Speaker 0 | 00:09.647
All right, welcome everyone back to Dissecting Popular IT Nerds. Today, we have secret operative, Jim Smith. Jim Smith, a very, very, we were just talking about the rarity of this name in America. Just behind John Smith. I love it. But no, we have to name you Jim Smith because it’s, like you said, secret operative. And we can’t really, if we knew your real name,
Speaker 1 | 00:41.957
you would have to kill everybody. And I’d kill your listener base. I mean, that’s, you know, can’t have that.
Speaker 0 | 00:48.843
So security, it’s a, it’s a field. That not many people are entering into nowadays. It’s rare to find someone out there that would like to get into security. Why is that?
Speaker 1 | 01:05.152
I think that people don’t really…
Speaker 0 | 01:08.413
It’s not really rare, obviously.
Speaker 1 | 01:10.694
No, it’s not rare, but…
Speaker 0 | 01:11.895
There’s a whole spawn of people that say, I love security and trying to get into it.
Speaker 1 | 01:19.338
They don’t. They love it because it’s a hot topic. And that’s not a bad thing. Don’t get me wrong. I like people doing this because it is a hot topic because it needs to be. But I’m not going to sit here and tell you that it is all thrilling work all the time. Once you’ve gone through some audits, you’ll stop and realize that maybe this wasn’t as much fun as I thought it was going to be. Because audits are, I mean, everybody’s been audited in some way, shape or form or process one. It’s not fun, but it’s necessary.
Speaker 0 | 01:48.001
It’s like a bunch of my friends that wanted to become cops, but actually did become cops. Some of them quit being cops. Some of them still are cops, but it’s not, you know, it’s not just probably driving a cruiser around. No. Although you might not want to do that now.
Speaker 1 | 02:03.117
Yeah. No, no, you probably wouldn’t.
Speaker 0 | 02:05.398
It’s not patrol. It’s not chips patrol. No,
Speaker 1 | 02:07.400
you are not on a motorcycle. One of the biggest things I tell people when they talk about wanting to get in this line of work is you’re not going to be chasing somebody across the screen with black and green numbers falling everywhere like you’re in the matrix. that that doesn’t happen it’s why you might change white and black yeah of course no um the thing is it doesn’t exist like people think it does you know and that’s that’s true with most every job but i don’t ever want people to get this wrong idea that oh no i’m gonna i’m gonna be running people down through through logs and i’m gonna show up at their house because i pinged cell phone and i you Unless you’re NSA, CIA, FBI, that type of stuff, you’re not going to do any of that stuff. You need to get into this because you enjoy the game of human chess because that’s all security really is.
Speaker 0 | 02:56.767
Yeah, I think it would be fun. Here’s the reality. It would be fun to be the security guy that’s kind of like the old SNL IT guy where you walk around the office and look over people’s shoulders and you’re like, what the hell are you doing? Did you really just frigging do that? Are you an idiot?
Speaker 1 | 03:14.504
Your password’s hello1234? Really? Come on.
Speaker 0 | 03:17.165
Is that, are you really using a sticky note to write down your password? Because if you are, no, but if you are, congratulations, good job, because you didn’t keep it on your desktop in a spreadsheet that says passwords. If you keep it on a sticky note, at least the worst that can happen is your guy sitting in the cubicle next to you can log on to your computer. And just kind of really, you know, mess with you. We used to forward people’s phones. I’m from telecom background via coffee before that. So it used to be fun to forward people’s desk phones. When you know the star codes, you’d forward people’s like, like their desk phone to like, this was like the new, this was like, you know, for the new guy that came in, if it was the new sales manager or something, you forward their desk phone to the conference room.
Speaker 1 | 04:14.920
That’s brutal. I mean,
Speaker 0 | 04:16.360
I love it. The conference room Polycom, you know, like Starphone. Oh, yeah. So wrong. There’s security issues, right? So there is an issue right there. So topic number one in the security world is, and I have some notes from our initial conversation, which is security has to stop being 80% tech. And I think that that’s an example right there where there is some tech involved, but really it’s all human factor.
Speaker 1 | 04:44.884
Exactly. And that’s what security has to boil down to, because tech is going to evolve. And from that, tech is going to evolve ways to poke holes in existing tech. That’s how that works. That’s a development lifecycle. We see it, we go, oh, this is a flaw, we then change it. That’s never going away. So what you have to do is plan for the human element behind all of these flaws, behind all of these little hole pokings and whatever you want to call it. It has to be psychology. It can’t be just a technical solution. There will always be a hacker that can crack your firewall. There will always be somebody that can… pop into and move past your web app firewall or whatever you’ve got in place, there’s always going to be somebody that’s better than that tech. Outsmart them.
Speaker 0 | 05:38.578
Yes, not everyone can be a pen tester. That’s, and I don’t even know. So are you saying that that’s the glory? Like, because I’ve had a lot of coffee this morning and I’ve only just taken my genius mushrooms to try and keep me on task.
Speaker 1 | 05:52.181
Genius mushrooms, I love it.
Speaker 0 | 05:54.142
Seriously, Google it on Amazon. Can you Google Amazon? Yeah, you Google Amazon. Google Genius Mushrooms Amazon. It’s got like, you know, 4.9 stars. If that means anything, because we could just have a bunch of people, you know, go give ratings on Amazon, however that hack works now. I think they figured that out by now, though. That shouldn’t be a… I would hope they have, but you never know. Off topic, but… The… What just happened? What were we talking about? Oh, pen testing. Yes. So not everyone can be a pen tester is what you say. We don’t just walk out of, Hey, I’m going to go take some security courses. I’m going to be a pen tester. Is that the glory role is a, is a pen tester, the glory role in security. And before we get it, it’s not. Okay, good. All right. So we answered that question. Next topic. How did you get started and where are you now? What do you do? And, and just so people know why you’re kind of a big deal.
Speaker 1 | 06:48.863
Okay. So, I didn’t know I was a big deal, but that’s kind of cool.
Speaker 0 | 06:53.104
I said kind of.
Speaker 1 | 06:53.744
There you go.
Speaker 0 | 06:54.584
I said kind of.
Speaker 1 | 06:55.384
I’ll take kind of. Being kind of is better than being none of a big deal. You know what I mean? But no, so security and that, and I’m not just talking about information security or cybersecurity, whichever buzz term you want to call it these days. That overall mindset of here are my walls. I’m going to defend them as best I can. has always been a neat concept for me. I have never been a go out, chase it down, kill it, bring it back. I have always been a here’s my line, don’t cross it. And I’m going to keep you out as best I can. That’s my mindset, just in general. Had I been in a better physical state, then I might have gone into law enforcement or I might have gone into government work. I don’t know. Uh, but that’s, I’ve well aged in that lifestyle.
Speaker 0 | 07:49.361
So yeah, so all around security. So exactly. If I can save you from shivving someone or getting myself shivved, great. Uh,
Speaker 1 | 07:56.286
if I can save you from that protector kind of mindset, I want to help people out and keep them from getting gotten. Well, I have a natural affinity toward computers. I enjoy playing with them. I enjoy working on mine. You would break them and fix them. So the two kind of merged into my brain when I went into look for a bachelor’s degree three years ago.
Speaker 0 | 08:15.331
What was your first computer?
Speaker 1 | 08:17.371
Oh, God. The first computer I remember working on was a 286 running DOS like five.
Speaker 0 | 08:25.475
Nice.
Speaker 1 | 08:26.976
Yeah, it was, I had to park the hard drive before I could shut it off, if that gives you any idea.
Speaker 0 | 08:33.319
What did, yeah, I really, I still want to do the computer museum in my house kind of. speak i bet you once i do it though i’d get real frustrated and be like i can’t believe we used to work on these things or i can’t there’s a computer museum down here in georgia yeah i mean it’s fun but i mean i want to like plays like i don’t know some of the old games or something so
Speaker 1 | 08:57.852
playing the games is fun i go back and play oregon trailer now again just to to see if i can actually they have that on a handheld in target now do you know that yep yeah they also have it on emulators like everywhere yeah i mean you can pull it off the web no problem but old games, yes old operating systems, you couldn’t pay me to run Windows 3.1 anymore
Speaker 0 | 09:17.184
I’m just sitting in the corner and crying.exe, enter exactly,
Speaker 1 | 09:22.149
so that stuff no,
Speaker 0 | 09:23.590
we’re probably losing some of our listener base we’re losing some of our listener base right now, and that’s a good thing that’s why,
Speaker 1 | 09:30.336
that’s because I never heard anything before like 7 Windows 95, I don’t understand we’re just on 11 now
Speaker 0 | 09:38.859
Okay, so where did it grow from there? I’m just curious. Because back in the day, computers was like, we had computer lab, but I don’t think anyone ever really took it seriously. I don’t think the jobs didn’t evolve right away. No one ever said. you know, you know, you should do this for living. No one said that growing up. You got to become a doctor or a lawyer. You know, if you’re, you know, we’ll throw you to, you know, we’ll throw you to trade school. If you’re like one of the dropout kids, which nowadays I think everyone should be going to trade school. That’s, I think that’s the way of the future. I’d rather, those kids are probably, those are the ones that all the other guys are working for now because they’ve got a fleet of, you know, 20.
Speaker 1 | 10:23.059
plumbing trucks and they’re joe the plumber or whatever and you know what you’ve got to do is you got to have balance and during the 80s everybody puts to go to a degree a degree path excuse me so hard that the pendulum swung that way and now we’re correcting back toward trades because there’s not any tradesmen left you know all the the master welders or master blacksmith or master electricians whatever they’re all retiring off because they’re in their 60s having made a crap ton of money And they’re like, no, I’m done beating myself up. But there’s no way to replace them.
Speaker 0 | 10:55.716
No,
Speaker 1 | 10:55.856
no one wants to go back to work trades.
Speaker 0 | 10:57.377
No one wants to work now. And it’s impossible for me to find an electrician. It’s absolutely ridiculous. Like they only want to come if the job’s $1,000 or more. And I totally feel them. I get it. Yeah. Yeah. If I need someone to, it’s again, side topic, but I went to go snake the toilet the other day and the snake didn’t work. And because my kids flushed like a… Matchbox car down the toilet or something. No, you know what it was? Here’s what I found it. It was a water bottle. It was a crushed up water bottle. Some kid actually put a water bottle. I would say like your typical Nestle small drinking water bottle that you buy. Decided to crush that up and flush the toilet. And obviously it didn’t flush down. So they took the end of the… plunger and tried to ram it down the hole. And then the toilet just kept said no. Yeah. Yes. So water was trickling by, you’d plunge it for like 15 minutes and be like, okay, the water got out and like you’d flush it and the water would come right up to the edge. And then it would slowly sleep down through, which is going through around. I’m like, what the heck did my kids do? You know? And I got the metal snake. The old school. And I’m ramming it down there. And it’s all the way down. And I know that I’m getting it through, but not working. I was like, I don’t know what they put down here. It’s either getting, I’m thinking Matchbox car, because that was the last time this happened. Call Joe the plumber. Oh yeah, it’s going to be $60 for the trip charge. And then 60 bucks for my guys. So 120 bucks for the trip charge to diagnose. And then we’ll go from there. So yeah, well, you did everything. We’re going to have to pull the toilet. So it’s $340 to pull the toilet. I’m thinking to myself, I could just go down to Home Depot and buy a brand new toilet and kick you guys out of here and rip that toilet off myself and put a brand new toilet on. Like, yeah, that’s what I’m trying to avoid. Yeah, well, sorry. Okay, I will go pound sand and get out of here. Good job, Joe the plumber. Congratulations. You know, you’re rich. That’s what’s going on right now. So, yeah. So, eventually I… Paid my other handyman buddy, like, hey, I’ll pull that toilet for you. He’s like, let me do it. It’ll be 80 bucks or something. I pulled it off and ripped a water bottle out of the thing. Anywho.
Speaker 1 | 13:22.937
That’s where we’re going, though. I mean, that’s where we are. But no, the pendulum is going to swing back toward professionals when we don’t have any more professionals left. And that’s actually some of what you’re seeing in security. You’re seeing a dearth of talent. supposedly, quotation marks, dearth of talent.
Speaker 0 | 13:43.176
I like that you used dearth. I’ve only used that. I’ve used that. I’ve heard that word a couple times used. But go ahead. Because I say a dearth of, there’s a dearth of vendors and they’re all, the customer service that they provide is mediocre at best. And there’s a dearth of sales reps selling them. And good for them, but it’s like the handoff to customer care is what all my people are dealing with.
Speaker 1 | 14:17.761
That’s a common thing. That’s where you get into service industry and the way we treat people who are subordinate to us or who we review and believe are subordinate to us. But that’s a whole different problem. What you’re experiencing right now is you have…
Speaker 0 | 14:32.125
Wow, you’re taking responsibility. You’re actually taking responsibility for the failure of others. I love it. How dare I? I love it. Maybe it’s me. Holy crap.
Speaker 1 | 14:43.414
No, 110%. When we look at people who are subservient to us or who we believe are at least subordinate to us, and we treat them in a less than respectful manner. We create the customer service problems that we are now going through. We have created care.
Speaker 0 | 15:01.868
Wow. Blown away.
Speaker 1 | 15:08.490
Back to security, because I’m going to get sidetracked if I don’t get this thought out.
Speaker 0 | 15:11.632
Yep.
Speaker 1 | 15:13.032
What we have is we don’t have a talent gap. We have people who don’t know how to communicate a position. When I read a position on LinkedIn on… Indeed, on comegetajobatralz.com, whatever it is, the first things that I see are they want me to have five years of experience, they want me to have a bachelor’s degree, and they want me to have a CISSP. Oh,
Speaker 0 | 15:37.969
yeah, that’s old news.
Speaker 1 | 15:40.792
Right. But it’s the same thing that happens everywhere else in this world. Hiring managers don’t know what tech people need. Tech people don’t get asked about what they’re looking for. Everybody hears buzzwords. They create buzzwords for the ad, and then they wonder why they don’t get anybody to come in. I’m a perfect example, and I’m not trying to advertise myself here because I’m not that way. But I’ve got 10 years in IT. I’ve got three years in security. I’ve got a bachelor’s degree. There is nothing in your organization I cannot do. And I mean that legitimately. I can run risk management. I can run backup continuity and disaster recovery. I can run incident response. But because I don’t have your magical qualifications that you don’t understand what you’re asking for, I’m not qualified for your position. That is why there is a desert of talent and a plethora of jobs.
Speaker 0 | 16:46.753
So amazing that you just took responsibility for other vendors’poor customer care, but you aren’t taking responsibility for your own ability to sidestep and completely blast through that stupid HR process.
Speaker 1 | 16:59.241
Oh, no, I figured out how to do that. It involves hacking my resume and being so charismatic they can’t deny me.
Speaker 0 | 17:06.045
I have a different methodology. I have a different methodology. I don’t know if it works. This is a theory.
Speaker 1 | 17:11.501
What’s your theory? Lay it on me.
Speaker 0 | 17:12.702
This is a theory, but I need enough people to be willing and bold. What’s the Star Trek thing? Bold to go beyond?
Speaker 1 | 17:23.451
Boldly go to where no one has gone before.
Speaker 0 | 17:26.193
Yes. That is what I need. I need people to boldly do this. And that is find first the company. This sounds like a Stephen Covey thing. Find first. Find first the company that thou want to work for. Find first the company that thou want to work for is pillar number one in this process. And then find 20 more, minimum. I’d say 20 more. So you’re going to first find 20 companies that you want to work for that you might know have a security problem or you’d be excited to work for them, whatever it is, okay? Then, You are going to find whoever your boss would be at that company. You’re going to find them on LinkedIn, right? Then you are going to reach out to said person and completely bypass the HR process altogether. And you’re going to say to that person, can I ask your advice? And that person is going to say, most likely, yeah, unless they’re a total jerk. And then you have eliminated… said company from your list of 20 people that you would work for, right? Because you wouldn’t want a boss that you couldn’t ask for advice or they couldn’t mentor you or couldn’t help you grow in some way, shape, form, or fashion. So they’re going to say, shoot, man. Yeah, go. What’s your advice? Hey, so I’m very involved in the security play, blah, blah, blah, short rapport, whatever it is. And I’m just curious, like when it comes to security in your organization, what’s your single biggest frustration, problem and or concern? And now you have immediately tapped into what keeps them up at night and what their real problems are and why they need you. Because you are going to now fix what keeps them up at night. And you’re saying, oh, wow, that’s interesting. I have found that other people. I’ve dealt with that same situation that it’s not uncommon. And this is how I solve that problem. So I’m going to give you some, here’s what I think, take it for what it’s worth. If it helps you out, great. If not, no big deal. Boom, that’s it. And then maybe, just maybe that person would want you to work for them, or at least you’re starting to network. You’re starting to show your value within the thing. And you’re showing your value to people that… A, appreciate your value, people that you would want to work for to begin with, and not the people that… I need five years of experience that don’t know how to read your position. Because most likely that person sent, went to HR and said, hey, we need to hire someone for this.
Speaker 1 | 20:14.753
Yep.
Speaker 0 | 20:15.953
So that’s my theory.
Speaker 1 | 20:18.734
And your theory actually represents one of the classic hacking techniques in the world. That is social engineering at its core. Because what you have done is you have established a rapport. You have gotten information. You have then utilized that information to meet a goal that you wouldn’t necessarily have been able to access and meet beforehand due to barriers in place. Does that make sense?
Speaker 0 | 20:48.080
Yep. I just want someone to say, I love it. I just want someone to say, hey, Phil, I did what you said and I got a job. Thank you. And I just wanted to say, don’t thank me. I just wanted to say like, cool. It works. So it takes some boldness though. It takes some boldness.
Speaker 1 | 21:04.013
It does. And it also takes a salesman mentality. And that’s not a shot at salespeople. Don’t get me wrong.
Speaker 0 | 21:10.579
Let me address that. Let me address this most passionate part. This most passionate part in my entire career of my entire life here. Every single person is a salesperson. Everyone is. The doctor is a salesman. Every single person is a salesperson. Just not everyone’s a slime bag. that doesn’t know what to do because anyone can make a sale, but only care and, and, and, and climb their way to the top. You’ll see it anywhere, right? Anyone can climb to the top of the company, but only character and integrity will keep you there. And I agree a hundred percent. A salesperson is just someone that a good professional is another professional, right? Just like a doctor, right? A bad doctor prescribes you something without asking enough questions or finding out what your needs and concerns are. And we kind of were talking about this prior to the call about testosterone replacement therapy and issues and you know a bad doctor is just going to say you’re getting old man just deal with it exactly you know about it they say oh just here buy this you’ll be fine yeah but put this firewall in you’re good all you need is more internet what we don’t know is that there’s all these loops inside the network and like we’re creating our own issues and you know no faster internet’s not the key here that’s not what you need you know um so Yeah, a good doctor is going to do a good needs assessment. They’re going to listen, right? And then they are going to prescribe. And that is a good salesperson. So anyways. I agree with you.
Speaker 1 | 22:32.853
100% agree.
Speaker 0 | 22:34.513
So, sorry for the side again. No,
Speaker 1 | 22:38.134
you’re good.
Speaker 0 | 22:39.135
I think the genius mushrooms are starting to kick in. They might start. The shrooms.
Speaker 1 | 22:43.696
That was important to actually discuss is everyone is a salesman and everyone is. a customer to another salesman. And that’s why we actually have to own and be responsible for the treatment of other customer people. You know what I’m saying? When I hear, oh, it’s our CRM system. It’s our CRM theory. No, stop that. Treat other people like humans. Don’t try and just make a quick buck. You’re going to be a better person.
Speaker 0 | 23:12.251
Which is a really good point, which is a really good point because salespeople, it’s… It’s really all about the other person. It’s really all about them. And in technology and in security, it’s really all about the end users. It’s all about protecting the company, right? So when we say like, you know, and that’s part of the boldness, right? The boldness means stepping out of your own shell for a greater good. So it’s always hard to do something that you’ve never done before. It’s hard to step out of your comfort zone. It’s hard to do something new. But that’s where the growth happens, right? That’s where, just like, you know, lifting weights, right? Like, you know, I’m sure there’s probably like a thousand Arnold Schwarzenegger videos on this thing on, you know, probably didn’t even pronounce his name right. And, you know, where if the muscle fibers aren’t really being forced, if you’re not really feeling, you know, no pain, no gain, right? Right.
Speaker 1 | 24:07.032
So there is no resistance. There cannot be growth. But a refrigerator magnet that says growth begins outside your comfort zone.
Speaker 0 | 24:13.317
Yes. But what helps you step outside of that comfort zone is having a vision and a purpose and a reason for doing it that’s greater than yourself. So if you want to get a good job in security or if you’re all frustrated and sitting around and complaining, A, step out of your comfort zone, have a reason that’s bigger than yourself, and you’ve got to stretch yourself. You need to have the recipe. And I think we just kind of prescribed some of that recipe on how to get a job. which is not the old way. I mean, to me, it’s a theory. I need some people. We need some people to test this.
Speaker 1 | 24:46.717
Listeners, go out and test. And remember, when you get that job, you need to send residuals to me and Phil.
Speaker 0 | 24:51.961
There’s probably no residuals involved, but we’ll help you get it, which is going to bring us to the next topic. But before we get to that next topic, I would like to take a break in the show and I would like to read Microsoft’s Certified Technical Department mail because… that my father received. Okay. So this is a section of the show that we call hackers that try to rob, that successfully rob my 87-year-old father. And they’re out to get your parents and loved ones as well. And I’m going to read to you. This is a piece of paper, white. It has the Microsoft logo on the upper left-hand corner, and next to Microsoft logo, in blue, it says, Certified Technical Department. This is great. This is to my father, who’s also Philip Howard, Jr. That’s right, folks. I’m a third. I’m Philip J. Howard III. Good done to me. Dear Philip Howard, this is the official letter. The sad thing is I feel so bad. I’m just like, my father falls for this stuff. And I keep trying to tell him, dad, stop. But he has dementia. So he doesn’t remember that we tell him to stop doing this. Dear Philip Howard, this is the official letter from the security department to inform you that, comma, we’ve monitoring from last couple of weeks, your computer sending some warning signals. to our server, period. That is word for word. That’s with an apostrophe S. That’s mean someone from out of United States sending viruses and trying to hack your computer, period. Basically, comma, they will get your information and misuse them to do cyber crimes from your computer. If they do anything wrong, then the computer owners get in trouble. No, if they do anything wrong, then the computer owners get into a trouble for that, period.
Speaker 1 | 27:10.787
Ooh, a trouble. At least it’s not many troubles.
Speaker 0 | 27:13.769
Oh, this is brutal. And then two spaces down, we’re now getting into the signature section. We find out they’re using your information like email. And I use my father’s email, comma, phone number. And then he gives my father’s phone number, which we’ve changed. That’s why he’s sending the letter because he can’t call my father anymore. So because he can’t call my father, he sends him a letter and then tells him to call from the Microsoft certified department. Okay. Current home address. He lists his home address. Social security number XXX-XXX-the last four of his security of social security because he was able to get that. And then his date of birth, he lists his date of birth. So now the person reading this letter is like, oh my gosh, this is real. Bank or credit card informations, apostrophe S, and your computer IP address, etc. We are from the security team, comma, our job is to protect you. So we tried to stop them, but we are unable to do it from here. Please give us a call immediately to stop them. and secure your computer and your informations. For your safety, call us at, we should all call him. We should all call him. For your safety, everybody that’s listening to this show, please call the Microsoft Certified Technical Department at plus one, three, six, zero, five, one, five, seven, nine, six, three. Or we have option number two. It’s not a 1-800 number, of course. 202-657-6501. Please, everybody, make many calls. Thank you, technical team. And that completes this portion of the show, letters that get sent to 87-year-old Phil’s dad and other people in the world. What’s funny is that it comes from the Microsoft Certified Technical Department. But on the front of the envelope is USPS first class package is the return address, which do you think the return address is Microsoft certified technical department? No, the return address is MicroStore online, Arlington, Texas, which I’m not going to list it because you know what? That poor sucker that. he’s using for the return address is another old guy that he’s using. This guy actually got my father to go down to the bank, open up a bank account after my father said, my son said, I shouldn’t talk to you anymore. He did remember one time and the guy said, okay, no problem. I get it. You know, Dr. Howard, would you like to make some money? Uh, yeah, this is what Come on. Why are you serious? Dad, what’s wrong with you? You know, this is, so he actually got my dad to go down to the bank, open up a business bank account. provide him the routing number and account number and said, doc, here’s what you’re going to do. I’m going to like, we’re a computer department. We sell online thumb drives for $75 for a four megs thumb drive. We sell real cheap crap and market up. He didn’t tell him any of that. And I really just need you to take the money that goes into the bank account and like PayPal it to me here or whatever the heck it was, Western Union. And you’re going to get to keep $500 a month. I stopped that one. Oh,
Speaker 1 | 31:06.871
what could have gone wrong?
Speaker 0 | 31:09.391
Money laundering.
Speaker 1 | 31:11.152
No big.
Speaker 0 | 31:12.832
No big. I want you to exchange it into Bitcoin. And that’s just the beginning of the story. If we did this every month, the month prior would have been the Google Play scratch-off cards that, you know, my daughter’s sick and can you send them to her in the mail or something, whatever it is. It’s amazing.
Speaker 1 | 31:28.657
And these are all… Okay, so these are all targeted at people who either, and I’m not saying uneducated by way of not intelligent, but they don’t know computers. You and I know computers. We don’t get caught by this stuff, but we might get caught by something else.
Speaker 0 | 31:47.488
Yeah.
Speaker 1 | 31:47.949
The whole deal is a lack of generalized education toward just general topics.
Speaker 0 | 31:56.832
Here’s what we could get caught with. We could get caught with. The monthly, you’ve got to change your password and someone completely scraped the HTML code perfectly. And you know that in like a dual factor, like, you know, they catch us with actually the systems that we are using and are supposed to be using and doing. And if you don’t really double, triple check, you could do something quickly without thinking. I don’t remember the last time I almost got caught. I almost got caught once. It was really good.
Speaker 1 | 32:29.038
The last one that got me was a training email. I had been with the company I’m at now for like three months, four months, and we were super busy. And, you know, they said, hey, we have this, this company we partner with, they’re going to send out emails. And I was in a hurry and I didn’t read it. And it was, it was something about like a profile or something or other. And there was an extra in, in the email address that I didn’t catch. And I was like, oh, good. So now I have to go through training again because I wouldn’t slow down. linkedin.com exactly something like that it was one of those i got caught by that double l linkedin.com yeah your profile click here to reset your password uh yeah those are fantastic though because people don’t slow down and that’s you know that’s what i mean when i said 80 of this job shouldn’t be tech tech is important to this job but you need you People need to understand that they got to take 30 seconds to go, why is the CEO asking me for high-tech gift cards?
Speaker 0 | 33:34.512
Yeah, yeah. And that’s the obvious one, but it also full circle though, to come back to what we were talking at the beginning of the show, it comes back to not thinking you’re superior and speaking down to people because the reason why it’s so easy is because it’s the 80-20 rule. So anyone, I know hackers don’t like it, calling hacking or any thieves we’ll call them thieves cyber that’s a good cyber thieves criminals cyber uh what’s better what’s a funnier word for thief anyway it’s got to be easy yeah some you know whatever it is these guys it’s easier to prey on employees that are disgruntled so if you speak down to your people and and you know at the end of the day like the employees think this is the company’s computer. I don’t care. Like, this is like, you know, whatever. They don’t pay me enough to give a crap about all this stuff, you know? And besides, he just talks on me anyway. I don’t care. I’m like, whatever.
Speaker 1 | 34:36.268
So I got a story to tell you real quick. Speaking of that, the college I went to to get my degree, one of the classes we had to take was an accounting class. Principals, fundamentals, whatever you want to call it, is accounting basics, essentially. And I’m in there. Right. No, I get why it’s necessary. When they started writing in different colors, I was lost. I was like, but it says subtraction. Why am I not? I don’t. What are you doing? So I’m in there with a couple more security people. And we talk kind of outside of everybody. And we’re trying to figure out what we’re doing in this class. And a weekend, no lie, we get into this discussion where it is the top three reasons. top three motivations that a person in a company would steal. One of them is, uh, you don’t feel like you’re properly compensated for your position. And I’m going to go ahead and hopefully I’m not going into business for myself doing this, but shout out to every company out there who actually pays their employees what they should, because you are doing everything you can to help your employees not become these people. Because number one on the list is, man, I’m not, I’m getting paid 20,000 less than my average salary. So. What does it matter if I use my laptop, my company laptop for personal purposes? What does it mean if I grab an extra case of pens when I don’t need to or whatever the case may be?
Speaker 0 | 36:11.895
Watch a YouTube video, whatever. Exactly.
Speaker 1 | 36:15.776
One leads to two, two leads to ten. Next thing you know, you’re like, you know, I got this petty cash fund and I really need a new suit or whatever the case may be. So paying your people is a top priority. I understand everybody’s trying to meet a bottom line, but if you don’t, you’re going to breed discontent. Same thing if you don’t do performance reviews. If people don’t know where they stand in your company, man, I don’t matter to you.
Speaker 0 | 36:40.164
Is that point number two? Is that point number two? The three reasons?
Speaker 1 | 36:44.366
Yes and no.
Speaker 0 | 36:45.127
Okay.
Speaker 1 | 36:45.867
The second one is, one second, my brain just kind of jumped to track.
Speaker 0 | 36:52.511
I think it probably has something to do with like setting expectations or… Maybe some part of it, if you’re not knowing what your job is, like not having a clear job description or, you know, something, I don’t know.
Speaker 1 | 37:04.518
If you don’t have, if you don’t have defined expectations and defined parameters that you’re in, then that also breeds that discontent that breeds that I’m owed extra feeling. The third one is opportunity. If you give somebody opportunity without putting boundaries around it. You’re going to create a situation where, and I’m not saying natural temptation is a thing for everybody, but I’m saying that if you create the opportunity sooner or later, someone is going to take that opportunity. Without checks and balances, without, in the security industry, we have things like mandatory vacations so that no one has all the access. We have separation of duty. We have, in the financial industry, you have… It takes two signatures to write a check over $10,000 or whatever the case may be. You have to create situations where one person does not have all the control, where one person does not have all of the motive, and where one person does not have all the opportunity.
Speaker 0 | 38:11.638
Well, that’s a good, you know, that brings up a good point, which is security policy. What do you think are like, I don’t know, the top three or top five things that… someone should have on the security policy that you might not, that they might not normally have on. Or just what are the top five right now? Because anyone listening out there that doesn’t have these top five things on a policy, a written policy that we can deliver to HR, that HR can deliver to everybody else, and everyone can sign it and not even think about it. But what are the top five? You know, what are the five? Are there, is there an easy five policies that we should throw out there that would just… Just break your security department right there and make your life easy?
Speaker 1 | 38:58.293
Number one is you need to have a password policy. It needs to be a complex password policy. And I’m not going to get into specifics because every company is going to be different. But I personally require 16 characters mix of upper and lower symbol and number. I prefer if you use a password manager, but the companies get twitchy about that. Uh, number two is there has to be separation of duty or responsibility. No one person can hold the keys to the kingdom.
Speaker 0 | 39:31.813
That’s like, yeah, there’s some people that are just sitting back in like a cave somewhere with the keys to the network.
Speaker 1 | 39:39.019
Oh yeah. Somebody’s in their mom’s basement still.
Speaker 0 | 39:42.341
Separate. Well, no, I’ve run into some like old school IT guys and like a big, massive. I don’t need to be specific, healthcare facility with 360 locations and one network guy that’s like, you’re not touching my network. My network? Mine? Like, you know, like he’s been there for years. Like he’s like, you know, like building a wall around his job that’s like, you know, and if he left, it’d be like, oh my gosh, what do we do?
Speaker 1 | 40:14.945
How do we-The greatest phrase, go ahead.
Speaker 0 | 40:17.582
Well, it just reminds me of like that meme of like the Jurassic Park meme where they’re like, you know, spared no expense, hired one IT guy.
Speaker 1 | 40:24.606
Yeah, that’s it right there. I think I love it. Because IT is a call center.
Speaker 0 | 40:28.828
Yeah, you know, spares no expense. Hire as my IT guy.
Speaker 1 | 40:33.678
Boggles my mind. The phrase that always sticks with me is anybody who is a single point of responsibility is also a single point of leverage. And that leverage can be anything. It can be anything from you got one janitor who has all the keys to your building. All right. Then if I want into your building, I just got to take care of him and steal his keys. If your CEO is the only one who can write a check, then all I got to do is leverage him and I can get him to write any check I want. So that brings us to the third thing. Third thing is multi-factor authentication.
Speaker 0 | 41:14.019
Yes.
Speaker 1 | 41:15.260
Make it policy right now.
Speaker 0 | 41:19.262
Don’t you realize I’m the guy that writes everyone’s paycheck here?
Speaker 1 | 41:22.683
Turn it off. I don’t care.
Speaker 0 | 41:25.904
Can I get a new job, please?
Speaker 1 | 41:28.505
Yeah. Number one, I don’t care. Number two, I’m going to be going now because you need some anger management. What was that, three? Let me think.
Speaker 0 | 41:41.656
Don’t you know who I am?
Speaker 1 | 41:44.258
I’m better than you. That kills me. And that goes back to that whole insubordination and all that kind of good stuff. Or not insubordination, but subordinate human beings and treating them like humans. The moment we stop doing that, we are creating friction. And eventually something’s going to go boom.
Speaker 0 | 42:01.139
I’ve literally sat across from a boardroom table and had people leave a room for a second. And I’m sitting there with the one other person, a vein popping out of their head, banging the table, saying, I am the best. Do you think you’re better than me? Are you serious? Not kidding you. I’ve literally heard someone. I’m going to have to stand away from the mic for a second because this is how loud he was. Like literally banging the table like. The best. Do you think you’re better than me?
Speaker 1 | 42:34.109
Do you?
Speaker 0 | 42:36.010
I was like,
Speaker 1 | 42:37.791
whoa.
Speaker 0 | 42:39.292
I am. Is this real? Like, this is really happening. Like, in my head, I’m like laughing. In my head, I’m laughing. Like, I’m like, wow. Like, this is like real life.
Speaker 1 | 42:51.060
Boggles my mind, man. Like,
Speaker 0 | 42:52.401
I ain’t getting any real. life.
Speaker 1 | 42:55.350
No, just, just no. Have a tranquilizer. I’m going to need you to calm down. I don’t care which one, pick three flavors. You need something and it needs to happen.
Speaker 0 | 43:06.134
It’s the real man. This stuff is like, I’ve seen some crazy stuff when you get, when you get kind of like, that’s why I like corporate America. I, I love just doing what I’m doing and being free. Like, I don’t like answering to another man. I will do it. if I really like the person and I support their cause and I want to see them win. Like I’m not, I’m like the leader that doesn’t want to be a leader. So sometimes I get pushed into things and I don’t want to be. I’m like, look, I’m just, you know, what do they say? Not too many, too many chiefs and not enough Indians. Like I am, I am like, I love taking orders for the right person. But most of those people are. not people I want to take orders from, so that’s why I’m here. Sounds depressing and dark.
Speaker 1 | 44:01.228
No, it doesn’t, actually. I was watching the new Lord of the Rings show on Amazon last night.
Speaker 0 | 44:08.513
Wait, before we get totally sidetracked again on Lord of the Rings and all kinds of other things, is there two other points to our five list, or do we want to just stop at the top three?
Speaker 1 | 44:18.380
The top three, because those are actually
Speaker 0 | 44:20.142
pretty good i could go fine but they’re complex password policy uh separation of responsibilities responsibilities multi-factor is actually we gotta do a couple more because i think most people are gonna have password policy most people number two they might not have separation of responsibilities they might need some work on that multi-factors like if you don’t have that you’re that’s just you better have that
Speaker 1 | 44:50.134
You’d be shocked.
Speaker 0 | 44:52.015
Okay, you’re right. It’s true.
Speaker 1 | 44:55.597
I can give you 10 companies right now that have eight character password maximums. Not minimums, maximums. Because they’re on outdated legacy systems. So number four in your policies is, and I don’t even know how to word this and I’m a policy guy. Understand that tech upkeep has to happen.
Speaker 0 | 45:20.174
Oh, yeah. This is how we word that.
Speaker 1 | 45:25.120
Upgraded cycles need to be defined.
Speaker 0 | 45:27.062
Preventative maintenance.
Speaker 1 | 45:28.964
Yes. That’s a very good way of putting it. So preventative maintenance is a necessity. And I can put that in a couple of different spots.
Speaker 0 | 45:36.719
I was in charge of security and asset protection at Starbucks for a while. Rentative maintenance.
Speaker 1 | 45:43.365
Is that how you got the coffee addiction?
Speaker 0 | 45:49.049
I wasn’t a very good student in high school. And when I got to college, I went to 7-Eleven and I had my first large coffee. And I realized…
Speaker 1 | 45:56.095
And your work changed.
Speaker 0 | 45:57.256
I know. It really did. It really did. I was like, why… did my parents not make me drink coffee in sixth grade and fifth grade? Like they knew I was getting bad grades, like, you know, not bad grades, but like, you know, I could have done a lot better with coffee. It’s going to stunt your growth.
Speaker 1 | 46:20.675
It’s now a cup of motivation.
Speaker 0 | 46:22.877
Okay. Preventative maintenance.
Speaker 1 | 46:25.099
And the fifth one is actually the fifth one is performance reviews.
Speaker 0 | 46:32.405
Oh. That’s a good one. That’s one that they might ship off to HR.
Speaker 1 | 46:44.397
If you are a company that does the wonderful SOC 2 audits from the AICPA every year, then you have to have a mandatory review period or an annual performance review.
Speaker 0 | 47:00.862
But that’s taking the personality. Here’s the thing. Here’s how you want to do this. Performance reviews on steroids. We need to add on steroids, on steroids, on steroids to everything. Okay? Performance reviews on testosterone and human growth hormone. Human growth hormone. Human growth. and the reason human growth, the word human growth is in there. And if you actually, when I say on steroids, I mean like not once a quarter, not once a year for your quarter raise it, not, you know, now meet with your team, have one-on-ones have a form or some way of measuring success because people like to see measured success. People like to know I’m growing. People want to know, how do I know I’m growing? I’m, I’m, I was never good at languages. I really want to, I shouldn’t say that. That’s negative self-talk. I’m trying to beat my own stuff. I am, I’m going to be good at languages. I there’s anyways, whatever it is. How do I know that I’m progressing? How do I know if I’m just studying, right? But if I actually clock the time I had, I had a friend, a close friend of mine. He’s like, I started clocking my time. So I started doing different things when I want, because I always want to, I always love talking with the people that can speak another language fluently, like Chinese. It’s crazy. Like, how is this guy with the accent and with the perfect thing and other Chinese people look at him like, I can’t believe like this white guy is speaking perfect Chinese. I just remember this one guy speaking Chinese and ordering Chinese on the phone. And there’s a difference between like, you know, knowing a little bit of a language, like, you know, como estas, you know, esta bien, you know, different things like this. There’s a difference between that and the breakthrough where you’re speaking it, you’re not thinking about it.
Speaker 1 | 49:01.006
When you’re conversing.
Speaker 0 | 49:02.107
So when I’m asking, so I’m always asking people, like, what was that? How, at what point, how did you do it? Like, where did you get, because at one point I just realized, like, if I didn’t start clocking and seeing progress, I would get frustrated and give up. So I started clocking. all my time studying and all my time this, so I could start to see progress. So I could start to see, oh, I put this many hours in, I put this many hours in because, because there’s this, you know, saying whether it’s 1000 hours or it’s 10,000 hours to master something. So you knew if it’s 10,000 hours to master something, I’m going to start clocking those hours so I can see progress. It’s the same thing with performance reviews. It’s a great point. It’s very, very, and everyone can, I know from I’m managing people in the past and on it right now, I know for a fact that enough one-on-ones are not happening and they’re not happening with a form and they’re not happening with measured results and they’re not sitting down and you’re not asking people, what gets you up in the morning? What would you like to go? Where would you like to go? How can I help you get there? How can we measure those results? And how can we have a regular conversation to sit down? That person’s not stealing from you.
Speaker 1 | 50:09.668
And if they are,
Speaker 0 | 50:11.449
they’re a criminal. They’re going to end up in jail.
Speaker 1 | 50:13.810
Exactly. That is, they are engaged. And if you get someone engaged, then they’re not going to steal from you. You are exactly correct. But it takes a manager who wants to engage their subordinates as opposed to someone who’s checking a box. I got to give you a performance review, so let’s sit down and talk. That’s not going to cut it. What I need you to do is I need you to call in Sally and call in Bob individually and say, all right, where do you want to be in six months? Where do you want to be in two years? Now, let’s figure out a plan to get you there. And let’s break that plan down so that in two years you are there because you have gone through steps one through J or whatever the case may be.
Speaker 0 | 50:53.272
Gotcha.
Speaker 1 | 50:54.453
You have to plan that with your employees. If you don’t, you’re going to lose it.
Speaker 0 | 50:58.876
At this point in the show, if I was really smart, I would have a commercial break and so on. paying me to do all this stuff someday that could hopefully if i someday maybe they say get off the someday aisle someday i will do this get off someday i’ll start doing it now we’re gonna use this portion of the show to talk about conspiracy theories which uh i love which is very healthy it’s a very healthy way you to live life. It’s what causes people to storm the Capitol, so to speak, I think. Just so everyone knows, I am not a politically motivated person at all. I just like to press people’s buttons. So in my family, my dad, he was a big Trump supporter. I don’t know if he still is. And my sister’s on the other spectrum, very, very liberal. I can press people’s buttons. Like I can, like I can, if my sister’s over at the house, I can just say, hey,
Speaker 1 | 52:03.322
he did it.
Speaker 0 | 52:04.483
I can’t believe he did it. He overturned the election. And my sister will start losing. What? What? What? What’s going on? And I’m like, I’m just kidding. So anyways, conspiracy theories. Are they true in the security world? So here’s a conspiracy theory. I’m on this, on this, I think I told you last time. Patriot email list. Yes. And I’m on it because they just sell cool stuff. Like I’ve got this multi-unit hammer hatchet thing that I got that was marked down to $7 for 60 bucks. I buy all the scrap off this list. I’ve got the survival watch that can go underwater that has a compass and it also has like a flint on it so I can start a fire. But a lot of the emails that I get are these one conspiracy email I got is right up your alley in security. It said, all right, basically, are you ready for Armageddon? Because it’s not going to be nuclear warfare. It’s not going to be this. It’s going to be Russian hackers. And they are going to shut the power off across the United States. And you better be ready for it. Start. And then comes the you can buy your rations here for a discounted price. And you can. I’m like, oh, man. Here it comes. Armageddon. Hackers are going to shut down the electricity. Is it possible?
Speaker 1 | 53:30.517
Yeah, it’s possible. And the reason it’s possible.
Speaker 0 | 53:33.718
And then they have a video of you speaking like, yes, absolutely possible. Go ahead.
Speaker 1 | 53:38.960
And somebody is going to grab that as a soundbite and my career is going to be effectively over. So that’s cool.
Speaker 0 | 53:44.081
No,
Speaker 1 | 53:46.762
it is possible. And here’s how I know it’s possible. Georgia Institute of Technology is. a fantastic engineering program. They have a lot of smart people that come out of tech. Tech built a master’s in cybersecurity directly aimed at infrastructure support and power grid support and things of that nature. So you don’t have universities, and I use them as an example because I happen to apply to one of their other programs. You don’t have universities who are building things like that if it’s not a possibility. Okay, number two. It’s a possibility because we like things being networked together. We are all a big fan of, man, I’m sitting here in my house in Atlanta, but I work for Massachusetts Power Company. So I’m just going to remote in. I’m going to check the levels and make sure the grid is healthy and it’s all good. OK, but before you really think that that’s the only way that that happens, vulnerabilities exist even in air gap systems. I’ll tell you a story about that in just a second about something that happened in Iran. Power grids and power supplies and utilities are all vulnerable. Look at the Colonial Pipeline issue in Georgia last year. They got hit by ransomware. They had to shut half their plant down. All right. So, yeah, it’s possible. Not only is it possible, it can, in theory, happen soon. I don’t work for a power company. I don’t know what kind of controls they have in place. So I’m not going to take steps on how it will be. be done. But asking me if it’s possible, it’s likely because it happened to a natural gas pipeline. It happened to, so story time. Back in the early 2000s, I believe it was. All right, don’t quote me on dates. So any security professionals listening who might know about this already, don’t quote me on dates. This is all just coming off the top of my head. There was a situation where Iran’s nuclear program that was ostensibly for energy purposes was also being used to develop nuclear weapons. This is not a shock. There are a lot of. Other countries are trying to develop nuclear weapons just simply as a safeguard against someone using it on them. It’s called a doomsday device or doomsday weapon. It’s not uncommon because people say, well, if you shoot it at us, ours will automatically fire at you and we’re just going to kill the entire world. That creates a standoff. It’s not an uncommon military tactic. So I’m not trying to alarm anybody by saying this. So a couple of governmental entities that will go and remain nameless because it’s not been verified. decided that they didn’t like Iran doing this under the guise of a power program. They knew what Iran’s centrifuges were running, what software, because there’s not really a whole lot that runs centrifuges, right? They developed a virus based off of this particular software. It became colloquially known or nicknamed Stuxnet because of what it was and some of the stuff that was inside it.
Speaker 0 | 57:02.786
S-T-U-X-N-E-T for anyone listening. That is correct.
Speaker 1 | 57:06.947
Yes, thank you very much. They dropped it on a flash drive and then had someone drop that flash drive outside of one of these nuclear facilities. Human nature being what it is. And here we go back to the human psychology behind security, just so that everybody out there can kind of follow along. Someone picked up this thumb drive and went, huh. I found a flash drive. I wonder what’s on it. Took it inside the air gap nuclear facility. For those that may not know, air gapping means that it is not connected to any network outside of that facility. There is no internet. There is no link to the outside world. I can’t hack in from the United States and get into this facility. All right? There is no connection. So they grab this thumb drive. They go in. They plug it into a computer. When the computer recognizes it and reads what’s on it. Stuxnet activates, causes all their centrifuges to spin at exceedingly high rates and break themselves, effectively shutting down that nuclear plant.
Speaker 0 | 58:10.463
Unbelievable.
Speaker 1 | 58:11.964
It’s real. Go out and Google it. Go out and look it up on Wikipedia, whatever you want to use. Stuxnet, S-T-U-X-N-E-T. Not the only one. It will happen again. That’s security issues. Breaches are going to happen. That’s what people don’t understand. It’s not a question of if. It’s a question of when and how we respond.
Speaker 0 | 58:32.258
Yeah, I say that about people’s internet when they don’t have a backup internet connection. It’s not a matter of if this connection is going to go down. It’s a matter of when and for how long and how bad it is. And then who you’re going to call.
Speaker 1 | 58:46.883
It’s Ghostbusters.
Speaker 0 | 58:48.243
I mean.
Speaker 1 | 58:51.564
Sorry, 80s reference. I couldn’t help it.
Speaker 0 | 58:55.545
The flood. The flood of memories. It just reminds me of the cycle. It opens up with the psych scene of the shock. Like, you know, what card am I holding up? Wow, you got it right.
Speaker 1 | 59:10.335
Oh, yeah. Dude, that movie is so good.
Speaker 0 | 59:14.137
One of my absolute favorites. So,
Speaker 1 | 59:18.238
no, conspiracy theories, where they say there’s always a nugget of truth or a kernel of wisdom in all of them, I don’t know that I can go that far because I don’t know. People have come up with some really weird stuff. Like, I don’t think that we’ve been replaced in the government with lizard people.
Speaker 0 | 59:33.252
No one says. Did somebody say that?
Speaker 1 | 59:36.195
Oh, yeah. That’s a popular one. Go to Reddit. Go to conspiracy theories on Reddit. You’ll get some interesting stuff. But no, the power grid could be taken down by outside threats.
Speaker 0 | 59:50.187
I wish I could find this one from Concerned Patriot. So if anyone wants to know, it’s like, it’s, let’s see, what is this? The email list that I’m on, I don’t know how I got on it. I’m just on it. But you know how like you like unsubscribe, unsubscribe, unsubscribe. I don’t, I do not unsubscribe from this as wild as some of these emails are because there’s, it’s concernedpatriot.com. That guy, you know how they say like, it’s, it’s not. you know you don’t want to be you want to be polarized like it’s good to be you know i’m trying to think like it’s not good to be like kind of in between you know what i mean like he knows good press yeah yeah like concerned patriot.com genius He’s got 50% at least of, you know, the United States that are going to be on his list. So let’s give him a plug. Why not? Concernpatriot.com, dissecting popular IT nerds. You helped us, you know, talk about conspiracy theories and the government shutting down. And there’s truth to it. There’s truth to it.
Speaker 1 | 60:59.178
There’s possibility.
Speaker 0 | 61:01.700
Coming from a concerned patriot. Yeah. Oh my gosh. I’m in the middle. I’m in, again, I’m not like, I’m not one side or the other. I am, I am, I’m concerned, concerned.
Speaker 1 | 61:15.023
Oh, I have concerns. That’s the trick is if you can create fear without logic or education to refute it, then you’re going to have people eating out of the palm of your hand. That’s where That’s why security stuff like the letter your dad got happens. If you don’t know any better, if I send you a letter that goes, we caught you, we think about the emails that come out.
Speaker 0 | 61:41.742
It doesn’t even matter if there’s misspellings.
Speaker 1 | 61:44.703
Exactly.
Speaker 0 | 61:46.004
It’s crazy.
Speaker 1 | 61:47.464
I see them all the time. People will send me an email and go, hey, it says they turned on my camera and my laptop and saw what I was doing and saw what I was watching.
Speaker 0 | 61:56.608
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 | 61:57.188
I don’t even know what this is talking about. I mean, we’ve all gotten that stuff.
Speaker 0 | 62:00.314
I still wonder how I get advertisements after talking about something with my wife randomly and my phone just happens to be sitting on the table. Yeah.
Speaker 1 | 62:09.119
I try not to think about that.
Speaker 0 | 62:10.679
I do think they’re listening.
Speaker 1 | 62:13.281
By the way, NSA listeners, I am not. I like you guys.
Speaker 0 | 62:18.864
If you’re listening, by the way, good job. How do I get in on this? How do I get in on this? Not even lying. How do I get in on this, you know? Um, we can hear a cat in the background. I can, and I can see a cat in the background. Quit throwing some like stuff on cat food and throw them on this. Like, you know,
Speaker 1 | 62:39.312
I don’t think you’re wrong. And that’s, that’s kind of scary. Actually.
Speaker 0 | 62:43.293
It’s a, uh, concerned. I’m concerned. I’m a concern. Yeah. Yeah. Concerned Patriot. Um,
Speaker 1 | 62:53.636
this has been for connection, but sometimes it just kind of worries me. This getting to be too much.
Speaker 0 | 63:01.091
Like they say, there’s going to come a time where there’s going to be two types of people. Those that use social media and those that do not. And I’m in too deep already. It’s too deep. It’s too late for me. It has been an absolute pleasure having you on the show, Jim Smith.
Speaker 1 | 63:21.864
Thank you very much,
Speaker 0 | 63:22.584
sir. I won’t let people know your real name. If you want to look up Jim Smith, all you have to do is Google Jim Smith. You will find him immediately. Oh, yeah. If there’s any one message or anything that you wanted to send to the listeners out there or anything that’s that. We didn’t even get to what wakes you up in the morning and what keeps you going and what’s the end game for everyone, which we’re still trying to figure out. I’ll just summarize it. It’s. China locking down the internet is not cool. The internet should be accessed. Everyone should have access to it, right? Not just, you know, people in the third world. And it shouldn’t just be them feeding you advertisements of us listening to them on their cell phones. I added that in because I’m a concerned patriot. If you had one… I don’t even know where I come up with this stuff. This is great. I wish, again… Looking for advertisers, anyone that would like to advertise And Q Yeah There might be something there It might be Just so you know How we sign off on this This is how the sign off Is at the bottom of their emails For liberty Exclamation point In bold italics the Concerned Patriot team.
Speaker 1 | 64:53.891
You got to make sure that gets seen.
Speaker 0 | 64:56.052
It’s definitely not one guy. Okay, so anything that you would like to send out there to the ether?
Speaker 1 | 65:05.957
Yeah. Stop thinking that security needs to be technical. Start thinking that security needs to be a personal thing. If I’m covering my needs and you’re covering your needs, then there’s a whole lot less that we all have to worry about.
Speaker 0 | 65:21.658
Be kind,
Speaker 1 | 65:23.560
treat people with respect. Once you stop creating friction in your world, then there’s less things that are going to blow up. Unless you got to be worried about. Wow.
Speaker 0 | 65:35.202
That’s so deep. It really is. It’s, it’s so deep. It’s just, you know, here’s, it’s, it’s so simple. Are you a fan of what it is? Are you a fan of what about Bob? It’s so simple. It’s just so simple. Baby step on time. Ice knots. Um, you know, it’s so simple in the fact that it’s like, We create our own problems. So basically what you said is stop creating your own problems and treat people with respect and dignity.
Speaker 1 | 66:12.158
If you treat humans like they’re humans and you stop putting roadblocks in your way, your world’s going to open up.
Speaker 0 | 66:19.701
So simple, yet so complicated for us complex patriots.
Speaker 1 | 66:29.906
Because we’re concerned.
Speaker 0 | 66:32.227
I’m concerned. I don’t have time for that. Okay. Yeah. Stop causing your own problems and treat people with respect. And it’s just, it’s so simple yet. Why are people not doing it? Because they’ve got. issues in their head that they’re dealing with and you’re blaming other people and i think a lot of comes down to just taking responsibility for yourself and your own thoughts and i agree with that take responsibility for just you know quitting your stinking thinking which can be very hard to do because
Speaker 1 | 67:11.410
it just happens all the time we’re all kind of socially engineered to move on negative thought not positive thought you need like little stickers everywhere we look that says like
Speaker 0 | 67:21.458
Do it on purpose. Have intention. Intentionally think about what you’re thinking about. Have intention about what you’re thinking about. Think about what you’re thinking about. Think about what you say to people. Been a pleasure. Thank you so much for being on.
Speaker 1 | 67:37.169
This has been fantastic. If you get a chance, I’d love to do it again.
