Episode 8.6 -- Bad month for cyber criminals.

It has been a bad month for cybercrime. Yes, attacks are on the way up. Yes, they are still extorting money and causing infrastructure chaos. But there is a massive, shadow-busting spotlight on them right where they live and defense technology is advanced enough that they are hearing footfalls of law enforcement behind them. Recently a faked call from "President Joe Biden" to New Hampshire Democrats urged them not to vote in the state’s primary. It only took a few weeks using AI-detection tools to not only identify what company provided the technology but also the user himself. For today’s episode, we followed this theme and called one of our favorite technologists, Vijay Balasubramaniyan, CEO of Pindrop, whose technology can reliably identify AI-generated video and audio tech. Vijay would not confirm whether his product was used in this investigation. You will hear him demur that “we can’t comment on an active investigation.” But he said it in such a way that I’m pretty sure it was. Also, he was interviewed for articles in Wired where he said his tool identified the call as a fake with a factor “north of 99 percent.” Independent researchers at first claimed that number was hard to believe, but after running their own tests grudgingly admitted, “Yeah, that's pretty close.” BTW, this episode is sponsored by Safety National Insurance