Speaker 1: What's surveilling my you. This is Robert Evans, host of
Speaker 1: It Could Happen Here, a podcast about how things are
Speaker 1: kind of falling apart uh and also advice on how
Speaker 1: to you know, deal with that ship. UM. Today, I'm
Speaker 1: here with my colleagues Garrison Davis. Hello, Garrison, Garrison. Hi,
Speaker 1: Sorry Garrison, it did not know we're getting called on
Speaker 1: Garrison and Christopher Wong. HELLU, yes, that's right. And we're
Speaker 1: going to talk about privacy, about information, self defense, about
Speaker 1: avoiding surveillance with somebody who knows what the funk they're
Speaker 1: talking about, because I sure as held down. Uh. And
Speaker 1: for that, I want to welcome Chelsea Manning. Hey, how's
Speaker 1: it going good? Chelsea? Um? Well, why wouldn't you want
Speaker 1: the government to no exact actually what you're doing? Well,
Speaker 1: I mean it's not just the government. UM. So you know,
Speaker 1: one of the things that I do as a security
Speaker 1: consultant is I UM is I provide sort of a
Speaker 1: an analysis as to what your actual tangible threats are. UM.
Speaker 1: So depending on who you are, what you're doing, and
Speaker 1: what environment you're in, UM, that that is going to change.
Speaker 1: So in the instance of the government, it may be
Speaker 1: that you are a political dissident. It may be that
Speaker 1: you are UM engaged in activities that are criminalized in
Speaker 1: that society or culture UM or or it may be
Speaker 1: that you know, you are simply trying to get you know,
Speaker 1: you're trying to live your life, uh and not not
Speaker 1: have to engage with UM, you know, tax authorities or
Speaker 1: you know, so so it could be, it could be.
Speaker 1: It could depend on what you're doing, UH and who
Speaker 1: you're trying to avoid UM with respect to the government. UM,
Speaker 1: I'm mostly focus on political activism and dissidents, and uh,
Speaker 1: you know a part of that is, you know, ensuring
Speaker 1: that you are actually not being uh you know, spide
Speaker 1: on or threatened by whoever your government is, whether it's
Speaker 1: a local, state, national, or international threat for you. And UH,
Speaker 1: I don't know. I guess my first question would be,
Speaker 1: like for a person who's UM, I don't know, perhaps
Speaker 1: a slightly lower imminent threat of I mean, any of
Speaker 1: the stuff that that you worry about, or that perhaps
Speaker 1: people who are much more involved in kind of organizing
Speaker 1: have to worry about, Like what is what do you
Speaker 1: think is kind of the basic security hygiene toolkit that
Speaker 1: you know, an average person ought to ought to at
Speaker 1: least understand, if not actively practice. Right. So the basics are,
Speaker 1: you know, a privacy based browser, you know, something that
Speaker 1: doesn't have cookies for your Internet browsing UM and changing
Speaker 1: changing Firefox. No, I mean I think I think you
Speaker 1: know it's it's understanding the privacy features of your particular
Speaker 1: UM browser. UM. There are browsers like Brave that that
Speaker 1: that specifically specialized in this or tour browser. But UM,
Speaker 1: you know, the vast majority of browsers today have privacy
Speaker 1: feud features. Although you know there are there, there are
Speaker 1: risks that come with that as to whether or not
Speaker 1: they are UM revealing the true nature of how much
Speaker 1: you know, information that they're collecting on you, where it's stored,
Speaker 1: whether it's in a cloud hosting service, or whether it's
Speaker 1: you know, on your on your device, on your phone,
Speaker 1: on your computer, UM, or whether or not it's being
Speaker 1: sold to a third party advertising you know company, or
Speaker 1: you know to advertisers or to you know, data mining companies.
Speaker 1: So you know it it really depends, you know, like
Speaker 1: basically basically, nothing you do, Unfortunately, nothing you do on
Speaker 1: the Internet or on an electronic device is that is
Speaker 1: connected to another computer. UM. Is truly private. UM. So
Speaker 1: it's about sort of reducing your um your we would
Speaker 1: say surface area, your attack surface area or your visibility
Speaker 1: surface area as much as possible while also maintaining a
Speaker 1: certain amount of um, you know, usability because you know,
Speaker 1: you can you can go out into a cabin in
Speaker 1: Montana and live live off of live live out in
Speaker 1: the woods if you so choose. But I mean, you're
Speaker 1: not gonna be able to accomplish you know, the things
Speaker 1: that you need to do, um that you can that
Speaker 1: you can do with mobile devices, with computers, with servers
Speaker 1: and with cloud cloud services. So it's about it's about balancing.
Speaker 1: It's about balancing the risk versus what you actually want
Speaker 1: to accomplish and how usable that is. Yeah, And I
Speaker 1: don't know what is what is like when you think
Speaker 1: of a of a of kind of an ideal browser solution,
Speaker 1: because right like tour is a is a whole thing
Speaker 1: as opposed to just like grabbing Chrome or Firefox. It's
Speaker 1: it's it's more involved of a process to use. What
Speaker 1: do you think, like what when when you're kind of
Speaker 1: like recommending like what people should do, kind of what
Speaker 1: is what is you're probably safe best practice in terms
Speaker 1: of just browsing. In terms of just browsing, I would say, no,
Speaker 1: the no, the sites that you're browsing, No, their privacy UM.
Speaker 1: You know, like you don't have to read the privacy UM.
Speaker 1: You know, in terms of conditions yourself, because it's usually
Speaker 1: in legalistic gobblegook um. What you can read articles about it.
Speaker 1: You can find out um, you know from somebody who knows,
Speaker 1: UM what those are and how they change. You have
Speaker 1: to update that, so you know, they update their terms
Speaker 1: of service sometimes every six months. I know that some
Speaker 1: companies do this more frequently and they don't notify you.
Speaker 1: They and they'll they'll notify you that it's been changed
Speaker 1: like three months ago, you know, like so you know,
Speaker 1: you gotta you gotta keep on top of it. UM
Speaker 1: and then UM, you know we're you know just sort
Speaker 1: of like no. I mean, another big thing is is
Speaker 1: password hygiene. You know you've got to use. I mean,
Speaker 1: I always recommend using a password manager, like the most
Speaker 1: basic people should use a strong password manager UM that
Speaker 1: generates you know, specific passwords for specific accounts UM. Because
Speaker 1: nobody nobody can memorize no, no, no, nobody can memorize
Speaker 1: like I I think I have like nine d passwords
Speaker 1: that I use on a regular basis, but only I
Speaker 1: only memorize like three or four, you know, for my
Speaker 1: one for my device, um, one from each specific device,
Speaker 1: and then another for the pastor manager itself. So you know,
Speaker 1: you know it just it just mostly you know, those
Speaker 1: are basics. So everyone should be doing those things. They aren't,
Speaker 1: but you should, you know, even if you're even if
Speaker 1: you are you you your uh your political views are
Speaker 1: that you know bridge brittan nity spears should be freed, uh,
Speaker 1: you know if it if you're not facing like an
Speaker 1: existential threat from your from like a you know, fascist
Speaker 1: dictator you know, or or a police state that you
Speaker 1: know is discriminating against you know, a particular class of
Speaker 1: group of people, then you should be doing these things anyway,
Speaker 1: you know, even though they would help you in that situation.
Speaker 1: You should be doing these things baseline and um. Okay,
Speaker 1: so outside of just kind of like browsing protection, right, like,
Speaker 1: let's let's say, uh, that's not your primary word. Let's
Speaker 1: say you're worried about being kind of like physically surveiled
Speaker 1: um or physically followed, having your your your space, having
Speaker 1: someone inter it UM, and uh, you know potentially even
Speaker 1: when you're not there. What are kind of the physical
Speaker 1: security measures that that you think are kind of accessible,
Speaker 1: you know, without getting James Bond about it and buying
Speaker 1: a bunch of bugs. Like we're talking kind of low tech,
Speaker 1: low cost things that a person could deploy kind of
Speaker 1: in the moment if they suddenly start to worry that
Speaker 1: they're being targeted for that sort of thing. Right, So,
Speaker 1: in terms of physical surveillance and protection, UM, there's again
Speaker 1: you know, a ladder in terms of what you can
Speaker 1: do and what you should do. UM. Some basic things
Speaker 1: are put us put a strong alpha numeric password onto
Speaker 1: your phone. UM, even if you have uh, you know,
Speaker 1: your facial recognition or your your touch feature enabled, UM,
Speaker 1: your biometrics enabled. UM, maintain physical possession of your phone.
Speaker 1: Have a strong password. And then if you're in an
Speaker 1: environment where you feel it that you're at risk, know
Speaker 1: how to disable the biometric feature. For instance, you know
Speaker 1: with my phone, the iPhone twelve, you have to hold
Speaker 1: down to buttons for five seconds. UM. You know it's
Speaker 1: the it's the top, it's the up volume button and
Speaker 1: the power button. If you hold those two down for
Speaker 1: five seconds, Uh, it automatically locks the biometric featricks features,
Speaker 1: which don't have the same protections um as. I mean,
Speaker 1: they don't have the same for legal protections as your password.
Speaker 1: And you know, you you you can't be forced and
Speaker 1: even if you even if you are in a place
Speaker 1: where they can force you to do so, you know,
Speaker 1: they can't just hold up your phone or you know,
Speaker 1: put your finger right onto your device. UM have UH
Speaker 1: encrypt your phones, like ensure that you have hardware encryption
Speaker 1: on your Apple on your But you know, I always
Speaker 1: recommend like iPhones, UH in particular for people, not because
Speaker 1: androids are bad or anything. It's just that, you know,
Speaker 1: the type of encryption that it uses is baked into
Speaker 1: the hardware as opposed to UM into the software. You know.
Speaker 1: And I know there's this whole debate over and you
Speaker 1: know Android, you know, Apple being able to dig crypt
Speaker 1: phones and and and things like that. But I mean,
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, an Android phone is
Speaker 1: one hundred thousand times easier to break into than an
Speaker 1: Apple phone, UM, just by virtue of the fact that
Speaker 1: UH it has hardware encryption and it's baked right into
Speaker 1: the device. UH. And UM android phones use U use
Speaker 1: software which is a type of software that is crackable. Um.
Speaker 1: You know. Uh, and it's the type that's not used
Speaker 1: on like a Linux computer you know crypt set up
Speaker 1: so um and yeah. So as you're moving up the
Speaker 1: ladder in terms of like physical surf alience, um, by
Speaker 1: somebody who's following you, Um, there's this uh. There there
Speaker 1: are ways in which you can detect that because you know,
Speaker 1: you can be paranoid and you can be like, okay,
Speaker 1: is this person following Well, but you know, there's things
Speaker 1: that you can do. You know, you can alter your route.
Speaker 1: You can alter the patterns of where and how you
Speaker 1: are moving. Um. For instance, if you go to the
Speaker 1: coffee shop at three pm every day, at the same
Speaker 1: time every weekday that you go to your you know,
Speaker 1: wherever you go, um, change it up, you know, like
Speaker 1: don't don't go to that coffee shop one day, or
Speaker 1: go to a different coffee shop, or you know, change
Speaker 1: up the pattern of how you go, like you know,
Speaker 1: go down this street, you know, mix mix it up
Speaker 1: a bit. Um. If you are active, if you believe
Speaker 1: that you are actively being surrealed, you can do what's
Speaker 1: called a surveillance detection route, which is where you alter
Speaker 1: your path uh to a predesignated UM bottleneck where no
Speaker 1: other person where there's no there's no way of like
Speaker 1: there's not like three passes a place, there's a bottleneck
Speaker 1: like a bridge or a tunnel or an alleyway that
Speaker 1: UM you would have to go through UM if you
Speaker 1: are being followed, and then you can detect and confirm
Speaker 1: that you are in fact being followed by by by
Speaker 1: an individual. And physical surveillance is typically not done by
Speaker 1: an individual. Obviously in the case of like a stalker,
Speaker 1: it maybe, but UM if if if it's like a
Speaker 1: law enforcement agency or an intelligence agency or even like
Speaker 1: a paramilitary you know, militia group, UM, typically they're going
Speaker 1: to use UH two typically at least three or more
Speaker 1: UM people too that are in communication with each other.
Speaker 1: And then that's another thing you can look for is
Speaker 1: do they have radios? Do they have earpieces? Are they
Speaker 1: wearing clothing that would um hide uh the fact that
Speaker 1: they're wearing a radio for instance, or you know, and
Speaker 1: all that also goes for like firearms, right, you know,
Speaker 1: if they're wearing a baggy clothing UM or a suit
Speaker 1: that uh is a little ill fitting, it's a little
Speaker 1: too much then they may be trying to hide, um,
Speaker 1: some bolts or something. Somebody who's in a tight fitting
Speaker 1: leotard is probably not surveilling you. And um. One of
Speaker 1: the things that kind of I always have in mind
Speaker 1: when I'm at like a hotel or you know, an
Speaker 1: airbnb or whatever in a strange place, if I am
Speaker 1: concerned about like being followed, is trying to set up
Speaker 1: little um, little catches. Uh yeah, tell tales, Um, would
Speaker 1: you talk about that a little bit? So tell tales
Speaker 1: and there's new there's the hundreds of methods of doing
Speaker 1: these things. They're little, so sometimes they can be um.
Speaker 1: Sometimes they can be simple things like setting a book
Speaker 1: or an item on top of something or in front
Speaker 1: of something at a particular angle and that angle maybe
Speaker 1: you know, you can take a picture of it, or
Speaker 1: you can mark the angle of that particular item. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, something that that you know you would that
Speaker 1: you would not think, you know, you would just be like, okay,
Speaker 1: here's an item that's in the way, and you might
Speaker 1: move that if you are trying to surreptitiously enter into something. Um,
Speaker 1: And then they would put it back, but they wouldn't
Speaker 1: put it back quite in the same way right. So
Speaker 1: if they if they don't see the tell tale the
Speaker 1: fact that it's a tell tale, UM, they may they
Speaker 1: they may it may be like completely off right. UM.
Speaker 1: There's also things that you can do in terms of
Speaker 1: like having seals UM. You know, I tend to keep um,
Speaker 1: you know, evidence tape, which is difficult to break and
Speaker 1: serialize that evidence tape at that UM to know that
Speaker 1: you know that it has a particular serial number on it.
Speaker 1: UM to be able to detect whether an item has
Speaker 1: been broken into UM or that you know that seal
Speaker 1: has been broken into and that would be very difficult.
Speaker 1: I mean it's possible, but it would take You would
Speaker 1: be talking about the resources of of a very sophisticated
Speaker 1: state actor with an enormous amount of planning, an enormous
Speaker 1: amount of intelligence gathering to be able to replicate um
Speaker 1: that uh, that seal has been broken UM. And there's
Speaker 1: simple things like you know, using using tape and spaghetti,
Speaker 1: you know like drive spaghetti like prety like pre cooks spaghetti.
Speaker 1: Something that would break if you know a door is
Speaker 1: open or something. Literally that photo of the cheeto over
Speaker 1: the door latch, Yeah, I think that's from that that's
Speaker 1: that's from death note right, I don't know. Actually, you know,
Speaker 1: you and I talk pretty regularly. At one thing you
Speaker 1: you've kind of are constantly going over in your head
Speaker 1: is kind of different potential uh risk scenarios you see happening. Um.
Speaker 1: You spend a lot of time thinking about what might happen,
Speaker 1: um and what the what the best response would be
Speaker 1: in that situation. Yeah, And and there's a lot of
Speaker 1: precedent for most most things. Most things are typically a
Speaker 1: lot of precedent. You know, it may not be because
Speaker 1: I mean, like for instance, the US. You know, there
Speaker 1: may be situations or you know, things that are that
Speaker 1: have that have happened in the past, um but not recently,
Speaker 1: or things that um have happened internationally that have not
Speaker 1: happened recently in the US that you can look to
Speaker 1: as a as a as a corollarya or an example.
Speaker 1: So yeah, what do you I mean when it when
Speaker 1: it comes to kind of threats you see for let's say,
Speaker 1: people who are activists, community organizers, who have you know,
Speaker 1: had their face published as part of an anti fascist
Speaker 1: gathering or whatever. When you think about like crackdown concerns, UM,
Speaker 1: what are kind of the what are kind of what
Speaker 1: are the potentialities that kind of run through your head
Speaker 1: is as kind of likely narrative events that that could happen,
Speaker 1: and then kind of what you see is the best
Speaker 1: reactions to those, right, So you know, I I mostly
Speaker 1: focus on, UM, either the basics or the worst case scenario.
Speaker 1: So obviously there's that that step ladder, right, you know,
Speaker 1: So I am always thinking about, UM, you know, the
Speaker 1: basics of you know, okay, what happens if I have
Speaker 1: been docked? Right? You know, the vast majority of people
Speaker 1: that come to me for assistance tend to be people
Speaker 1: who are afraid of being docked or who have already
Speaker 1: been docked. UM. Doxing is the this is I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm I'll just explain it real fast. You know.
Speaker 1: Doxing is whenever either your face, your your identity, UM who,
Speaker 1: what your name is, your age, your location, who your
Speaker 1: family is, your associations have been revealed and pulp and
Speaker 1: shared with a threat group or a large group of
Speaker 1: people who may who who could potentially gather this information
Speaker 1: and be and and use it as a threat against you, UM,
Speaker 1: you know, to to harass you, to show up at
Speaker 1: your house to UM find you in a crowd, um,
Speaker 1: and to attack you, or to harass you, or to
Speaker 1: you know, um, discourage an employer from working with you
Speaker 1: and whatnot. Um. And so you know, they're like unfortunately,
Speaker 1: once they're docs, it's kind of hard to it's it's
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's a it's a it's an edge
Speaker 1: ropy cut kind of thing. Like it's it's you. You
Speaker 1: can break it, you know, like you you can. You can.
Speaker 1: Once you make an omelet out of eggs, it's very
Speaker 1: hard to make that the eggs back into an omelet, right, So, UM,
Speaker 1: you've got to kind of start over after you've already
Speaker 1: been docks and start from scratch in terms of like
Speaker 1: how to protect yourself. And you'll never have the same
Speaker 1: level of protection as you did if you hadn't been
Speaker 1: docks in the first place. And that's that's the unfortunate reality. Um,
Speaker 1: the kinds of things that you you can try to do. Obviously,
Speaker 1: you know, if you were in a crowd where um
Speaker 1: you may be docked, you know, where some kind of
Speaker 1: face face covering or protection. You know, obviously we're in
Speaker 1: a pandemic, so you know, uh, you know, masks makes
Speaker 1: sense these days. Um. Another situation or another thing that
Speaker 1: you can do is you can just avoid being in
Speaker 1: the main group of a crowd or in the front
Speaker 1: line of a crowd like that. You know, it's sometimes
Speaker 1: it's just as simple as just not being where the
Speaker 1: cameras are as well, like being aware of where cameras are,
Speaker 1: where people who are maybe what you know, like documenting
Speaker 1: things are and avoiding those locations. I personally tend to
Speaker 1: be around the journalist gaggle myself because that way I
Speaker 1: see where the cameras are pointed, because I'm behind them
Speaker 1: as opposed to in front of them. So that's my
Speaker 1: own personal little trick to not being um captured on
Speaker 1: film or on camera. Um, you know, if if I'm
Speaker 1: at an event. Uh, so you know, Uh, this is
Speaker 1: something as simple as that, as just sort of knowing
Speaker 1: your angles and knowing you know, who's watching and and
Speaker 1: things like that, and then uh, don't put out your address,
Speaker 1: don't give out your address, and you know, like do
Speaker 1: surveillance detect you know, do surveillance detection routes when you
Speaker 1: go home or when you're leaving, you know, for a
Speaker 1: high risk event or activity. Um and um, you know,
Speaker 1: just the more that you think about it. The more
Speaker 1: and the more the questions that you ask, the better
Speaker 1: off you are you tend to be. And um, I
Speaker 1: think that a lot of people get very focused on
Speaker 1: their phones as well as opposed to like simple things
Speaker 1: like their faces and um, their interactions and how they
Speaker 1: how they address and how they look in a crowd. Um,
Speaker 1: there's this concept called the great person concept. Um prep
Speaker 1: you know, prepper, the preper community tends to degenerate, right
Speaker 1: and the man yeah, yeah, and you know like, okay,
Speaker 1: so I'll wait on that. No no, no, no, go
Speaker 1: ahead and explain it, and then I'll talk about because
Speaker 1: I think there's a there's a difference between the wisdom
Speaker 1: and the concept and also how idiots tend to adopt it.
Speaker 1: So I'll chat about that after you introduce it. Right, So,
Speaker 1: the great person concept, in my mind, it tends to
Speaker 1: be a way of you know, just sort of blending
Speaker 1: into a crowd, you know, or into an environment. Right.
Speaker 1: You know, if you are in a small town in
Speaker 1: a rural area, you know, dress like look, look how
Speaker 1: other people dress. You know, if you show up you
Speaker 1: know wearing a wearing a bright colored you know, um
Speaker 1: jacket with brand names on it and a beanie cap.
Speaker 1: You'll probably be recognizable even by people who are not
Speaker 1: looking for you. They'll there will be people who will
Speaker 1: be like, that person looks out of place, and then
Speaker 1: they can go come back in their member or and
Speaker 1: be like, you know, if somebody asks questions them, they'll
Speaker 1: be like, oh, yeah, I remember the person in the
Speaker 1: orange Nike jacket wearing a red cap. You know. Um.
Speaker 1: The great person concept is about avoiding that just being
Speaker 1: being unrememberable, unrecognizable in in a crowd an environment like that.
Speaker 1: You know. Um, I have I have names for what
Speaker 1: I do. Like I have my I have my my
Speaker 1: soccer mom vibe. I have my you know for for
Speaker 1: the suburbs. I have my business attire vibe for when
Speaker 1: I'm in an urban area. I have, um, you know,
Speaker 1: my street I have my street clothing, you know, for
Speaker 1: if I'm out a protest or at a march of
Speaker 1: some variety. Um. And and then you know, if I'm
Speaker 1: out in the rural areas, you know, I've got my
Speaker 1: I've got my jeans, We've got my belt buckle, and
Speaker 1: I've got my uh, I've got my plaid, my plaid
Speaker 1: for shirt, right, you know. So it's you know, and
Speaker 1: with a little bit of cama, right, you know, Like
Speaker 1: it depends on your environment. But you know, some basics
Speaker 1: are no bright, avoid bright colors, um, avoid branding unless
Speaker 1: everybody else is wearing the same branding. So if you're
Speaker 1: at a sport, if you're if you're in a college town,
Speaker 1: you know, and you have the mascot of the mascot
Speaker 1: of that team is everywhere, then it makes sense, um
Speaker 1: to have a jacket that has that sports team color
Speaker 1: on it, you know, or that or that mascot on it, um.
Speaker 1: You know. So it's about it. It's it's it's juggling.
Speaker 1: It's an adjustment, and no situation is the same. Like
Speaker 1: this idea that there there's this one great person outfit
Speaker 1: is kind of absurd. And uh, I think a lot
Speaker 1: a lot of a lot of a lot of a
Speaker 1: lot of a lot of people who do this stuff.
Speaker 1: They tend to like buy the most tactical stuff like
Speaker 1: don't wear don't we don't wear tactical gear and Hawaiian shirts,
Speaker 1: you know, in the middle of in the middle of
Speaker 1: in the middle of like upstate New York for instance. Right,
Speaker 1: you're gonna stay, You're gonna stand out. So the gray
Speaker 1: man in a it's usually referred to in like kind
Speaker 1: of the tactical prepper community is like gray man um
Speaker 1: has has turned into its its whole fashioned brand, which
Speaker 1: is like literally the opposite of the point. The point
Speaker 1: is that like nothing about you would stand out in
Speaker 1: a crowd um. But people have this like if you,
Speaker 1: if you're, if you're, if you, if you're like me,
Speaker 1: and you talk about guns at all on social media,
Speaker 1: you get a bunch of targeted ads for like specific
Speaker 1: backpacks that are meant to carry entire rifles and have
Speaker 1: like body armor panels in them, and like yeah, hoodies
Speaker 1: with gun holsters, and we know it and we see it.
Speaker 1: So if we if we're you know, I I can
Speaker 1: tell if I wileven tactical bag from mile away. You know,
Speaker 1: I I own them a car, I own my own
Speaker 1: good bags. I carry good bags. But the idea that
Speaker 1: the idea that a threat, that that a potential threat
Speaker 1: isn't going to immediately recognize those brands, uh, those brands
Speaker 1: of bags and those foreign factors of bags and jackets
Speaker 1: and pants is absurd. You know, any law enforcement person
Speaker 1: is going to know, you know, any law enforcement or
Speaker 1: intelligence or paramilitary group is going to be able to
Speaker 1: be like I know that, I know those pants. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you'd be much more useful to basically Jerry Jerry your
Speaker 1: own of these scenarios kind of like what booster Begs
Speaker 1: used to be brands that like seldom now, which is like, no,
Speaker 1: that's not the point of Yeah, that's not the thing.
Speaker 1: If you want, if you want, if you want strong,
Speaker 1: sturdy wear, then go for the tactical stuff. But if
Speaker 1: you're trying to do the great person concept, go to target. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: like the the the way it's been taken by like
Speaker 1: the prepper tactical communities. You have to like dress like
Speaker 1: Jason Bourne, right, and like so everybody who winds up
Speaker 1: doing gray Man in that community woinds up looking like
Speaker 1: a federal agent. Right. They have like the cargo pants
Speaker 1: and they've got like yeah, but if everyone can see you,
Speaker 1: But if you're in Northern Virginia, that is the great person.
Speaker 1: Like if you are if you're in the country, dress
Speaker 1: like a fed for sure. Um. But if you're smaller, yeah,
Speaker 1: and there's even like smaller simple things like my I
Speaker 1: have a friend who is decently good at like this
Speaker 1: great person concept I don't think he uses that term,
Speaker 1: but he teaches stealth classes at a park ordium. I
Speaker 1: used to go at um And one of the main
Speaker 1: things that gets talked about is like even like controlling
Speaker 1: where your eyes are and controlling where your head is
Speaker 1: is super useful for trying to do that. Like if
Speaker 1: you're like looking around always, if always parked up, if
Speaker 1: you're trying, if you're like very focused on things, people
Speaker 1: are gonna pay attention to you. If if you keep
Speaker 1: your head down, if you keep your body kind of
Speaker 1: slouched of people's eyes graze over you so so much more. Yeah,
Speaker 1: be the loser kid in the hallway and be the
Speaker 1: good to a grocery store, and like watch the moms right,
Speaker 1: like watch the kind of clothing they're wearing, or like
Speaker 1: watch you know, dad's with their kids. Like watch people
Speaker 1: who normally you would just kind of like, oh, these
Speaker 1: are just other people around in the world. Um and
Speaker 1: and and dress like those people like they don't. That
Speaker 1: doesn't attract much in the way of attention. Like you
Speaker 1: you are, you are being less of a gray man
Speaker 1: if you're wearing the specific gun concealing tactical pants. Then
Speaker 1: if you're wearing I don't know, sweat pants and a
Speaker 1: flannel you know, like just just just like think about
Speaker 1: how people actually dress in the world and go like
Speaker 1: part of effectively doing that is actually paying attention. It's
Speaker 1: like Chelsea said, if you live in a place where
Speaker 1: like every third person as a government contractor, then yeah,
Speaker 1: maybe maybe go with the khakis and the polo and whatever, like, right,
Speaker 1: Like that's that maybe your best bet, um, But if
Speaker 1: you're in Williamsburg or whatever you're going to have, there's
Speaker 1: going to be different clothing that isn't going to like
Speaker 1: arouse any suspicion, right, And you know, you know, you
Speaker 1: we you all often saw this as an example, you
Speaker 1: know from my own military background. You know, you would
Speaker 1: see this with um, with special forces, right, the special
Speaker 1: operators would come in wearing you know, and come into
Speaker 1: a village wearing just decked out in tactical gear with
Speaker 1: their beer, with their beards and their um and their schmods, right,
Speaker 1: and you know, of course, of course they stand out, right,
Speaker 1: you know it it's the idea that they were that
Speaker 1: they were secret or that they were invisible is you know,
Speaker 1: they may they may fit into the culture and they
Speaker 1: may look cool, but they you know, a true operator,
Speaker 1: uh is not going to do those things. I mean,
Speaker 1: at least one who is who is actually trying to
Speaker 1: do the great person concept. Yeah, and it's um it
Speaker 1: kind of dovetails into one of the other things I
Speaker 1: think is the dumbest thing you see on kind of
Speaker 1: like the prepper whatever, right, is like open carry, which
Speaker 1: is like, you can't get further from this concept than
Speaker 1: than visibly carrying a weapon. Um, which if your your goal,
Speaker 1: and it always should be in a violent situation, yeah,
Speaker 1: it should be, it should be concealed, but X yeah,
Speaker 1: if if you're carrying a firearm. But in general, um,
Speaker 1: there's there's a concept within kind of like the military
Speaker 1: and people who like particularly within kind of like special
Speaker 1: forces of it's called the onion of survivability, and the
Speaker 1: basic idea, you know, it's a it's a diagram of
Speaker 1: an onion that's supposed to kind of explain to you
Speaker 1: the different things you can do that make you more
Speaker 1: survivable in a gunfight or another dangerous situation, and stuff
Speaker 1: like having body armor is the tiniest part of the
Speaker 1: onion because if body armor is useful to you, a
Speaker 1: number of things have gone wrong because you've been shot. Like,
Speaker 1: it's not the worst case scenario, but it's the second
Speaker 1: worst case scenario. The things that protect you most are
Speaker 1: not having body armor, they're not being seen, if you
Speaker 1: are seen, not being acquired, which means not but not
Speaker 1: being seen, not being noticed. Not being targeted is by
Speaker 1: far like the biggest thing, um. And so if you
Speaker 1: know you are, wherever you are becomes a markedly more
Speaker 1: dangerous place, whether you specifically you're targeted or if there's
Speaker 1: just a lot of random violence going on, your best
Speaker 1: bet for safety is always going to be not being targeted. Um.
Speaker 1: And obviously there's no perfectly doing that right as you know,
Speaker 1: we've all seen enough stories of mass shootings where the
Speaker 1: victim is a bunch of kids in a fucking elementary school.
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to like victim blame people who do
Speaker 1: get targeted, but there are things that you can do
Speaker 1: to make it less likely that you'll be targeted, because
Speaker 1: anyone looking to do well there there's you know, there
Speaker 1: are there are also things that you can't do, like,
Speaker 1: you know, like you can't change that, you can't choose
Speaker 1: the color of his skin, you can't the language that
Speaker 1: you speak. You know, and these are these are things
Speaker 1: that the proper community just don't take into effect. It's
Speaker 1: always it's always a white it's always a white dude, right,
Speaker 1: you know, uh, you know, and I'm me being a
Speaker 1: FIM presenting trans person, right, My outfits tend to lean
Speaker 1: towards something that is non threatening in a in a
Speaker 1: great person situation. And that's why I have my sort
Speaker 1: of uh my soccer mom, get up right, you know
Speaker 1: which is you know, it's the kind of thing where
Speaker 1: you know, you wouldn't notice me in a in in
Speaker 1: a in a Walmart, right, you know it's I'm not
Speaker 1: wearing you know, I'm not wearing boots, I'm not wearing
Speaker 1: you know, fancy clothes. I'm not wearing. You know. It's
Speaker 1: it's it's stuff that you get at Target. It's and
Speaker 1: it's like faded clothe It's it's it's faded clothing that
Speaker 1: maybe like one that's been worn a bit, but you know, uh,
Speaker 1: neutral neutral tones of clothing. Um, you know, a bag,
Speaker 1: you know, just what fits for that particular environment, right,
Speaker 1: you know, and and who you are, it will affect that.
Speaker 1: You know, if you have brown skin, you are not
Speaker 1: going to be able to dress up the same way
Speaker 1: as you would in West Texas. Like you're not going
Speaker 1: to be able to blend in, um the same way
Speaker 1: that a that a white you know, guy in a
Speaker 1: cowboy in a you know, in a gallon sized cowboy hat,
Speaker 1: it is able to do. I would like to talk
Speaker 1: about something that was brought up a lot last year,
Speaker 1: mostly towards the end of the protests, with stuff like
Speaker 1: sell Bright and Pegasus UM. Oh boy, Yeah, the the
Speaker 1: the ms I catchers or whatever they are, the phone
Speaker 1: hacking slash phone cloning UM. Specifically, those two brands boast
Speaker 1: for their abilities two break into Apple phones, both from
Speaker 1: a distance and you know when once the phone is
Speaker 1: actually like once they have physical possession of the phone. UM.
Speaker 1: And you know, this freaked out a lot of people
Speaker 1: and people, you know, there's a lot of people when
Speaker 1: they go to demos they're talking about like not not
Speaker 1: bringing your phone, which can be very very useful for
Speaker 1: a lot of ways, but for some people it is
Speaker 1: and it is it is a necessity, um, because they
Speaker 1: need for for various reasons, they needed to like get
Speaker 1: around and can get in contact with certain people. UM.
Speaker 1: So what are good security things to kind of get
Speaker 1: in the habit of if you need to have your
Speaker 1: phone at places and you are thinking of these types
Speaker 1: of raiance technologies. You know, it's stuff like our our
Speaker 1: Faraday begs useful are are a certain dance better than others?
Speaker 1: What are like? I know, there's there's a lot of
Speaker 1: like grifting in this kind of sphere online as well.
Speaker 1: If people could like make these like you know, security
Speaker 1: type of things, you know, to protect yourself. There's a
Speaker 1: lot of like dubious websites claiming that they can protect you. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: how how would one go about, well, at first to
Speaker 1: give if you give, if you would be able to
Speaker 1: explain what celebrate is? Um, and like what what would
Speaker 1: people can do too? Well? Yeah, to try to prevent
Speaker 1: some of the worst effects. So there are a number
Speaker 1: of tools that law enforcement and forensics UM offices use. Um,
Speaker 1: they're not as good as the intelligence agencies. You know,
Speaker 1: I think people just jumped immediately to the n s
Speaker 1: A because of the Stone leaks. UM. You know, your
Speaker 1: biggest threat groups are actually going to be much lower
Speaker 1: tier if if you're pro tester UM, since those are
Speaker 1: those those methods tend to be reserved for the most
Speaker 1: uh um for the most extreme cases, you know, not
Speaker 1: anything involving like large math casualty incidents, national security, or
Speaker 1: you know, foreign foreign states. Right, if you're a protester
Speaker 1: on the street, UM, your biggest threat group is going
Speaker 1: to be your local law enforcement and your local federal
Speaker 1: eight federal agencies in the US UM, and the methods
Speaker 1: that they use are going to be these these tools
Speaker 1: called you know they're there are different brands. There are
Speaker 1: different brands for it UM. There are different there are
Speaker 1: different methods UM. You know for MZ catching, which is
Speaker 1: an older methods UM for uh, you know, capturing your
Speaker 1: location both your location uh and uh what you know,
Speaker 1: any text messages that you're doing over SMS UM can
Speaker 1: be just sort of grabbed out of the air um uh.
Speaker 1: If you're using a data plan UM, you know, like
Speaker 1: just tend to you know, your your your stuff is
Speaker 1: gonna be at a higher level of encryption, so you
Speaker 1: want to keep your If you are going to use
Speaker 1: your communications using cryptic communications, I highly recommend signal UM.
Speaker 1: There are a number of problems with WhatsApp, there's a
Speaker 1: number of problems with Telegram. There's another number of problems
Speaker 1: with all these different applications. They will they will provide
Speaker 1: you some level of protection. But but signal I think
Speaker 1: is just the most is just the safest and the
Speaker 1: most reliable, But it also is it perfect. And there
Speaker 1: are going to be situations where where you know, using
Speaker 1: signal fails. Um I you know, I can think of
Speaker 1: a number of situations where signal in particular failed on
Speaker 1: Android devices that were physics that physical possession was obtained
Speaker 1: by a law enforcement agency and they were able to
Speaker 1: even see disappeared messages. And that that brings us back
Speaker 1: a little bit to the turning off. You know, the
Speaker 1: thing that is often recommended for protesters. Turn off biometrics
Speaker 1: if you're going, if you're bringing your phone to a protest,
Speaker 1: which is not ideal, turn off biometrics, and uh, turn
Speaker 1: off like visible notifications, so like when they aren't popping
Speaker 1: up with people's names and all the contents of the message,
Speaker 1: because then I don't need to break into the phone.
Speaker 1: They could just watch your screen. Yeah yeah, yeah exactly,
Speaker 1: Um yeah, Put it and do not disturb. Stick it
Speaker 1: in the Faraday bag. Put the Faraday bag in one
Speaker 1: of your holes. Turn off your phone importantly if you're
Speaker 1: if you put it, if if you have a fairity bag.
Speaker 1: There's no there's no point if you put your bag
Speaker 1: into a fairy if you put your if you have
Speaker 1: your cell phone not on airplane mode and it's on
Speaker 1: the data, it's on the cell network, and it's and
Speaker 1: you know it's pinging, and you've got bars, and you
Speaker 1: leave it on and you put it into a fairity bag,
Speaker 1: you may as well. You may as well just be
Speaker 1: in an elevator at that point, because that's the best
Speaker 1: protection you're going to get. You can double wrap it,
Speaker 1: but actually physically like turn it off into completely off
Speaker 1: where you actually have to turn it on if you're
Speaker 1: going to put it into a fairity bag, because you
Speaker 1: are reducing the purpose on the level of protection that
Speaker 1: you have. And I know a number of people who
Speaker 1: have made this mistake where they think, oh, my my
Speaker 1: phone is safe because it's an a fairity bag. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, you have, you are muffling your you're you're
Speaker 1: getting one bar, but you're you're still if somebody is
Speaker 1: close enough and they have if they have, if they're
Speaker 1: physically close enough, they can still MC catch, they can
Speaker 1: still identify you, and your phone is automatically going to
Speaker 1: try to transmit harder and and use up more battery power.
Speaker 1: So it's it's even a risk in terms of like
Speaker 1: you know, just soaking sucking up all the juice out
Speaker 1: of out of your battery as quickly as possible, you know,
Speaker 1: by putting it in there, and it's not it's not off. Um.
Speaker 1: And yeah, I think that turning off your phone and
Speaker 1: keep putting it into a fairity bag is the best
Speaker 1: is the best compromise for not bringing your phone at all. Um.
Speaker 1: That's what I tend to do, is I turn off
Speaker 1: my phone, put it into a feririty bag, dig it
Speaker 1: into my bag, and then if I need it, I
Speaker 1: can pull it out and I keep my phone on
Speaker 1: airplane mode and use you know, like whatever WiFi services
Speaker 1: there are with a V Like. These are things that
Speaker 1: I do if I'm if I'm in a situation like that. Um.
Speaker 1: One thing that's been on my mind more and more,
Speaker 1: are you know, situations where which are more extreme and
Speaker 1: which are less of what we've been seeing for the
Speaker 1: last you know, decade or so. And what do you
Speaker 1: mean by that? Well, I mean what I mean is
Speaker 1: is imagine such a situations where, um, you know, the
Speaker 1: people in the United States haven't seen, haven't seen very
Speaker 1: often the full effects of the security establishment just unleashed, unshamped, right,
Speaker 1: Boomerang hasn't come all the way back around yet, right,
Speaker 1: so it has. It's just the people forgotten about situations
Speaker 1: where the government has unleashed its full potential, right you know, yeah, oh,
Speaker 1: even even bigger, like, you know, the biggest, the biggest
Speaker 1: example that I can think of is the Boston bombing,
Speaker 1: right where essentially West Boston and Cambridge and Watertown were
Speaker 1: turning to a we're turned into a military occupation, right
Speaker 1: where they were just worrelessly busting down doors using every
Speaker 1: single surveillance method you know, and and just you know,
Speaker 1: somebody you know push the you know, somebody in Washington
Speaker 1: pushed the button and said we're going to you know,
Speaker 1: unleash the full potential, you know, And it was it
Speaker 1: was over two guys you know who and and who
Speaker 1: murdered a couple of people you know, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: and more people have done more, more people have died
Speaker 1: in some of these protests than you know than they
Speaker 1: killed and injured in that bombing. So, you know, like
Speaker 1: the government has the option and the choice to fully
Speaker 1: unleash its full potential. And those are the kinds of
Speaker 1: situations that I've been trying to sort of threaten model
Speaker 1: for its situations that are more extreme and that are
Speaker 1: that we haven't really encountered before. Um, you know, what,
Speaker 1: what happens whenever you know, warrants don't mean anything. What
Speaker 1: happens whever you know, like what happens whenever you have
Speaker 1: a blend, a hybridized blend between a para between whether
Speaker 1: you know, you can't tell whether it's a whether it's
Speaker 1: a paramilitary street gang, or if it's a or if
Speaker 1: it's a legitimate law enforcement agency. You know, like and
Speaker 1: something that happened to people in Oregon last year with
Speaker 1: the checkpoints during fire season, where there were folks who
Speaker 1: looked almost indistinguishable from cops in in their body armor
Speaker 1: and guns, checking people for driving into certain towns. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a mild version of the thing you're talking about.
Speaker 1: But like this isn't you know, this isn't uh what
Speaker 1: what you're modeling is like five minutes ahead. It's not
Speaker 1: a not a huge leap. Yeah, So you know in
Speaker 1: those kinds of situations, you know, Um, your threat models
Speaker 1: are going to change for everyone, right, you know in
Speaker 1: that instance, you know, um, you may not have Internet access,
Speaker 1: it may be shut down, it may be restricted, right,
Speaker 1: you know, So a lot of those things, a lot
Speaker 1: of those resources that I was suggesting before in terms
Speaker 1: of protecting yourself are you know, uh are for situations
Speaker 1: where you have a somewhat functioning you know, liberal society
Speaker 1: and government, right with with with some norms and protections, right,
Speaker 1: But if those norms and protections are eroded to a
Speaker 1: to a certain point, or they are removed, then you
Speaker 1: need to start look thinking about like the kinds of
Speaker 1: methods that are used by more extreme situation and more
Speaker 1: extreme situations such as in conflict zones like where you were,
Speaker 1: you might not use your cell phone at all. You
Speaker 1: may only use a laptop you know that is disconnected
Speaker 1: from the Internet, and to do all of your things,
Speaker 1: you may have to physically carry you know, um USB
Speaker 1: devices to transfer information you may need. You know, your
Speaker 1: your your least concern may maybe showing out a p
Speaker 1: up at a protest, Your your your your primary motivation
Speaker 1: maybe to avoid all crowds at all. You know, in
Speaker 1: those kinds of situations, you know, you you know, and
Speaker 1: that's what what I've been talking about in terms of
Speaker 1: like threat modeling, you have to understand what your threat is,
Speaker 1: and that can change. You know, if you're a normally
Speaker 1: that can that can shoot up if you're in a
Speaker 1: situation where you're not sure who the actual governing authority is.
Speaker 1: I don't want to with this get to the place
Speaker 1: where we're like we're like trying to hunt people up
Speaker 1: or freak them out. Part of the point of like
Speaker 1: thinking about this stuff and and understanding, um, kind of
Speaker 1: the risks and what could happen and how to mitigate
Speaker 1: it is so that um, it's less freaky if something
Speaker 1: like it happens, and so that you're kind of prepared
Speaker 1: and understand what the possibilities are. UM. And I wonder
Speaker 1: kind of why you think we didn't hit things didn't
Speaker 1: go as like to the extent you're talking about, like
Speaker 1: what happens if this national security apparatus turns like it
Speaker 1: on fully and hits people kind of like full in
Speaker 1: the face. Where do you think that didn't happen last year? So?
Speaker 1: I think it didn't happen last year because you know,
Speaker 1: the it was it wasn't it was too big of
Speaker 1: a protest movement for the government to to try to
Speaker 1: suppress fully. Um, and it would lead the backlash. And
Speaker 1: also it wasn't it wasn't enough of a threat to
Speaker 1: the order of things, so to speak, um for it
Speaker 1: to be for that level of you know, of extreme
Speaker 1: measures to be uh enacted and and and used. Right, Um,
Speaker 1: those are those those methods tend to be used for
Speaker 1: the most extreme situations in which the federal which the
Speaker 1: federal government in particular, not just the state of local authorities,
Speaker 1: The federal government feels that there is that there is
Speaker 1: a distinct threat. I mean obviously in the case of
Speaker 1: the Boston bombing, Um, they viewed, they viewed the you know,
Speaker 1: they they viewed that situation very differently than they do
Speaker 1: you know, a couple of thousand people protesting, you know. Um,
Speaker 1: it just it just has very very different Um, it
Speaker 1: has a very very different intent. What my concern is
Speaker 1: what happens when um, you know, local state and local
Speaker 1: authority is in a particular region or locality cease to function,
Speaker 1: you know, they just stop showing up. And what the
Speaker 1: federal government does in that situation, right you know, where
Speaker 1: you know, law enforcement decide actually we're we're gonna let
Speaker 1: you know, We're we're gonna let people murder each other,
Speaker 1: we don't care. You know. Um, we're gonna let We're
Speaker 1: gonna let paramilitary groups do policing operations, we don't care.
Speaker 1: You know. In that kind of situation, the federal government
Speaker 1: may step in, uh and assert its authority. You know,
Speaker 1: And it has happened before, you know, reconstruction. Um, you
Speaker 1: know where you know, there wasn't really a share. There
Speaker 1: weren't really sheriffs that you could go to in the South.
Speaker 1: So you know, the military essentially established its own court system,
Speaker 1: its own government. Um. So there is precedent, but it's
Speaker 1: never been used in the twenty one century high technology,
Speaker 1: high surveillance like you know, like the the Union Army
Speaker 1: in in South Carolina was not using drones, right. I
Speaker 1: wonder if the closest thing we've gotten to that sort
Speaker 1: of recently was during the La riots in the nineties
Speaker 1: because I mean, like ye know that they have to
Speaker 1: play the army there. I think we almost got that
Speaker 1: last summer, we did. Um. The problem the problem there,
Speaker 1: The problem is is that there there were it was
Speaker 1: happening in too many cities, and the federal the military
Speaker 1: only like people forget the military only has so many
Speaker 1: logistics that it can move at a time. Right, It
Speaker 1: actually takes time to move a division of true, right,
Speaker 1: you know, uh, you can move a brigade combat team
Speaker 1: in ninety six hours only because that that brigade combat
Speaker 1: team has been designated and has been trained for and
Speaker 1: been tooled up for six months to be able to
Speaker 1: do that. And it can only do that. It only
Speaker 1: has that capability for a year. Right. So A the
Speaker 1: idea that you can move multiple divisions of troops to
Speaker 1: a to multiple major cities, uh in a in the
Speaker 1: span of a week or a month, is is a reaching.
Speaker 1: You know, you have to pre stage that stuff. It
Speaker 1: takes time. It takes time to move this stuff, even
Speaker 1: even if you cut corners. You know, the redeployment in
Speaker 1: Afghanistan is about the speed that you're going to see
Speaker 1: a deployment within the United States of say, um the
Speaker 1: military or and that's essentially like a deployment to a
Speaker 1: city and as even in some ways kind of less
Speaker 1: than you would need because of the limited scope of
Speaker 1: the mission. If you were trying to like lockdown New
Speaker 1: York or Los Angeles, you can you can send you
Speaker 1: could send activity troops to Los Angeles. And two because
Speaker 1: it's it's limited to Los Angeles, you have a specific mission.
Speaker 1: You also have you know, there used to be a
Speaker 1: military base that was nearby, um, you know, not not
Speaker 1: nearby like you know probably in military terms like a
Speaker 1: three hour drive. You know you had you had, um
Speaker 1: what is it for Ordo uh in? Yeah, by Monterey
Speaker 1: you know if it was called basilone yet. But yeah,
Speaker 1: there's like Marine Corps training bases near San Diego. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so you know, like it it's feasible. Right. The idea
Speaker 1: that you can that you can do this in in
Speaker 1: what fifty sixty cities is you can't do it's we
Speaker 1: couldn't do it Iraq with troops. So you know, the
Speaker 1: best the best we could do was like deploy was deployed,
Speaker 1: was deploy a division here and there and play you
Speaker 1: know what John McCain called black Amole. Yeah. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: did ask the military to come to Portland. They just
Speaker 1: said no because they thought it would be a bad idea. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And where where where this Where wud this troops come from?
Speaker 1: What affiliate? You know, what kind of what kind of
Speaker 1: affiliation would they have? What kind of you know, um.
Speaker 1: National Guard to National Guard troops tend to reflect the
Speaker 1: sentiment of a slightly more right wing um, you know,
Speaker 1: version of the population. Maybe maybe the Overton window is
Speaker 1: a little bit more to the right, but not that much,
Speaker 1: you know, Yeah, they're not not certainly not as much
Speaker 1: as like cops. It's a much more mainstream chunk of
Speaker 1: the populace um, which is why when we did have
Speaker 1: National Guard in Portland, they were a lot less violent
Speaker 1: than the federal agents had been, or than the kind
Speaker 1: they're also green, you know, they're they don't have the
Speaker 1: They don't they have They haven't been inculcated or indoctrinated
Speaker 1: for years with this idea that we are we are
Speaker 1: here too occupy and to suppress right um. In this
Speaker 1: very it takes a while for that mindset to sort
Speaker 1: of set in. It did happen interack in Afghanistan. So
Speaker 1: it doesn't mean that troops can't won't won't gain that
Speaker 1: mindset if there's if there was a domestic occupation of
Speaker 1: some variety um from a federalization of troops, but it
Speaker 1: would it would start to kick in, and it wouldn't
Speaker 1: it wouldn't take It wouldn't take as long as you
Speaker 1: think maybe maybe maybe a few and maybe a few
Speaker 1: violent incidents, you know, before that mentality starts to to
Speaker 1: kick in. One other interesting thing to look at, like
Speaker 1: in terms of like how fast the apabis can be deployed.
Speaker 1: It's like in the days after January six, there was
Speaker 1: like a lot of people, um, we're getting doortalks in
Speaker 1: the FBI. Like there was a lot of there's a
Speaker 1: lot of people, like to the point where there was
Speaker 1: like bystanders who were just watching were like, the FBI
Speaker 1: should have at my house, and they said that they
Speaker 1: knew I was around January six, and they like they
Speaker 1: showed me on a map the actual spot where I
Speaker 1: was standing on the sidewalk, and like the FBI very
Speaker 1: quickly got tons of phone records. Yeah, that was like immediate,
Speaker 1: So like they don't always have them all the time,
Speaker 1: but they can get them very quickly whenever they watched too. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they were reaching out to so many people that like
Speaker 1: FBI agents whose job is not at all doing anything
Speaker 1: like that. Like everybody who was like not outsick for
Speaker 1: work was doing door knob knocks, Like people who were
Speaker 1: in completely different branches because they were they were they
Speaker 1: had gotten so many people's records, and they were just
Speaker 1: kind of flooding the zone. Yeah, which I think is
Speaker 1: less less about fact finding because I don't think I
Speaker 1: don't know how munch. I think it was less about
Speaker 1: fact finding and more about kind of a show of force,
Speaker 1: you know, the kind of force that the FBI does exert,
Speaker 1: which is information force primarily. Yeah, I mean that in
Speaker 1: presence you know the fact that they can knock on door.
Speaker 1: They can knock on your doors even though they met.
Speaker 1: There may not be actual purpose, you might not have information,
Speaker 1: but they don't care because the whole point is we
Speaker 1: knocked on your door, like we you know. Um that
Speaker 1: it won. Six was the second I mean, I was
Speaker 1: I think the largest investigation, I mean, which is quite
Speaker 1: something if you look at the fact that nine eleven
Speaker 1: was previously the largest investigation, Like nine eleven is now
Speaker 1: the second largest federal law enforcement investigation in US history,
Speaker 1: with one six being higher. Um, we did it, everybody,
Speaker 1: We beat bin Laden. Yeah, so you know, it's ladies
Speaker 1: and gentlemen, the capability exist. The capability exists a matter
Speaker 1: of of of of actually enabling those resources, you know.
Speaker 1: So um, and in that instance, it was for eighteen
Speaker 1: people in this instance, it was for several hundred, which
Speaker 1: is one of the reasons why it's scaled out. But
Speaker 1: the consequence of the consequences from lawn from from the
Speaker 1: federal agency's perspective of the of this investigation are different.
Speaker 1: Like I don't think anybody's gonna I don't think you're
Speaker 1: looking at a death penalty Guantanamo case. I guess one
Speaker 1: other thing that I wouldn't see if you think there's
Speaker 1: something you can take from it, which is that you know,
Speaker 1: if if you look at the response between like the
Speaker 1: people fighting outside the White House last summer and then
Speaker 1: January six, is that there there's kind of you get
Speaker 1: safety and numbers to some extent, Like it isn't always
Speaker 1: protect you know a lot of people, Like I mean,
Speaker 1: there's there's a bunch of FED or a bunch of
Speaker 1: FED raids in Atlanta at the end of last year,
Speaker 1: people who were involved in protest stuff. But yeah, like
Speaker 1: I guess it. You know, the the more unrest is happening,
Speaker 1: the more sort of but the harder it is for
Speaker 1: the crackdown to come. Yes, um, which is why they
Speaker 1: tend to hold that you know, UM security forces have
Speaker 1: it to. I mean, this is why I think it's
Speaker 1: very important if there is another uprising situation like last year. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, and I don't think I don't think. I
Speaker 1: don't think that they've I don't think that that that
Speaker 1: is that that is over. From their perspective. They are
Speaker 1: going to continue to do investigations into what happened in summer.
Speaker 1: You know, there are investigations still ongoing from the stuff
Speaker 1: that happened in sen you know, with Standing Rock. So
Speaker 1: you know, um, obviously you know, like the investigation in
Speaker 1: in my own in my own personal case in twenty
Speaker 1: ten seems to never end, right you know, so, uh,
Speaker 1: something happen, Yeah I had, Yeah, I got. I won't
Speaker 1: get into that, but you know that. But the point
Speaker 1: is is that is that the the one of the
Speaker 1: advantages that a federal that the federal government or state
Speaker 1: law enforcement has is time. You know, they don't have
Speaker 1: to always be there in a show of force. Um,
Speaker 1: so you want to re do you know if if
Speaker 1: you and that time can mean political changes, right, you know,
Speaker 1: where a situation like under a Republican president will be
Speaker 1: different than a democratic president will be different than a
Speaker 1: situation where there where it's unclear who the president is. Well,
Speaker 1: this has been a fun one. UM, fun stuff to
Speaker 1: think about. Um, Chelsea, where can the good people or
Speaker 1: the bad people find you? The good people or the
Speaker 1: bad people can find me at x y chelsea on Twitter.
Speaker 1: I am at x y chelse eight seven on Twitch.
Speaker 1: I do some game streams periodically. I have slowed that
Speaker 1: down a bit though. UM. I have a Patreon at
Speaker 1: UH patreon dot com forward slash x y Chelsea UM
Speaker 1: for content that I am currently in the late stages
Speaker 1: of producing UH for tech related things, including you know,
Speaker 1: things like cryptocurrency, are official intelligence, surveillance, those kinds of
Speaker 1: concepts UM. And I am also on Instagram at x
Speaker 1: l c oh and I have a TikTok now so
Speaker 1: I will be I'm working on several TikTok's that are
Speaker 1: related to these kinds of things, UM, privacy, surveillance, and
Speaker 1: protecting yourself. UM. As I showed my my everyday carry
Speaker 1: bag was one of the first things that I showed. Awesome. Well,
Speaker 1: all right, UH, find Chelsea there and find us tomorrow
Speaker 1: with another episode of it could happen here talking about
Speaker 1: I don't know something something something, let's go oh, actually, Garrison.
Speaker 1: We know what it'll be. Why don't you put in
Speaker 1: a plug for the thing you did? Oh yeah, tomorrow
Speaker 1: we uh, I will be releasing the first of a
Speaker 1: two part episode. On my trip to northern Minnesota, I
Speaker 1: traveled to an Earth First gathering and subsequent Stop Playing
Speaker 1: three protest camp. UM was there for a little little
Speaker 1: over a week, was present and documenting multiple kind of
Speaker 1: direct actions. And yeah, we'll be talking about with like
Speaker 1: Earth First and like the history of environmental organizing and
Speaker 1: then the more modern kind of Stop Line three UM
Speaker 1: protests going on and what Mbridge is doing, so that
Speaker 1: that is going to be the next next two episodes
Speaker 1: will be covering that topic. And actually, in another fun,
Speaker 1: fun little side note, I had just finished a video
Speaker 1: game called Telling Lies, which is about the federal surveillance
Speaker 1: operation into an environmental protest group. And I think they
Speaker 1: hand this game was done very well. UM. I would
Speaker 1: love to talk about it more on the podcast eventually, UM,
Speaker 1: after I do some more like reading on its development.
Speaker 1: But um, if you want to, if you want to
Speaker 1: get a look at like potential ways FEDS do like surveillance,
Speaker 1: this game is actually a great example of how they
Speaker 1: infiltrate um in in the environmental activist groups and different
Speaker 1: different methods they use to survey surveil people, and how
Speaker 1: they can pull like, um, you know, videos and phone
Speaker 1: records that kind of stuff. So it was fun, fun
Speaker 1: to entent on these all these topic. Yeah, this has
Speaker 1: been a fun, fun day for everybody. Well that's going
Speaker 1: to do it for us that it could happen here. Oh,
Speaker 1: this wasn't even the heaviest stuff that I could get into.
Speaker 1: Well we'll do that maybe in another week, thanks Chelsea. Alright,
Speaker 1: well until next week or tomorrow whatever. Bye, it happened.