S1: Say goodbye to countless spreadsheets and endless email threats when
S1: you automate compliance with Fanta. Fanta automates up to 90%
S1: of the work for Soc2, ISO 27,001, HIPAA, and more
S1: getting you audit ready results in weeks instead of months.
S1: Customers report saving over 300 hours of manual work and
S1: up to 85% of associated costs. And with 200 plus integrations,
S1: you can easily monitor and secure the tools your business
S1: relies on. Join the 5000 fast growing companies that leverage
S1: Vanta to manage risks and prove security in real time.
S1: Vanta scales with your business, helping you successfully enter new markets,
S1: land bigger deals, and earn customer trust. Vanta Unsupervised Learning
S1: listeners get $1,000 off Vanta at vanta. Com slash unsupervised.
S1: That's vanta.com/unsupervised. Welcome to Unsupervised Learning, a security, AI and
S1: meaning focused podcast that looks at how best to thrive
S1: as humans in a post AI world. It combines original ideas,
S1: analysis and mental models to bring not just the news,
S1: but why it matters and how to respond. All right,
S1: welcome to unsupervised Learning. This is Daniel Miessler episode 448.
S1: Let's do this. Okay. I want to ask everyone to
S1: resubscribe to the podcast. I don't know all the different
S1: channels that are listening to this. This could be on
S1: YouTube for example. There is a podcast feed which you
S1: can get on Apple or Spotify or whatever. So I
S1: would just say go sign up for that because the
S1: URL has changed and I'm putting out a lot more
S1: content and putting out a lot more clips of different,
S1: shorter pieces in addition to the weekly episode. So I
S1: would say go check that out. And if you're listening
S1: to the podcast, then, uh, apologies, because obviously you're subscribed,
S1: otherwise you wouldn't be listening. Okay. My new favorite fabric
S1: pattern is one I just made up called Extract Primary Problem.
S1: And I'm so excited about this thing. So it takes
S1: any text input or any body of work. So you
S1: could basically say like Noam Chomsky or you could literally
S1: like echo the words Noam Chomsky or like the Unabomber
S1: or whoever. You can send basically any person's body of
S1: work or like Russian literature or whatever. You send anything
S1: in there, and it will turn it into a single
S1: sentence that summarizes what that work believes the biggest problem
S1: in the world to be. And the reason I'm doing
S1: this is because I'm trying to understand people's work, or
S1: an essay or something based on a concise description of
S1: what they think the problem is. I think this is
S1: a very powerful way to see the world, is to
S1: understand what do they think the biggest issue is that
S1: we need to solve, because that's where you start. And
S1: then you look at, okay, are the solutions that they're providing,
S1: are they actually good strategies for addressing that? But most importantly,
S1: what do they think the actual problem is? Because if
S1: they think the actual problem is like something you don't
S1: care about, I mean, why are we listening to their work?
S1: It doesn't mean there isn't like some other way to
S1: get value from their work. I could think of examples
S1: where there is, but I would rather listen to Viktor
S1: Frankl's work, who believes, you know, that there's a lack
S1: of meaning in the world, for example, which is definitely
S1: my view. Uh, I invented, uh, I invented basically the
S1: same thing that Viktor Frankl did. Um, well, probably lots
S1: of people have done it before Frankl as well, but
S1: I was basically going down and am still going down
S1: this path. Then, like a year ago, I read Viktor
S1: Frankl's work, and it is I mean, it's 100 years
S1: before I'm doing this work, and it basically found that anyway,
S1: it doesn't matter. That's a diversion. He nailed it. And
S1: his problem statement is essentially the same as my problem statement.
S1: So it raises the question of like, okay, for a
S1: given person, for a given person who's producing value and
S1: work in the world, what do they believe the problem is?
S1: So that's what this particular pattern does. The other one
S1: I created recently is a create story explanation, which explains
S1: a really difficult piece of content in a flowing story style.
S1: So it basically is like, okay, so they believe this,
S1: which means this and a few facets of what they
S1: believe is this here and also this here, which means
S1: this part here. And the reason this is important is
S1: because of this. So it turns it into a story based,
S1: conversation based explanation of the topic as opposed to like
S1: extract wisdom, which is like, you know, listed out in
S1: a very clear and concise way, but it's still kind
S1: of sciency or scientific like, oriented as opposed to like
S1: story and conversation Oriented, so I really like this one
S1: as well. Highly recommend everyone check out the. We've been
S1: Lied To About Work essay that I put out last week.
S1: Getting a lot of positive feedback around that. So appreciate that. Security.
S1: Researchers have discovered a SQL injection vulnerability in a critical
S1: air transport security system. This is actually Sam Curry, um,
S1: and another one of my buddies who actually put this out.
S1: Really cool. I mean, the vuln is, uh. Yeah, remarkably,
S1: I don't know how that vuln still exists, but they
S1: are basically able to use SQL injection to add themselves
S1: to a list of authorized individuals to get cockpit access
S1: to a plane. The New York Times has revealed a
S1: significant breach involving GitHub tokens, and attackers are already using
S1: it to gain access to various repositories. Researchers from OpenAI, Microsoft, MIT,
S1: and Harvard have proposed personhood credentials to verify real humans
S1: online without revealing their identities. This might also be needed
S1: for voting. This might also be needed for handing out UBI.
S1: This might also be needed for social media accounts. There's
S1: so many reasons to have this. I think this is
S1: really cool tech. The other thing that's interesting about this
S1: is Sam Altman has a world coin, which I think
S1: is crypto based on authenticating yourself. So you could see
S1: world coin like folding into this as well in a
S1: way that ties in with UBI. Um, yeah. So it's
S1: zero knowledge proof, which is a crypto concept. Essentially, you
S1: don't have to know who it is, but you know
S1: that it is them. Yeah. One thing I worry about
S1: is the back end database probably get eventually hacked, because
S1: at some point you have to have a database that
S1: you're actually validating against. Thanks to Nudge Security for sponsoring
S1: the show this week, Record a future has announced a
S1: new integration with Google's security operations, enhancing both Siem and
S1: Soar components. North Korean hackers are back to targeting the
S1: NPM code repository with malicious packages. The US Army Special
S1: Forces showed their hacking skills during the Swift response 24
S1: military exercises in Sweden. They used a remote access device
S1: to hack into a building's Wi-Fi, disable security systems, and
S1: then stormed the building, leaving leaving behind signal jamming equipment
S1: and a laptop playing Never Gonna Give You Up, so
S1: they rickrolled them on the way out. Chinese companies are
S1: planning to launch over 15,000 low Earth orbit satellites with
S1: Mercedes page from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute warning that
S1: this can enable countries using Chinese broadband services to control
S1: information flow, monitor user activity and even shut down the internet.
S1: Internet during unrest. Yeah, I think that's the whole purpose
S1: of it. Las Vegas police are pushing back against a
S1: new NFL policy requiring officers working Raiders games to provide
S1: photos for facial recognition. They don't want potential misuse of
S1: that data. I mean, the biometric data is a picture
S1: of them. I don't know. I don't know why they're
S1: so worried about that. Maybe there's more to it. I
S1: don't think so, though. I mean, you call anything biometric
S1: data and people are like, oh, I don't want that
S1: out there. It's like, yeah, that's just your face, man.
S1: It's just your face. And it's not actually your face.
S1: It's a picture of your face. Google has announced new
S1: variants of its Gemini 1.5 model, including the smaller Gemini
S1: 1.58 B and improved Gemini 1.5 flash and a stronger
S1: 1.5 Pro. I have not messed with this yet. And
S1: by the way, we are in the AI and tech section.
S1: I've not messed with the new Gemini 1.5 Pro. I
S1: hear it's really good, so I'm going to do that
S1: within fabric soon. OpenAI keeps making everyone wait spelled w
S1: e I g h t. I don't know why I
S1: think that's funny. It's very stupid for their new model.
S1: Half model, whatever is going to come out soon, maybe
S1: called Orion and maybe using the new strawberry technology. So
S1: we're all waiting for that. California's AI regulation bill, SB 1047,
S1: has passed the state Senate with 29 to 9 vote,
S1: and now is going to Gavin Newsom. And this is
S1: basically a set of rules saying companies making models of
S1: a certain size must have certain safety measures in place,
S1: like you have to have a kill switch and stuff
S1: like that. It seems rather logical. Elon actually backed it,
S1: which was surprising. OpenAI is reportedly in talks to raise
S1: a new funding round at a valuation exceeding 100 billion,
S1: led by Thrive Capital, with Microsoft also expected to participate.
S1: And Nvidia and Apple have also been rumored to be
S1: involved in potentially wanting to invest. OpenAI has enhanced its
S1: assistance API, making it easier for developers to fine tune
S1: how AI assistants handle file searches. So this is basically
S1: more controls and power Around. Rag companies like JP Morgan
S1: and Walmart are shifting from restricting generative AI tools like
S1: ChatGPT to developing their own internal assistants. Basically, they know
S1: they can't use the cloud versions, but they know they
S1: also need to use AI. So there appear to be
S1: deciding to build internally. Cisco is acquiring robust intelligence, which
S1: secures AI applications. Not close to the details at all here,
S1: but feels desperate from Cisco. Like we know we're screwed
S1: because networking is not where it's at anymore. And we
S1: need to do something in AI. So let's buy a
S1: thing that secures AI applications. I don't have high hopes.
S1: Today's new note pin is a wearable version of its
S1: previous credit card form factor, which I have and have used.
S1: I don't use it that much. I don't like the
S1: form factor of having to pull it out. It's actually
S1: the friction of using the app that's that's hurting my
S1: use of it. So hopefully that's better with the pin. Also,
S1: I don't like the credit card version of it. Actually,
S1: I need to take it out of my wallet because
S1: I don't really use it that much. Amazon is set
S1: to release a new version of its Alexa voice assistant
S1: in October, and it will be powered by Anthropic's Claude
S1: AI models. I am getting the new one. I have
S1: it on order though. The new note pin. Sorry to
S1: go back to the previous story, but I'm getting the
S1: one that goes around the neck, similar to the limitless one,
S1: which I also have on order. I hope it has
S1: a red button though, because I want people to know,
S1: and if I don't know the person, I'm going to
S1: ask and say. My thing is like recording everything. Not
S1: specifically for this conversation, but it's kind of recording everything
S1: just to let you know. So I could turn it
S1: off if that bothers them. Amazon is set to release
S1: a new version of Alexa Voice in October, so very soon,
S1: and it will be powered by Claude. That is going
S1: to be actual. I am very excited about this. I
S1: can't wait. I don't actually have any Alexa stuff, but
S1: I can't wait for the Apple version. Nearly half of
S1: Nvidia's revenue comes from for mystery customers, each spending over
S1: 3 billion on AI chips like the H200. Heavy reliance
S1: on a few major clients raises concerns. Yeah, and and
S1: they just got hit with an antitrust kind of like
S1: a probe yesterday. And I think they crashed like 10%
S1: like the stock went down like 10%. That was painful.
S1: And and tech is shutting down after 27 years. They
S1: said they are passing the torch to Tom's Hardware. Kind
S1: of sad I kind of grew up on an antique.
S1: China's Wukong game just sold 10 million copies in three days.
S1: Huawei posted record profits in the first half of 2024,
S1: 7.7 billion in net profit, despite ongoing US sanctions. That's insane.
S1: Imagine what they would have done without the US headwinds.
S1: A woman in California used an AirTag to track down
S1: her stolen mail, and the suspects were found with mail
S1: addressed to lots of other people. So they're now they're
S1: facing multiple felonies for disrupting federal mail. Humans. Anarchy in
S1: Sudan has led to the worst famine in the world
S1: seen in 40 years. Nearly half of New York City
S1: bus riders are skipping the fair. 48% of people are
S1: not paying for the bus, presumably because they just like,
S1: what are you going to do? What are you going
S1: to do? You're not going to fight me, you're not
S1: going to kick me off. There's not enough police. The
S1: police don't care. So hopefully they're going to start clamping
S1: down on that. Researchers at the University of Kentucky have
S1: found that long Covid patients show brain changes similar to
S1: those seen in Alzheimer's. The study, published in Alzheimer's and Dementia,
S1: highlights shared issues like neuroinflammation and abnormal brain activity, suggesting
S1: common underlying mechanisms. That is super interesting and exciting. We'd
S1: love to address both. Scientists have discovered that the interaction
S1: between two molecules, pkmzeta and kibra, is crucial for maintaining
S1: long term memories, so this appears to be a pretty
S1: major breakthrough on how long term memories are formed. Ozempic,
S1: a drug for type two diabetes and obesity, might also
S1: slow aging. Are you kidding me? It's like they keep
S1: finding new things that this does. Researchers found it could
S1: treat illnesses like heart failure, arthritis, Alzheimer's and cancer, even
S1: reduce deaths from cardiovascular issues and Covid 19. Oh yeah,
S1: that's a new thing I just saw. Covid 19 death
S1: reduction by 34%. That's not a story in this one,
S1: but it's a story I just read. So it's in
S1: the podcast. So I wonder how much of this. Oh yeah,
S1: I put it right here. All this as news of
S1: it addressing more and more issues feels like it's hitting
S1: something extremely fundamental, like inflammation, which has long been pointed
S1: to as a meta cause or like a meta symptom.
S1: I think meta cause more than meta symptom in lots
S1: of other diseases. I'm not saying it's actually inflammation, just
S1: that it seems to be affecting something very fundamental. But
S1: what if it's just that being thinner and having less
S1: visceral fat or something related to that is actually the thing.
S1: Or maybe being thinner. And the less visceral fat leads
S1: to less inflammation, which the inflammation is causing all the
S1: other things. So like maybe the Covid 19 and the
S1: aging and the dementia and all this stuff is related
S1: to one or both of being thin and healthy, maybe
S1: physically active, maybe inflammation, I don't know, but I'm very curious.
S1: I can't wait to see, like this mystery unfold. A
S1: CIA deep cover operative known as Anthony Laguna spent years
S1: infiltrating Islamist extremist groups, even reaching al Qaeda's broader network.
S1: But he died in 2016, seemingly seemingly of like mental
S1: health issues, which is calling attention on the CIA for like,
S1: how do you how are you taking care of your
S1: people when you put them in these traumatic situations? How
S1: do you handle their mental health? And more people are
S1: going no contact with their parents, driven by a mix
S1: of personal growth and unresolved conflicts. I think the gulf
S1: between Gen Z and what are Gen Z's parents? Are
S1: those exes? I think those are exes. Maybe the difference
S1: between Gen Z and Gen X is just so large,
S1: like ideologically, that maybe that's why this is happening. It's
S1: definitely a factor. Discovery. Whoosh is a command line tool
S1: for transferring files and opening shells over a peer to
S1: peer WireGuard connection. Super cool fire crawl crawl sites using
S1: Claude or GPT and turn the output into LLM ready markdown. History.
S1: For feed, Jozek developed an open source tool that creates
S1: a complete historical archive of full text posts from any
S1: RSS or atom feed. I absolutely need to use this. Yes,
S1: I need to use this like immediately. Uh, which is
S1: why I put it in there. So the most dangerous
S1: email I've ever sent. This is a great read. Who
S1: wants to be hired? A Hacker News thread for people
S1: looking for work. My buddy Clint Gibler did an epic
S1: post summarizing every AI talk from Blackhat and Defcon 2024.
S1: Just an amazing piece of work. It is so like
S1: so deep and like involved. Yeah. Very comprehensive. Definitely check
S1: it out. Using GPT four for web scraping. Three questions
S1: candidates can ask to invert the power dynamic in technical interviews.
S1: The Hatch Restore two is a smart alarm clock designed
S1: to mimic sunrises and sunsets to help you wake up
S1: more naturally. I am so close to getting one of
S1: these things, but I'm stopped by a simple fact I
S1: get natural light in my windows in my bedroom when
S1: the sun comes up, so the sun provides like a
S1: sunrise like experience. But I wear an eye mask when
S1: I sleep to block out the light. So I feel
S1: like this is like the worst kind of overengineering when
S1: you have actual sun, you buy a fake sun, but
S1: you can't see either of them because you're wearing an
S1: eye mask. Uh that's silly. Okay, ideas. Beware of commodified incuriosity.
S1: This is a really good piece. So it's talking about
S1: the act of researching and thinking being replaced by focus
S1: on efficiency and productivity. I think it's a great way
S1: of looking at things and a reason to be cautious
S1: with the overuse of something like extract wisdom, which I
S1: talk about a lot. Basically, I summarization basically a big
S1: part of learning something is struggling with it, and that's
S1: why I tooling focused on learning should be used, in
S1: my current opinion, to help you find things that you
S1: read slowly and absorb and you grapple with and think
S1: about critically. And then you could use something like extract
S1: Wisdom to help you make sure you don't miss things
S1: when you take notes, but don't think that anything other
S1: than future learning implants or something can substitute for the
S1: hard work of actual thinking and processing and grappling with content.
S1: Depression as a hand on a stove. This argument suggests
S1: that instead of trying to eliminate depression, we should see
S1: it as a signal to make life changes. Attention to enchantment.
S1: This piece argues that being enchanted by the world comes
S1: from learning to pay attention to it. I feel like
S1: learning to meditate, which is really just paying attention in
S1: my Sam Harris based school of meditation combined with music festivals.
S1: For me, I've truly learned to appreciate small things in
S1: daily life. It's made me a very happy person. I
S1: really feel like it's a cheat to be able to
S1: extract this much joy from, like, my neighbors, and seeing
S1: people go for a walk with their little kid, or
S1: hearing distant like children playing and like roughhousing and screaming
S1: or whatever. And this also relates to framing, but the
S1: action or the attention piece is really, really key here.
S1: Rarity and beauty. I often wonder how much of beauty
S1: is just rarity. There are lots of seagulls at this
S1: lake that I visit often. The local lake here in
S1: my town. I barely noticed them by default, but they're
S1: like big white birds and I actively try to look
S1: at them sometimes as if they are rare to try
S1: to trick my mind into noticing their beauty. Ralph Waldo
S1: Emerson has a quote if the stars should appear but
S1: one night every thousand years, how man would marvel and stare.
S1: So if the stars only came out every once in
S1: a while, there would be like eclipses, organized like eclipse
S1: watching things. They would be organized just to go and
S1: watch the stars. And the opposite is true as well.
S1: If the eclipse happened all the time, nobody would look
S1: at it. It would be like the most boring thing ever.
S1: So it's the fact that it's rare that makes it special.
S1: That's really it. And I often think about how much
S1: beauty we have in our lives that we ignore because
S1: it's either too common or too omnipresent, or maybe those
S1: are the same in this context. I feel like the
S1: Stoics had it figured out when they taught the exercise
S1: of imagining your life without certain things. I try to
S1: do this, and it does help me appreciate them. Two
S1: bad choices in November. This is a political one. I'm
S1: not going to do it, honestly. It's just that I
S1: think both candidates are both bad in different ways, and
S1: I'm very afraid in both cases of either of them winning,
S1: but for very different reasons. And I think both of
S1: them could do some good as well. Recommendation of the week.
S1: Here's a frame for you to try on. This goes
S1: along with the previous one of the previous points. You
S1: become what you pay attention to. It's election year in
S1: a few places, including the US. The world is on fire.
S1: Politics are a mess everywhere, and it seems like the
S1: very fabric of Steven Pinker's last couple of books has
S1: completely unraveled. But maybe we have an option other than
S1: staring directly into the toilet. Maybe all the beauty in
S1: the world is still there, and maybe we could focus
S1: on that instead. Or at the very least, not on
S1: the toilet. I'm not saying to be cowardly. If you're
S1: one of the few people who can actually change lots
S1: of minds and help the world in some sort of way,
S1: maybe you should serve time in the toilet. That is
S1: our current situation, but that's probably not the case. Most
S1: of us won't be missed on those front lines, so
S1: maybe instead we could use those few months to make
S1: a list of the best poetry books, or start a
S1: D&D campaign with your friends, or learn to play piano.
S1: Maybe we could focus our attention on the great stuff
S1: in the world that we always said we'd look at later.
S1: Now is a pretty good time to do that. It's
S1: a good time to fill our attention with that instead
S1: of the ugliness in the world, so we can become
S1: the goodness for someone else. And the aphorism of the week.
S1: You become what you pay attention to. So be very
S1: careful what you pay attention to. You become what you
S1: pay attention to. So be very careful what you pay
S1: attention to. Unsupervised learning is produced and edited by Daniel
S1: Meisler on a Neumann U87 AI microphone using Hindenburg. Intro
S1: and outro music is by zombie with a Y. And
S1: to get the text and links from this episode, sign
S1: up for the newsletter version of the show at Daniel miessler.com/newsletter.
S1: We'll see you next time.