Inside the Hunt for the Discord Leaker + Twitter Chaos Updates

Aric Toler untangles the web of teens, gamers and memes at the heart of the latest intelligence scandal.Then, an update on Twitter — where things have gone from bad to worse.Plus: How A.I. is bringing us closer to “Westworld.”On today’s episode:Aric Toler is the director of research and training at Bellingcat, the Dutch investigative site. He worked with journalists at The New York Times to identify the man who allegedly leaked top secret documents on Discord, a social media chat platform.Additional reading:A 21-year-old member of the Massachusetts Air National Guard was arrested for his alleged role in the leak of military intelligence on Discord.A Discord member shared details with The Washington Post about how the hundreds of pages of classified material were leaked.Twitter took steps to block Substack newsletters from circulating on the platform after Substack, a publishing start-up, started a Twitter-like service.NPR announced it was suspending all use of Twitter.Researchers at Stanford used generative A.I. agents to simulate human behavior. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts or on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. You can also subscribe via your favorite podcast app here https://www.nytimes.com/activate-access/audio?source=podcatcher. For more podcasts and narrated articles, download The New York Times app at nytimes.com/app. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.