturday night in
Speaker:midnight or 1:00 AM in Mexico City- Yeah
Speaker:downtown- For sure … versus downtown Boston."
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I do think, and I've heard more stories that have surprised me lately of people
Speaker:saying, "Just, you know, be careful. Don't walk down-" Yeah … dark streets
Speaker:in the middle of the night, you know, 'cause it's not the criminals necessarily,
Speaker:it's the police that shake you down.
Speaker:Yeah, I see.
Speaker:Especially if you're a foreigner.
Speaker:Mm. But they t- I've decided if e- that ever happens to me I'm just
Speaker:gonna act like I don't s- I, I don't, confused, or act like I speak French
Speaker:or something, and they'll eventually be like, "I don't care." Yeah.
Speaker:"You know, this is not worth my time." Did you start learning Spanish right away?
Speaker:Uh, I, it, it's in fits and starts.
Speaker:Yeah?
Speaker:So at the time I had an American girlfriend-
Speaker:Ah,
Speaker:does this help … who was fairly fluent in Spanish.
Speaker:Oh, well, that
Speaker:does help.
Speaker:Um, however, my attempts were, uh, met with laughter in many cases.
Speaker:By her?
Speaker:By her and- Oh,
Speaker:that's helpful
Speaker:… the Americans were much more stricter than, uh, Mexicanos.
Speaker:Oh,
Speaker:really?
Speaker:That was just- Of course … my, my take.
Speaker:Of course.
Speaker:They were very like, "No, no, it's pequeño." You know, like- Yeah,
Speaker:yeah, yeah … very, very precise.
Speaker:Gotta follow the rules, man.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So that was a little bit discouraging.
Speaker:So I'd kinda start on and off.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Um, sometimes I went i- uh, tried to learn, uh, Español to the point where
Speaker:I'm almost getting a migraine like- Yeah
Speaker:like two or three years ago.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:And sometimes I'm q- I'm an older guy, so I-
Speaker:Sure
Speaker:… think it's a little more- Yeah … difficult, uh- Yeah … you know?
Speaker:Um, but I met this, uh, this friend Lima.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And, um, so her story was her dad was from Lima, thus her name.
Speaker:That's convenient.
Speaker:Lima Peru.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And her mom was from Okinawa.
Speaker:Oh, wow
Speaker:… Japan.
Speaker:And, uh, she was here working for the United Nations.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And she was like, I don't, I forget, the B2 level Spanish.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So she spoke fluent Japanese, really good English-
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… and incredible Spanish.
Speaker:So I kind of, I was like, "Geez, I wanna do that." Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:And it's, it's as, as you know, it's- It's hard
Speaker:it's a challenge.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It's- It's, it's really hard.
Speaker:But it's rewarding.
Speaker:Mm. Like, when you understand something else- Oh … and you're on the street and
Speaker:you're like, "Oh, I actually understand that now." I'm like, "Oh, it actually, it
Speaker:actually works." It doesn't happen very often, let's be clear, but when it does
Speaker:happen, it's a magical, magical time.
Speaker:Do you know there's 17 tenses?
Speaker:I-
Speaker:17, Ted.
Speaker:I- I'm working on- Sev- … the first or second one.
Speaker:When, when my teacher told me that, which was just this week, he
Speaker:was like, "You shouldn't ask, but 17." And I was like, "Oh my God.
Speaker:No thank you." You grew up in Boston?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:I grew up in, uh, Chelsea, Massachusetts.
Speaker:It's a, uh, little gritty town- Yeah
Speaker:right over the bridge from Boston.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:In, um, in the '70s.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Thoroughly middle class.
Speaker:We, we grew up single- Yeah … single welfare mom.
Speaker:Oh, yeah.
Speaker:Tough streets.
Speaker:What
Speaker:happened to your dad?
Speaker:Just-
Speaker:Uh, alcoholic.
Speaker:Oh.
Speaker:Left.
Speaker:Did you ever, do you remember him or did he leave?
Speaker:Ne- never met him.
Speaker:Oh, wow.
Speaker:No.
Speaker:Are you ever curious?
Speaker:Um, I, I always think about, like, people who are adopted-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:… and that f- they'll track down folks- Yeah … and they'll go to every length.
Speaker:Eh, my mom raised us.
Speaker:Um-
Speaker:It's also like if he didn't try to find you, why should you go find him?
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But, um, yeah.
Speaker:Grew up in a really gritty town.
Speaker:My brother still, now that we're both thoroughly middle
Speaker:class, he'll still- Right
Speaker:he'll still send me an email, um, uh… It's, the city's a
Speaker:little, little, uh, nicer now.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, but he would say, "Hey, we beat Compton," meaning when
Speaker:they would list the top 10 crime cities- … Chelsea, Massachusetts-
Speaker:Wow … would be above Compton.
Speaker:So, so it, oh, so
Speaker:it was really-
Speaker:Oh, we were, we grew up in the streets.
Speaker:I mean, it was-
Speaker:Wow
Speaker:it was rough.
Speaker:So, like, gunfire?
Speaker:Gunfire.
Speaker:We, we started carrying knives at age seven.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:But that was a good thing because then people were reluctant to beat
Speaker:the shit out of each other 'cause, that they knew everybody might.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So it was like detente.
Speaker:It was like the cold Cold War with, like, Gorbachev and Reagan.
Speaker:Everybody's
Speaker:carrying weapons, like nobody's…
Speaker:So it was actually an improvement.
Speaker:Problem solved.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So did you ever get in any s- any scuffles or anything when you were-
Speaker:We were always fighting.
Speaker:Really?
Speaker:We were always fighting.
Speaker:The, the, the challenge in a community like that, and, and I've reflected
Speaker:a bit back, actually I was talking to my, my girlfriend about this
Speaker:recently, is that, you know, if you grow up in that type of like South
Speaker:Side of Chicago- Sure, sure, sure
Speaker:or, you have two choices.
Speaker:Well, uh, technically three.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:You can either be a lion or you can be a lamb- Or the third choice, that's,
Speaker:this is a, a, a smaller percentage- Right … you can be a comedian.
Speaker:Ah, fair enough.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:' Cause if you're a comedian, you kind of get both sides-
Speaker:Yeah … are kind of- That's
Speaker:kind of what I-
Speaker:living through this … got through high school.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So honestly, I didn't like being a lamb, so, uh, I was a, I was a tough kid.
Speaker:And you weren't funny enough to be a comedian- I, I, no … so you had to- No,
Speaker:I wasn't … you had to carry a knife.
Speaker:So do you ever, like, did you usually win the fights?
Speaker:Um, here's the situation.
Speaker:So when you and I was about seven or eight-
Speaker:All right
Speaker:… and this was, this was badass, you know- Sure, sure
Speaker:… ' 70s.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And I, I tell my son the challenge at that time was that, you know, and people
Speaker:don't realize how important abortion is.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You know, this was generations of kids who if there were abortions, we probably
Speaker:none of them would have ever existed.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And all the dads were out of this- Right … neighborhood.
Speaker:These neighborhoods were entirely women
Speaker:centric.
Speaker:Oh, like single moms and all that?
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:They were all single moms who- Wow … we used to joke, uh, I joke
Speaker:with my friend now, I say, "Geez, back in the day they should have
Speaker:taken one of those dust croppers-
Speaker:and, and, and just, and just thrown Prozac out of- … 'cause all the m- We
Speaker:joke every- Right … every mom back then would lay on the couch- Be depressed.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah … with a cigarette and watch the soap operas and-
Speaker:Yeah, yeah … the telenovelas.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But, um, yeah, I fought enough.
Speaker:If you keep fighting somebody, especially if they're older than you-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:um, the neighborhood looks at it as like, how many times are you
Speaker:gonna beat up that little kid?
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:So at a certain point, I did get a reputation.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I, I, I'm the same height I was when I was 12, so- Right … hope that I-
Speaker:That
Speaker:helps … started early.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And I had a, I had a very sharp tongue.
Speaker:I cringe at… So my, my main weapon was my tongue.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I could not repeat what I would say.
Speaker:Your mom, blah, blah, blah, blah,
Speaker:blah.
Speaker:Oh, yeah.
Speaker:That's light, but yeah.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Uh, that's unexpected.
Speaker:Anyway.
Speaker:Unexpected touch.
Speaker:Were there ever guns?
Speaker:So some of us, we were, we had about a gang of 10 people.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:Um- Did you have
Speaker:a name?
Speaker:Was there a name for
Speaker:the gang?
Speaker:No, no, no.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:If we were all Black kids-
Speaker:Uh-huh
Speaker:… we would've been a gang.
Speaker:We would've been in jail.
Speaker:Oh,
Speaker:so the white people- We- … made it not a gang.
Speaker:The cops would come by, and most of the cops were white and racist-
Speaker:Oh … and say, "Oh, just-"
Speaker:I
Speaker:see … "All right. Just go home."
Speaker:Huh.
Speaker:" Go, go over there and- Yeah, yeah … you know- Crazy kids
Speaker:go to that parking lot and drink." Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Just leave us alone.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:We're gonna-
Speaker:Get the Black people.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Sadly.
Speaker:So we were never labeled a gang, but we had about 10 or 12 of us, and
Speaker:there were really big, tough guys.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:And that saved us from… We really didn't have to fight,
Speaker:'cause we all protected each other.
Speaker:Oh, wow.
Speaker:So f- and, and the other thing is we were a good crew.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:We didn't, we didn't fuck anybody over.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:We didn't deal heavy drugs.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Are there knife fights?
Speaker:I don't like to talk a lot.
Speaker:The, the… I-
Speaker:There were some knife
Speaker:fights?
Speaker:There were some knife fights.
Speaker:Wow,
Speaker:dude.
Speaker:But, but also, uh, yeah, but- Yeah, I'd rather
Speaker:Yeah, that was, that was-
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:When did you realize that your childhood growing up was different than the-
Speaker:I'll defer to my brother recently told me this story.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So he's in his mid-50s, and he said, um … And just, you know, we're white
Speaker:guys- Yeah, yeah, yeah … because we're on, you know- Yeah … The Voice Only.
Speaker:My brother had this really interesting observation, and he shared this
Speaker:with me only about three years ago.
Speaker:He said, he goes, "Ted," we were, you know, we were watching TV, and, uh,
Speaker:maybe he was, like, eight or nine.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And Good Times-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:… was a, I'll-
Speaker:I remember,
Speaker:yeah … give some background here for folks
Speaker:… old, old sitcom, uh, I forget-
Speaker:An old sitcom.
Speaker:What was
Speaker:the plot of that?
Speaker:A working class/poor African American family- Uh-huh
Speaker:who lived in housing, housing projects.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And the janitor would come up and make jokes.
Speaker:Right, right, right, right.
Speaker:It was a
Speaker:comedy.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And what was interesting, my brother said, he goes, "Geez, Ted, you know, I
Speaker:was like eight or nine," or, you know, whenever that came, show came out.
Speaker:And he goes, "And I was watching the show, and it wasn't a race thing, like
Speaker:we were white and they were Black."
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:He goes, "I was really listening to the jokes they made, and they were making
Speaker:jokes about how poor they were." And he goes, "Then I looked at our, our family.
Speaker:I said, 'Wow, we're really poor.'" "Because this family's," you know, so
Speaker:that was the poorest kind of thing he saw.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:You know?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:We-
Speaker:Um, interesting.
Speaker:Interesting.
Speaker:So did you go to … Like, you finished high school, I assume.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And then you went, did you go to college?
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Where'd you go to college?
Speaker:What'd you go to college for?
Speaker:So I went to, um … So the, the real benefit of growing up in the Boston area-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:… ton of colleges.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:And back in the '80s, they were ver- public colleges were cheap,
Speaker:affordable, and excellent.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:We can only dream.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So, um, in high school, um, I was still a tough kid.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I would s- you know, there was, uh, I was, I was telling my, my girlfriend, I
Speaker:said, we were doing a theater production.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:And me and my friend, we were so tough we could do anything.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:We could skip rope.
Speaker:We could hang out with the gay kids.
Speaker:Right, right, right.
Speaker:Nobody was gonna m- you know?
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:You know, nobody's gonna mess with us.
Speaker:So we did the theater production.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:We did the background, and we didn't, weren't actors, but we did the- Oh, right.
Speaker:But still
Speaker:… sets and the lights- Yeah, yeah … and everything, and we loved it.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And, um- What was interesting was, is that, um, there was one point
Speaker:where I got up in class and I said, "Hey, I'd like everybody to go to…"
Speaker:It was Peter Shaffer, The Private Affair.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Not your s- typical high school-
Speaker:Yeah, never heard of it.
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… great, great play.
Speaker:And I said, you know, "Hey, I'd like to have people come to the play," and there
Speaker:was, um… There's a longer digression around- Of course … Boston and racism.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:But there was this, um, guy who, you know, basically was like, "Fuck you.
Speaker:Why should we go to this play?
Speaker:It's for pussies."
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And at that point I said, "All right. After school, let's go." So this is
Speaker:what… You know, you're, you're, you're trying to get folks to go to a play.
Speaker:Like threatening them to go to the play.
Speaker:And,
Speaker:and, and they're like, you know, like… Anyway, so.
Speaker:Did he go to the play?
Speaker:Uh, he never went.
Speaker:Oh, boy.
Speaker:He should kick
Speaker:his a- But the background is, um, it was a Catholic high school,
Speaker:all boys Catholic high school.
Speaker:Ah,
Speaker:that it… Yeah.
Speaker:Um, it was a very, very tough high school in East Boston.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And the background is, is that busing occurred in the '70s in Boston.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So every racist white family didn't want their kids to go to
Speaker:school with Black kids- Right
Speaker:all these horrible kids.
Speaker:Of
Speaker:course.
Speaker:So they sent them to the Catholic school that accepted anybody at that point.
Speaker:Hmm.
Speaker:So it was kind of me and kind of our multicultural crew- Right,
Speaker:right,
Speaker:right … against all these- Right … white racist kids, which
Speaker:was another kind of- Huh … dynamic.
Speaker:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker:But that said, the priests were dying off, so we got-
Speaker:a couple of teachers, and who were really just genuinely, "I
Speaker:wanna give back to my community."
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:And I had one teacher who basically, since the priests
Speaker:were… Well, that's another story.
Speaker:Mm. Wow.
Speaker:Um, doing their thing.
Speaker:This guy could teach anything, and he grew up in the same kind of community.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:And he taught, um, political thought and, uh, economics to us-
Speaker:Okay
Speaker:and Marxism.
Speaker:Of course.
Speaker:And, uh, you know, the, the- That's how
Speaker:they get you.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:There you go.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And he was really a mentor to me.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:And I read, I read Plato's Republic.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:How old were you?
Speaker:Uh, 16, 17.
Speaker:I've never even read Plato's Republic.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:And I just, I was hooked on philosophy.
Speaker:Oh, wow.
Speaker:So, um- My brother and I took two very different paths.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So we grow up with- when we were hung- growing up, we were
Speaker:hungry, there was no heat.
Speaker:This was the real-
Speaker:Right,
Speaker:right, right … the real deal.
Speaker:So my brother and I, back to TV, he loved TV, and he watched Leave
Speaker:It to Beaver and Father Knows Best.
Speaker:Me too.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:These iconic American, the perfect family, and the-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… the wife's always got the hair up, and it's- Yeah, yeah,
Speaker:yeah
Speaker:… there's some little issue with a young boy.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:The most minor issue of all time, right.
Speaker:And so my brother just fell in love with that lifestyle.
Speaker:He said, "This is a window to a different world."
Speaker:He liked the idea of, like, the very stable family that
Speaker:was portrayed as a TV show.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:He totally was hooked on that.
Speaker:He wanted to be Wally or The Beaver, do you think?
Speaker:Um, I, I was more The Beaver.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:He's Wally.
Speaker:Maybe he was more, more Wally.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So he went to … It's a really interesting story.
Speaker:He, he said, "I wanna make money. I wanna have nice things."
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:" I wanna live this middle class life that I've seen on TV." So he went to the
Speaker:library, and he looked up careers that paid the most after four years in college.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And it was mechanical engineering-
Speaker:Oh, well, that checks
Speaker:out … of all things.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And he's still a mechanical engineer.
Speaker:He's got the white picket fence- Wow … the big mansion.
Speaker:He did it.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:For me, I just fell in love with reading and literature and philosophy.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:And I said, "I'm gonna go study philosophy."
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And I almost wasn't gonna go to college, but my mentor was like, "Ted, go."
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:"It's not as bad as this jungle you're in." Yeah.
Speaker:"You're in high school. Go." That
Speaker:was a good advice.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And, uh, I think it was about $1,000 a year.
Speaker:Jesus.
Speaker:Where'd you go to school?
Speaker:Uh, University of Massachusetts at Boston.
Speaker:Oh, nice.
Speaker:Nice.
Speaker:Um, no dorms.
Speaker:Oh.
Speaker:So it was really a urban- And you commu- you were commuting
Speaker:commuter,
Speaker:commuter school.
Speaker:So I'd hop- Wow … on bus.
Speaker:It took me about an hour and a half to get there each day.
Speaker:So
Speaker:you're still living in the, you know, the neighborhood.
Speaker:Well, that's the thing, you know?
Speaker:So I'm going and studying Wittgenstein and Heidegger and Lovingman- Right,
Speaker:right, right … and reading J.H.
Speaker:Florence, and then you go back home and, you know, the guys be-
Speaker:the drug addicts beeping the horn saying, "Oh, you wanna buy some-"
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… " stuff?" You know?
Speaker:Right, right.
Speaker:Or we're just drinking on the corner.
Speaker:So it was a, it was- Huh … still that kind of-
Speaker:That's really interesting
Speaker:… dichotomy.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It must have been eye-opening, though.
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… like going to, yeah.
Speaker:Interesting.
Speaker:When I was in college, they would, they would basically say, you know,
Speaker:I was an English lit major, and they would say that there's only one degree
Speaker:that's more useless than a English lit degree, and it's the philosophy degree.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, so what did you… I ended up teaching English in Korea.
Speaker:What did you end up doing- Oh … with your philosophy degree?
Speaker:So I had my philosophy degree.
Speaker:Um, I was an active alcoholic at the time.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Graduated, and as any good philosophy major does, I became a, uh, messenger
Speaker:in Boston, in downtown Boston.
Speaker:Oh, like r- doing the bike thing?
Speaker:Yep, yep.
Speaker:Oh, cool.
Speaker:Bike and walk of some of the-
Speaker:What's that movie called?
Speaker:There's a movie about that with Kevin Bacon.
Speaker:Remember?
Speaker:Quicksilver.
Speaker:Quicksilver.
Speaker:Quicksilver.
Speaker:Remember that?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Was it just like that?
Speaker:Um, it, it, it was, it was always a heavy drinking crew.
Speaker:Oh.
Speaker:And, uh- Are you drinking while you're biking around?
Speaker:Um, no.
Speaker:We'd usually wait till- Wait till after … after.
Speaker:That's probably for the best.
Speaker:But there was a little pub, we'd all go afterwards.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:And, you know, you'd s- then, and sooner or later everybody would get injured.
Speaker:Luckily I- Right … I switched over to walking messenger.
Speaker:Oh, that's smart
Speaker:Because then I could go into bookstores and wander around and- Right
Speaker:… that was that.
Speaker:It looked like a very dangerous job.
Speaker:I mean, the, the movie made it look very dangerous.
Speaker:So yeah, I was a messenger after, uh, with my philosophy degree.
Speaker:And, and the back- I just wanted to study philosophy and read, and I ha-
Speaker:I never kinda had that middle cl- I didn't even think about money at all.
Speaker:I just figured, oh, I'll go back- Huh … to a fa- I'd, I'd done factory work-
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah
Speaker:in, in high school and college.
Speaker:I did a
Speaker:little of that,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:Well, maybe I'll go back to the factory.
Speaker:I just wa- I just loved philosophy, I loved literature, yeah.
Speaker:But there wasn't even, like, a dream job that you were thinking about when-
Speaker:Maybe writing.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That was it.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Never had any kind of… No future, yeah.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Very, very, here I am.
Speaker:So when did computers enter your life?
Speaker:I was graduating college, it was '88- Mm-hmm … and the library was starting
Speaker:to install digital card catalog.
Speaker:They were taking out-
Speaker:Oh,
Speaker:right … the old long index cards … I remember that.
Speaker:Yeah, the really
Speaker:crappy digital- And I was like, "Oh, that looks interesting."
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I was just inter- I was like, "Wow." Yeah.
Speaker:Now that I'm graduating.
Speaker:For sure.
Speaker:And, um, my friend had a, uh, an old, these were old, old
Speaker:laptops, just, uh, like a-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… green screen, no, no graphics.
Speaker:100
Speaker:pounds.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Big huge thing.
Speaker:He said, "Hey, Ted, do you want… You know, I'm upgrading.
Speaker:Do you want my laptop?"
Speaker:And I was, uh, I got fired from my messenger job for
Speaker:trying to union organize.
Speaker:Hey, you know- Hey … fight the power, bro.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:The, the, the unemployment statement was, um, Ted's motivation is incongruent
Speaker:with the firm's larger ideals.
Speaker:That's true.
Speaker:It's true.
Speaker:True statement, right?
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:You can't argue.
Speaker:So, uh, I got this computer and I was gonna write, you know, I, I've still
Speaker:jour- to this day, I journaled just now.
Speaker:I d- I've been journaling my whole life and writing short fiction.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And, and I said, "Oh, good, I can write stories on this computer- Sure … rather
Speaker:than writing down or using my type- typewriter." Well, I don't know.
Speaker:Typewriter, good Lord.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, so the computer had a little, um, opening that you could
Speaker:put a phone line in, a modem.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:It had an old modem.
Speaker:Right,
Speaker:right.
Speaker:And my friend, uh, Dr. Dave from Ohio-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:… uh, said, "Oh, geez, my, my, one of my roommates," and in Boston
Speaker:you live with five or six people.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:It's just kind of the- Expensive, yeah … you know, post-college life.
Speaker:And he said, "Oh, geez, my, uh, my roommate, uh, used to be a
Speaker:hacker," and this is, like, '92.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:' 91 maybe?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:He was an early hacker.
Speaker:Yeah, that's a long time
Speaker:ago.
Speaker:And he goes, "Oh, yeah, bring over the computer." And, and this guy was like,
Speaker:"Oh, man, you can connect this to a phone line." And he showed me how to-
Speaker:Uh-huh
Speaker:… connect the, the internet was not acceptable, a- a- accessible-
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… except university and some businesses.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:you had to, like, dial into the specific- Yeah … Freenet thing
Speaker:or whatever.
Speaker:Or even, yeah, even then it was, this was, like- Yeah … this was bulletin
Speaker:boards, which for the listeners, computer enthusiast- Uh-huh … would get a second
Speaker:phone line, and they would hook up a computer with some software, and people
Speaker:could call into directly, no internet.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:You could call into this person's phone number, and there was
Speaker:some kind of directory somehow.
Speaker:Yeah, it was like BBS kind of a thing.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I forgot what they
Speaker:call it.
Speaker:Exactly, BBS.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And you could get a menu.
Speaker:It was, then this is all-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… menu-driven.
Speaker:All text.
Speaker:Yeah, you- Yeah … could get some kinda files if you wanted,
Speaker:or just maybe if it was advanced, you could chat with somebody else.
Speaker:Yeah, it was just, a lot of those were just, like, a conversation,
Speaker:just like a, a message board kind of a thing was all it was.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:And then there'd be files that you could l- you know, kinda get from
Speaker:the message board and so forth.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It was very rudimentary, but it was incredible.
Speaker:Oh,
Speaker:it- Incredible
Speaker:… it blew my mind.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So instead of writing, I really got into this bulletin board thing,
Speaker:and then my friend who sold me the computer said, "Hey, Ted, there's
Speaker:this new thing called the internet." And we live in Boston, we're lucky
Speaker:enough where there's connections.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So, and these modems were like- 2400 or something
Speaker:Yeah, like-
Speaker:So that's, yeah
Speaker:28, eight I think.
Speaker:Oh, yeah And 14, 14, 4 is 28.
Speaker:That was,
Speaker:that was getting good.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah That was all right.
Speaker:And 56 was amazing.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Because the, the, the, my, my friend's friend showed me the modem,
Speaker:and he had gotten busted for credit card theft, believe it or not.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:'Cause there was no security, and he was a early…
Speaker:I don't know if Boston has a lot of-
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:It's like you're… It's just… For some reason you're always
Speaker:end, end up being s- you seem like you've been around, like, criminals-
Speaker:That is the case
Speaker:… for most of your life.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:Right, right.
Speaker:Well, you made w- made, you made good use of it.
Speaker:I'm, I'm, I'm-
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So-
Speaker:So keep going.
Speaker:I'm sorry.
Speaker:So, yeah.
Speaker:No, no, no, no.
Speaker:So he had showed me, like… You know, he had told me, "You, I used
Speaker:to hack," but he really knew comp- Yeah … so he told me the modem.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:My other buddy says, "Hey, Ted," for I don't even know how much
Speaker:it was an h- it was hourly rates.
Speaker:Internet was not unlimited.
Speaker:I remember.
Speaker:This was like- Yeah
Speaker:probably one of the first internet connections in Boston- Mm-hmm … just
Speaker:kinda two hippies smoking weed would be like, "Yeah, we, let's, let's-
Speaker:Right … give people the internet."
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And me and my friend Steve started to do it, and back then, which I've, I
Speaker:think on, you would go to the bookstore and buy books on early in- Yeah.
Speaker:You would actually buy a
Speaker:paper
Speaker:book- Yeah, for sure … 'cause there was no
Speaker:resources.
Speaker:How
Speaker:to use the internet.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So we- I forgot about that.
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… we bought a book, and we got these internet accounts.
Speaker:And we just love, we love the idea.
Speaker:You can go to France and get a file from France, so you can-
Speaker:Yeah … chat on what's now-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:IRC, Internet Relay Chat, which is- I
Speaker:always hated IRC,
Speaker:but yeah … maybe Discord.
Speaker:You, you know your stuff.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:Discord.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That's
Speaker:right.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And we just became hooked, just for the passion, just, just as a hobbyist.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:We would be up all night figuring something out or-
Speaker:Yeah, yeah
Speaker:… you know, you… Et cetera.
Speaker:I'm not gonna- Yeah, yeah, yeah
Speaker:get too geeky, but-
Speaker:What… No, feel free
Speaker:… we loved it.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:So I'm living in Cambridge, in Inman Square at the time.
Speaker:I'm, I'm, I'm a unemployed messenger- … with a philosophy degree.
Speaker:I'm like- Right, right … "Where am I gonna go from here?"
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And back then you would get the Sunday Boston Globe, which
Speaker:was about three inches thick.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:And you'd pull out the Help Wanted section-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:… and you'd get your red pen.
Speaker:Circle.
Speaker:I know.
Speaker:Is this like-
Speaker:God
Speaker:… man, I'm old
Speaker:… so retro.
Speaker:We would circle these things, and I saw this thing that said,
Speaker:"Delphi Internet Services."
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:And it was the f- arguably, you know, these things.
Speaker:You know, arguably the first company that offered public internet access.
Speaker:This is before AOL did.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:The AOL was our main competitor.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And it was right down the street on Mass Ave from me.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So I said, "Hey, let me apply. This, this-" Why not?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:"Wow, I love doing this.
Speaker:Let me apply." And I had an interview and they said, "Do you know how to
Speaker:transfer a file?" And I said, "Yes, I do.
Speaker:I know this and that, and I know…" Lynx was… There was no web browsers- Yeah,
Speaker:yeah, yeah … really considered then.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But there was a appli- all command line Unix links, L-Y-N-X.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And you would get hypertext.
Speaker:And that was cool 'cause you could tab and ta- uh, t- tap a
Speaker:different color to a URL, right?
Speaker:Yeah, I remember.
Speaker:I
Speaker:remember.
Speaker:And they were like, "Oh, you're in. You're hired."
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So I would suppo- I was a support person.
Speaker:It was that easy.
Speaker:You just need to transfer a file back then and you're Ex-
Speaker:exactly.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:"Can you trans- Okay, you're in." You're… Yeah.
Speaker:The… 'Cause there were no courses on internet tech.
Speaker:And this is in- Of course, yeah
Speaker:this is, this is Mass Ave between M- I- Right … literally,
Speaker:this place was between Harvard and MIT on Mass Ave. Right.
Speaker:Right, right.
Speaker:So I started that jo- I loved that job.
Speaker:'Cause I had done… I was a meat packer.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I was a… I made boxes.
Speaker:I had done demo.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I had done a lot of tough jobs in my- Right … my life.
Speaker:This was nice.
Speaker:You had, like, kind of a little cubicle and- Right.
Speaker:You're sitting
Speaker:down.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah
Speaker:… talking to people.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:And we would teach people how to use the internet and connect to modems.
Speaker:So you,
Speaker:you were like customer support?
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And, um, since I, uh, I n- I guess I knew enough, and I was
Speaker:quickly promoted to manager.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:And, um, yeah, it was really interesting 'cause we would, uh, we
Speaker:would someti- since we're in Cambridge, we would hire kind of drop-out
Speaker:or burnt-out Harvard or MIT kids.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And we had to teach them 'cause there was, there was no- They didn't
Speaker:know … course in internet back then.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right, right.
Speaker:Especially if we get to internet security.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Nada.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:They were in programming.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You'd go to college and they would teach you how to program.
Speaker:Yeah, people didn't know what the hell it was.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I was on the internet probably about the same time- Yeah … '92, '93, '91 maybe,
Speaker:'cause I gradu- anyway, it doesn't matter.
Speaker:My cousin Joe gave me a extra computer that he had, this Commodore computer
Speaker:with a modem, and there was the Cleveland Freenet, which I think is one of the
Speaker:longest running Freenets in the world.
Speaker:It just closed down finally, unfortunately, but I think it was
Speaker:com- Case Western Reserve So we logged into that, and I remember
Speaker:going into the chat thing, which was all very confusing to look at.
Speaker:It didn't look user-friendly whatsoever, of course, and typing a message to what
Speaker:I knew was my cousin Joe's username, and then we typed back, and I was like, pff.
Speaker:My mind just- Yeah … you know, I just- Oh … typed in something in the
Speaker:screen, and it showed up on my… Yeah.
Speaker:Amazing.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Amazing.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I mean, it was a, it was an exciting t- … I would have worked that job for free.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:That's how much I loved doing it back then.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I mean, it was just amazing.
Speaker:I mean, seeing what's happened with the internet now, I'm not sure how
Speaker:excited I would have been back then, but at the time it felt very exciting.
Speaker:Uh, exactly.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And, and, and one thing I was thinking back to when I was doing customer support
Speaker:and, you know, managing a team, um, the beauty of the internet, there was
Speaker:Usenet- Yeah … which is the equivalent of Reddit, so it's message forums.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And there was, uh, there was no moderator.
Speaker:No, they didn't need it.
Speaker:There was no mo- Right … you know, your moderation was if your words
Speaker:were reasonable, then there you go.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And if they weren't, you'd dismiss it.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:But the… And then there was, um, Gopher, Gopher for fi- finding files.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:There was links- Vaguely remember
Speaker:this,
Speaker:yeah … to theoretically the web.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:This was the early HTML.
Speaker:And, uh, that was about… And the IRC to chat.
Speaker:That was really the internet.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But I came into work one day, and they s- and they said, "Oh my God, the
Speaker:internet's exploded." And I said, "What happened?" And this is where, this is,
Speaker:like really I'm still processing this.
Speaker:It was the first advertisement in the history of the internet.
Speaker:So some law firm, an immigration law firm- Yeah, of
Speaker:course
Speaker:… spammed, spammed, that word was just becoming- Right … in use then.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Spammed Usenet forums.
Speaker:So it's like basically- Uh-huh,
Speaker:yeah
Speaker:… putting an ad. They, they somehow got wind of there's this internet thing- Mm-hmm
Speaker:… and we're gonna use… But that was the very first time theoretically- Right
Speaker:you could see an ad.
Speaker:Huh.
Speaker:And it's been all downhill since.
Speaker:Yeah, it really has.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, they really sold us the internet as this way to connect the world, and we'd
Speaker:all be more connected and have this global community, and as it turns out, it's
Speaker:just made us hate each other even more.
Speaker:Wah, wah, wah.
Speaker:So you're a manager at this, uh, internet company.
Speaker:You're selling internet.
Speaker:You're helping people- Yep … with internet.
Speaker:And, uh, and then, then what happens?
Speaker:Like I said, I loved the job.
Speaker:I think, don't quote me, but I think I… So I came up with an idea, 'cause it was
Speaker:so frustrating doing customer support.
Speaker:Nobody had to use the internet.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So I think I came up, and they advertised it in news- newspapers literally, I
Speaker:gave one of the first internet-based courses on how to use the internet.
Speaker:Oh, look at that.
Speaker:I would do, like, a internet chat- Ah … and teach people how to use the service.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So-
Speaker:Wow
Speaker:… that's my claim to fame, I guess.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:And, and I had a early enough website that I just put the site up, me and
Speaker:my friends started figuring out HTML.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right, right.
Speaker:And you would get, like, 42 million hits from all over the world.
Speaker:Sure,
Speaker:' cause it's
Speaker:the only website.
Speaker:Because there weren't many- Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:… it wasn't, it wasn't my content.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:There wasn't many websites
Speaker:then.
Speaker:Do you remember the URL?
Speaker:Oh, you got me on
Speaker:that one.
Speaker:No?
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:No.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Wow, yeah, it used to be a pain in the ass to make websites.
Speaker:So to answer your question, um, so part of the challenge was it was
Speaker:$20 for 20 hours, and then- Crazy
Speaker:an hour, a dollar, a buck an hour or something like that.
Speaker:Right, right, right.
Speaker:So all of these kids would sign up with their parents' credit cards.
Speaker:They would get addicted to this thing.
Speaker:Of course.
Speaker:And then their parents would get a bill for, like, 400 bucks.
Speaker:Right, right, right.
Speaker:And they would, you know, the tick of- Yeah
Speaker:you know, and that was it.
Speaker:So then they learned how to hack back i- they became hackers.
Speaker:That was the first-
Speaker:Ah
Speaker:… ' 93, yeah, '94, that was the first wave of hackers.
Speaker:They learned how to get in without paying.
Speaker:So you, they could do a credit card generator, which back then- Oh, yeah, I
Speaker:remember … you put your credit card in.
Speaker:It wouldn't actually see if it was valid.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:It would, there was a- Just
Speaker:give you
Speaker:a… Yeah … just a checksum.
Speaker:And then…
Speaker:And they quickly knew.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So these kids started hacking the hell out of my service.
Speaker:So I'm doing customer support, but then I was like, "Man, let's go." Yeah, we go.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:This, this bec- this was fun.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So we, we'd, we'd have, like, a, an old-school map on the wall, and we
Speaker:would pinpoint the different hackers and track them down, and that's- Oh,
Speaker:there were so many hackers.
Speaker:Oh, yeah.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:These kids loved to, to, to hack, yeah.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And they were good.
Speaker:They were, they're, they were, they were really good.
Speaker:They were very creative.
Speaker:They would rat each other out, which made it easier on us- … 'cause
Speaker:there were always wars.
Speaker:And, uh, I remember one time this kid was just, he was setting up 50 accounts
Speaker:every day- Wow … because he knew it would kill off so many of them quickly.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So it took some work.
Speaker:I finally tracked him down.
Speaker:I finally caught him 'cause I found his original account that
Speaker:his father had the credit card in.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And I said, "I'm calling this kid's dad. That's it." In some
Speaker:little town in Pennsylvania.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:I call the, I call up the middle and he goes, uh, "Reverend
Speaker:Williams here." I go, "Oh, hi.
Speaker:Hi, Reverend.
Speaker:How you, how you doing?" I said, "Do you have a son and, you know,
Speaker:named Johnny or something?" Right.
Speaker:"Yes, I do." I go, "Does he have a computer?"
Speaker:"I got him that computer to, to do good in school-" "… and to go to college." Wow.
Speaker:I go, "Well…" So then I had to explain that there was a telephone wire-
Speaker:Right, right … in
Speaker:the, in, in- Right, right … in, in he s- and, and he, uh… We
Speaker:ended the conversation with, "Well, thank you kindly, sir. I'm gonna
Speaker:take him out to the woodshed."
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:That was the- Beating him with a slice … punishment hackers got back then.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So you basically taught yourself how to hack?
Speaker:Uh, yep, yep.
Speaker:There w- Or how to prevent hacking, I guess.
Speaker:To prevent.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So first I played defense, but in order, if you play good
Speaker:defense, you gotta play offense.
Speaker:Gotta try.
Speaker:So I learned all of the tricks and, and it was interesting too, um, I was older
Speaker:then, so I wasn't as, you know, I, I…
Speaker:And I had full access to anything on the internet.
Speaker:Right,
Speaker:right,
Speaker:right.
Speaker:And still.
Speaker:But it was always intriguing that even back then in Boston,
Speaker:you could, um… There was a util- Unix utility called Finger.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Bad, bad phrasing perhaps.
Speaker:But you could, quote-unquote, "finger" anybody on any computer
Speaker:in Boston networks- Right
Speaker:Harvard, Tufts.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And you could see if they were online by typing in finger space and their username.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:I think they've discontinued that term.
Speaker:I think they stopped that- Yeah, yeah, yeah … a, a ways back.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But yeah, so I, I lear- I was just intrigued by just
Speaker:more theoretically really-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:… kinda how did, how did they do it?
Speaker:I'd find out their methods.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And then they would actually… So AOL was our competitor, and some kids partic- they
Speaker:actually wrote a program called AO Hell.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And it was like a graphic interface that you could hack just using buttons.
Speaker:This is the first kind of graphic hacking tool- Wow … as opposed to-
Speaker:I see
Speaker:commands.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:And I just, I just was really intrigued by all this stuff.
Speaker:S- so, uh, I, I hesitate to ask this question- No, sure … but I am curious.
Speaker:Like, like how did they hack back in these early days?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Like, how were they hacking into AOL back in those early days?
Speaker:Again, a lot of times it was the, um, they didn't validate credit cards, so
Speaker:the checksum could get you pretty easily.
Speaker:So they
Speaker:never did?
Speaker:So they never va- I mean, if you had a car- oh,
Speaker:wow.
Speaker:You could just generate a different credit card every time it, it did the checksum.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And then you would just, you'd have to make up an address that somebody didn't
Speaker:have before, 'cause well, there was, there were very primitive controls.
Speaker:Right,
Speaker:right,
Speaker:right.
Speaker:This address is gonna get flagged 'cause some- there was
Speaker:already been a bogus account.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So it would have very primitive, like, kind of blacklist or something.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And then once they were in there, as long as they behaved,
Speaker:which they usually didn't.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And, but the other thing is we would do some tracking as far
Speaker:as cr- um, phone numbers, 'cause kids would have to call- Sure
Speaker:from the same phone number.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:So that was kinda the equivalent of the IP address back then.
Speaker:Right, right, right.
Speaker:Um, but yeah.
Speaker:But,
Speaker:but, but that was the main way.
Speaker:They would just do fake credit cards?
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:I mean, a- as a parallel side, there was a whole other with
Speaker:Kevin Mitnick is a hacker.
Speaker:Uh, he, he died a couple years ago, but he was what's called a phone phreaker.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So his angle wasn't necessarily the internet.
Speaker:He wanted to get into telecoms.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:There's a whole history of phone phreaking.
Speaker:There was, um, there was a whistle.
Speaker:You could go to a payphone, and you could-
Speaker:Ah, right, and make the
Speaker:sound of a modem … play the whistle, the sound of a modem- Yeah, yeah,
Speaker:yeah … and get a free phone call.
Speaker:There were different phone numbers that you could call back.
Speaker:And even in my community, there were all these numbers that you could f- 'cause
Speaker:long distance, amazingly, was pricey.
Speaker:Yeah, it was.
Speaker:It
Speaker:was really pricey.
Speaker:It's crazy.
Speaker:It's crazy.
Speaker:So if you could beat a f- a long distance phone code, you know, this… So there
Speaker:were all this kind of- Right, right
Speaker:ad hoc-
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… kind of hacking.
Speaker:Um, I think I initially was intrigued by hacking as I grew up, and everybody
Speaker:was a car thief in my neighborhood.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:I mean, I'm, it all kinda connects together.
Speaker:It's, it's, it's a, they- Yeah … how do you hack?
Speaker:What's, how do you hack a car?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:How do you hack, you know, getting welfare?
Speaker:How do you hack?
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So I was always intrigued by-
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… how to beat the system or something.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:You know, or shoplifting, or okay, you take this little tab off, and it-
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah, yeah, yeah … the thing won't go,
Speaker:stuff like that.
Speaker:When did you go full-time as the ha- as the anti-hacking hacker?
Speaker:Or
Speaker:whatever you wanna call it.
Speaker:So, um, after that job, um, that, that service lost to AOL.
Speaker:And then at that point, since I had a background in Unix and, um, hacking-
Speaker:Mm-hmm … and et cetera, I, um, you know, I had a recruiter, and they
Speaker:said, "Hey, there's this, uh, there's this company on Route 128," which
Speaker:was technology highway at the time.
Speaker:It was all these, you know, Boston had all these techno birds.
Speaker:Of course.
Speaker:And
Speaker:this is dot com, dot com rumblings here.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:And AOL and, um- Yeah … you know, Yahoo, et cetera.
Speaker:M-
Speaker:mid-'90s we're talking about?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, mid-'90s.
Speaker:And, um, they said, "Why don't you apply to this firewall company?" And these
Speaker:were the first generation firewalls.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:' Cause you ne- suddenly people said- Yeah
Speaker:we need firewalls.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Now, you could build your own and whatever, but-
Speaker:Sure
Speaker:… companies finally said, "We need…" The internet was, you
Speaker:know, it was going crazy and-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:… there were firewall companies.
Speaker:So I applied and I said, "Yeah, I know Unix, and yeah, I do…" And
Speaker:they were just drooling over me.
Speaker:They're like, "Yeah, when can you start?"
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:' Cause back then it was like- Yeah, nobody knew
Speaker:… nobody
Speaker:had this.
Speaker:Nobody knew.
Speaker:Nobody knew this background.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So, uh, I trans- trans… It was a, it was a small startup.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And you could… And I loved these atmospheres too be- 'cause you
Speaker:could wear whatever you wanted.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And, uh, so I got a job at a, a firewall company And, uh, loved doing it.
Speaker:Again, customer support.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:Teaching folks how to configure firewalls- Right,
Speaker:right, right
Speaker:… and et cetera.
Speaker:And, you know, our customers still would get hacked because they would
Speaker:misconfigure- Of course … the firewall.
Speaker:Of course.
Speaker:So I still had… And then, and what we would do, too, that's w- when I
Speaker:got kind of pen tested and put on my hacker hat, you would have to
Speaker:do a penetration test against the firewall to make sure- Ah, I see
Speaker:it was a pretty damn good firewall.
Speaker:I see.
Speaker:You're selling this thing- Yeah, yeah, yeah … to, you know, really
Speaker:big companies- Yeah, yeah … right?
Speaker:But it was still very homegrown.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:40, 40 people chilling out- Yeah … you know, throwing balls
Speaker:at each other and- Yeah, yeah, yeah … goofing around, and- Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:I got some stock options, and I, I think- Oh, nice
Speaker:the ex-wife probably got those, but-
Speaker:Ah,
Speaker:that's too bad … I forget how that played out.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But anyway, but I loved doing it.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It was a great job.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So I was just happy.
Speaker:I was like, "Wow, I'm…" You know, I came from this poor- Right … background.
Speaker:I found my place.
Speaker:I've got a car.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:They treat me w- I can wear whatever I want.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:I can be myself.
Speaker:It's a little chill company.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:They loved me there.
Speaker:Money's decent, I imagine.
Speaker:The money was decent.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:The stock options, right?
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:And what was inter- I was just happy there.
Speaker:I d- again, I never had no future- Right … trajectory to do anything.
Speaker:I was like, "Oh, this is cool." And I had, I had my, my son was born,
Speaker:and I said, "Things are good."
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Life is good, right?
Speaker:Um, but then I had two colleagues, Dileep and Hermeng.
Speaker:Mm. And they were really hardworking guys from India, and they were actually,
Speaker:they were like, "Ted, Ted, um, we're getting our Microsoft certifications."
Speaker:And the funny thing is, is the, the building was this little building
Speaker:on Route 128, and the Microsoft certification center- Right next door
Speaker:was across the parking lot- Right, right … literally.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So it became… It was just more like something to do, really.
Speaker:I was like- Sure … "Oh, I guess I'll do that, too," and he go-
Speaker:Yeah … "Oh, you c- you can make money and get a better job." And I- Yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:" Oh, okay.
Speaker:Okay, Dileep.
Speaker:I guess I'll do that." 'Cause I had no… I had never had a computer course.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:I used to teach.
Speaker:I would, you know, I would teach people.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Um, and I was the instructor for the firewall company to teach the-
Speaker:Right, right
Speaker:… young folks.
Speaker:So we would go across the… W- at lunchtime, you'd go across the parking
Speaker:lot, and you'd take your Microsoft certification, and it was, it was
Speaker:the walk of shame if you failed.
Speaker:But- It was just like wor- like, like Windows and this kind of thing?
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Like Windows Server, Windows- Right.
Speaker:So I became a Microsoft certified engineer.
Speaker:So- I-
Speaker:I mean, early on, too.
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… and I figured this, this sounds good.
Speaker:Can't hurt.
Speaker:I don't know Dileep.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And then Dileep said, "Ted, Ted, you can get a better job."
Speaker:You know, he goes, "We're stuck here with H1s or something, but you can
Speaker:go." Like, they were really… So the, the, the interesting thing about,
Speaker:you know, immigration, th- these, these folks really were responsible.
Speaker:I still see them on LinkedIn.
Speaker:They were responsible for getting my career, 'cause I
Speaker:was- Wow … just kinda like.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:They were like, "No, Ted. Now, you know, go, go get a better job."
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:I said, "Oh, okay, okay." Yeah.
Speaker:So I updated a resume, and I don't even know what you did back then.
Speaker:Monster.com, I think.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Monster.
Speaker:Yeah, that was the
Speaker:one.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:The monster reared its head.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And by that point, financial services had realized the Internet's coming around.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:We have a lot of money.
Speaker:We need to protect our money.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So, um, I got a job at, um- A financial service firm in downtown Boston
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:And back then there was no, uh, you're just like, "Oh, you
Speaker:are, you know that?" Right.
Speaker:"Come on in."
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:That's it, you know?
Speaker:Right, right.
Speaker:And so then I had to get a suits.
Speaker:They, there was still- Oh … suits days … fuck, yeah So I was kind of bummed out.
Speaker:Man, that sucks.
Speaker:But I had a son, and I figured, oh, I'm making more money.
Speaker:Right
Speaker:And I had more technical know-how than anybody in the IT… These IT departments
Speaker:were these huge armies of- Yeah … people who really didn't know much
Speaker:Have an idea what they were doing, yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So I knew what I was doing, so they were, you know, it was like, wow.
Speaker:So I transitioned, I did information security.
Speaker:Uh-huh
Speaker:Uh, it's information security, yeah, it's- And you're setting
Speaker:up firewalls and stuff- Yeah … for these companies, yeah Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And, um, just defending against the hackers.
Speaker:And- And
Speaker:back then, were there a lot of people trying to hack into this bank?
Speaker:So, you know, here's the thing, like, with, with, with investment
Speaker:firms it's a little tricky.
Speaker:So the, most of these were investment firms or banks.
Speaker:Right,
Speaker:right.
Speaker:It's really hard to steal money from these, uh, big money.
Speaker:It's really hard to steal big money.
Speaker:Right
Speaker:You know, to get, like, a huge transfer.
Speaker:Right
Speaker:But they would nibble, you know?
Speaker:They could maybe grab something or, you know, and, and these com- 'Cause
Speaker:the big tr- big transfers all get flagged, I imagine.
Speaker:Ex- Right, right … most of them.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Wire transfers sometimes you could get beat.
Speaker:They'd
Speaker:be- But if you were to set up a system where you were getting
Speaker:little tiny pieces of money every, like, hour, that would maybe-
Speaker:So that's called salami slicing.
Speaker:Oh.
Speaker:There's actually a name for that.
Speaker:Wow, that's quite another- Yep … unfortunate name
Speaker:… where somebody would just- Yeah … round up the penny.
Speaker:Oh, right.
Speaker:That they stole There was a movie where they did that.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:The irony of the… You know, yeah, this company actually, um, some of
Speaker:the senior management was indicted-
Speaker:and because they were kind of, they were a lot more shadier than the, the hackers.
Speaker:Right, right . And, and the hackers had other… Back then
Speaker:it was still hacking for fun-
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah … and
Speaker:joy.
Speaker:But, I mean, there were probably people that were doing bad
Speaker:hacking all, I mean, there, yeah,
Speaker:yeah Yeah, we would see, like, you know, you would go into a firewall log and you'd
Speaker:see a bunch of stuff from- Random people
Speaker:you know, Russia, and you'd raise a flag, and you'd have a- Mm,
Speaker:right … Ukraine was really, really good hackers, and Eastern Europe.
Speaker:Oh, really?
Speaker:Oh, wow.
Speaker:They were the best.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Um- I
Speaker:wonder why that is?
Speaker:Uh, yeah
Speaker:Yeah, I mean, chess champions too, so it's gotta be some connection there.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:there's, there's-
Speaker:Yeah, yeah
Speaker:really, they were just really-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… good at it.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And sometimes, like I said, for fun, not… N- now it's
Speaker:more, it's all monetized now.
Speaker:Why would you do this for fun?
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:There's no more fun in the world.
Speaker:Well,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, anyway.
Speaker:I mean, I- Well, they were like… It
Speaker:can be
Speaker:now.
Speaker:Out- outside of the community.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Um, so yeah, I, I, I started at that company and I put
Speaker:on the suit and everything.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And then, you know, just not gonna name any names, but, um, you know,
Speaker:I started, I would say, "Oh, you…" Some other firm would want me.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And they said, "We'll give you this much." Right.
Speaker:And, and these, these Boston firms have a lot.
Speaker:I mean-
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:I mean, Wall Street does the trading, but I always say Boston is the
Speaker:one that decides the investment.
Speaker:Right,
Speaker:right.
Speaker:If you think Fidelity, State Street, et cetera- Those are all… Yeah … tho-
Speaker:those are the folks that figure out- Yeah, that's true … what trades to make- Yeah
Speaker:… and then they send it to Wall Street.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So at that point I was a, you know, I was… I headed up all these information
Speaker:security departments of very tri- I mean, billions to trillions of dollars.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And-
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… they trusted me somehow- Right … I guess so.
Speaker:Did anything terrible ever, or any, ever get through?
Speaker:Um-
Speaker:On your watch?
Speaker:I ke- I kept a pretty tight ship.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And like I said, it was very convoluted.
Speaker:You'd have to… I mean, trading is interesting, right?
Speaker:Because you'd say, well, if you can get into the trading desk-
Speaker:Mm-hmm … you can figure out what a company is gonna trade- Sure … and
Speaker:you can make money off of that trade.
Speaker:Of
Speaker:course.
Speaker:So if like… And I never worked for Fidelity, so I'll
Speaker:use the Fidel- Fidelity example.
Speaker:Fair
Speaker:enough.
Speaker:You know, if Fidelity's gonna move, you know, 7 billion of IBM tomorrow,
Speaker:and you know about that- Right, you can make a ton … you can place bets.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And you can, you know it's gonna go up.
Speaker:For sure.
Speaker:So stuff like that.
Speaker:So there were, you know, there was always kind of, uh- theoretical stuff.
Speaker:But it's- Right
Speaker:it's, it's very hard to do even if you got through a, a, a firewall or something.
Speaker:Um- I mean, the, the… most of my job was just, uh, desktop viruses.
Speaker:I mean- Oh, wow.
Speaker:Yeah … it wasn't very sexy, but, like, okay, a virus which… or
Speaker:a, there was a… What was it?
Speaker:Oh, this was horrible.
Speaker:SQL Slammer.
Speaker:So this was a, a hacker wrote a hack about, um, a database, SQL database.
Speaker:I know what's SQL,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:And it was so damn good, it- the unintended benefit is it took down
Speaker:half the internet because it scanned.
Speaker:Its scanning capability, not the hacking- Ah, I
Speaker:see … it was mis- a misconfiguration.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right, right.
Speaker:So things like that, that would, you know, keep me up at night.
Speaker:And when we did have incidents, I was the p- you know, the…
Speaker:I'd get the call at- Right … 3:00 AM.
Speaker:They're like, "Ted-
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… fix this stuff," you know.
Speaker:So… And the other thing we would do is we would hi- I would
Speaker:hire penetration testing firms- Another- … to hack into our banks.
Speaker:Another unfortunate term … those are the terms I was-
Speaker:There's a lot of interesting terms they use.
Speaker:Finger, I think- Pe- penetration … salami slicing, penetration.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:interesting.
Speaker:The, the, the, the Boston Catholics would… I would have these
Speaker:big board meetings to explain- Oh … where they're, "Can we change
Speaker:the name on those things?" Yeah,
Speaker:yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, they,
Speaker:they're very, very Catholic in Boston.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I mean, I'm not arguing with that, quite honestly.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But, um, so yeah, so what… Part of my role was to, um, hire, um,
Speaker:penetration teams to hack into our banks or investment firms or whatever-
Speaker:Uh-huh
Speaker:… find the holes- Right … so we could patch them before the
Speaker:hackers could leverage them.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And, uh, that was always interesting because there was a clash of
Speaker:old-school hackers with, you know, stuffy- Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
Speaker:suit-and-tie Boston Brahmin-
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah, yeah, yeah … business
Speaker:people.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I always did a twofold approach.
Speaker:Uh, social engineering- hacking, and then the computer engineering
Speaker:And what's the social engineering?
Speaker:So the social engineering really involves, um, how can you hack without a computer?
Speaker:Mm.
Speaker:So the, I, the perfect example was, uh, at one point we hired this guy called Mr.
Speaker:Mojo.
Speaker:If he's out there, hello Mr. Mojo.
Speaker:Really cool guy.
Speaker:So this was like this dude from Texas with kind of a strag- straggly…
Speaker:The ponytails were big back then.
Speaker:How'd you find this guy?
Speaker:I had connections and, you know- All right.
Speaker:Fair enough … we would network.
Speaker:Fair enough.
Speaker:And I knew who… And, and the other thing is there were enough
Speaker:forums out there where you could find who was good and who wasn't.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:'Cause there was a lot of bullshitters-
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah
Speaker:… who loved to… They couldn't do jack shit.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So basically we hired Mr. Mojo to do, uh, physical hacking.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Social engineering hacking.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And, uh, I was sitting in my office in a building in downtown Boston, and
Speaker:he was supposed to appear at 3:00.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And I'm doing whatever I'm doing, and I look up and I see kind of this tall guy.
Speaker:He's got the ponytail back so he looks a little-
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… appearance.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And, uh, this, this, this raincoat he must have got out of Goodwill- … 'cause he
Speaker:had no, he never wore a tie or anything.
Speaker:Sure, sure.
Speaker:And he was like, "Dude, Mr.
Speaker:Mojo here.
Speaker:Yo." And I was like, "Um…" 'Cause usually the protocol is they call,
Speaker:you know, "Ted, somebody's here to see you." Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:"Okay, I'll come down and…" Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:You had to come down and get them.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And, you know, these were- He
Speaker:just got right in.
Speaker:Just…
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And I go, "How'd you get in?" He was like, he was like, "Smoking, dude."
Speaker:I go, "Oh, h- hold on here.
Speaker:What do you mean smoking?" He goes, "Well, wherever building I go into, the
Speaker:smokers always… If you hang out with the smokers- Mm … the visitors who visit
Speaker:the building will have a visitor sticker."
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:" And after they smoke their cigarette after the meeting, they throw
Speaker:their visitor pass in the trash."
Speaker:Oh,
Speaker:right, right, right.
Speaker:So he slapped it on his raincoat- Right … and just walked
Speaker:in like he owned the place.
Speaker:Like, "Hey."
Speaker:And what did he steal?
Speaker:Did he steal, like, s- important documents or something?
Speaker:Well, so what we would do is we would call it trophy hunting.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So we would give them some trophies to get.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And the two trophies were the HR systems, and HR at the time was
Speaker:adamant about not going computer 'cause they didn't trust it.
Speaker:Oh, right.
Speaker:May- maybe for some good reason.
Speaker:Probably.
Speaker:And of course the trading desk 'cause-
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… that's where the money is.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:So I said, "Dude, you gotta, you… I, I want you to, um- hack, try to
Speaker:hack the, get into HR, get a folder-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:I think, uh, you'd probably… And get a trophy you'd give one
Speaker:of the big- Sure … whigs' names.
Speaker:Sure,
Speaker:sure, sure.
Speaker:And get into the trading desk and, I don't know, take a picture of the trading desk.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It's a trophy.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Trophy, right?
Speaker:He goes, "All right, dude." He goes, he goes, "Uh, can I come back
Speaker:later?" He's like, "I'm trying to quit smoking and I need a cigarette."
Speaker:"All right. Whatever you want, Mr. Mojo." Right.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:So before he left, what later I found out, is he went into the stairways
Speaker:and he put masking tape on o- all of the locking doors, you know, how the-
Speaker:Uh-huh … the little lock would come up.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:On the floors he needed to do.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And then he went out and had a cigarette, you know, had a cigarette or whatever.
Speaker:He ca- snuck back in later of course, 'cause it- Right … wasn't
Speaker:a big deal for him to do that.
Speaker:And for the HR basically, he, uh, the cleaning people will
Speaker:always let anybody anywhere.
Speaker:Of
Speaker:course, yeah.
Speaker:So I think he got… The door, the door was already open,
Speaker:said hi to the cleaning person.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And we were, one of the security measures I implemented was shredding.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:You're gonna shred these documents.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Early on, yeah.
Speaker:So we had these, these big, you know, garbage cans with shredding.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:So he took the, uh, the an- the, the security measure
Speaker:and turned it anti-security.
Speaker:He pushed the big shredding bin against the wall and, you know, businesses
Speaker:have those drop-down square- Yeah
Speaker:ceilings.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:horrible ceilings.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So he pushed it against the HR room, bumped himself through the ceiling into
Speaker:the room- … and grabbed the trophy.
Speaker:The, the HR documents.
Speaker:So that was pretty easy.
Speaker:That's pretty awesome.
Speaker:And then, um, for the trading desk, either the… Sometimes just, it was so easy.
Speaker:Sometimes the cleaning person would let them in.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:They didn't know.
Speaker:Or he would, um, there were a couple of ways to break into
Speaker:these, uh, doors at the time.
Speaker:Um, one time you could take a, you'd get a coat hanger from the coat room-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:… and just grab- Always there … a piece of paper out of a Xerox machine-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… and stick it on and wave it over the, you know, stick it through the glass
Speaker:doors and wave it over the sensor- Ah
Speaker:and the doors would open, 'cause it was a- Always a coat hanger … motion detector.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Mr. Mojo was very popular.
Speaker:Hm.
Speaker:And, um, then- How much
Speaker:does a person like this get paid for that kind of a job, do
Speaker:you know?
Speaker:They do okay.
Speaker:Yeah?
Speaker:However, Mr. Mojo might not have known his true worth, 'cause
Speaker:he's just doing it for fun.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right, right.
Speaker:This is the generation-
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I wonder how Mr. Mojo got started in that.
Speaker:That's interesting.
Speaker:So yeah, we sent him to Dublin.
Speaker:We said, "All right. You can hack Dublin." He was psyched.
Speaker:He's like, "Dude, I never been to- All the way to Ireland … never
Speaker:been out of Texas." Wow.
Speaker:We sent him to Dublin, and Dublin had an interesting system.
Speaker:To get through the doors, you needed, um, it was a heat activation.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:It wasn't motion, 'cause they wanted to get a human b- Oh … a live human being.
Speaker:Right,
Speaker:wild.
Speaker:So again, it's always a cat and mouse game.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Okay, you can take the coat hanger.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So he got a… He saw the cleaning per- these cleaning people, you know,
Speaker:they're- Always the cleaning people
Speaker:they're, they're, they're very important.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:He grabbed the plastic bag and he s- he slid it through the glass doors,
Speaker:and he blew it up and the, the heat from his breath- His breath … was
Speaker:enough to open the- … the door.
Speaker:So then we sent him to Milan.
Speaker:And we said, "How'd you do there?" And I got a early digital picture of him
Speaker:in the lunch room with a cappuccino and, like, a top secret trading manual.
Speaker:And I said, "How'd that go?" He goes, "Well, I just said I was from
Speaker:the US office, and they let me in.
Speaker:They showed me- … they gave me a seat.
Speaker:They were, they called IT to set me up, and then they showed me
Speaker:a cappuccino." It's, it's Italy, so you gotta have a cappuccino.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So they showed him the lunch room.
Speaker:Did you ever go to, like, any hacker conventions back in the day?
Speaker:Uh, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So n- the, geez, early.
Speaker:'99 DEF CON was the hacker convention.
Speaker:That's what
Speaker:it's called?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:DEF CON.
Speaker:No, I went in '99.
Speaker:It started in the '90s probably.
Speaker:Yeah, sure.
Speaker:And it was still the Wild West back then.
Speaker:Now it's very corporate.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Even Vegas, though, back then was kind of the Wild West.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So, um, yeah, I went in '99.
Speaker:The company paid for my trip.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And it was, uh, the, the… I, I guess at the big management meeting they
Speaker:were joking that this was the, this was the least expensive conference they
Speaker:ever encountered, 'cause it was, like, $25 for, like, a cool hacker badge.
Speaker:How many people were there?
Speaker:Thousands already, even by- Wow … '99 was st- it was n- '99, so this is
Speaker:kind of just before the dotcom.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And the, and hacking was huge then, you know, everybody was huge.
Speaker:Mm. And it was really still kind of the Wild West ethos where the
Speaker:kids would get drunk and throw the furniture into the pool.
Speaker:And they'd go to the shooting range and shoot guns and everything.
Speaker:And, uh, this was early stages.
Speaker:So right now these conventions have become n- you know, they're corporate now.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And also the, sadly they're a pipeline for the NSA to get early talent.
Speaker:Oh, wow.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Because back in the day-
Speaker:That's fucked up
Speaker:yep, back in the day, the FBI would come.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And they would be these pudgy, middle-aged, white, balding guys-
Speaker:Yeah, with beige suits or something … with a, with the fanny pack- Yeah,
Speaker:yeah
Speaker:… and the khakis and the boat shoes.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And, uh, at the time they would have a contest, spot, spot a fed.
Speaker:Spot a fed.
Speaker:And it'd be like, you'd be the, you know, they'd have, like, a
Speaker:conv- you know, would have…
Speaker:It was, you know, seminars.
Speaker:And s- like, s- this hippie dude would be like, "Dude, that's a fed. That's…"
Speaker:And this guy could not not be a fed,
Speaker:right?
Speaker:Right, right, right, right.
Speaker:And then they… But it was a very kind of, it was a very fun thing.
Speaker:Like, they'd say- And friendly … "Come on up, come on up."
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And they'd be like, "Okay, are you a fed?"
Speaker:And the guy would just show his badge and like And they'd both get T-shirts and hug-
Speaker:Right … and it was a different vibe.
Speaker:It's a different time, yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So now the, uh, yeah, now the NSA find, that's, that's where they find- Find
Speaker:talent.
Speaker:Yay … the,
Speaker:the talent.
Speaker:But the first, the opening ceremony was about 3,000 people, and as my son
Speaker:always says, like, when we go to Micro Center in K, like, the hackers in com-
Speaker:they're the smelliest people on earth.
Speaker:True.
Speaker:And these were the smelly people of the smelly people.
Speaker:Yeah, I can only imagine.
Speaker:And, um- Las Vegas in August
Speaker:Oh, right.
Speaker:Unclosed- Right?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And suddenly they start the convention and you hear, like, all these, like
Speaker:… Right.
Speaker:And we say, and everybody's just looking at each other, and within, like,
Speaker:three minutes the temperature started inching up by a degree every minute.
Speaker:Oh, they took out the AC.
Speaker:They took out the AC.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Some had … They, and you see people playing with it.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So, like, "Oh, this is gonna be un-" People were about to … I was going,
Speaker:"I'm out of here then." Right, right.
Speaker:I'm like, "This is, this is deadly." Yeah.
Speaker:"And they smell. Everybody smells." Oh, God almighty.
Speaker:So suddenly the, the MC comes on, "All right.
Speaker:Hey, kudos.
Speaker:I tip my hat to you.
Speaker:We salute you.
Speaker:Can you please turn it on?" Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:You, you got the first hack of the conference, right?
Speaker:Yeah, you did.
Speaker:'Cause they'd, they'd always be hacked.
Speaker:Every … That was the other game- Right … to hack the hotel- Hack
Speaker:the hotel … the CRM, and hack the … And suddenly a couple people
Speaker:went and they brought it back up.
Speaker:So, um, but that was, that was the vibe back then.
Speaker:That's hilarious.
Speaker:So it was, like, actual bad hackers, not, you know, uh, uh, criminal
Speaker:hackers, and good hackers combining it
Speaker:up.
Speaker:It, it was e- everybody and anybody.
Speaker:And again, most of the, most of the presenters were just really,
Speaker:um, intellectually curious people.
Speaker:They weren't … They did, they didn't- Right, right … understand
Speaker:that, like, you could go and end up making $2 billion and doing a startup
Speaker:creating penetration testing tools.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:That was f- the furthest thing from the mind.
Speaker:In fact, um, so in Boston, Boston was a hotbed for hackers, and,
Speaker:uh, there was a, uh, group of hackers called L0pht, L-O-P-H-T.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:And at the conference I attended, um, they released, uh, The Cult of the Dead Cow.
Speaker:I love these names.
Speaker:It was ca- it was called … What was it called?
Speaker:Oh, my God.
Speaker:Back Office was the Microsoft- Uh-huh … new amazing thing.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So they renamed their old hacking tool Back Orifice.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Great name.
Speaker:Lot of, uh, yeah.
Speaker:So they could take over any Windows machine.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:And there was this guy Hobbit who I know.
Speaker:Of course.
Speaker:Hobbit is an interesting guy.
Speaker:He refuses to wear shoes.
Speaker:Ah, yes.
Speaker:He just, his whole career he said, "I'm never wearing shoes.
Speaker:I don't like to wear shoes."
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Okay, it's
Speaker:Hobbit.
Speaker:I
Speaker:think
Speaker:Steve Jobs didn't wear shoes either, I think.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So he ended up cracking Microsoft's, uh, password encryption for the hell of it-
Speaker:Wow
Speaker:uh, back in the '90s with this other guy called Mudge.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And Mudge ended up in the defense industry or some- Of course … you know, so.
Speaker:But these were just a group of guys, and, and I, I always, when
Speaker:people always say, it's like, "Well, how about computer science?
Speaker:Did they study at MIT?" Mm. I was like, "Mudge was a Berkeley guy."
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Hobbit was Hobbit.
Speaker:I don't think he ever went to college.
Speaker:Mm. Right.
Speaker:So I always say the best hackers are a music background-
Speaker:Huh
Speaker:… or philosophy.
Speaker:Why do you
Speaker:think
Speaker:music?
Speaker:Music is patterns, and think of a symphony that's all about pattern recognition-
Speaker:Oh,
Speaker:yeah … when you're playing an instrument.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So it's very easy to detect an off-key or find a flaw in the-
Speaker:Oh, right.
Speaker:Interesting.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Interesting.
Speaker:I've found great hackers with music backgrounds, so.
Speaker:Huh.
Speaker:Huh.
Speaker:But- How, how, um, how did it change?
Speaker:Like, how long, when did you, when you retired, what'd you
Speaker:retire from, one of the banks?
Speaker:What was the last job you worked at?
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I w- I was working at a large investment firm, and, uh, I had had enough of it.
Speaker:My son was my, I was able to send my son to art school.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And I had just, it wa- you know, I- How long
Speaker:ago did you retire?
Speaker:I retired four years ago, but, um, got of, got out of financial services
Speaker:maybe around, uh, 10 to 15 years ago.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:It just, I'd had enough with it.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Financially, I was, I was doing well.
Speaker:I'm sure.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So I did some consulting after that.
Speaker:Like hacking consulting kind of things or
Speaker:just computer related?
Speaker:No, or setting up, so same thing, kind of in a management role where-
Speaker:Yeah … I would get Pen testers and, uh, the, the, like, the, just to kind
Speaker:of close the loop, uh, the la- so Mr. Mojo would do this physical engineering.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:The easiest way to do it now is social engineering- Yeah … which
Speaker:means you call the help desk-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:… and you pretend to be a bigwig, and you demand you take off
Speaker:two-factor authentication, and you need to get this file now.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And this help desk person is shivering.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So that's kind of the new wave.
Speaker:Huh.
Speaker:And it's much more sophisticated now.
Speaker:But I- I think they're
Speaker:doing even AI voices to do that now as well.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And to close the loop now, I, I, I don't follow the industry closely.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I don't have any interest-
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah … in, in it anymore, but, um, you know, I do every now and then I'll take
Speaker:a look, and AI is really good at hacking.
Speaker:So at this point- Yeah … you don't need the humans.
Speaker:All these-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… kids and Mr. Mojo, it's just-
Speaker:Yeah
Speaker:… go to AI and say, "Find vulnerabilities in this particular
Speaker:version of blah, blah, blah."
Speaker:Well, yeah, they released that version of Claude.
Speaker:I don't know if you kept, keep up with this- Yeah … but they
Speaker:released that version of Claude that was, like, just, like, was able…
Speaker:It, it was built to be able to look at the security weaknesses of
Speaker:every company, and they… Yeah.
Speaker:That seems dangerous to release.
Speaker:That seems like not a good idea maybe.
Speaker:They, they, they handed it out to the, um, like Oracle and- But
Speaker:of course it's gonna leak.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I mean, it's of course gonna leak.
Speaker:It's just- Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Or s- And I think it did leak.
Speaker:Yeah, or somebody will figure it out.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So I-
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Yeah, I'm not as close to it now, but I, I still write short stories on a computer.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:So it's, it's been, uh…
Speaker:I often wonder how many people are hacking at any particular time.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, well, the, the… So there's more sophisticated hacks now.
Speaker:So here, here's one that, um, I've heard about and people struggle to defend.
Speaker:So now, um, you can still hack a wire transfer if you're good at it and
Speaker:you know the right numbers and know how to do a good old wire transfer.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:So what a hacker will do is they will break into, like, the
Speaker:accounting people's accounts, like the finance and accounting- Mm-hmm
Speaker:of a co- any comp- any company.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:Investment firm.
Speaker:And what they'll do is they'll go into Microsoft and set a, a… Send me a
Speaker:copy of any email with the keyword invoice, wire transfer- … blah, blah.
Speaker:You know, they have a whole list.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right, right.
Speaker:And after they set these things up, they just sit there, "Let's just…"
Speaker:I don't wanna pick on the Ukraine, but say they're just sitting in their ba- Yeah
Speaker:… mom's basement in Ukraine, and they just set up all these kind of feeders.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:And once, once they get the email that says wire transfer- Mm-hmm … so
Speaker:s- you know, this company has to pay another company 200,000.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:They quickly forge an email to say, "Oh, by the way, our
Speaker:wire transfer number changed."
Speaker:And there's no reason not to trust that because-
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Right, right
Speaker:… the accounts payable person just said, "Hey, you owe this."
Speaker:It, it's a level of trust.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:And they say, "Oh, okay, we'll send it to another account." Yeah.
Speaker:And, and that money's poof.
Speaker:You ain't getting that money back.
Speaker:That's, that's a legitimate-
Speaker:Wow
Speaker:thing that's happening today still.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:Interesting.
Speaker:And you don't miss it?
Speaker:I don't miss it at all.
Speaker:No?
Speaker:Well, the early days were the best, like I said, I would've- I'm
Speaker:sure … done it for free, but- I'm sure … after a while, I, uh-
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:On the course of my career, it's interesting, people always ask me, since
Speaker:I've done firewalls, I've, I've reviewed hundreds of thousands, millions of, of,
Speaker:of what people surf the web, 'cause if people don't un- the firewall shows every-
Speaker:Everything
Speaker:employee going everywhere all the time.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And they say, "Well, what is it?
Speaker:Is it intra-…" And I go, "The people are boring." Hmm.
Speaker:They go and they go on Amazon, and then they go to PayPal.
Speaker:You know, it's just- Yeah … or they go to buy some shoes or something.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:So it, it's not, uh, sometimes it sounds a lot more exciting than, than it is too.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah, I guess so.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That stuff used to be really hard to set up too, those firewalls and everything.
Speaker:Oh.
Speaker:I remember it used to be, like, so complicated.
Speaker:Even using drivers, I remember back in the '90s- Oh, yeah … you have to set up
Speaker:these driver, there'd be conflicts- You gotta- … and the right downloads and-
Speaker:Give me-
Speaker:It was like that was half of using computers back in the day- The driver
Speaker:was just keeping it running properly, the stupid drivers.
Speaker:And fun, you know, funnily enough, I realized, 'cause I've been working
Speaker:as an editor, so I've been working with computers for years, and it
Speaker:used to crash all the time, but, like, you don't e- I haven't even
Speaker:really noticed until I thought about it, it doesn't crash anymore.
Speaker:That's right.
Speaker:They're, they're making them better.
Speaker:They're solid, yeah.
Speaker:Crazy, right?
Speaker:Do you think there'll ever be, like, a, a catastrophic hack
Speaker:into the system of some sort?
Speaker:I wonder, wonder, like, they always talk about it, like one little
Speaker:hack into the electrical grid or something could, could take down-
Speaker:Uh, you know, that's where it gets interesting because you, y- one, one last,
Speaker:kind of on a global level, just to shift gears, here's an interesting idea of a,
Speaker:of, of a theoretical great hack, right?
Speaker:And this is actually very relevant with Iran, right?
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:So the American NSA or something-
Speaker:Sure
Speaker:… they said, "We wanna, to this day, we wanna, we wanna break down their
Speaker:capacity to build a nuclear weapon."
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:This is called, I think it's Stuxnet, but don't quote me on this one.
Speaker:It's been a while.
Speaker:So basically the, the, the U- the United States government
Speaker:said, "How can we hack…
Speaker:What can we do to hack into the Iranian infrastructure-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:… to slow down their nuclear power aspirations?" Right.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:And there, and I don't understand, but there's a centrifuge that spins a lot.
Speaker:To create uranium, you've need these centrifuge- Sure,
Speaker:yeah … things that spin at 5,000
Speaker:RPMs a side into a- I have no reason not to
Speaker:believe you,
Speaker:yeah
Speaker:something like that.
Speaker:And these things spin around and they create uranium or something like that.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:And again, this is just secondhand knowledge.
Speaker:Whatever,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:But the US government said, "Hey, wouldn't it be neat to…" And they,
Speaker:and, and, and these are air-gapped.
Speaker:Air-gap- Mm-hmm … the definition is it ain't hooked up
Speaker:to the internet theoretically.
Speaker:Supposedly,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:So the US probably had some spy or a two- double agent.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And they took the old floppy, and they were in the air-gapped Iranian
Speaker:network, and they plugged in this virus.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:It's
Speaker:called Stuxnet.
Speaker:And it, instead of the, the centrifuges spinning at 5,000 RPMs, the hack was
Speaker:the, the virus had it spin at 10,000.
Speaker:Clever.
Speaker:And they all shit the bed.
Speaker:Very clever.
Speaker:So very clever.
Speaker:And part of US's thinking was like, "Well, you know, they don't
Speaker:have the capability we have."
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And then two, two years later, it's, I think this is public knowledge.
Speaker:So two years later we found out, yes, they do have that capability.
Speaker:Uh-huh.
Speaker:So now bo- this stuff is all behind the scenes- Right
Speaker:from when you look at the news today.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Very intri- I forgot all about this, how relevant this is.
Speaker:But then Iran at the time said, "We really hate Armaco," which is the, uh, sovereign
Speaker:wealth fund- Yeah … of Saudi Arabia.
Speaker:Mm-hmm.
Speaker:And they took down, Iran took down their entire network.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:So these are things kind of happening behind the scenes.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It's always a cat and mouse game.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, but to, back to your question, can somebody do a full- A real full-scale.
Speaker:True hackers say probably not- Yeah … because you have such a diversity of-
Speaker:It's all disconnected, yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:There's, there's a benefit of having a diverse- Or- … ecosystem
Speaker:there's
Speaker:not one grid.
Speaker:One thing.
Speaker:It's many, many grids kind of, yeah.
Speaker:But y- I think as part of warfare, you're gonna see that more and more.
Speaker:Oh, yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Maybe under the, under the covers.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Well- I mean, look at the Israeli a- hack where they, um- The phones
Speaker:and- … distributed phones and they blew up in people's faces.
Speaker:That's a- Y- yeah … what's that?
Speaker:That's a hack.
Speaker:That's kind of terrifying, actually.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I know.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So, um-
Speaker:Well, remember when, was the Sony hack by North Korea when they
Speaker:hacked into Sony's and all the movies came out- Yeah … early and-
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Um, if I, if I was gonna do, if I was gonna put on my bad
Speaker:guy hat, how would I do it?
Speaker:I, what I would do is, so there's, um, all of the Internet, think of a
Speaker:pyramid, and at the top- I'm gonna
Speaker:get, I'm gonna get on a list because of this podcast episode.
Speaker:Uh, think of a pyramid.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And at the top of the Internet pyramid is what's called certificates.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:These are the cryptographic- Yeah, mm-hmm
Speaker:keys that- Like SSLs or whatever.
Speaker:Yeah … SSL, got it.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And there's, there's core keys, and there's actually a few inter- there's
Speaker:this elaborate ritual that's part show that 12 people have to go and pass
Speaker:security and- Okay … you replace and update these keys, but there's been a
Speaker:number of smaller hacks, like somebody was able to grab Microsoft's keys.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So if you really wanted to pop everything, if you could grab those top
Speaker:level pyramid keys- Get all the SSLs, yeah … if I was, if I was really
Speaker:a- Yeah … um, like I s- I'm just a dude hanging out in Mexico- Sure.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah … City now.
Speaker:But if, uh, probably That, that might be juicy, as we would call it.
Speaker:Huh.
Speaker:That might be a juicy- Huh
Speaker:juicy target, I guess.
Speaker:Huh.
Speaker:Well, if anybody is, uh, looking to do that- … do not reference
Speaker:my podcast when you get caught.
Speaker:You will go to jail.
Speaker:You will go to jail.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:You will, you will not pass go and you
Speaker:will go to- Well, you might, you might not.
Speaker:Right?
Speaker:I'm sure some hackers don't get caught.
Speaker:They probably been doing it for years.
Speaker:Oh.
Speaker:Yeah,
Speaker:yeah.
Speaker:So one interesting case where hackers never get caught, 'cause most of
Speaker:the time hackers will get caught.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:You're always gonna trip over something.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:The two biggest cases, there was, um … And maybe, I don't know, 15 years
Speaker:ago, there was a, a, a group called Lu- Lutz, Lutz SEC, and they … Lutz, S-E-C.
Speaker:Interesting name.
Speaker:And they just did it for fun.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Again, back to the fun.
Speaker:And it was a guy who lived in a house of proj- housing projects on the Lower
Speaker:East Side, and how the FBI finally got this guy is one time he forgot
Speaker:to connect to IRC with encryption.
Speaker:Huh.
Speaker:He forgot-
Speaker:One time.
Speaker:You're gonna get busted.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Now, just to … If these listeners are, have aspirations, in fact.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:You're gonna get busted.
Speaker:There's one guy I know of, there's others, but his name is Phineas, Phineas Fisher-
Speaker:Mm-hmm
Speaker:… and he's a good guy in that he hacks, like, the bad Israeli defense company-
Speaker:Oh, good
Speaker:… companies.
Speaker:Good, good.
Speaker:Yeah, I like that.
Speaker:And he says, "Fuck you. You're … You know, you're … What you're
Speaker:doing is having people killed."
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:To my knowledge, he has never been caught.
Speaker:In fact, the latest exploit, he's been quiet for a while, he robbed a bank.
Speaker:He really did break into a bank, grabbed money.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:And he held that up as a bounty.
Speaker:If people did good things and hacked into bad banks, he would give them the money.
Speaker:So Phine- Phineas Fisher, I think, is still-
Speaker:Oh, wow
Speaker:… is still loose these days.
Speaker:I'll look that one up.
Speaker:But that's the exception.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:And you know this guy?
Speaker:I do not know him personally.
Speaker:Oh, you don't know him personally?
Speaker:But I, I follow, I used to follow these things too.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Wild.
Speaker:And you're moving to Mexico City when, did you say?
Speaker:Uh, probably- Two or three months?
Speaker:… next September.
Speaker:I need to go to the embassy when I get back home.
Speaker:Anything else to say about Mexico, Mexico City?
Speaker:Uh, things you love, things
Speaker:you hate.
Speaker:I gotta say beautiful people.
Speaker:I was, I was just in Veracruz-
Speaker:Oh,
Speaker:yeah, yeah, yeah … over the weekend.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Took a little getaway.
Speaker:And ev- everywhere I go, it's just … It, it, the … Not just Mexico City,
Speaker:but this is a beautiful country.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Well, Latin America, I think, is just a general vibe.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Not just the shore.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:And, uh, the cost is reasonable.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:That folk- folks think it's, like, dirt cheap.
Speaker:It's, it's getting worse.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:It, it is getting worse.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:But- I was in Polanco, uh, last week.
Speaker:Wow.
Speaker:And, like, that was, like, America prices.
Speaker:It was kind of ridiculous, actually.
Speaker:Exactly.
Speaker:And when you come here, be nice, and as we're doing, try, try
Speaker:to learn some Spanish, I guess.
Speaker:Yeah, learn the language.
Speaker:Do, do what you can do.
Speaker:That's the problem.
Speaker:A lot of people don't even try to learn the language.
Speaker:Learn the language.
Speaker:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Go wherever you want.
Speaker:Uh, the final question I usually ask, I usually always ask everybody who comes
Speaker:on the podcast, gonna be a bit of a, of a, of a, uh, curveball, but, well,
Speaker:you're a philosophy major, actually.
Speaker:That's good.
Speaker:What do you think happens when we die?
Speaker:So I, I, I refer to myself as an atheist Buddhist.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:So from my philosophy background, I'm a hardcore atheist- Mm-hmm … as we say.
Speaker:Right.
Speaker:Uh, so I don't think anything happens when we die.
Speaker:Okay.
Speaker:But, um, but that really, uh, stresses how we live now.
Speaker:Sure.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So it puts more stress on you.
Speaker:You got this life… I was telling my son I was in Lima, Peru for a couple weeks,
Speaker:a couple months ago, and the American, you know, the kind of, the American ethos
Speaker:is, "Oh, I'm gonna retire at 75, 'cause I'll get maximum Social Security- Yeah
Speaker:and then I'm gonna see the world."
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:I mean, you're told-
Speaker:Well, that's not gonna happen.
Speaker:No.
Speaker:So the advice is, since there is no God, according to my, my philosophy-
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… do it now.
Speaker:Because when I was in Lima, Peru, I'd go around and I'm going on
Speaker:all these TripAdvisor tours.
Speaker:Yep.
Speaker:And I'm in my early 60s- Yeah
Speaker:and I was the oldest person.
Speaker:I didn't see any of those 75-year-old Americans- Right.
Speaker:Right
Speaker:… um, you know, surfing down the sand dunes- Right.
Speaker:Right … of, uh, Peru.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:So.
Speaker:The, the whole saving for a future is- Do it … there's no there there.
Speaker:Do it now.
Speaker:Do it now.
Speaker:Do it now.
Speaker:Ted, thank you so much for coming on the podcast.
Speaker:Appreciate you.
Speaker:Fascinating story.
Speaker:Um, I don't imagine you have anything to promote.
Speaker:Kindness and peace.
Speaker:Ah,
Speaker:lovely.
Speaker:Yeah.
Speaker:Lovely.
Speaker:Be kind to
Speaker:each other.
Speaker:All right, Ted.
Speaker:Thank you so much.
Speaker:My pleasure.
Speaker:Cool.
Speaker:And there you have it.
Speaker:Fascinating conversation with Ted from my Spanish class.
Speaker:From my Spanish class is not Ted's last name.
Speaker:As I said in the intro, I withheld his last name on request because
Speaker:he was a hacker, and you know.
Speaker:You know.
Speaker:Thank you once again, Ted, for taking the time to come on my podcast.
Speaker:I truly appreciate it.
Speaker:As someone who was on the internet at a very young age, this whole
Speaker:conversation was just fascinating to me.
Speaker:If you also know somebody who was on the internet at an early age and
Speaker:would also find this conversation fascinating… I've used that word too
Speaker:many times, but once you start going with the word, you just gotta keep going.
Speaker:Won't you share this episode with them?
Speaker:Send it to them right now.
Speaker:Say, "Hey, this is an interesting episode about a guy who worked on the internet
Speaker:before anybody knew what the internet was.
Speaker:You'll love it." Or, "Hey, blank, you like computers.
Speaker:You were on the internet early on.
Speaker:You might enjoy this episode of this podcast I love."
Speaker:It- Just a few suggestions.
Speaker:Just some thoughts.
Speaker:Growing a podcast like this is difficult work, and it takes a village,
Speaker:and you, person listening to this right now, are the village at this
Speaker:moment, so please do share it with the rest of the village of yours.
Speaker:Did I make that as convoluted as possible?
Speaker:I think, I think that I did.
Speaker:If you would like to follow the podcast on Instagram, and I know
Speaker:you would, go to Instagram and go to @onefjefpod, O-N-E-F-J-E-F-P-O-D.
Speaker:Or TikTok.
Speaker:Oh, you like TikTok?
Speaker:Well, have I got a TikTok page for you.
Speaker:@onefjefpodcast.
Speaker:You gotta add cast to that one.
Speaker:If you'd like to email the podcast, you can do so at onefjefpod.
Speaker:This is all in the show notes in case you're trying to…
Speaker:You know, don't run for a pen.
Speaker:Or best of all, if you would like to call and leave a voicemail message for
Speaker:the podcast telling me anything at all about anything at all, that phone number
Speaker:would be country code 1-669-241-5882.
Speaker:Ugh.
Speaker:That wasn't bad.
Speaker:1-669-241-5882. I may or may not play your voicemail message on the air.
Speaker:Isn't that exciting?
Speaker:That is very exciting.
Speaker:Finally, please do like, rate, subscribe, and review.
Speaker:These things help more than you realize, or more than I realize.
Speaker:I honestly don't know how much they help, but I feel like every podcast,
Speaker:they say it, so I feel like I should say it too or be left behind.
Speaker:So please do do that.
Speaker:Maybe I can get Ted to, uh, hack into the podcasting thing
Speaker:and up my ranking or whatever.
Speaker:I'll talk to him about that.
Speaker:And finally, I'm going to leave you with a quote from the late,
Speaker:great Tom Robbins Our lives are not as limited as we think they are.
Speaker:The world is a wonderfully weird place.
Speaker:Consensual reality is significantly flawed.
Speaker:No institution can be trusted, but love does work.
Speaker:All things are possible, and we could all be happy and fulfilled if we only
Speaker:had the guts to be truly free and the wisdom to shrink our egos and quit
Speaker:taking ourselves so damn seriously.
Speaker:I'll see you next week
Speaker:Very good, Jeffrey
