Episode 273
October 15, 2026
56 MIN
This Week on What the Hack: Fake Job Scams
Congrats, you’re the perfect candidate! (You’re not. You’re the mark.) Jay Jones “The Profiler” has taken down more than 58,000 fake job postings. Learn how scammers turn a job hunt into open season on your data, your money, and, if they play it right, your identity.
Episode 273
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Episode 271
September 29, 2026
52 MIN
This Week on What the Hack: Surveillance, Flock ALPRs, and the Panopticon
This Week on What the Hack: Surveillance, Flock ALPRs, and the Panopticon
Worried about AI? Don’t trust Flock Security? You might get on a law enforcement list for that. Investigative reporter Daniel Boguslaw explains Big Tech’s push to re-label anti-surveillance camera activists and AI skeptics alike as threats to national security.
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This Week on What the Hack: Data Breach Exposed 153 Million IDs
Episode 270
September 23, 2026
42 MIN
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Your Exclusive Listener Offer
What The Hack brings you the stories and insights about digital privacy. DeleteMe provides the solution.
You’ve learned about the risks of data brokers. Now, you can do something about it. Our service removes your personal information from over 750 of those sites for you. Take the next step in protecting your privacy.
As a WTH listener, get an exclusive 20% off any plan with code: WTH
Episode 266
August 25, 2026
49 MIN
Welcome to the infuriating world of surveillance pricing. Chris “the Producer” Parr created a digital nobody to find out whether companies would charge the new him less. What he found was…
Episode 264
August 12, 2026
45 MIN
A stranger showed up at Anna Nasset’s art gallery with a painting called “Marry Me.” She said no. He did not get the message — for 15 years. Now Anna trains law enforcement on stalk…
Episode 263
August 4, 2026
51 MIN
Coco Berthmann sold a survival story. Amanda Riley sold a cancer battle. Both were lies that raided communities, wallets, and trust. Journalists Sarah Ganim, Karen Given, and Charlie Webster tell the…
Episode 262
July 30, 2026
56 MIN
Fake screenshots. Burner numbers. Forged emails. A stalker who somehow always knew what a 15-year-old was wearing. Blogger Cathy Holman thought she knew everyone in her tiny Wyoming town—so who’…
Episode 261
July 21, 2026
48 MIN
Aaron Parnas is the Walter Cronkite of Substack. He has millions of followers who follow him on every platform to get his just-the-facts reporting, but even the most trusted voice on TikTok has some…
Episode 259
July 7, 2026
49 min
Ethan Merritt is an WTH alum, but the last time he was on the pod he was the target. This time, he asked for it: Find four flags using only publicly viewable data. Social media posts, podcasts, leake…
Episode 258
June 30, 2026
46 MIN
A teenager rage-hacks a Tetris leaderboard and becomes a millionaire by 18. Now Tal Kollender breaks into companies for a living—and fixes whatever made that possible. We talk about that and Anthropi…
Episode 256
June 16, 2026
42 MIN
A retired Army Colonel becomes the unwitting face of thousands of army romance scams. Bryan Denny has been breaking the hearts of people he’s never met for years. What do you do when hundreds o…
Episode 255
June 9, 2026
95 MIN
She said her name was Clara Harper from Chase Bank. She argued with a police officer. She needed gift cards. Brian Ward shares the three times his 85-year-old father got scammed — and why the most un…
Episode 254
June 3, 2026
95 MIN
Craig doesn’t have Facebook. He’s not a gamer. He builds things, fixes things, grows things, has an assortment of antique chainsaws. So why is his name, age, address, and phone number sit…
Episode 253
May 27, 2026
95 MIN
A former military guy goes viral, but not in the way he’d hoped. With fake profiles popping up by the dozen using his photos to scam lonely hearts out of money, Ethan Merritt did what we all fa…
Episode 252
May 19, 2026
95 MIN
The ACLU’s Nate Freed Wessler won Carpenter v. United States and changed how the Fourth Amendment applies to your phone. But data brokers found a workaround — and the IRS, the Pentagon, and ICE…
Episode 251
May 12, 2026
50 MIN
Suveillance-for-profit bros say they can eliminate crime in America, but what about the Fourth Amendment? This week: a 1950s numbers racket and some real talk with Jason Koebler, Benn Jordan, GainSec…
Episode 250
May 6, 2026
95 MIN
Online fraud isn’t just getting smarter, it’s getting personal. Becky Holmes, author of “The Future of Fraud,” traces con artists from ancient Rome to AI-powered scam compound…
Episode 249
April 27, 2026
43 MIN
Sen. Ron Wyden, the longest-serving member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, the ACLU’s Kia Hamadanchy and Marcy Wheeler explain why the deadline to reauthorize Section 702 of FISA may be the mos…
Episode 248
April 22, 2026
48 MIN
Data as duh-duh. It’s all is out there—indexed, sold, and weaponized. Open source intelligence turns public records into a hacker’s playground, your LinkedIn profile is dangerous, but you…
Episode 247
April 14, 2026
46:10 min
The whisper: A downed U.S. pilot was located by tracking his heartbeat from 40 miles away. Real, or fake news to rattle Iran? Benn Jordan and physicist Chad Orzel help us separate the science fiction…
Episode 246
April 8, 2026
52:14 min
You’ve heard how the compounds work. This week we go inside one—through the eyes of Small Q, an Ugandan musician who was trafficked in and got out—also: Erin West of Operation Shamrock on the bigger…
Episode 245
April 1, 2026
48:24 min
Christopher Anderson has spent thirty years in high-stakes situations—war zones, sinking boats, the current White House. What he’s learned about the information people don’t know they’re giving away…
Episode 244
March 25, 2026
49:52 min
One of Time Magazine’s Women of the Year and a vocal advocate for diversity in tech, Tracy Chou built Block Party after discovering firsthand that the platforms have no real incentive to protect you…
Episode 243
March 18, 2026
49:51 min
Jim Clemente built a career reading criminals. FBI special agent, behavioral profiler, Unabomber case, the hit series Criminal Minds. Then someone bought his debit card number on the dark web, linked…
Episode 242
March 11, 2026
50:48 min
Flock Safety says their cameras have never been hacked. Benn Jordan and Jason Koebler watched themselves on one from their homes. This week: a deep dive into the vulnerabilities, the no-opt-out track…
Episode 241
March 3, 2026
49:56 min
You’re not paranoid. From Ring doorbells to AI-powered camera networks, digital surveillance has gone ambient. This week we trace how Big Tech turned data into infrastructure, why police are buying a…
Episode 237
February 2, 2026
46:45 min
This week, we’re going to the movies. Virginia Heffernan joins us to talk about Groundhog Day (the movie), surveillance, and why online systems reward repetition over reflection with a special…
Episode 230
December 23, 2025
49:26 min
A deadbolt clicks. This email, that voice–they sound all right. Then things go sideways. This week, 911 Cyber CEO Marc Raphael joins the pod to explore how AI makes scams faster, smoother, and…
Episode 229
December 11, 2025
43:21 min
How do you stay safe online? (Wrong answers only.) Avoid public Wi-Fi, QR codes, charging stations. Cyber OG Bob Lord (Yahoo, DNC, CISA) wrote an open letter tackling the real harm caused by bad advi…
Episode 228
December 2, 2025
39:34 min
Sextortion scams targeting teenage boys doubled this year—and Paul Raffile says the platforms knew it was happening. Learn how Instagram’s default settings let criminals to weaponize friends li…
Episode 228
November 26, 2025
29 min
The giant glittering scam and fraud trap of the holidays is here. Beau reunites with former co-hosts Adam Levin and Travis Taylor to talk about about fake websites, why gift cards are still a huge ve…
Episode 226
November 26, 2025
41 Min
Jeff Williams on the business of moving money: who gets blocked, what slips through, and why checking the right boxes doesn’t always mean a win in the nascent AI-powered sanctions compliance space. F…
Episode 225
November 12, 2025
35:34 min
When a young engineer uncovered a sizeable click fraud situation at Google, he discovered a bigger problem; namely, the perverse ingenuity that drives online fraud and scams. “Big Breaches̶…
Episode 224
November 4, 2025
46:55 min
Cybercrime expert Gary Warner joins to discuss Nigerian confraternities, the “campus cults” rooted in idealism that morphed into a multi-billion dollar transnational organized crime netwo…
Episode 223
October 28, 2025
37:41 min
When scammers tried to steal Graceland, it seemed like a fluke, but deed fraud is very much on the rise. This week on “What the Hack?” Del Denney of the Land Trust Company explains how cr…
Episode 222
October 21, 2025
46.48 Min
This week on “What the Hack?” forensic expert Heather Barnhart (SANS Institute) decoded Osama Bin Laden’s phones and helped convict quadruple murderer Brian Kohberger. Learn how sur…
Episode 221
October 14, 2025
44 MIN
Marketing visionary Seth Godin explains how the Internet got hijacked by an attention-stealing spam economy that keeps us in an endless loop of badly targeted marketing. Godin’s anti-spam playb…
Episode 220
October 7, 2025
41:49
A locked account. A call for help. What happened next left Tony questioning everything he thought he knew about the Internet. This week is about trust, technology, and how quickly things can unravel…
Episode 219
September 30, 2025
44 min
Former federal prosecutor Tom O’Malley takes us inside the strange, high-stakes world of modern fraud—where victims are presumed guilty, families lose fortunes, and the fight against global crime rin…
Episode 218
September 23, 2025
50 MIN
Every click, swipe, and post fuels the data economy. Credit cards, apps, even maps—our lives are scraped, stitched, and sold. It feels like a heist, and sometimes it is. Identity Theft Resource Cente…
Episode 217
September 16, 2025
39.37
It started with a slow roll of weird emails and phone calls. And then award-winning filmmaker Dan Sturman found himself in the crosshairs of serious hackers. With parallels to another case of mistake…
Episode 216
September 9, 2025
44 MIN
Feeling watched? Join us as Vermont Attorney General Charity Clark breaks down the new reality of digital surveillance. From school apps to AI scams, we dive into how companies collect your data and…
Episode 215
September 2, 2025
44 MIN
A fake Microsoft pop-up cost Ken Westbrook’s mom her life savings. But they scammed the wrong family. Westbrook is former CIA. These days he’s sounding the alarm on how foreign crime rings steal bill…
Episode 214
August 26, 2025
35 MIN
In this second installment of our DEF CON two-parter, we talked to SocialProof Security CEO Rachel Tobac about how and why people are often the weakest link in so many cybersecurity protocols and how…
Episode 213
August 19, 2025
42 MIN
At DEF CON’s Social Engineering Village, contestants have 22 minutes to charm real employees at real companies into revealing real details that could lead to a breach. We step inside the booth to see…
Episode 212
August 12, 2025
43 MIN
Kurtis Minder knows the dark web better than most—and he’s not just watching from the sidelines. As a ransomware negotiator, he’s helped victims talk their way out of seemingly impossible situations…
Episode 211
August 5, 2025
34 MIN
A not-entirely innocent moment at a concert set the internet on fire. But what if that was just a symptom of a bigger problem? New York Times journalist Kashmir Hill, author of Your Face Belongs to U…
Episode 210
July 29, 2025
45 MIN
Online fraud isn’t just annoying; it’s a national crisis. Last year alone, it may have siphoned $158 billion from the U.S. economy. This episode features AARP’s Kathy Stokes, who re…
Episode 209
July 22, 2025
42 MIN
Fortune Magazine’s Amanda Gerut offers a deep dive into the secret army of remote IT workers funding North Korea’s nuclear ambitions. Explore the hidden world of laptop farms, the crimina…
Episode 208
July 15, 2025
46 MIN
Join Ben Winters, director of AI and Privacy at the Consumer Federation of America, for a front-row seat to the chaotic world of AI regulation where dirty data, aggressive lobbying, and public confus…
Episode 207
July 8, 2025
34 MIN
Kristin got scammed because she didn’t want to give a puppy mill her business. This classic digital scam has it all: fake breeders, phony shipping agents, and a non-existent air-conditioned cra…