CYBER

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Amazon. The company none of us can seem to get away from. Whether you’re a Prime member or just surfing the web on sites hosted by AWS, the company is inescapable. But it’s worse when you work for them. Especially if you’re an independent contractor running delivery vans. It’s a job where crushing debt, sudden shifts in policy, and impossible demands are the norm. 

These Amazon Delivery Service Partners, or DSPs, are key to Amazon's dominant position, and the way many people are able to get what they order from the company so quickly, the next day or even within hours. But as Amazon gets unimaginably rich, some of these small companies are going bankrupt and leaving owners in crushing debt.

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This week on CYBER, Motherboard Senior Staff writer Lauren Kaori Gurley walks us through her piece ‘‘I Had Nothing to My Name’: Amazon Delivery Companies Are Being Crushed by Debt.

We’re recording CYBER live on Twitch. Watch live on Wednesdays at 4pm EST. Follow us there to get alerts when we go live. We take questions from the audience and yours might just end up on the show.

Subscribe to CYBER on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

There are a lot of companies out there willing to sell shady customers the tools they need to spy on just about anyone. All over the world software vendors like Hacking Team and NSO Group will help you break into a cellphone or read an email you’re not supposed to. But that might soon be changing.

On this episode of Cyber, Motherboard senior staff writer Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai joins host Matthew Gault to talk about spyware vendors. It’s the subject of Lorenzo’s new piece, “The US Crackdown on Spyware Vendors Is Only Beginning.”

After a brief break, Gault and Franceschi-Bicchierai discuss the war in Ukraine. It’s a wide ranging conversation about the digital battleground. As of this recording, Russian Government Websites are Down and the world is discussing whether it's feasible and effective to prevent Russia from updating its software. Gault also talks about how a college professor used Google Maps traffic data to figure out the war had started before news had even broken.

We’re recording CYBER live on Twitch. Watch live on Wednesdays at 4pm EST. Follow us there to get alerts when we go live. We take questions from the audience and yours might just end up on the show.

Subscribe to CYBER on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The internet has created an explosion in audio and video captured from the frontlines of war zones. As Russia escalates the conflict in Ukraine, it’s also pushing propaganda harder than ever. But there’s so much information available online, and so many people willing to call bullshit on propaganda, that it’s hard to make a believable video that justifies a war these days.

That hasn’t stopped Russia from trying.

On today’s episode of Cyber, Motherboard journalist Matthew Gault sits down with Motherboard editor-in-chief Jason Koebler to discuss the community of people online who are debunking Russian disinformation in real time. It’s a wide ranging conversation that goes from incredible memes to ethical considerations and a brief remembering of the Boston Marathon Bombing.

We’re recording CYBER live on Twitch. Watch live on Wednesdays at 4pm EST. Follow us there to get alerts when we go live. We take questions from the audience and yours might just end up on the show.

Subscribe to CYBER on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Cops love technology. From robot dogs to drones to Ring cameras to tasers to facial recognition software, America’s police are often early adopters of the world’s newest dystopian tech. How does it happen? Often the tech companies are actively pitching police departments on stuff they say will make the cops’ life easier. Every month, conferences across the country are stuffed with tech companies and officers breaking bread and cutting deals.

What goes on at these conferences, exactly? This week on Cyber, Matthew sits down with Jack Poulson of Tech Inquiry to talk about a tech conference for cops he recently attended. It’s the subject of a new article on Motherboard—Please Delete Your Recordings: Inside a Police Conference.

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We’re recording CYBER live on Twitch. Watch live on Wednesdays at 4pm EST. Follow us there to get alerts when we go live. We take questions from the audience and yours might just end up on the show.

Subscribe to CYBER on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Roblox is one of the most popular and profitable video games ever created. Unless you’ve got kids, there’s a decent chance you’ve probably never heard of it. What makes it so engaging is that it’s a place where players develop and sell their own games and items. There is an internal economy and culture built around it. Roblox is, dare I say,  a metaverse all its own.

Lurking at the edges of that metaverse is a group of people called Beamers. With so many items floating around the Roblox economy worth so much cash and so many of them owned by children. That’s a target an unscrupulous hacker can hardly pass up.

This week on Cyber, Motherboard staff writer Joseph Cox walks us through the underground world of Roblox. It’s the subject of his newest piece, “How Roblox ‘Beamers’ Get Rich Stealing from Children.”

We’re recording CYBER live on Twitch. Watch live on Wednesdays at 4pm EST. Follow us there to get alerts when we go live. We take questions from the audience and yours might just end up on the show.

Subscribe to CYBER on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In 2016, someone hacked the crypto exchange Bitfinex and made off with 120,000 BTC. At the time, the bitcoins were worth $65 million. Now they’re worth around $5 billion.

On February 7, authorities in the U.S. arrested Ilya Lichtenstein and his wife, Heather Morgan. The charge? Allegedly the couple laundered around $1 billion in stolen Bitcoin. As news of the charges spread, journalists began to dig into the couple and discovered that Morgan was extremely online. A wannabe rapper, Morgan has posted dozens of YouTube videos, TikToks, and contributed to Forbes. 

Here to talk about the hack, the charges, and Morgan’s outsized personality we’ve got Motherboard senior staff writer Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai and Motherboard Senior Editor Jordan Perason.

Morgan’s output is embarrassing, but it’s also a distraction from the very real crimes her and her husband have been charged with. Pearson and Franceschi-Bicchierai unpack the central mysteries that still linger on the case. The feds have seized the Bitcoin but haven’t charged the couple in the hack and there’s still so many questions about what happened in 2016.

We’re recording CYBER live on Twitch. Watch live on Wednesdays at 4pm EST. Follow us there to get alerts when we go live. We take questions from the audience and yours might just end up on the show.

Subscribe to CYBER on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The late 80s and early 90s were a golden age of free stuff on the internet. If you could afford the equipment and the access, you could find just about any piece of software you wanted without paying for it. And also a lot of pictures of naked people.

The Bulletin Board System, or BBS, was the lifeblood of this freewheeling time. It didn’t last long.

This week on Cyber we’re bringing you the story of Rusty ‘n’ Edie’s BBS: the Friendliest BBS in the World. Here to tell the tale is Motherboard Senior Staff Writer Samantha Cole. It’s the subject of her newest piece, The Death of Rusty n Edie’s, One of the Horniest Places on the 90s Internet.

We’re recording CYBER live on Twitch. Watch live on Wednesdays at 4pm EST. Follow us there to get alerts when we go live. We take questions from the audience and yours might just end up on the show.

Subscribe to CYBER on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.