WEBVTT - The Weird Story of the First Cyberattack 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:12.840 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey Thearon, 0:00:12.960 --> 0:00:15.960 Welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland. I'm 0:00:15.960 --> 0:00:18.919 an executive producer with iHeart Podcasts and how the tech 0:00:18.960 --> 0:00:23.400 are you. Since we're winding down my tenure as host 0:00:23.520 --> 0:00:27.240 of this venerable podcast, I thought that it would be 0:00:27.320 --> 0:00:31.240 fun to kind of look at some quirky stories I 0:00:31.320 --> 0:00:34.640 haven't covered in the past, and this is one that 0:00:34.720 --> 0:00:38.760 some people refer to as the first cyber attack. Cyber 0:00:38.760 --> 0:00:41.800 attacks obviously big in the news these days. There are 0:00:42.320 --> 0:00:47.640 tons of stories surrounding them, everything from using cyber attacks 0:00:47.640 --> 0:00:53.120 to spread disinformation, to espionage to sabotage. So there's a 0:00:53.120 --> 0:00:56.480 lot we could talk about. But what if we were 0:00:56.520 --> 0:01:00.560 to talk about a nineteenth century cyber attack, a cyber 0:01:00.600 --> 0:01:04.680 attack that happens well before there was ever an internet, 0:01:05.120 --> 0:01:09.240 in fact, before there was wired telegraphs running through the 0:01:09.280 --> 0:01:12.399 region we'll be talking about. So allow me to tell 0:01:12.440 --> 0:01:15.480 you a story. And details of this story may or 0:01:15.480 --> 0:01:19.120 may not be entirely true, but we're going to go 0:01:19.240 --> 0:01:22.560 with it anyway. There are certainly some resources that point 0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:26.600 to this story being true. There are tons of blog 0:01:26.720 --> 0:01:30.240 posts and videos and stuff that talk about this, but 0:01:30.319 --> 0:01:32.640 I think most of them are pulling their information from 0:01:32.720 --> 0:01:36.639 one or two more recent sources. However, there's an article 0:01:36.680 --> 0:01:39.640 in an eighteen thirty seven edition of a French newspaper 0:01:39.959 --> 0:01:43.840 that I used for this particular episode. Now I should 0:01:43.840 --> 0:01:47.520 add I had to rely on auto translation for that article. 0:01:47.600 --> 0:01:50.840 My French at this point is non existent. But it's 0:01:50.880 --> 0:01:53.880 the story of how a pair of brothers were able 0:01:53.920 --> 0:01:57.920 to tap into a communications network and then insert information 0:01:58.240 --> 0:02:02.680 into that network in an effort to capitalize on stock 0:02:02.760 --> 0:02:06.440 market and bond information before anyone else could, or at 0:02:06.480 --> 0:02:09.160 least anyone else in their neck of the woods in France. 0:02:09.600 --> 0:02:12.280 So I want to point out a few sources that 0:02:12.320 --> 0:02:14.760 I use while playing this together, because that's going to 0:02:14.800 --> 0:02:16.600 be very helpful, especially if you want to read up 0:02:16.600 --> 0:02:20.240 on this too. So I think my starting point was 0:02:20.800 --> 0:02:25.240 Tom Standige's piece called The Crooked Timber of Humanity in 0:02:25.320 --> 0:02:29.120 eighteen forty three magazine. That piece was published, as far 0:02:29.120 --> 0:02:32.040 as I can tell, in twenty seventeen, but Standige had 0:02:32.080 --> 0:02:35.680 written a book in nineteen ninety eight titled The Victorian 0:02:35.760 --> 0:02:38.680 Internet that certainly ties in with this. He talks about 0:02:38.720 --> 0:02:41.359 the network system we're going to chat about in this episode. Now, 0:02:41.360 --> 0:02:44.480 I have not had the chance to read Standige's book. 0:02:44.720 --> 0:02:47.320 I want to get a copy because it sounds fascinating, 0:02:47.560 --> 0:02:50.160 but I'm not sure if this particular incident makes an 0:02:50.200 --> 0:02:52.799 appearance in the book because I haven't read it yet. However, 0:02:52.880 --> 0:02:55.720 Standage certainly writes about one of the key elements involved 0:02:55.919 --> 0:02:59.480 in our story within the Victorian Internet, and from the 0:02:59.480 --> 0:03:02.160 reviews i've it sounds like it's a really easy read 0:03:02.200 --> 0:03:06.040 and very informative and entertaining. So it's on my list now. 0:03:06.280 --> 0:03:09.720 Another piece I relied upon was a nineteen ninety nine 0:03:09.880 --> 0:03:14.560 article titled taking Stock by Gerard J. Holsman. Holsman has 0:03:14.600 --> 0:03:16.960 also written about this communications network we're going to be 0:03:16.960 --> 0:03:19.600 talking about in this episode. He's got a white paper 0:03:20.040 --> 0:03:23.520 that I found that's all about this particular network, and 0:03:23.560 --> 0:03:26.240 then in this article he goes into the incident we'll 0:03:26.280 --> 0:03:28.960 be chatting about. I found that article in INC magazine. 0:03:29.000 --> 0:03:32.320 By the way, that's INC as an incorporated, not as 0:03:32.360 --> 0:03:36.920 in tattoos. And finally, thanks to a blog commenter with 0:03:37.000 --> 0:03:40.480 the handle tATu Tata, and I know I've messed that 0:03:40.600 --> 0:03:43.840 up on Schneier dot com, I can cite that eighteen 0:03:43.920 --> 0:03:47.040 thirty seven newspaper article. I mentioned it's in the and 0:03:47.080 --> 0:03:51.320 I apologize. My French pronunciation is worse than my understanding 0:03:51.320 --> 0:03:53.880 of French. It's been thirty years since I've studied French. 0:03:53.920 --> 0:03:57.840 But the newspaper is titled Journal des de bat Politique 0:03:57.920 --> 0:04:01.560 e leterreer. So again, I know my pronunciation's horrible. Just 0:04:01.600 --> 0:04:04.640 save it. I'm already aware. So we're going to assume 0:04:05.120 --> 0:04:08.160 this story is true, or at least mostly true. It 0:04:08.200 --> 0:04:12.440 definitely has some verifiable elements in it. One big, important 0:04:12.520 --> 0:04:17.080 verifiable element is that an eighteenth century inventor named Claude 0:04:17.200 --> 0:04:20.520 Shop came up with a clever way to transmit messages 0:04:20.600 --> 0:04:25.760 quickly over vast distances. He used signaling towers, which you know, 0:04:25.839 --> 0:04:29.320 actually has been a way to send messages for hundreds 0:04:29.320 --> 0:04:32.480 of years, even before the eighteenth century. But his initial 0:04:32.520 --> 0:04:36.560 approach used two clocks and some large flipboards that had 0:04:36.640 --> 0:04:38.880 white on one side and black on the other. And 0:04:39.160 --> 0:04:42.840 the method of communication, honestly, is somewhat opaque to me. 0:04:43.080 --> 0:04:45.839 I read a very simplified explanation, but it was so 0:04:45.920 --> 0:04:49.919 simplified as to not have any sticking power on my 0:04:50.000 --> 0:04:52.800 brain cells. However, it doesn't really matter because by the 0:04:52.839 --> 0:04:56.280 time our story takes place, he had already evolved his 0:04:56.320 --> 0:04:59.680 approach to using poles that were mounted on beams, and 0:04:59.720 --> 0:05:03.000 those beams, in turn were mounted on masts that stood 0:05:03.080 --> 0:05:07.000 up on the top of signaling towers. So each mast 0:05:07.400 --> 0:05:10.240 had a beam attached at the top. The beam was 0:05:10.279 --> 0:05:13.000 attached in the center on like a pivot point, so 0:05:13.080 --> 0:05:16.560 the beam could rotate and it could hold four different positions. 0:05:16.640 --> 0:05:19.480 It could be horizontal relative to the mast, so this 0:05:19.520 --> 0:05:22.000 would be like a person standing up straight and holding 0:05:22.000 --> 0:05:25.640 their arms out straight off to either side. Or it 0:05:25.680 --> 0:05:28.159 could be vertical, so this would be if you were 0:05:28.200 --> 0:05:30.640 to hold your arms at the twelve o'clock and six 0:05:30.640 --> 0:05:34.479 o'clock positions, assuming you are familiar with anaalog clocks. And 0:05:34.520 --> 0:05:37.240 then it could also be diagonal, with either the left 0:05:37.240 --> 0:05:40.200 side higher than the right or vice versa. Now at 0:05:40.320 --> 0:05:43.599 either end of the beam that's mounted to this mast 0:05:43.960 --> 0:05:47.279 were poles, a pole on each end, and they were 0:05:47.320 --> 0:05:51.400 mounted at the ends on a pivot point. So it's 0:05:51.480 --> 0:05:53.600 like if you were holding a stick, like imagine that 0:05:53.640 --> 0:05:55.719 you're holding a stick at the end. That's kind of 0:05:55.760 --> 0:05:58.239 like what this looked like. So the poles could also 0:05:58.279 --> 0:06:01.919 be rotated into different position, and they could hold multiple 0:06:01.920 --> 0:06:05.279 positions from their respective end of the beam. The whole 0:06:05.320 --> 0:06:08.200 thing was meant to be like a human being holding 0:06:08.400 --> 0:06:11.520 semaphore flags. If you've ever seen those those signaling flags 0:06:11.520 --> 0:06:14.400 where you hold your arms out and you hold the 0:06:14.400 --> 0:06:17.640 flags up in specific positions, and that gives a particular 0:06:17.760 --> 0:06:22.839 meaning according to a shared code. So, using a control 0:06:22.880 --> 0:06:26.680 system that consisted of chains and pulleys, an operator could 0:06:26.760 --> 0:06:30.400 manipulate the device to hold one of many different positions, 0:06:30.640 --> 0:06:34.640 and then by ascribing these positions some sort of meaning. 0:06:34.960 --> 0:06:38.000 Through creating a code, Shapp was able to create a 0:06:38.000 --> 0:06:41.120 messaging system. So the towers were constructed so that through 0:06:41.120 --> 0:06:44.360 the use of a telescope, the operator could see incoming 0:06:44.400 --> 0:06:47.640 messages from the previous tower. They could then transcribe the 0:06:47.680 --> 0:06:49.960 symbols that were used in that message. Then they could 0:06:50.000 --> 0:06:52.840 send that same message further down the chain to the 0:06:52.880 --> 0:06:57.000 next tower on and so forth. Now, Shap's plan was 0:06:57.040 --> 0:07:01.360 to give only the origin and the destiny nation cities 0:07:01.800 --> 0:07:06.479 the endpoints of the communication lines the actual ability to 0:07:06.760 --> 0:07:10.360 encode and decode those messages. The operators in the middle 0:07:10.400 --> 0:07:13.040 of the line would have no idea what they were transmitting, 0:07:13.080 --> 0:07:15.800 they would just be copying what came before and then 0:07:15.840 --> 0:07:19.480 sending that same sequence of symbols along. This was to 0:07:19.640 --> 0:07:23.720 maintain message security because this communication systems was primarily used 0:07:23.720 --> 0:07:26.320 by the French government and nobody else Like the French 0:07:26.360 --> 0:07:30.480 government had exclusive use of this communication system and there 0:07:30.480 --> 0:07:33.480 would be special commands that the origin operator could use 0:07:33.480 --> 0:07:36.760 to indicate that he had made a mistake in the transcription. 0:07:37.120 --> 0:07:40.080 So let's say that you are operator number one or 0:07:40.160 --> 0:07:43.880 a number uden, you know, if you're in Paris, France, 0:07:44.080 --> 0:07:47.040 and you're transcribing a government message to be sent to well, 0:07:47.120 --> 0:07:49.440 let's say it's Bordeaux, because that's the city that will 0:07:49.440 --> 0:07:52.760 factor into our story. However, you realize that, gosh darn it, 0:07:52.760 --> 0:07:55.480 you've only gone and done put the wrong symbol in 0:07:55.520 --> 0:07:59.120 your last transmission, like you were transmitting, and you accidentally 0:07:59.160 --> 0:08:01.920 sent a message or a word that means something like 0:08:02.080 --> 0:08:06.760 cat instead of I don't know military. So then you 0:08:06.840 --> 0:08:11.160 have to use another signal, and that signal is essentially backspace, 0:08:11.320 --> 0:08:14.920 meaning that last symbol I sent you was in error. Well, 0:08:15.200 --> 0:08:17.160 the next operator in the chain is going to transmit 0:08:17.320 --> 0:08:21.640 everything you sent, including the mistake and the backspace because 0:08:21.880 --> 0:08:25.600 operator too or do if you will, is unaware of 0:08:25.640 --> 0:08:28.560 what those symbols actually mean. They're just sending along what 0:08:28.720 --> 0:08:31.720 it is that they personally have received the message errors, 0:08:31.760 --> 0:08:34.199 and all continue down the line until they finally get 0:08:34.240 --> 0:08:38.200 to their destination. There at Bordeaux. The receiving operator at 0:08:38.240 --> 0:08:40.800 the end of the line writes on the code, notes 0:08:40.840 --> 0:08:44.959 the indicators that say there's an error here, erases those errors, 0:08:45.280 --> 0:08:48.120 and decodes the message and records it down. So any 0:08:48.200 --> 0:08:51.080 errors that were sent along the line, assuming they hadn't 0:08:51.080 --> 0:08:55.120 been introduced by an intermediary tower, will get taken out. Now, 0:08:55.200 --> 0:08:58.240 it was this get taken out bit that in eighteen 0:08:58.360 --> 0:09:00.840 thirty four factors into our store all right. Now, Sadly, 0:09:01.160 --> 0:09:04.320 Claude Schapp would not live to see this happen. He 0:09:04.360 --> 0:09:06.960 had taken his own life back in eighteen oh five 0:09:07.280 --> 0:09:11.560 under circumstances that were never entirely clear, at least not 0:09:11.640 --> 0:09:16.080 to history, and this provided opportunity to a pair of 0:09:16.120 --> 0:09:19.600 brothers who are the heroes or perhaps anti heroes of 0:09:19.679 --> 0:09:23.199 our story. We'll talk about those brothers in just a moment, 0:09:23.240 --> 0:09:27.640 but first let's take a quick break to thank our sponsors. 0:09:35.440 --> 0:09:37.520 So before the break, I mentioned we have a pair 0:09:37.559 --> 0:09:43.079 of brothers, not just brothers. They're twins, Francois and Joseph Blanc. 0:09:43.360 --> 0:09:46.480 At least according to various sources, those were their names. 0:09:46.559 --> 0:09:49.080 If you go to that eighteen thirty seven newspaper article, 0:09:49.400 --> 0:09:51.320 you get a bit more specific. I mean, at first 0:09:51.440 --> 0:09:53.800 article just as the brothers Blanc over and over and 0:09:53.840 --> 0:09:56.480 over again without telling you their first names. But eventually 0:09:56.600 --> 0:10:01.280 you get Louis, Joseph and Francois Blanc. That Louis is 0:10:01.440 --> 0:10:06.400 very important because Louis and Francois Blanc twin brothers, would 0:10:06.440 --> 0:10:09.360 indicate that the Francois Blanc in this story would go 0:10:09.440 --> 0:10:12.880 on to great fame and fortune. More on that in 0:10:12.920 --> 0:10:15.960 a bit. So, according to this newspaper article, the fact 0:10:16.000 --> 0:10:18.760 that they were twins actually made it more complicated because 0:10:18.760 --> 0:10:22.000 they're identical. They were identical twins, not fraternal twins. And 0:10:22.280 --> 0:10:24.080 I feel like we have the working for a real 0:10:24.559 --> 0:10:28.280 farcical situation going on here where there's like mistaken identities 0:10:28.360 --> 0:10:31.840 and conspiracies. Seriously, how has Wes Anderson not made a 0:10:31.880 --> 0:10:35.840 movie about this already? Anyway, the brothers Blanc were bankers 0:10:35.960 --> 0:10:38.760 in the city of Bordeaux, which sounds like a tongue twister. 0:10:38.920 --> 0:10:41.880 They were in the business of trading government bonds or 0:10:41.960 --> 0:10:47.040 speculating if you are being a little less generous, let's say. However, 0:10:47.080 --> 0:10:49.520 one problem they ran into was that they were always 0:10:49.600 --> 0:10:52.440 behind the times when it came to what was going 0:10:52.440 --> 0:10:55.160 on with the market in Paris. Because this is eighteen 0:10:55.240 --> 0:10:58.280 thirty four, news about the market would take days to 0:10:58.480 --> 0:11:02.080 arrive in Bordeaux would be carried aboard a male coach, 0:11:02.320 --> 0:11:05.080 and obviously male coaches had to traverse hundreds of miles 0:11:05.120 --> 0:11:07.920 to get to their destination, Like the distance between Paris 0:11:07.960 --> 0:11:10.480 and Bordeaux is more than three hundred miles, So by 0:11:10.520 --> 0:11:12.240 the time the Brothers would learn of what was going 0:11:12.280 --> 0:11:13.760 on in Paris, it would be too late for them 0:11:13.800 --> 0:11:17.040 to capitalize on that information in Bordeaux. But if they 0:11:17.040 --> 0:11:19.720 could only find out what was going on faster, if 0:11:19.760 --> 0:11:23.640 they got news before their competitors did, they could actually 0:11:23.679 --> 0:11:27.080 make money on speculation. Now, the telegraph system, as I 0:11:27.120 --> 0:11:30.760 mentioned earlier, was restricted to official government communications, so the 0:11:30.800 --> 0:11:34.080 brothers had no legal access to that system. And if 0:11:34.120 --> 0:11:37.600 they had, so would everybody else, and the playing ground 0:11:37.600 --> 0:11:39.800 would be even across the board. But the brothers came 0:11:39.880 --> 0:11:42.600 up with a clever scheme. There was a weakness in 0:11:42.640 --> 0:11:44.920 the line. So, like I said, an operator at the 0:11:44.960 --> 0:11:47.520 beginning of the communications line could indicate that they had 0:11:47.520 --> 0:11:51.479 mistakenly transmitted the wrong symbol by including a backspace message. 0:11:51.559 --> 0:11:55.760 But if mistakes happened in between the origin and the destination, 0:11:56.160 --> 0:11:59.280 they would go unchecked until they arrived at the endpoint. Now, 0:11:59.320 --> 0:12:02.920 the longer the chain of communication was, the more likely 0:12:03.160 --> 0:12:06.880 errors would confound the message, because towers along the way 0:12:06.880 --> 0:12:09.160 would just make a mistake right, not just at the 0:12:09.200 --> 0:12:12.360 beginning and endpoints, but all along the way. And since 0:12:12.400 --> 0:12:14.719 the distance between Paris and Bordeaux was, you know, three 0:12:14.840 --> 0:12:17.240 hundred miles, actually more than three hundred miles, there were 0:12:17.360 --> 0:12:19.920 risks that a message arriving at Bordeaux would just end 0:12:20.040 --> 0:12:22.000 up being gibberish by the time it got there from 0:12:22.040 --> 0:12:24.800 all the errors. So the French government deemed it necessary 0:12:24.800 --> 0:12:27.600 to have a sort of midway point established in Tour, 0:12:27.920 --> 0:12:31.680 which is roughly halfway between Paris and Bordeaux. So at Tour, 0:12:32.000 --> 0:12:35.480 another operator would be allowed to actually decode the incoming 0:12:35.520 --> 0:12:38.920 message before encoding it again and then sending it along 0:12:38.960 --> 0:12:41.800 to Bordeaux. The Tour operator would be able to correct 0:12:41.800 --> 0:12:45.280 any errors before they became too egregious. And it was 0:12:45.400 --> 0:12:49.120 this operator that the brothers Blanc targeted. Paris would have 0:12:49.120 --> 0:12:52.280 been too risky, but tour was a possibility, so they 0:12:52.480 --> 0:12:55.439 plied this operator with bribery. I like to think they 0:12:55.480 --> 0:12:58.439 included wine and cheese in the process, but actually, according 0:12:58.440 --> 0:13:00.920 to the eighteen thirty seven French news paper report, it 0:13:00.960 --> 0:13:04.320 was through money. The telegraph operations paid out very little, 0:13:04.320 --> 0:13:07.360 and the brothers were happy to supplement the operator's meager 0:13:07.440 --> 0:13:10.360 income with bribes. That, in fact, was one of the 0:13:10.360 --> 0:13:13.760 elements that investigators would point to that the co conspirators 0:13:13.800 --> 0:13:16.720 in the Blanc crime were able to accumulate wealth far 0:13:16.800 --> 0:13:22.120 beyond their legal and meager means. Yay capitalism. Also, sadly, 0:13:22.320 --> 0:13:24.560 it would be those two co conspirators that would end 0:13:24.600 --> 0:13:26.880 up getting most of the blame. We'll talk about why. 0:13:27.320 --> 0:13:30.839 But anyway, what did the brothers actually want the tour 0:13:31.120 --> 0:13:35.120 operator of this communications line to do. Well. They wanted 0:13:35.200 --> 0:13:39.560 him to insert errors on purpose into the chain of communications, 0:13:39.600 --> 0:13:42.480 and those errors would be in response to news about 0:13:42.480 --> 0:13:45.880 the French markets. And there are some variations in the story. 0:13:45.920 --> 0:13:49.800 At this point in Standage's twenty seventeen Economist article, that's 0:13:49.800 --> 0:13:52.920 the crooked timber of humanity. He doesn't actually indicate how 0:13:52.960 --> 0:13:56.680 the tour operator would get information about the Parisian stock market, 0:13:56.720 --> 0:13:59.520 just that he would pass that information down the communications 0:13:59.600 --> 0:14:03.120 line to dough in the form of purposefully inserted errors 0:14:03.120 --> 0:14:06.160 in the communication chain. But the newspaper article from eighteen 0:14:06.200 --> 0:14:09.880 thirty seven says that someone in Paris would actually indicate 0:14:10.040 --> 0:14:13.320 where the Parisian markets were going by sending either a 0:14:13.360 --> 0:14:16.280 pair of gloves or a pair of stockings, or sometimes 0:14:16.280 --> 0:14:21.040 a necktie by coach to the tour operator. So the 0:14:21.080 --> 0:14:23.240 package arrives at the tour operator, he opens it up, 0:14:23.280 --> 0:14:24.960 he sees, Oh, there's a pair of gloves, that means 0:14:24.960 --> 0:14:27.120 the market is doing this, or oh it's a pair 0:14:27.160 --> 0:14:29.960 of stockings, that means the market is doing that. Meanwhile, 0:14:30.280 --> 0:14:34.160 his glove and stocking collection is growing every week. Later 0:14:34.240 --> 0:14:37.240 versions of the story were, as conveyed in various blogs 0:14:37.240 --> 0:14:39.240 and such, would say that the color of the fabric 0:14:39.280 --> 0:14:41.520 inside the package was also an indicator as to how 0:14:41.560 --> 0:14:44.600 the markets were doing. But I couldn't really glean that 0:14:44.800 --> 0:14:47.160 from the eighteen thirty seven newspaper article. I'm not saying 0:14:47.160 --> 0:14:51.000 it's wrong. I'm just saying my ability to read somewhat 0:14:51.080 --> 0:14:54.080 questionably translated French is a little iffy, all right. So 0:14:54.320 --> 0:14:57.160 the tour operator gets the indication of where the Parisian 0:14:57.200 --> 0:14:59.800 stock market is going, and then he inserts an error 0:14:59.840 --> 0:15:03.640 in to the official messages, indicating essentially either up or down, 0:15:04.040 --> 0:15:07.240 then includes the backspace symbol to indicate that the up 0:15:07.280 --> 0:15:10.720 or down message was transmitted an error. So the message 0:15:10.760 --> 0:15:14.000 with the inserted error would continue on down the line 0:15:14.240 --> 0:15:17.040 all the way to Bordeaux, where the brothers had hired 0:15:17.080 --> 0:15:20.800 a former tower operator to watch for incoming messages and 0:15:20.840 --> 0:15:23.880 look for the tailtale signs of up or down followed 0:15:23.920 --> 0:15:26.520 by the backspace. So this person wasn't actually working a 0:15:26.560 --> 0:15:29.200 signal tower. They were just using a telescope to look 0:15:29.240 --> 0:15:33.800 at a penultimate tower, the one that arrives before the endpoint, 0:15:33.920 --> 0:15:36.680 to see what the message says. So this co conspirator 0:15:36.720 --> 0:15:39.240 would then tell the brothers what the messages indicated, and 0:15:39.240 --> 0:15:41.840 the brothers would quickly capitalize on the situation before the 0:15:41.840 --> 0:15:45.200 rest of Bordeaux knew where the markets were headed. Meanwhile, 0:15:45.400 --> 0:15:48.280 at the end of the line in Bordeaux, the innocent 0:15:48.320 --> 0:15:52.000 operator there the one who's receiving the message would just 0:15:52.120 --> 0:15:55.360 decode the incoming messages and delete all the errors as 0:15:55.400 --> 0:15:59.280 indicated like do the backspaces, and that erased the evidence 0:15:59.680 --> 0:16:02.760 of the brothers crime. And for two years, the story goes, 0:16:02.800 --> 0:16:04.640 the brothers were able to get the scoop on what 0:16:04.840 --> 0:16:06.920 was going on and were able to profit from it 0:16:06.960 --> 0:16:10.000 by acting faster than their competitors. But it all came 0:16:10.080 --> 0:16:15.000 crashing down. Why well, Sandidge says that the compromised operator 0:16:15.040 --> 0:16:17.280 in Tour got sick, and in fact, the eighteen thirty 0:16:17.280 --> 0:16:20.760 seven article tells the same story, sick enough to be 0:16:20.960 --> 0:16:23.760 on his deathbed and he could no longer work his post. 0:16:23.960 --> 0:16:26.320 So then he confides in a friend of his and 0:16:26.360 --> 0:16:29.320 he hoped that his friend would take up that same 0:16:29.480 --> 0:16:32.080 role in the conspiracy. But his friend was the more 0:16:32.200 --> 0:16:35.560 honest sort of person, and he went to the gendarme. 0:16:35.760 --> 0:16:39.280 He went to the authorities, and ultimately the co conspirators 0:16:39.360 --> 0:16:43.040 and the Blanc brothers were arrested. Now, the co conspirators, 0:16:43.400 --> 0:16:47.680 the operators, they could actually be charged on issues with 0:16:48.720 --> 0:16:51.760 compromising the communication systems, but for the brothers it was 0:16:51.760 --> 0:16:54.920 more complicated because there was no law on the books 0:16:54.960 --> 0:16:57.840 that the brothers had actually broken This kind of crime 0:16:57.920 --> 0:17:00.280 was so new there was no law to cover. This 0:17:00.320 --> 0:17:03.400 is something we have encountered multiple times with technology. So 0:17:03.760 --> 0:17:06.720 they were released. The two brothers were released not too 0:17:06.760 --> 0:17:09.040 long after they were arrested. Now some versions of the 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:10.960 story say they had to pay some fines, but they 0:17:10.960 --> 0:17:12.760 got to keep most of the money they made off 0:17:12.800 --> 0:17:15.879 their schemes, and so ins the tale of the first 0:17:16.000 --> 0:17:19.919 cyber attack, or what's alleged to be the first cyber attack. 0:17:20.320 --> 0:17:23.120 But I do have a couple more fun bonus details 0:17:23.160 --> 0:17:25.800 to share with this story now. First up, the Blanc brothers, 0:17:26.040 --> 0:17:29.200 according to that newspaper article, were also students of pressed 0:17:29.200 --> 0:17:34.480 to digitation or stage magic, particularly playing card magic, and 0:17:34.520 --> 0:17:38.159 they were identified also as gamblers who rarely lost. And 0:17:38.200 --> 0:17:41.080 the implication in the newspaper, if one were to read 0:17:41.119 --> 0:17:43.840 between the French lines, is that they use their stage 0:17:43.880 --> 0:17:47.399 magic skills to cheat at cards. In fact, one of 0:17:47.440 --> 0:17:51.040 the two, Francois Blanc, would become known as the Magician 0:17:51.080 --> 0:17:53.879 of Hamburg when a few decades later he would establish 0:17:53.920 --> 0:17:56.960 a casino in Hamburg. But further down the line, he 0:17:56.960 --> 0:18:00.040 would play an instrumental part in the establishment of the 0:17:59.840 --> 0:18:04.479 world famous Monte Carlo Casino in Monaco, which is a 0:18:04.560 --> 0:18:08.359 totally separate story. I've been to that casino, though I 0:18:08.359 --> 0:18:10.280 didn't know about this story at the time, and I 0:18:10.280 --> 0:18:12.679 think it's a really cool story to know. When I 0:18:12.720 --> 0:18:15.119 first started researching this, I began to worry that it 0:18:15.160 --> 0:18:18.000 was an apocryphal story because all the sources I could 0:18:18.000 --> 0:18:21.480 find were after at least after nineteen ninety eight, most 0:18:21.520 --> 0:18:24.119 of them were after twenty seventeen, and none of them 0:18:24.160 --> 0:18:27.240 were citing the French newspaper articles, so they all seemed 0:18:27.240 --> 0:18:29.600 to gather it from this pair of articles from ninety 0:18:29.640 --> 0:18:32.320 nine in twenty seventeen, and I worried that maybe it 0:18:32.359 --> 0:18:34.879 was all made up seas. But eventually, when I found 0:18:34.880 --> 0:18:37.960 that French newspaper, thanks to the commenter on the blog 0:18:38.000 --> 0:18:40.240 that I mentioned earlier, I was able to at least 0:18:40.280 --> 0:18:46.399 see that there's some journalistic evidence that Francois Blanc Impresario, 0:18:47.800 --> 0:18:50.720 founder or co founder of the Monte Carlo Casino in 0:18:50.840 --> 0:18:54.159 Monaco once upon a time, was a hacker, or at 0:18:54.240 --> 0:18:57.679 least paid hackers to hack. Kind of cool. Hope you 0:18:57.760 --> 0:19:00.880 enjoyed that story, Hope you enjoyed this episode. I will 0:19:00.920 --> 0:19:10.480 talk to you again really soon. Tech Stuff is an 0:19:10.480 --> 0:19:16.000 iHeartRadio production. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, 0:19:16.160 --> 0:19:19.320 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.