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Cyber Crime Junkies
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Cyber Crime Junkies
Unlocking Unity: The Power of Civil Discourse and Protecting Online Privacy in America
Kurt Long, founder and CEO of a privacy-based messaging app BUNKR (https://www.bunkr.life/) join David Mauro to discuss: how civil discourse helps our country, Newest Ways To Take Control Over Data Privacy, and why protecting online privacy is important.
Summary
The conversation explores the topics of data privacy, government surveillance, and underreporting of crimes. Kurt Long, CEO of Bunker and an expert in privacy and information security, discusses the risks associated with leaving a digital footprint and the increasing power of governments in surveillance.
He highlights the non-enforcement of laws and under-reporting of crimes by global governments, putting citizens at risk. The conversation also touches on the balance between privacy and surveillance, the impact of uncontrolled immigration, and the need for civil discourse and transparency in government actions.
The conversation explores the correlation between underreported crime and the development of technology solutions. It delves into the challenges faced by law enforcement agencies in infiltrating criminal activities and how the tech industry has responded by creating encrypted and private platforms. The discussion also highlights the rise of cybercrime on platforms like the dark web and the importance of valuing personal privacy.
The need for enforcement of existing laws and regulations, especially in ar
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Have you ever wondered just how much of your personal information is out there? How much still remains long after you log offline? Did you know everytime you click “agree” to using an smart phone app or accept cookies on a website and
type in an online search
you're leaving behind a permanent trail-a digital footprint-
It increases your personal risk and your organizations brand.
This is the story of the newest ways to take control over data privacy and joined by Kurt Long, innovative entrepreneur, CEO of BUNKR and expert with experience helping the NASA Space Shuttle Hubble Telescope and much more..
And now the show….
Welcome
How Civil Discourse Helps Our Country. Interview with CEO Kurt Long.
Kurt Long, founder and CEO of a privacy-based messaging app BUNKR (https://www.bunkr.life/) join David Mauro to discuss: how civil discourse helps our country, Newest Ways To Take Control Over Data Privacy, and why protecting online privacy is important.
TAGS: why protecting online privacy is important , how civil discourse helps our country, importance of civil discourse, , Kurt Long, BUNKR, Newest Ways To Take Control Over Data Privacy, New Approaches To Safe And Private Messaging Apps, New Approaches To Safe And Private Messaging, New Approaches To Secure Cloud Messaging, New Messaging Apps Improving Privacy And Security, New Security Risks From Messaging Apps, New Ways To Protect Personal Data Privacy, New Ways To Protect Your Data Privacy, Online Safety And Security Technology, Privacy And Security In New Technology, Unknown Security Risks From Messaging Apps, Why Online Privacy Is Important To Family Security, Why Online Privacy Is Important To Freedom, , Why Online Privacy Is Important To A Free Country
Keywords
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Summary
The conversation explores the topics of data privacy, government surveillance, and underreporting of crimes. Kurt Long, CEO of Bunker and an expert in privacy and information security, discusses the risks associated with leaving a digital footprint and the increasing power of governments in surveillance. He highlights the non-enforcement of laws and under-reporting of crimes by global governments, putting citizens at risk. The conversation also touches on the balance between privacy and surveillance, the impact of uncontrolled immigration, and the need for civil discourse and transparency in government actions. The conversation explores the correlation between underreported crime and the development of technology solutions. It delves into the challenges faced by law enforcement agencies in infiltrating criminal activities and how the tech industry has responded by creating encrypted and private platforms. The discussion also highlights the rise of cybercrime on platforms like the dark web and the importance of valuing personal privacy. The need for enforcement of existing laws and regulations, especially in areas like data privacy and security, is emphasized. The conversation concludes with practical best practices for individuals, including password management, reducing attack surfaces, and using secure communication tools.
Takeaways
Every time we use smartphones, apps, or browse the internet, we leave behind a digital footprint that increases personal and organizational risks.
Global governments, including the US and EU, are putting citizens at risk through non-enforcement of laws and under-reporting of crimes.
There is a blurring of lines between physical crime and cybercrime, and governments are becoming more aggressive in surveillance.
Platforms like Telegram and Signal provide end-to-end encryption and resist cooperating with law enforcement, leading to challenges in investigating and preventing cybercrime.
There is a need to restore balance and order, prioritize civil discourse, and ensure transparency in government actions. Underreported crime has led to the development of technology solutions that provide encrypted and private platforms.
The rise of cybercrime has been facilitated by the availability of platforms like the dark web.
Valuing personal privacy is crucial in preventing abuse and loss of human rights.
Enforcement of existing laws and regulations is essential in protecting data privacy and security.
Best practices for individuals include password management, reducing attack surfaces, and using secure communication tools.
Chapters
00:00 Leaving a Digital Footprint
06:02 Government Surveillance and Non-Enforcement of Laws
30:14 The Need for Civil Discourse and Transparency
32:55 Underreported Crime and Technology Solutions
36:10 Valuing Personal Privacy
48:31 Best Practices for Individuals in Protecting Privacy and Security
D. Mauro (00:02.696)
Wait a minute, there we are.
All right. Have you ever wondered just how much of your personal information is actually out there? How much still remains long after you log offline? Did you know every time you click agree when using a smartphone app, accept cookies on a website, type in online search, send messages on systems and platforms that you think otherwise would be private, you're leaving behind a permanent trail.
a digital footprint. It increases your personal risk as well as the risk to your organization's brand. Today we have in the studio, Kurt Long, CEO of Bunker and an expert with experience helping in initiatives like the NASA Space Shuttle, the Hubble Telescope and much more. This is his story on the newest ways to take control.
over data privacy. And now, the show.
All right, well, welcome, Kurt. We appreciate you being on and joining us.
Kurt Long (01:19.278)
Thank you, David. Thanks for having me.
D. Mauro (01:20.904)
Yeah, so, yeah, no, we're, we're, we're excited. So a little bit of background for anybody that may not know you, we don't have to go into detail. We've, we've explored your origin story on, on, on a prior episode that'll be linked in the show notes, but, share with everybody kind of how you, how you got started in technology and ultimately came to work at NASA and work on the things like the
Hubble telescope and other very cool initiatives that are much, much, much smarter and more technical than things that most of us see on a regular basis.
Kurt Long (02:02.126)
I watched the Apollo missions when I was really young in Florida. I grew up in Florida and could see literally the takeoffs and the launches. And then a few days later, you'd see the astronauts on television. And that was very inspiring. And ultimately, I wound up working at... This was directed. It didn't just happen by happen chance, but worked very hard to wind up being...
in the real time space shuttle launch data bank at Kennedy Space Center and was part of, you know, a few dozen launches, including Hubble Space Telescope, left somewhere in the nineties and wound up being an information security entrepreneur and have been involved, involved in that for about 30 years of strictly privacy and information security, built several businesses, sold them.
and somewhere around health protected healthcare systems with around 250 million patient records and trillions of dollars of assets within banks, wealth management firms, trading companies. So in the last 20 years, always kind of on the highest standard of protecting information.
D. Mauro (03:23.048)
That's just phenomenal. Yeah, we and we explored a lot of your recent accomplishments in in the last episode. And it's it's it's really remarkable how somebody that has the ideas has the experience has the good cause behind them can actually make an impact like like you have. And so we thank you for kind of all the all that you've done, especially in health care and the financial industry. I mean, I'm
Kurt Long (03:46.478)
Sure. And.
Yes, that's where the most sensitive data is. That's where the bad guys hang out. Yeah. Yeah.
D. Mauro (03:53.736)
It really, yeah, it really is. I mean, yeah. You know, it's, it's remarkable how cybercrime has just advanced in their, their leveraging of AI, everything from, from the code that they're able to create, you know, undetectability, get into systems, the amount that it's
just been funded and the amount of revenue that that cybercrime and ransomware gangs and financial crime gangs have have created and built up in in the past few years. You know, I'm sure before we get into some of the topics that that we had wanted to discuss, I wanted to just to get your your take, because you see the news, obviously.
law enforcement has had some big wins in the last few months against some of the ransomware gangs and some of the cyber crime gangs. What's your take on that? It's pretty exciting, isn't it?
Kurt Long (05:03.246)
I mean, you have field level intelligence analysts doing an incredible job of infiltrating the gangs. I know them, some of them personally, and they're very proud of the work that they do. And they make a lot of personal sacrifices to be trusted by people that are tough to earn the trust. So a lot of those wins just come down from field level intelligence analysts infiltrating the organizations and putting
those people in a position to be compromised and it takes a long time and they make a lot of personal sacrifice. At a more macro level, something I hope we can talk about today is global governments, including the United States and European Union particularly, are putting their citizens at great risk through non -enforcement of laws and under -reporting of crimes. So while the field level,
Practitioners are phenomenally dedicated and very, very skilled. Our political class is putting all of us at risk. And there's a blurring of lines now between physical crime and cyber crime and governmental enforcement of laws.
D. Mauro (06:22.056)
Yeah, absolutely. And we see that across so many platforms and at various levels. So let's jump right in there. What are some of the samples or examples that you can give that are showing that, especially in the US and in the EU?
Kurt Long (06:43.406)
Yeah, I mean, I travel a lot. We travel a lot internationally. And you know, you really can't. The one point I want to make up front is that you really can't get good data by just reading the headlines and reading the media either direction. If you're in the EU or UK and you're reading American headlines, US headlines, probably not getting the real story and then vice versa. You know, you read the headlines there, you go there on the ground, you talk to people. So.
I was just in Prague, a country we had not visited, Czech Republic, and had a great visit there. And the driver is driving us back to the airport. And I realized that he had lived in the Czech Republic through the Warsaw Pact. And while the USSR still had a big influence. And he told the story of using the phone, that his family used the phone.
D. Mauro (07:19.247)
Mm -hmm.
Kurt Long (07:42.99)
And when they did, they always knew somebody, landline or cell phone, didn't even matter. Like they surveilled. And he said that everyone knew that every conversation was listened to and that if you said things that were disparaging of the party, that your kids would be taken out of school, that you would lose your job, you'd be not allowed to travel. And,
D. Mauro (07:44.788)
Cell phone or landline? I didn't mean to interrupt you. Yep. Right.
Kurt Long (08:11.502)
that over time reduced down to what they just call the red phone so that you had to be a red card carrying party member in order to use the phone at all. And as a, if you weren't that, you kind of became a non -person and that they turned everyone against each other. They would try to get neighbors to tell on neighbors so that they...
D. Mauro (08:31.432)
They create a society and a culture of fear. It's a form of indoctrination. They get compliance by getting everybody to kind of rat on each other.
Kurt Long (08:47.534)
Yeah, then they don't trust each other. You don't even trust family members. And he went on to, that is literally what he said. I wouldn't trust my friends. I could barely trust family members. We didn't talk to one another. Very...
D. Mauro (08:58.792)
People in the United States can't even relate to that though, because they think that's something for a spy. I know. I mean, that's what we're going to talk about. But I mean, people like they think that's something from the McCarthy era or something from back in the day, or it's something that they see in movies, right? It's not something that people that are in their 30s and 40s have really grown up with. I mean, you have to realize, right? Like people below, what is it?
Kurt Long (09:02.84)
We're getting there. We're getting there.
Kurt Long (09:18.99)
Yeah, so.
D. Mauro (09:27.56)
35 or so in age, like the USSR wasn't even around when they were kids. Right? Like they, they didn't grow up like that, like, like I did in like you did.
Kurt Long (09:34.03)
Yeah, so we talked about that.
Kurt Long (09:39.406)
Yeah. So, conversation continued and I said, well, what is your free? You know, he said the nineties were the most amazing time for everyone in Eastern that Eastern block. They said it was just incredible. The freedoms that came with it. And I said, well, what about today? And he said, well, today I feel like censorship is coming back. surveillance is coming back. And I said, really, you know, tell me, tell me about that. And his.
D. Mauro (09:52.392)
Hmm.
right after the wall came down. Yeah.
D. Mauro (10:02.63)
Hmm.
Kurt Long (10:08.814)
comments were that crimes are not reported, that they're censored, if you will, online, they're never published in the media. And I said, what do mean specifically? What do you mean by that? How do you say they're... Well, he said that if it's immigrant crime, it will never be reported. So on the trains in Germany, on the train system throughout that region, Austria, Germany, Poland, and the Czech...
We will never report on immigrant crimes and that's being censored.
D. Mauro (10:43.24)
Why is that? Like, why do you think that is? Why do you think, assuming that what he's saying is true, why do you think that is?
Kurt Long (10:50.414)
Yeah. So I think what you see globally across the EU and across the United States is there's generally a huge movement for immigration and I'll just call it uncontrolled immigration. I don't know what other word is how you're supposed to refer to it, but it's uncontrolled immigration. And so if I'm on the ground, every, every country I'm on the ground in Europe, there's a backdrop of this.
the immigration question. And so for example, in Britain, and this is all what I'm about to, this was a personal story I just told you now, and that's just in the last weeks, like, and literally that was two weeks ago, whatever it was. These are headlines right now, and you can do your own research. Like in Britain, they're refusing to publish statistics on who's committing the crimes, and the people are getting, some people are getting upset, and you can look at that. In Denmark, they did report crimes,
D. Mauro (11:28.488)
Yeah, of course. Yep. Yep.
Kurt Long (11:49.678)
by country born and the immigrants were 40 times more likely to commit a serious crime than a Danish born person. And so if you kind of just look at general policies as a general statement, by every indication I have both in the US and the EU, there is a political sentiment amongst the political class to encourage broad scale.
immigration and then those same parties are suppressing the crime statistics that would reveal that the policies are endangering the citizens and that's a pretty obvious theme to research and recognize.
D. Mauro (12:37.992)
Yeah, that seems fairly well documented. Just a cursory research will show people that. Here's my question. Like, what is the benefit to political leaders of whichever party? But what is the benefit to them to have uncontrolled immigration? Do they get more votes generally because the new immigrants tend to be aligned to them politically?
Kurt Long (13:07.886)
You know, I think we all have our opinions. I'm a cybersecurity and privacy expert. Maybe, you know, I know a bit about fraud. I can make observations and, I, I don't know, David, like I, in other words, your, your speculation or the audience's speculation is as good as mine, which is something like, for some reason they view it as an accumulation of power.
D. Mauro (13:12.55)
Mm -hmm.
D. Mauro (13:25.512)
Okay.
D. Mauro (13:32.232)
Right.
Kurt Long (13:33.038)
And by every indication, it looks like central governments in the US and central governments or Europe are in power accumulation mode. And so I want to point something out. The family, the Long family, just committed a million dollars to the University of Florida Hamilton Center, which is creating the largest department of Western Civilization Studies in the world. And the thing that tipped it over for us is what's civil discourse. That
the president of the university, Ben Sasse, is saying that, and I have every reason to believe that they're going to teach all 60 ,000 students, it's a big university, how to speak to one another without argument, without physical violence. Could Dave, without contempt? Yeah. Yeah. And I'll tie it in in just a second. Go ahead, but I'll tie this together in just a second.
D. Mauro (14:19.628)
Exactly. Without contempt, right? Just to wreck. Yeah, that's really important. You know, that's so important. Yeah. No, please do. Go ahead. No, that's, I think that's remarkable what you guys are doing. That's really noble.
Kurt Long (14:31.116)
I didn't mean to, I don't want to interrupt. Okay, so, and we're making a similar commitment with a firm in Denmark that's doing these kinds of things on a global scale, a firm called Voluntus, fantastic people. And we're also working in war -torn countries. We are, they are, and I'm helping fund it, you know, so, meaning rights of people. So why is...
D. Mauro (14:51.176)
Hmm. Hmm.
Kurt Long (14:57.88)
Why is Western civilization tied into crime? What I came to believe deeply is that, you know, by the time you get to the US Constitution, we've learned a lot of lessons about civilization. And one of them might be the way that, say, ancient Greeks and early, the third, fourth century people wrote. They wrote, Socrates and Plato wrote in kind of this...
dialogue style and people like both these Boethius wrote in a dialogue where they were arguing they were literally holding arguments that were civil and that that is kind of the lowest level foundation of our civilization is that we can talk to each other without resorting to violence or without me deciding that we need to get rid of you.
D. Mauro (15:26.248)
Correct.
Kurt Long (15:49.24)
Today that get rid of you is probably more canceling online. Back then it might have been physical. And then if we progress through, say, let's just go through England, it's really well documented that the kings would go into a political adversary's home and without a warrant, famously.
D. Mauro (15:54.76)
Right.
Kurt Long (16:12.654)
and find, they managed to find something bad that you were doing and if they didn't find something bad you were doing, well then they would plant something. And so that the, the king's men, if you will, were weaponized against political adversaries. So when our constitutional framers put together the fourth amendment, famously, it was a protection from warrantless search. And then on the other side of that, that's right.
D. Mauro (16:38.052)
Exactly. And there was checks and balances because otherwise it's uncontrolled power, right? Like otherwise, correct.
Kurt Long (16:44.814)
I would call it almost anarchy. We devolve into kind of anarchy. And that's where we are. We're teetering on that now. And so the tie back in the Western Civ thing, before we throw all that out, you know, say, this is, they didn't know any, we should probably at least understand it and maybe teach each other to talk well and at least recognize that like our Bill of Rights probably has things in there that we should be very careful of throwing out.
So if you were to tie all these things together, it's what we're devolving into online is you've got kind of this anarchy online because of the anonymity and end -to -end encryption and the location of businesses in countries that can't be challenged by central powers.
And that allows for kind of this anarchy online that criminals participate in there. There's no surveillance whatsoever, if you will. And what has this done to the politicians? Well, it's just made them ever more aspirational in their surveillance. Like they get more aggressive. You know, so when we look at FISA 702, which just got renewed in late April, there was a bill.
D. Mauro (18:03.72)
Right.
Kurt Long (18:13.294)
to make it required that there had to be a warrant in order that you be surveilled. Well, that got voted down in a tie vote and the Speaker of the House cast the deciding vote. I believe that's correct. I know it was a tie vote. I believe that was the Speaker of the House. And he made it where it's a two -year extension of FISA of the ability to surveil as opposed to five -year. But nonetheless, this spans political parties.
And so now there's even some expansions of FISA. And so you've got this incredible dynamic of government overreaching into surveillance and then tech entrepreneurs responding by getting above the law and outside the law. And it's the worst of both worlds. It's deep surveillance countered by almost like anarchy.
And that's all because we've thrown out the wisdom of some of these hard -earned lessons like the Fourth Amendment. So I know that was a lot to go through. Go through it, I did. Yeah.
D. Mauro (19:20.008)
Okay. No, let's break this down. That was really good. So it's your own personal assessment of what is going on, but I will tell you, it seems you're not alone. Let's just say that. It seems like there's a lot of people kind of feeling this way. For listeners, let's explain to them what is FISA 702. High level, right?
Kurt Long (19:29.902)
That's right.
Kurt Long (19:42.766)
Yes.
Kurt Long (19:46.862)
So, most of this started post 2001. You had the after 9 -11, and that's why it's always tempting to point at one political party and say, what's the Dems or it's the Republicans, but really this thing spans all, it's both. So it started with the Patriot Act, which at the time probably felt...
D. Mauro (19:55.846)
after 9 -11. Correct.
D. Mauro (20:05.544)
But it's not, it's both, it spans, it does.
Kurt Long (20:13.55)
really proper to a lot of a lot of us people who live in the US and it gave the government more surveillance powers to surveil for terroristic activities specifically around people who are not domiciled in the US and then if they came to the US or they communicated outside the US that that opened the surveillance net up and over time meaning over
over a decade, they wound down the Patriot Act, but they really spun up the powers of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act 702, which in effect replicates the powers of the Patriot Act. And so that the basic idea is that the government does not need a warrant to surveil your communications if you are communicating
with someone outside the US and then that gets all spun around and it's not transparent, which is the problem to say, well, if you're communicating out some outside the US and they get entangled and you get entangled with people that are in the US in those communications that it broadens the net. So I would assert that it is not exactly clear where the powers of surveillance start.
Well, we know they at least start when you're communicating outside the US, but they seem like they do not stop. They seem like they can twist that around to surveil all of us. And there's a great deal of lack of transparency, including the voting down of a warrant requirement, which is the most fundamental constitutional, one of the more fundamental things we have as domiciled in the US. Yeah.
D. Mauro (22:04.584)
Yeah, because in the United States you have the right of not having warrantless searches.
Kurt Long (22:10.638)
Yeah, the King's men, if you will, the government can come kick your door down and say, I know you're doing something wrong, you know, and start looking around and we're going to find it. And then if the government gets corrupt enough, which I argue that if you think that this stuff's okay, you're just one presidential change away from thinking it's not. So if you like Biden, you're not afraid today. Well, wait till Trump gets in office and see if you, you fear, or if you like Trump.
D. Mauro (22:17.032)
Right. And if not, we're going to find it or we're going to make it happen.
D. Mauro (22:36.102)
Mm -hmm.
Kurt Long (22:39.182)
and you're not afraid, well, wait till a Democrat gets voted in. These are things that cut across parties that we all have to learn to stand up for.
D. Mauro (22:47.144)
Right. and it's not just one. It's not just the executive leader. Like, like, like this is a systemic issue, would you would you think so, rather than just the executive leader?
Kurt Long (22:57.984)
You see, this is where I...
It's absolutely not just the executive leader. And right now, you know, I would say the demo and in the past, Democrats have always tilted toward privacy, right? So I was favorable from my own self interest because I was in the privacy business to say, well, you know, the Dems are going to stick up for privacy. That's probably a good thing. Today, the Dems are probably leading a little bit away from privacy and a little more towards surveillance as a general. But here it is.
D. Mauro (23:13.062)
Mm -hmm.
D. Mauro (23:17.64)
Right.
Kurt Long (23:29.486)
You know, I just saw an article online that the Republicans are kind of split into two groups and that they're pitted against one another and that they're going to use 702 against one another to control a central vote. So it goes up and down the stack, David, not just, and I wouldn't stop, but just once you weaponize this stuff, it's dangerous.
D. Mauro (23:53.16)
Yeah, exactly. Well, and right, exactly. And this could be the result of a lot of special interests and funding, right? Like you have certain Republicans that are funded by certain tech groups in favor of privacy, then they're going to vote a certain way. Other groups, right, exactly. Yeah. Right.
Kurt Long (24:03.026)
Absolutely.
Kurt Long (24:12.078)
A DOD contractor. I mean, if you're funded by a DOD contractor, you're funded by a pharmaceutical, you pick it. These things are all interrelated. And I hate to sound like the old guy yelling at the sky, but I'm okay to do that. If I get accused of that, fine. But we need to revert back a bit. We need to revert back to government is actually for the people representing our interest.
D. Mauro (24:20.52)
Yeah.
D. Mauro (24:24.584)
It's okay. Yeah. Right.
D. Mauro (24:38.53)
Yeah, woo woo woo.
Kurt Long (24:39.566)
and bring back a balance of the constitutional framework.
D. Mauro (24:42.76)
We have a lot of guests on here that are former FBI secret service and they're like, yeah, people have to stop believing in the phrase like we're from the government, we're here to help you. There's a lot of good intent, but in the execution, there's a lot. The system is really broken. So, yeah. No, it's good.
Kurt Long (24:48.046)
Mm. Mm.
Kurt Long (24:55.246)
Yeah.
Kurt Long (25:03.982)
Yeah, let me give you one more data point just to, and we can go wherever you want, David, but let me give you one more data point. Like if you look at the uniform FBI crime report statistics, you know, we're hearing people out there going, Hey, you know, crimes at all time low. And you're like, that doesn't match my intuitive view of the world. What's going on? Well, it turns out 33 % of the cities in the United States, including LA and New York are not reporting.
D. Mauro (25:12.582)
Mm -hmm.
Kurt Long (25:34.094)
They're withholding statistics. And, you know, just to tie... You know, Chicago was in there, David, to its credit. Crimes down. They were. But Tampa, where I live in Florida, Tampa was either late in reporting or had not reported. And that's a big city. So you're, you know...
D. Mauro (25:34.247)
Right.
D. Mauro (25:39.432)
So if you take Chicago, LA, New York out of the mix, crimes down. Chicago was in there. good for my alma mater. That's good. Yeah.
D. Mauro (25:58.12)
But it's interesting, you know, here's a real life example. There's apps that people can monitor their local safety or to see what law enforcement is doing. There's like the citizens apps and things like that where you can see, there's a break in over here or there's an emergency over here. There's a fire. It's a good way of being abreast of storms as well as criminal activity. But when people and I've spoken to people all over the country,
Kurt Long (26:01.262)
Yes.
Kurt Long (26:09.71)
Mm -hmm.
D. Mauro (26:28.104)
there's various jurisdictions that don't report into that app. And so you would see. So so you see all this, you know, like look at all this activity on the on the south side. Yeah, but the north side suburbs aren't reporting anything. There's no activity for three years there. I'm like, OK, well, don't tell me it's not happening. They're just not reporting because it's bad PR. Right. Like they don't like.
Kurt Long (26:32.59)
got it.
Kurt Long (26:43.694)
Yes. Yes.
Kurt Long (26:51.086)
Yes.
Kurt Long (26:54.926)
Yes.
D. Mauro (26:56.456)
People may not want to go to our local boutiques, et cetera, if they actually know how dangerous it could be, right? Yeah, that's exactly what's happening.
Kurt Long (27:07.502)
Yes. Yeah. And then in other regions like California, proposition 47, I passed in 2014 and it, in a sense, decriminalized certain kinds of crimes, nonviolent crimes for possession of drugs, as well as, stolen, goods, which, under $950 turn them into misdemeanors. And so in a sense we've legalized some,
D. Mauro (27:21.448)
Right, right.
Kurt Long (27:35.202)
what used to be crime, so those also don't get reported. And what I can say is I've traveled to over 50 countries. I don't know how many cities, and the only place I've ever been robbed is San Francisco.
D. Mauro (27:50.184)
You know, it was interesting, we, we recently interviewed somebody that was just out at RSA. And they've been to RSA in San Francisco numerous times. And they said, it has changed. It was they were, they were really afraid for themselves. And this is their own personal perception. Don't know what it's like there right now today. The problem is, I think is without the reporting of it, nobody really knows, right?
Kurt Long (27:51.886)
Kurt Long (27:56.62)
Mm -hmm.
Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.
Kurt Long (28:03.79)
Is that right?
D. Mauro (28:19.656)
But the sense is, you know, there's a feeling of not being safe and that's a concern.
Kurt Long (28:19.79)
That's right.
Kurt Long (28:26.926)
Yes, so I would say the overall theme here that I'm getting at is we have a poll. I'm just going to call them the political class of people, David, and you could refine that wherever you want. It's definitely not just the president. It's not one party. It's the political class. For whatever reason, they have these agendas and let's just call it less controlled immigration as an example agenda. And, and.
D. Mauro (28:34.054)
Hmm?
Makes sense. No. No.
Kurt Long (28:52.91)
they're going to run those and then apparently there we're going to not report crimes. We're going to legalize what used to be crimes. And then instead of like having directed law enforcement to say, I have reason to believe that Kurt or David is engaging in crime. We are just going to surveil you and you show me the man and I'll show you the crime. You know, as I believe it was Stalin who famously said,
And the result is like the tech entrepreneurs are reacting by creating products and services that remove us, remove their users completely from law enforcement. And then you wind up with more crime and we've got to restore some kind of balance and order back to a more centrist place.
D. Mauro (29:38.824)
Right.
D. Mauro (29:46.472)
Exactly. And let's talk about some of those, some of those platforms, platforms like Telegram, Signal, things like that, right? So, so walk us through what, what, what are those platforms and how are they? I mean, most of our listeners have, have heard of them, but they may or may not have used them. So I know that Telegram is used quite regularly by cyber crime. Like it's, there's a thousands of reports.
Kurt Long (29:52.846)
Yes.
Kurt Long (30:04.16)
Yes.
D. Mauro (30:14.28)
of it. And I know that law enforcement is monitoring a lot of it. There have been some significant arrests arising out of conversations that they see on telegram, which the people speaking kind of thought were private, but they weren't.
Kurt Long (30:29.998)
Yes. So that, that would be examples of where, you know, you'd have intelligence agents getting into groups that the criminals think are private groups, but they're in fact infiltrated by intelligence analysts. But the core say around Telegram is the encryption where they famously resist cooperating and probably resist cooperating with law enforcement governments is the right way to phrase that. And.
D. Mauro (30:37.254)
Mm -hmm.
D. Mauro (30:58.312)
What that means is if law enforcement issues a subpoena to them, they refuse to like turn over any anything. Right. Yeah.
Kurt Long (31:03.15)
Yes. As a general statement, I'm sure there's exceptions to that, but as a general statement, then they relocated the business to the UAE. And interestingly, the founder of Telegram was also robbed in San Francisco and claims that's the only place he's ever been robbed as well. But in any case, yeah.
D. Mauro (31:19.08)
He claims that, you know, I don't want to get a bunch of letters from San Francisco. It's a glorious place. Like, there's a lot of culture there. It's fantastic. Don't get us wrong. We just want it to be accurately reflected in the crime statistics. That's all we're saying, right? So you're going beyond that. Well, the official the official view of the show is it's a great place. So.
Kurt Long (31:38.126)
No, I think I'm going beyond that I mean safe no no I am because San Francisco what Yeah, my opinion is I've been traveling to San Francisco since 1985 I considered it my favorite City in the world even beyond the city that I grew up in in Florida and I thought I think San Francisco
D. Mauro (31:50.534)
Yeah.
Kurt Long (32:02.51)
was amazing. It's been amazing to the foundation of this country, but I think the policies that the political class have put in place there have not served law -abiding citizens and people who are industrious. I don't think it's served them well, and I think it's reflected in the city today. And I think that there's every reason to believe that the city can recover with the modest
D. Mauro (32:05.16)
Hmm.
Kurt Long (32:27.7)
Regaining of rebalance. It's always been a great place and will be in the future, but I believe it has to regain its balance That's my opinion Yep And hey, look like you could pick one city in the world to live. That's it, but I'd want law and order there So in any case in any case You know we we we we wind up with this under reporting of crime and and it becomes ubiquitous and we lose ground and we're on on telegram
D. Mauro (32:29.03)
Mm -hmm.
D. Mauro (32:36.072)
Absolutely, absolutely.
D. Mauro (32:55.528)
Well, an interesting correlation what you're making is, okay, whatever city, whatever state, whatever country even, there's an under reporting of crime for various reasons. We don't know what, but we can surmise or speculate. But because of that, the technology industry is responding and has been responding for years by creating ways around it, right? Because there's under reporting,
Kurt Long (33:04.462)
Yes.
Kurt Long (33:12.27)
Yes.
Kurt Long (33:22.318)
Yes.
D. Mauro (33:25.384)
of crime or because there's various challenges because the government can't employ a million intelligence analysts to infiltrate everywhere, right? They have sought through the laws to be able to have warrantless surveillance. And then from there, the tech industry is responding and they're saying, well, then we're creating platforms which can be encrypted and can be private.
Kurt Long (33:37.422)
Yes.
Kurt Long (33:44.718)
Yes.
Kurt Long (33:53.518)
Yes, and we will not cooperate with law enforcement.
D. Mauro (33:54.92)
And that and then cybercrime cybercrime elements are starting to leverage those platforms. Because. Right. Exactly. Right. Well, I mean, it's it's how it started with, you know, before, you know, like originally there was Brett Johnson and the Shadow Crew and and and that aspect and then the dark web in the Tor browser and all the onion.
Kurt Long (34:02.872)
They have been for at least a decade and it's expanding rapidly. Yep.
Kurt Long (34:16.014)
Yes.
D. Mauro (34:24.764)
URLs kind of came up. But now there's all these messaging apps like Telegram and Signal. Well, let's yeah, matrix. Yep. Tox, right. And and and talks we talk about all the time. Because if you get attacked by ransomware, you get a note that says, you know, come talk to us on a Tox channel. People are like, we don't what, like they've never heard of the Tor browser. They like business owners, right? They're not.
Kurt Long (34:31.598)
Matrix, TOCS, yeah.
Yes.
Kurt Long (34:50.542)
Yes.
D. Mauro (34:50.664)
necessarily technical, but all of a sudden they have to like download the Tor browser, set up all these other systems, maybe tails to get on there. And then they've got to go and have a talks channel communication, which, you know, is apparently, you know, not public. So it's, it's, it's where cybercrime lives. And it's where when people think of the dark web and this, and the shadows of it, I mean, it's really very similar and analogous.
Kurt Long (35:08.558)
Yes.
D. Mauro (35:20.552)
to organize crime back in the 50s and 60s, which would just go and talk. I mean, we've all seen them. We've all know the real stories where they have to talk and hide their lips. They have to go talk in public. They don't use the phones because they just find a place to have in to conduct business away from surveillance. And that's what's happening online. Yeah. yeah. It's happening at 10 X, a hundred X times, right.
Kurt Long (35:40.398)
Yes, it is. Except it scales really, really well. The scale of it is vast. You know, so one thing that gets a little messy in here is as I go through these things and we talk about these things is what are people supposed to do? And it's, I think we all have to play some role in bringing back accountability and balance to society. So there's a couple things. A person who's been involved in privacy for
at least 20 years. you know, we've heard famously from, from people that just get over it. Privacy is gone and accept that you're going to be surveilled. I think this is, this is one of the most, I don't know what word to use. I hate to say naive because it makes it sound to the listener that they're naive, but it's, it's nefarious. This privacy compromises absolutely.
D. Mauro (36:35.75)
Mm -hmm.
Kurt Long (36:39.29)
nefarious because you don't feel it. You don't, you can't see it. It's tough to attribute what you see in the world happening. But as we watch this play out and you speak to people, say from Czechoslovakia under the USSR, when you lose your privacy, it really does consistently lead to governmental political class abuse, a loss of not just human rights, but
the value of humans and to some extent, anarchy because everyone goes and hides from it in the dark, if you will, and you wind up with a criminal side of the world and a surveilled side of the world and a loss of rights. So if there was just one takeaway, it would be, I really, really wish the audience would take their.
privacy rights seriously. I'm not saying to go protest Facebook or something, but watch the government stand up to this and just push back legally. We don't need to be part of the problem, but push back legally in every way you can. That's my opinion.
D. Mauro (37:39.496)
No, but... Yep.
D. Mauro (37:51.304)
Yeah. And that's, and that's not misaligned with the messaging that other guests have had and that we've promoted. And that is take your like Americans in general have not been valuing their personal privacy. They just have it like as a culture. We haven't like you talk to people over in other countries and they considered a fundamental human right because I believe the harm that happens.
Kurt Long (38:07.382)
Yes.
You're right.
Kurt Long (38:15.95)
Yes.
D. Mauro (38:20.616)
when it leads to abuse has happened more recently over there to them. And because of that, right? I mean, I think that's a fair assessment. Yeah.
Kurt Long (38:25.294)
Yes. Yes. No, you're right. You're right. It's, it's in, in the case of the Prague driver, he was, he was in his 40s. So it's in living memory, right? It's in living memory for them. And you know, David, one thing I would say that if you want to take an action, how do you take action? Well, you know, we all got addicted to the free app. You know, the free app is part of this where it's like, and man, I use maps.
D. Mauro (38:35.688)
Right.
D. Mauro (38:49.096)
We talk about that all the time. When there's an app that's free, you're the product, right?
Kurt Long (38:54.062)
Yes. And like, you know, and for years you're like, why still went along with it? And the more and more I saw it play out, I'm like, you know what? It's worth paying a modest amount of money to get a really valuable app. where, where my, my sovereignty is protected. And that's what the bunker tie in is there. It's like, we try to make it a modest amount of money, for, for people to use. And,
D. Mauro (39:06.6)
Right.
D. Mauro (39:15.688)
Right. Yep.
Kurt Long (39:23.022)
and we really do protect their privacy.
D. Mauro (39:23.078)
it's very affordable. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I mean, it's and we will have links to bunker. I mean, it's extremely affordable and the levels of privacy are just unmatched. It's it's it's absolutely fantastic. Well, and there's also the what's your opinion? I wanted to ask you about this because we didn't talk about it last time. But the and I'm not one that is in favor of more regulation or more laws.
because again, I don't I mean, we just the people that I talked to and, and in my personal experience, my own personal opinion, not the opinion of my employer, none of these opinions are opinions of my employers, everybody. But but look like, you know, data brokers, like, data, like, there's no, there's very little regulation about, about data brokers. And there's so much like,
They take so much data and sell it to so many organizations that you have no idea when you're accepting cookies and you're signing up for these free apps, you're giving them, you're answering these questions, these security things, you're giving them all this stuff about you and it gets sold all over the place. And many of them are nefarious and you are subject to that.
Kurt Long (40:21.998)
Yeah.
It's true.
Kurt Long (40:44.558)
Yeah, you know, David, I was ready to give a little speech about how we should have fewer laws, but enforce the ones we do have. And then you did the data broker thing, which is really complicated. You're right. And the case, and I would, the thing I would add, I don't have anything to add what you said about that other than they also don't have breach reporting laws. So when they aggregate a ton of data, not only they selling your data and, and there have been charges of selling data in real time.
D. Mauro (40:55.048)
It is complicated.
D. Mauro (41:04.87)
No, exactly.
Kurt Long (41:13.326)
your location, all kinds of things. But when they're breached, this gigantic trove goes to the dark web and unlike a regulated industry, they don't even have to report. and so it's, I think you've hit the nail on the head with, with that one. And I don't know how you get around having a bit more laws on that, but, but my big thing is like,
D. Mauro (41:13.606)
Mm -hmm.
Kurt Long (41:39.054)
What I've seen over the years of being involved in information security and regulation, which is in effect laws, we don't usually need more laws. We usually need to enforce the ones that are there because we do not do a good job of enforcement. And just to give you an example of that briefly. Okay. So this is going to.
D. Mauro (41:59.014)
There's thousands of examples right there actually are because I think that's that's I think that's well said because people don't really think about it that way. Because because whenever something happens, they're like, well, we need to like, I mean, it's it's analogous in so many aspects of, of life, there's a big shooting. And so people in certain cities are like, well, we need more laws. I'm like, you already have the most strict laws on the planet, right? Like,
Kurt Long (42:24.686)
Gun laws there are, yeah. Yeah.
D. Mauro (42:27.162)
enforce them and then maybe it'll be okay, right? Like it's, it really boils down to enforcement.
Kurt Long (42:33.422)
It does. And this example is going to be one I used to spend a good amount of time in Washington, DC. I was not a lobbyist, but I did educate Congress, people, senators, staff, legal liaisons, as well as enforcement agency. And this was, this was at the time of Office for Civil Rights, Health and Human Services, together with congressional work. And what I learned,
D. Mauro (42:53.51)
Hmm.
Kurt Long (42:58.574)
is that I would go meet with a senator or a congressperson or a legal liaison for them and tell them that, listen, you know, in the healthcare industry, for example, these kinds of organizations don't worry at all about, in this case, HIPAA because there's no enforcement. And they were always shocked to the, and they were, I think, deeply disappointed on the lawmaking side.
And then you would go over to the office for civil rights side and they really kind of had the attitude of, you know, we're going to enforce what we want. We're going to kind of do what we want unless someone threatens funding. And, it was the first time I realized that the lawmakers might have really good intention, but if the administrative state doesn't enforce it, that the laws don't even matter.
D. Mauro (43:50.344)
And the yes, right.
Kurt Long (43:55.438)
That was a huge revelation for me and that's the nature of why I spent time in DC trying to bridge the gap between lawmakers and the enforcement agencies.
D. Mauro (44:05.736)
you know, that's a great distinction, because that cuts, it's non political, like you're not saying it's this party doing this or this party, because it's not, it is it is just it is the government function. And there are ways around that. They can tie in restrictions on funding should should there not be enforcement, there's always ways to craft and edit and amend in.
Kurt Long (44:16.844)
So.
Kurt Long (44:34.062)
So ultimately to your point David, what wind up happening in a positive note on this one is that they started tying Medicare funding to privacy and security regs and it worked. It worked. Because they got control of the money and like you're not going to get money if you are found to be negligent in the area of protecting the data as well as the associated fraud. And it worked.
D. Mauro (44:44.166)
Exactly. I was just about to say that for for for hip hop. Yeah. Yes.
D. Mauro (44:56.488)
Right.
D. Mauro (45:01.416)
Yep, absolutely. Well, I mean, here in the United States, it seems the financial industry clearly has been the leader in on the forefront of bolstering cybersecurity and bolstering compliance as evidence of certain controls for cybersecurity overall. But and and health care, you'd think would be right up there. It's still slowly coming, right? It's not as
And we see it in the data breach statistics, right? I mean, you just see US healthcare getting pummeled and with attacks like ransomware, it's literally killing people. Like it's literally causing physical, it's blurred the lines between digital harm and physical harm. And I think people are starting to see that more and more.
Kurt Long (45:41.966)
Yes.
Kurt Long (45:46.382)
Yes.
Kurt Long (45:50.798)
Yeah.
Kurt Long (45:54.766)
Yeah, I think that just as human beings, my belief is we've come to undervalue human beings. I think that my opinion is every human being that could come into the world, we should be aligning ourselves and programs to maximize the potential of human beings. And when we lose a human being, that this is a loss. And I think that's...
D. Mauro (46:04.872)
Right.
Kurt Long (46:22.04)
It's probably very naive, but I think we need to restill that beginning with our own selves and our children and our grandchildren and ask that lawmakers recognize that it's constitutional.
D. Mauro (46:29.382)
Well, it's constitutional as well. I mean, that's the found. Yeah, it's the foundation of the U .S. Constitution. And it's funny because I mean, I was I was a political science nerd. I was I was an attorney. And I will tell you that, you know, our Constitution is almost identical to certain communist countries. It's in the execution of it. Right. It's you know what I mean? Like on paper, they're almost the same. But let me tell you, the execution is completely different.
Kurt Long (46:34.626)
Yes.
Kurt Long (46:40.716)
Mm -hmm. Mm.
Kurt Long (46:49.87)
got it. That's a great point. Yeah, I do.
Yes.
D. Mauro (46:59.56)
Right? Like the way we created the entities, the checks and balances that we have in place. And what you're bringing up is we're lacking checks and balances in certain segments right now. Right? Yes. Transparency. Right. Exactly. Yeah.
Kurt Long (46:59.566)
Yes.
Kurt Long (47:10.734)
And transparency, like trans, you know, real delight is the best disinfectant, you know, like that's the same or, you know, we know that bad deeds happen in the dark and the light is the best disinfectant. And when we see government officials of any persuasion party, whatever, and they're pushing back on why we don't need to know, and, you know, no, it's too scary for the public to know, like, no, you should be.
D. Mauro (47:18.288)
Mm -hmm. Yep.
D. Mauro (47:22.854)
Yep.
D. Mauro (47:37.54)
my god, all they have to do is watch the news. Like they've seen everything at this point. Right? I mean, and I think it underestimates the public in general. Right? Like, you know, trust in your people a little bit more. And yeah.
Kurt Long (47:43.79)
Yes. Yes.
Kurt Long (47:49.998)
Yes.
Kurt Long (47:53.934)
Absolutely. That's exactly right. I know it's a little different conversation, David, but this is where my head's been. I appreciate you letting me explore these things a little bit.
D. Mauro (48:01.48)
No, it's always great to speak with you and this is so interesting. So let's talk about some things that people can do. So from a personal privacy standpoint, what are some of the top three to five best practices that an individual can do? And the reason I'm focusing on the individual is organizations benefit when individuals take their privacy more seriously and have better cyber hygiene.
Because when we create those best practices for ourselves, we bring those to work.
Kurt Long (48:38.894)
All right, I'm not gonna say password management first. So I won't do that. I'm gonna purposefully go a different direction. You know.
D. Mauro (48:41.352)
Okay, thank you. That's such an obvious. So so I just let me give you a little story. I just presented at a large manufacturer last week in front of like it was so close to a couple 1000 people live. And I thought it was going to be like 50. And there was like several 1000. I was like, Whoa, it's exciting. It was exhilarating. But I'll tell you, when we're talking about password management, I'm like they've like people's eyes roll over when we talk about passwords again.
Kurt Long (48:49.166)
Yeah. Yeah.
Kurt Long (48:56.15)
Yes.
Yes.
Kurt Long (49:09.998)
Yes.
D. Mauro (49:11.656)
It's like when you talk about spotting a phishing email, everyone's like, we know, we know. I'm like, do you? Do you really? Like, it's still like 80 % of all of the incidents are involved there. Like, we don't know, right? No.
Kurt Long (49:19.214)
No, it is.
Kurt Long (49:27.022)
They don't know, right? And again, so I would, you know, here's one that you don't hear as much that I think is a good one. And I have friends doing it. We all know that social media is important in people's lives and to say, well, stay off social media is very naive, but you know what you can do is you can at least not put the apps on your phone and you can just leave your social media activity to like your desktop, you know, your laptop.
D. Mauro (49:42.352)
Mm -hmm.
Kurt Long (49:56.942)
And so that can eliminate a lot.
D. Mauro (49:59.112)
That's an interesting point. Now, what's the benefit to that?
Kurt Long (50:02.958)
Well, you know, if they're, you know, you're, you know, you're getting tracked. I'm, I'm using a VPN today, on my desktop, you know, so on my phone, when I use a VPN, it messes up too much. Like another, so I took the darn thing off. You did the same thing, David.
D. Mauro (50:06.704)
Mm -hmm. Mm -hmm.
D. Mauro (50:15.432)
It does, it slows everything down, right? Yes, yep, yeah, it slows everything up.
Kurt Long (50:21.87)
It slows it down. It breaks the apps and you're like blaming the app and they're like, no, it's my VPN on my phone. So in case I can have the VPN on my desktop and you know, I have an Instagram account and I have an X account. I don't have a Facebook account. I have LinkedIn and I can go on my desktop when it's at my house and if they track me, they're going to, if they are able to get through the VPN and still correlate me to an identity, well, they're going to find out that I'm still.
D. Mauro (50:24.966)
Mm -hmm.
Right.
D. Mauro (50:31.944)
Yeah, that's a good point.
D. Mauro (50:49.672)
It's still fine because you're at work or you're at home, right? Yeah, exactly.
Kurt Long (50:51.054)
Boringly at my house and so and then like at least I'm not carrying this device around with me That's tracking every last interaction all the way down to I went to the doctor and now they're gonna market me products related to the like I just went to an eye doctor for example and So now they're gonna track me Yes Yeah, and I mean it brings a sense of safety
D. Mauro (51:02.536)
Well, that's an interesting best practice. Yeah, that's interesting. Right.
D. Mauro (51:12.226)
yeah, so then all of a sudden you'll start seeing ads for I, yeah, all the time, right.
Kurt Long (51:21.07)
At least a sense of physical safety and maybe the reduction of a good deal of unwanted ads and all the byproducts that come with it. So that's, that's one. we talked about the VPN. I do that on my desktop. we talk, we talked about password management. and you know, the next kind of two or three are going to be exactly what we constructed bunker to do is reduce the attack surfaces. Because if you can reduce the attack surfaces,
D. Mauro (51:21.352)
Hmm.
Yep.
D. Mauro (51:27.398)
Hmm?
D. Mauro (51:37.574)
Mm -hmm.
Kurt Long (51:50.254)
It just leaves the bad guys going on to the next target. So passwords and I think secure document storage. When you've got your most important documents spread out all over the place, they're on your phone, they're on your iPad, they're on your desktop, they're in Dropbox, they're in Apple Cloud, Google Cloud. I mean, that's increasing the attack surfaces. So for myself,
D. Mauro (52:13.16)
Right.
Kurt Long (52:14.51)
I've reduced my attack services by putting my most important documents all into bunker where I know they're going to be with or without internet connectivity and I don't have to store them in 18 different places. And then I think secure communications is a really big deal. I think that it's impossible not to observe every ransomware or every major loss, there's probably a...
D. Mauro (52:24.648)
Mm -hmm.
Kurt Long (52:41.986)
80 % chance it started with email. You know, so I, or that always goes to like an imposter on the other end of the email is an imposter. And I use bunker exclusively for any kind of mission critical communications I have. It's our own product. I 100 % trust it and believe we eliminate those risks. So those are some that come to my mind. And then now we got to worry about, you know, the deep fakes and the
D. Mauro (52:51.834)
Mm -hmm.
D. Mauro (53:07.684)
Absolutely.
Kurt Long (53:11.47)
not just voice fakes, but the video fakes and you have to.
D. Mauro (53:14.472)
I'm telling you that was the that was the how we began the the education summit last last week before that before that manufacturing group. It was all I mean, we just started on deepfakes. And we showed them so many examples because I said, I can explain this, but you're not going to believe me. So let me show you. And I just showed them samples of it. And it was undetectable from the human eye. And not only that deepfakes have gotten to the point where it's it's used live.
Kurt Long (53:32.526)
Yes.
Kurt Long (53:44.366)
Yes, there's the Hong Kong was the 25 million. There's a big slug of money they got out of. Yeah.
D. Mauro (53:44.424)
Like, like it's not just a pre done. Yeah.
seven different Yes, seven different transactions totaling 25 million. And what happened was it started with an email was business email compromise. They said no, we're not going to do this. I don't know anything about this. And they said, Okay, no worries. Let's all get on a zoom or a teams. And live there were seven other people live speaking with with the person in accounts payable, right? And
and the target and they were able to ask questions for like 25, 30 minutes. All seven people were live deep fakes. It was, and they said, there was, they said, I couldn't tell. Like they said, everything was accurate. Nothing was glitching. It was, it was just like if I was speaking to seven people at my company. It's really shocking.
Kurt Long (54:25.07)
Yes.
Kurt Long (54:39.278)
Yes. Now for individuals, the family password is you've probably heard that. I'm sure your other guests have said, create a family password for businesses. There's all kinds of ways you can avoid that. But part of it is what you already alluded to. And I've run business where we have a lot of employees and security awareness. It's well, you need to invest in security awareness and you can do that to your blue in the face. And there's still people who just.
D. Mauro (54:52.294)
Mm -hmm.
Kurt Long (55:07.854)
aren't going to remember to, hey, maybe I should pick up the phone and call this person on the known cell phone for them. They're still not going to take those actions. So I think businesses still probably have a challenge. I still think a lot of it revolves around email.
D. Mauro (55:12.52)
Right. Exactly.
D. Mauro (55:23.272)
Yeah, absolutely. Well, Kurt, thank you so much. What a fantastic conversation, my friend. Always a pleasure. You didn't. It was great.
Kurt Long (55:29.838)
Well, I hope I didn't go too far, but I've David, I've really, I want to be more, you know, I've watched all this happen and I know I'm filibustering slightly, but bear with me one second, you know, of all the things I've read and seen of, of, of authoritarian regimes to get, created around the world over all time periods is they always ask people to live with lies. They ask that you, it's almost like by the end, you know, I'm lying.
D. Mauro (55:54.056)
Right.
Kurt Long (55:58.766)
And I know you know I'm lying, but I'm still going to lie to you and you're going to go along with it. And as a society, the very best thing that we can do is to tell the truth, stay open -minded, stay civil discourse and assign a value to the truth and try to get to the truth as a society individually in conversation. That's what make that UF commitment important to us.
D. Mauro (56:02.696)
Because, right.
D. Mauro (56:24.04)
Well, who and congratulations on that. And I think that's that's remarkable. We will definitely speak with you again so we can find out how that goes. Because I think creating a safe place for open discourse is how we solve this. Right. This is how I mean, it used to be. I mean, I, I'm, you know, I'm a student of history. So I look at the Lincoln Douglas debates. Right. And things like that. Talk about heated.
life and death, like absolute diametric opposition of those two sides. And they were able to both just have open discourse and let the people vote. And it was just it was the way and the results remove slavery, right? And that was the result. But it was open discourse. It you know, it's it's just remarkable. So thank you so much, my friend. We will we will we will talk again, sir.
Kurt Long (56:58.766)
Yes.
Kurt Long (57:05.358)
Yes.
Kurt Long (57:11.086)
Yes.
Yes.
Kurt Long (57:19.246)
Thank you, David. Okay.
D. Mauro (57:22.344)
Chuck again soon, Kurt Long everybody, CEO and founder of Bunker. There will be links in the show notes and we thank you for all you do. Thanks everybody. Yep, yep, thank you.
Kurt Long (57:30.83)
Thank you. Yeah, it's bunker .life is the website. Thank you.
