Retrospect
Retrospect
Staying Safe In A Digital World (feat. Randy Hidalgo) | Retrospect Ep.211
In this week’s episode we discussed the essentials of cybersecurity. From data breaches, phishing scams, and strong passwords, we break down practical tips for keeping your personal and professional information secure. Whether you're a tech novice or a digital pro, this episode will help you stay one step ahead of cyber threats.
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Keywords
cybersecurity, digital safety, online intrusion, data breaches, privacy, identity theft, AI, dark web, child predators, router security, credit monitoring, social media, email security, virtual private networks, information protection, Apple laptops, Windows laptops, subscription-based software, Microsoft partnership, augmented reality, virtual reality, Vision Pro headset, Oculus Quest, AI in cybersecurity, internet safety, electronic devices, cybersecurity, online collaboration, non-kinetic weapons, fifth-generation weapon systems.
Jason
I imagine this, you wake up one morning, grab your phone and something's off. Your social media accounts are locked. Your friends are getting strange messages from you. Your bank sends an alert, a new credit card opened in your name. It's like someone broke into your house, only this time, the doors weren't physical, they were digital. The internet. It's our home, our office, our memory bank. It connects us to opportunity, to knowledge, to each other, but behind every click lies a silent Battlefield, one where the enemy isn't always visible. Every year, millions fall victims to cyber attacks, scams, data breaches and online manipulation in 2024 alone, global cyber crime losses surpassed 10 trillion, and experts warn that number could double within a decade. But it's not just about money. It's about privacy, trust and identity. The Internet has become the new frontier of both innovation and intrusion, and while technology evolves, the fundamentals of safety, awareness, vigilance and responsibility have never been more vital.
Ian
Welcome to the retrospect podcast, a short people come together from different walks of life and discuss a topic from their generations perspective. And is Ian, and as always, I'm joined by
Ian
Stoney
Stoney
hello
Ian
and Jason.
Ian
Hello everyone. We got ourselves a guest today.
Jason
So we do this to help us navigate this complex landscape we are. We're joined by a very good friend of mine. I've known not as long as known our guests for for over 30 years now, and
Stoney
I've known him for about six
Jason
but he has been a on the front lines of this issue for well over a decade, and we're excited to have him here. His name is Randy Hidalgo, and Randy, welcome to the retrospect podcast.
Randy Hidalgo
Thank you. I appreciate being here. It's a lot of information you share just now, and honestly, you can break it down into parts, because you have your cybersecurity, you have your information protection you got, you got so much that you can talk about, and there's no way you could talk about it in one show.
Stoney
Well, we can turn this into two, if we have, but I think the key word was intrusion, yeah.
Randy Hidalgo
And I think let's start with, let's, let's talk about hardware.
Ian
Well, I guess, before we do that, can you, can you share a little bit about no no, about, I guess, kind of your he said he was done for for 10 years, I guess. And like, in what space Did you, I guess, occupy this kind of role in cybersecurity stuff is that, like
Randy Hidalgo
a so it's more of a role of so I worked for the State Police. I recently retired this year after 32 years. And I think in 2007 got put into the Technical Support Unit for state police, and we did a lot of your computer forensics, video forensics, wiretaps, covert camera installs, and we assisted our child predator unit. And that, that realm, you know, yeah, they would, they would do the online solicitation and stuff, and we would have to do the computer forensics on the back end. So, you know, I would always say, whenever we were hiring somebody for the section, because you had to look at those images, yeah, get them ready for court. And I would always that was something, I like look at them and say, you know, I'm about to change your life, the rest of your life. And it really was something that kind of sat on me when I went on an interview, because once you see that, I can't unseen it. And so it's always, always thought that and stuff. So we did all those different things and and great people over there, and got to work with a lot of great people got to work with, not just in that section, but throughout the state, right, right? But um, and we would go talk to schools and talk to kids and try to educate, because that's the best thing you can do, is educate the kids and the
Stoney
parents and the parents.
Randy Hidalgo
And usually when we go to the schools to talk and stuff, it was the we would do one for the kids during the day, and then the afternoon we would meet and do one for the parents. And you know, the kids are like, Yeah, nothing. But the parents would like keep you there forever, because they had all kinds of questions, what can I put on this? What can I do with that and stuff? And so there are a lot of different things, and we can kind of delve into that,
Stoney
yeah, if I may, with the kids, you have to be. Be extra cautious, because my stepson is so advanced, we just found out, okay, he's a runaway, okay? And he's living with his father right now. And for some reason, he kept getting in trouble in the school, and they kept saying they kept contacting the domicile parent, which is my wife, Miranda. Well, we would not get phone calls or text. He was somehow able to block the school's phone from his mother's phone with no access to her phone, and we had to go through a process to unblock that so now the school can contact us. The kids pretty good. So now these kids are so advanced today. When when we were growing up, our our electronics was I remember when I got my first transistor radio that I could put under my pillow and listen to the to the music. And it was just am, and then, you know, then you got your FM. And then for us, it was a little TV time on Saturdays, watching cartoons. Then it became when the mother started going to work. Then it became the afternoon babysitter. So your intrusion was now the cartoons and the commercials, you know, the toys and things like that, and so that that changed, the how, the way, now you have a phone. You know, I have this great picture with a little baby with a nine millimeter in its diaper, leaning on a couch looking at the telephone. And the meme says there is no reason a child that young should have a telephone, okay? And they're you're there in your home, they're in your home with the Internet. They're in your home on your phones, because these are the new babysitters, right? They're the new babysitters, and so the kids don't even realize what's happening to them until they turn into my stepson and uses it for nefarious instead of good purposes.
Randy Hidalgo
You know, when we go out to talk different schools, I thought it was always funny. Because the guy I went with, he was hilarious because he would be like, because he's older, my age, and he would always be like, you hold up his phone, because, you know, the entire encyclopedia Britannica is on this thing. And those kids would look at us like, what is that? He would follow up? I remember when they created the Chicken McNugget, and they were like, Whoa. Their eyes are open and stuff. And it was like, it was just funny. Just funny how they he would say it and stuff. But you know it is, and you got to just deal with it. You got to, you got to figure out what's the best way and the best approach. And you know, in most houses like y'all have a router here, right? Oh, yeah. And so most of your routers come pre made with the admin and whatever the password is. And so that's a big vulnerability, because you know that that list of passwords is out there. And so because that's the first way in, that's your first wave, and it really is, so you have to do something about it. And and a lot of people go in, they'll change the password. All right, we're going to change the password well. So what I've done is I've changed the username, yeah, and the password the same thing as well for the because they're like, What do you mean? I'm like, well, everybody knows this admin, yeah, that's the default. And so that that gives them a better platform to run against, to try to hack it and stuff. And because if they get in your router, they're getting into everything. That's right, and, and that's, that's something you don't want. So that's, that's the number one thing that always tell people is, you gotta, you gotta. It's like putting an alarm on your house. Yeah, if it
Stoney
wasn't there, a number of years ago, that people were making a mark near your driveway if you had unprotected internet access. Do you remember
Randy Hidalgo
that I'd heard, I'd heard of that before, like, I don't know where I'd seen it, on social media or whatever, but I never, I've never seen it. I was
Stoney
just wondering if that was true. If you had any, I have no
Jason
Imagine that. I mean, I know people do that. Don't lock their route is down. I mean, I just, there are people that they don't. It's to me that blows my mind. I mean, I don't, I don't get that. But I guess some people just get frustrated. I can imagine older people sure that just
Stoney
don't know. I mean, we're here today is to help my own parents,
Jason
my own parents, maybe they struggle with that stuff. And I mean, it's like, you know, we have to, kind of okay, make sure you do this, make sure you do this, and to kind of keep yourself protected.
Ian
But I've done I've pulled pranks at restaurants sometimes because they'll have unprotected Wi Fi, but they'll also have unprotected printers. There's been a handful of times where I've jokingly printed something goofy back there and so joke. I probably will never hear the conclusion to but I hope that someone out there that's in the back office of a restaurant is like, why does it say I'm watching you on this piece of paper?
Stoney
My jerk move is I named my Wi Fi, FBI surveillance man, number five.
Randy Hidalgo
So the one that gets me the most is, like, my mom's older, she's in her 80s and stuff, and it's the calls, yeah,
Stoney
well, that used to be the original, well, other than selling the Golden Gate Bridge, right? It was the phone calls. And didn't we do an episode on scams where we're talking about why was that effective? Is because older people are just lonely, and men are lonely.
Ian
I think it also has to do with the fact they still have landlines, right? Nobody that's
Stoney
probably under a certain age,
Randy Hidalgo
but I'm talking about the spams that you're getting on your show. Okay, okay, yeah. And so she'll get them, and should, you know? And then sometimes it'll be the one where, oh, hey, grandma or whatever,
Stoney
and stuff. And AI is turning that into something else, because they can mask your voice, right?
Randy Hidalgo
And so it kind of sounds like, and my mom's just, she's funny. That's, that's, I want to be like her. It's like, really, well, I need some money too. And she'll start arguing with them because she didn't have nobody to talk to. Sometimes she'll start having a conversation, and they hang up quick, and I'm like, Man, that's how you do it. Yeah, it was just amazing.
Stoney
It's like, that one, if I can, it just popped in my head, and sorry, with this brain damage. Sometimes when it pops in, I gotta say it, right, or I forget it. But that's one of the things, one of the rules they're saying, If you answer a phone call, never say the word yes, because they're able to take that. Can you hear me? Yes? Well, if they can record that word yes, then they can do something else further down the road with recording your voice or something. Have you heard
Ian
that? I think it was a few years ago, but now with AI being able to, like, remaking your voice from you just a few sentences. Now it's even, even worse, scarier, yeah, but it's in a different way. And I
Randy Hidalgo
think that the worst part about that is is, and it's hard to not answer the phone when you don't know the number, but I don't, but you don't answer the phone, because all it is is, is, it's part of their automatic generated thing to see if there's really a person there, right? Once you answer it, guess what? Your numbers? Well, no, they don't. They're gonna sell it. Everybody sold it to everybody. And that's, that's part of the money. You know? It's all about making money, yeah, and you know, because you talk about individual families that usually see that give up money and get hit, usually they have bigger bank accounts, right? And because they know my son his, I think it was through OMV hit, his social security number got leaked over the yikes part. Well, a lot of people's information, right? This was a couple years ago, was all. It
Stoney
doesn't even have to be leaked. It's just a random number generator, right, that they're throwing. I mean, it's always gonna You only got so many numbers,
Randy Hidalgo
right? And it either came from there for from we found out the school that he went to, their information got out there because they had to disclose it and stuff because stuff because and and now for he's like, for the rest of my life, I have to enter this number for social when he does his taxes, because his social security number was, you know, compromise, somebody filed taxes with his social so now we have to do it. And the biggest thing, because I'm going with a subject on that is, there's three credit bureaus. Lock them all. I mean, are you going buy something? I mean, if you're going to buy something, yeah. But like, for example, I had, I was refinancing a car recently, and they said the thing so they had said, I think it was TransUnion that they use. I'm like, All right, I'll unlock it for 24 hours, and then they send me back. Think denied. And I'm like, what? And they're like, Yeah, we check all three. So you didn't say that first, so only unlock one. So because you can unlock them for and set the time period, would you want them unlocked? And then I'll lock it back down. So mine, my wife and my two kids are locked. Yeah, you're not. Because when do you really have to purchase something big?
Ian
You're gonna exactly, when do you how do you lock that?
Randy Hidalgo
You go to the providers. I think it's a
Jason
Trans Union, Experian and Equifax
Randy Hidalgo
and
Stoney
Miranda and I did that too. We went, both of us, locked. Everything is locked,
Jason
yep, and you just have to unlock it when it comes time to when you gotta, yeah, you have to go into there
Stoney
because you have an account with them, right? I have life lock, okay,
Jason
I have life lock so it, I have access to all that, and I can do that kind of manage it from there, yeah, yeah.
Randy Hidalgo
It's like digital. The one spot didn't manage. I just, I just, like, I wasn't paying for the life log. Yeah, I'm like, I just went in. And that's the easiest way, you know, you just lock them down, yeah? I mean, and that's like you
Stoney
said, if I'm going to go buy a car this weekend, I'll unlock it for Saturday or something, and just make sure, and then Saturday at midnight locks it back, and it's a wrap, yep.
Randy Hidalgo
So, because I remember, I used to always get the credit card things, hey, oh my gosh, yeah. So once I lock that credit down, I'm not getting them really, yeah, okay, because they can't, they can't see it exactly, interesting, and so, and I was like, Man, this, this is great, yeah, exactly, because I would have locked all this stuff down, but that's one of the key things I would do, especially with all the scams and stuff that are going on all the you know, everything you know, just bad information out there. As far as you know, it's them trying to get money, is what it is. And that's like, you know, they always say you never, never click on anything you don't know. Never get an email from anyone you don't
Ian
know. We, just recently, in my workplace, had an issue with with that, where someone had created a Gmail account with one of our employees, like, first and last name in, like, a way that made it seem pretty legit, and then was like, sending out, like a individual emails to everyone in the company around asking for some, like, pretty sensitive information, but like, saying it in such a way of like, hey, whenever you get the chance, just, could you send me that over? And then there was, I work in a workplace with some older people that may not have understood that. So the boss was like, hey, so I need you to, like, send out an email to like everybody being like, you know, we had a big spoofing incident where, you know, and so I did that recently, where that was probably, like a week or two ago, where
Stoney
I've been around some computers for a long time. And a couple of things that I did to make my life a lot simpler was I have four emails, one, family and friends, only, two, when I sign up for something, three that I use when I don't want to ever see it again, and four for anything else, right? And so nobody has my personal email, so if it comes through, I pretty much know. And it's not just a normal little thing that's a good product, pretty good. And then it just if I go to Home Depot and I want a credit card with Home Depot, I'll use the this one. So if they sell it, I know what's going on, because with Gmail, you can add the Home Depot part to the email. And so when it comes back that they sold the Home Depot one, bam, guess what? I know Home Depot sold my my email. And then that way, if it comes to my personal one, I know probably 99% I'm safe. Yeah.
Randy Hidalgo
I mean, you got to know who you who's sending yourself to which you got it by what they call a business email compromise, right, right? Somebody spoofed that and was able to get in
Stoney
pretty smart, though, if you think about it, because a lot of emails are name, last name, you know, first initial name, yeah, dot, last name, something else, yeah. And that's good.
Ian
I think we were able to catch it. We were able to catch it fast enough that nobody, nobody got dinged. No, we had a few, like, staff meetings that we had in between that. So I think some people kind of asked questions, which I'm glad that we're getting to that point now. We're, like, in the position that I'm in. I'm like, but if you even have the inkling of, like, questioning security for something or or wondering about this, just ask, just ask a question. Just just hesitate before you just, like, send out the email. If someone sends you a link from an email address you don't know, please don't click on it, because it's probably like, something bad, right? You know, like, that kind of stuff. And I think I'm getting to a point where, like, that's the culture now, where, like, people are starting to be a little bit more hyper vigilant, which I think is good about some of that stuff. Sometimes it can kind of be a bit of a bottleneck, but in a situation like this, happens that everyone's like, Hey, this is kind of weird. And I'm like, perfect. That's great.
Stoney
And I send out to everyone, hey, also use that as a teaching, yeah, help people understand it, especially some of the older
Jason
people. So what I've heard right now is some some things that that our listeners can can, yeah, can take is one routers, number one. So we need to lock down our routers. So we need to make sure that their past at least password protect
Stoney
and change the password from the original
Ian
Yes, correct. And also, because the defaults admin, and if you look underneath the router, yes, it's there.
Jason
Well, I mean, the only person is going to see that is, well,
Stoney
or your 15 year old son, well, you don't want to have access. But to the internet,
Ian
there's also ways around some of that too, where people can potentially get
Jason
right and so. Two, we want to make sure our credits are locked down to prevent any if we are compromised, then they're probably going to run into a brick wall there. Three, I heard you about possibly having multiple emails. I don't know if that. Say a good common if that's a best practice. So what would
Stoney
kill it? Go ahead, you're the expert.
Jason
Easier Randy. What other things that are, you know, our listeners should be concerned about, you know, when we were talking about this, this online world and and we're going to maybe dive into some of the more more sensitive stuff, if we can go there with some of that, and especially what parents can be looking out for, you know, when it comes to that kind of stuff. So what would be a another common practice, maybe a household can can really engage in to maybe help secure their their online presence.
Randy Hidalgo
So, you know, you and I both work for the state, and what you did too, and every year we had to do the cybersecurity class. That's right, we had to do it. And so I'm interested to see, do y'all do that in the private sector, or you're in the private sector?
Ian
Sometimes, yeah, yeah, it a lot of times we tried to sit down and get some security stuff, like cybersecurity stuff, as far as, like, good practices was what, whenever I got on board, they didn't really have any of that, and they were like, and again, obviously, I think the older generation of people in the Workplace were talking about, because they've had other meetings, kind of like in the past where or they've been able to talk to people in the like cybersecurity world. So I think they were also thinking about it a lot. So I came in to kind of help out with some of that stuff too, that kind of just be just go through things that are calm and just make sure everything looks all good and protected. But a lot of times we set some practices in place because they're like, again, it was just, they used to just leave computers unlocked, just like, would just be on. There was walk away from the desk, and sometimes they would shut down, but sometimes they would leave apps open that would just, like, keep the computer on perpetually. They didn't know any better. So and again, logged into social media, emails, you name it, just things like that, where it's like, hey, whenever you're leaving the office, like, go ahead and lock it, put it to sleep, put some sort of or shut it down, anything. Just don't leave it that kind
Randy Hidalgo
of stuff. I'll go on a story with that one. Yeah. So we used to do the, what they call counter measures, where you would go out and look for devices, see if there's an exact posting the license though, yeah, and so and and so. A lot of times we try to do it where they don't know we're coming, of course, but a lot of times they'll say those guys are coming, you know, yeah. And so the funniest, the funny ones, all we saw was because I would always tell them afterwards, when I brief, Hey, make sure your computer's locked. Make sure that you know that you lock it and you turn or turn it off at night, you know, because you don't need to leave it open, because you can get into it. So this one place, they locked everything down and stuff, but on the keyboard, they had their username and password, no. And I'm like, You can't do that. I'm like, well, that kind of, like, defeats the whole purpose. Like, well, we shut it down. And I'm like, Yeah, but you put your username and password right here.
Ian
You locked the door, but then you kept the key
Randy Hidalgo
outside, right, right? I thought that was always the funniest thing, yeah? But I think, you know, because I did the military too, I was in the guard for a long period of time too. And every year we had to do the cybersecurity class. We had to do, you know, PII, affirmation, protection. And I'm like, I wish there was something for, like, regular and there are probably something out there that you can go do, just to kind of give you an overview of what what to and what not to click on. I know there's a couple different courses, like course a ra or whatever it is, they offer different things, and some of that's paid but, but just to educate yourself, because you don't know. I mean, I know because, and we kind of take it to heart, saying, Oh yeah, everybody should know it, but they don't. A lot of people don't know. Hey, this is an email, okay, let me look at it. Click on it, you know, and it's like, and it's kind of funny, because in the training that they give on the state level, it gives you the option, oh, you click this, oh, that was wrong, or right, this was right. And so it kind of, it kind of embeds it, and it's like, oh, yeah, I got to do that training again this year. But you know what is actually, you know, reprocessing it through. And now you're, you're actually, yeah, this doesn't look like a duck, and it's not sounding like a duck, so guess what? It's probably not the duck, right? And therefore, you know, you alert people and let them know, and I think especially on the big scale, because that's who they're after, you know, because that's your money, that's where it's at. And of course, you know, like in these smaller businesses, but they're got a lot of money. It's all about that. And so educating them on, you know, knowing what not to click on, and looking at it and kind of, you know, it's just go talk to the person. Yeah, you know, if you got an email from somebody, I think that. The biggest thing that we're, you know, the thing that we were missing the most is people don't communicate anymore. Oh yeah, verbally, yep, we communicate via text and stuff like that. And I'm not a, I'm not a big texter, so, yeah, I'm gonna call and talk to
Ian
you every every two weeks we have, like, a big staff meeting where everyone sits down and at first people, I think people still aren't all totally on board with it, because we try to keep it to an hour, but inevitably, we always go to, like, an hour and a half, sometimes almost two hours, just because, like, we're trying to get calendaring out the way we're trying to get communication stuff. And it's always like, we're all we're all here. Let's, let's sit down and let's, like, if we, if you have any concerns or anything you want to bring up. Like, now's the time where we all are here we can move forward. And at first, I think people will really kind of like, well, staff meeting like, but it's also like, I've been trying to keep the the the dialog of like, but, but also like, do you know what's taking place in the next, like, two weeks? Do you know what you have to do, like, your actionable items, like all those things that like, and they're like, I mean, yeah, like, well, then we probably wouldn't have had that. If we're all we probably we could have done it, but I think it's better. We can all leave, and we all know we're doing for the next couple of weeks, and we all can move forward and and if we do too, we could follow back up with emails. But let's, let's all talk around a big table together and not over email, because, oh my
Jason
gosh, Randy, I have a question for you, or just kind of your opinion on a products that you can buy. I see a lot of things about virtual private networks. What's kind of the scoop on on these sort of products that supposedly enable you to browse internet without people seeing your IP address, or, kind of, maybe, if you want to talk about that a little bit, and what's going on with that.
Randy Hidalgo
So the VPN, which, which is virtual private network, kind of mask where you're at. And so this is, this is kinda Well, this is what's funny about it, and, and because normally I don't, I don't use it, you know, because I'm not you, right? But, but I do when I'm trying to get an airline ticket, because they will, oh, yeah, I've seen the different prices. And I'm like, This is crazy. So if I VPN, say I'm somewhere else in the country and I'm going from New Orleans to Orlando, yeah, I'll get a different rate. And that's the real one. That's the weirdest thing I've ever seen.
Jason
Now, that's, that's new. I didn't know that. Yeah,
Stoney
wow. You heard it first here at the retrospect podcast,
Randy Hidalgo
yeah, and so. And then I started looking at it. And then, you know, they always talk about, oh, they dropped the rates on Tuesdays and stuff. Yeah, it's all AI general. I mean, of course, generated.
Ian
It's all algorithm based. Where it
Randy Hidalgo
is not a Tuesday. It just seems like a, you know, because in your mind, like, oh, well, that's the day I went and looked, well, yeah, it was cheaper, but, but, yeah. So it
Ian
also depends on how far out you get the ticket, because sometimes, if it's too close, they ramp up the prices. But if it's far enough, there's, like, a Goldilocks zone of like, a few months there is but the same again. It trends down if you go too far out. I don't know why, just as a weird thing. Yeah, it's weird. Well, it's
Stoney
always watching. It's always listening. The phones are always listening. Your computers are always listening. It was probably a year and some change before the accident, Miranda and I were sitting there talking, and I said, you know, baby, we need a rolling ladder
Ian
for our library two weeks tell me about this. Yeah. Two
Stoney
weeks later, something popped up on Facebook, on sale, rolling ladder, 18 by 12 Foot library case, yeah, they're listening.
Randy Hidalgo
Always listening well. So think of it this way. So if I was gonna say, okay, Google or Alexa, you know, yeah, it's, it's gotta know, right? So it's got to be listening, right? So, and, and. So, I think the thing that people kind of, I guess, use it to your advantage, if that makes sense, sure. So I do a lot of online, like, I'll buy stuff, like, just whatever, and, and I'm not a let me buy it immediate, quick, you know? Yeah, I want to look at different prices and stuff, right? So what I'll usually do is I'll go in and I'll search, you know, hey, let's, let's just say I want to buy the title, S Pro v1, x's, you know, where am I going to get the best price for these? So I'm not ready to buy them yet, but I want the best price, of course, so I'm going to wait. Then I'm going to get emails. Oh, this is the cheapest price, so I'll go and look at it. Oh, yeah. And I'll wait, because I'm going to get a better price. And I'll wait it out, and I'll wait all them emails to come in, because it's all about marketing and it's all about giving. And then usually I'll find the best price, and then I'll go back to the military they can get the discount on it.
Stoney
So I want to go just a little step further. Okay, these phones now i. Oh, can you turn it off?
Randy Hidalgo
Yes, no, you can't. You turn the power down.
Stoney
You cannot turn the phone off. And this is one of the reasons that they stopped the removable battery, because before you could actually take the battery out and the phone was off. Just because you turn it off, the phone is still listening in the background. So if you have the phone next to your bed when you and your wife are having sex, somebody's listening to that shit. Because now you
Ian
can only turn it off computers listening to that. I don't think someone is listening to it. You don't know, though, do you? I would. I don't think that people, okay, someone
Stoney
AI is someone does AI identify now as a person? Okay, something, let me rephrase it. Something is listening because you can't truly turn your phone off. Now you can't remove the battery from it.
Randy Hidalgo
Have you ever heard of Well, I mean, but it's Faraday bag and stuff like that, right? And block the signal from it. I know that when 911 happened, and all those phones that were off, they they were able to turn them on and activate them so they could find the bodies, and, you know, find, see if they can locate people and stuff. I think the guy that did, he was over Blackwater. Maybe he's got the the phone indestructible or,
Stoney
yeah, I think that's what, something like that. Yeah,
Randy Hidalgo
that now that phone, you can't, you're not gonna get anything from it. Man, it's pretty much just, man, it will go brick if you don't put it in and stuff. So, I mean, I just use it for my benefit, you know, always put a if I'm searching for something, oh yeah, I want it to look, yeah, I'm looking, you know. And I'll do those different things and stuff and kind of that's like, when people talk about chat GPT, you know, a lot of people like, because that's the new AI world, you know, right? Are we scared of it and stuff? I'm like, No, I'm I'm using it. Like, what do you mean? I'm like, Yeah, playing a video game. I want to know what the best layout for this boat is. Yeah, I'm using it right, and you got to take it to heart. I mean, part of it because some of it's wrong. I'm like, Dude, this thing you told me to get, I can't get it's not there anymore. And so I find myself having conversation back and forth.
Stoney
Your ride's called Chat.
Randy Hidalgo
You're wrong on this. And it's like, Oh, I'm so sorry. Oh yeah, you know. And it's like, sorry. No, I went and tried to look for this for this for like, 30 minutes and so and I find myself, man, I'm out of full conversation with this.
Stoney
Ai, oh yeah, I got a question for you. Okay, what is the most under the misunderstood part of online security for the average person or family in your experience,
Randy Hidalgo
I guess so. Like, let's talk about kids. You know, sometimes I think kids, as far as they get these devices, and you said it about it's a babysitting device and stuff like that and and that's what parents give it to them for. Now, that's their world. So everything in it's their world. And so a lot of your online predators know that, because if you're gonna go fishing for fish, you're not, you're not gonna go fishing in the parking lot, right? And so you're gonna go fishing there. A guy from state police used to say that all the time when we go talk to kids, and I thought that was just made kind of makes sense. Does it make sense? And he would always tell them, you know, I'm the cutest little 14 year old you ever seen. And it was true. And so I think the biggest thing that this phone does, it can give you so much, but these kids get on there and they start talking to these people, or they start communicating with these people. And and we would always say, if you never broke bread with them, you don't really know them. You don't know who that person is unless you've actually broke bread with them. You have no clue, yeah, and it could be that predator and stuff, and so it's kind of, you know, making your kids aware, because there's apps like bark is one of the big ones that's that's the big one for the phones that it costs a little bit of money, but it, it looks at it uses AI to see the words and everything to see if, you know, oh, is this bullying, or is this that and that, but, but it can be wrong. You can it can be wrong. And so, because everybody's asking me, you know what it apps, so I'll tell them, and but they never asked the question, what have you used? And I'm like, I have a 23 year old and a 20 year old didn't use anything, you know. Yeah, you hope that you you prepare them for life you know. You hope that you teach them the things right and wrong. And you hope that you know that they can come to you if they have issues and stuff. And usually, I always tell them, if you have anything, make sure you go to your mama. I. Yeah, so, but yeah, and so. And there are kids are vicious out there. And so I always tell them that if somebody's asking you for something, you know, then they're not really your friend. If they they're asking you for, you know, pictures of yourself, then I mean, they should know what you look like. Why do they need a picture of you know? I of, you know? So. And I think kids these days get caught up in that, you know, they get caught up in the, you know, they let people talk to them and tell them these things and, you know, bad things about them and stuff and, and not enough kids hear good things and, and sometimes they go down the wrong route and stuff, and then there's no reinforcement from their parents there. I think, if we like younger kids, I think if you limit the amount of time they have on there, you don't really need to monitor their I mean, you can, you can monitor activity and lock some things down where they shouldn't go to certain things and stuff, but be open with them and communicate and talk to them and stuff. I think that's one of the better policies. As far as that goes. Can't even remember what your question was, what I was trying to know.
Stoney
It was just it was, what is the most miss, misunderstood part of online security for the average person or family,
Randy Hidalgo
there's you did all right? You think you screw on everything, yeah, and you're not, you know, because all they need to start doing is, like, when you do pictures, they always want to post these pictures. Oh, let me post where I'm at and stuff. Okay, let me post my picture outside this. Oh, well. Oh, you're at this school. Okay, yeah. Now I know if you're posting it out there and I'm seeing it, you know, you know where they're at. And then you see the trends of when they post their pictures, and it's over and over again. Okay, I know that the school they're outside 330 every day, and somebody doesn't pick them up until five, yeah. And so that's information you don't you want to share out there with nobody. And I think that we put information out there, we with all these tiktoks and stuff, and what do they call them? Influencers? Yeah, oh, I'm going to such and such. I'm doing this. I'm doing that, you know, I'm kind of private in my world. Yeah, I don't want all my information out there and stuff, but, but realize, again, guess what? Those influencers are making what money? Yeah, and so therefore they're putting all their information out there and so, and I think in some of those cases, because, you know, they're like, man, these people are stalking me, or this is that you created that environment, not anything against them, but, but by sharing all that information, there's, there's people that are different, we're making it hard. There's a lot of people that aren't very good out there. Yeah, there's some bad, evil people out there, and so, and I think my kids kind of got the brunt of that too, because, like, I would like, whenever we went anywhere, yeah, I had to have them on site. I had to know where they were at, you know. Had to kind of keep them, you know. But as far as the phones, you know, kind of let them open up and stuff. We didn't let them get the apps until probably high school, maybe. And that was out of my country. The boss talked about that. So mom again, yeah. And so I just kind of like, Yeah, okay. I'm in
Ian
total agreement. I don't think I really got social media until I was, like, at the tail end of high school, or, like, getting out of high school, because that was, like, when it was probably a good day out, yeah. Well, that's what I'm that's what I'm trying to say, is like, I don't think I got really into social media until, well, I don't say got into it. I don't think it was like a thing until I was like, really getting out of high school, and then that was when it was kind of becoming a thing, or more popularized thing. I can't imagine what my life would have would have been like if I had social media just all the time from when I was a child.
Randy Hidalgo
I think the strangest thing was, we talked to a school one time. We're talking me and this other guy, and he asked the question. He goes, how many y'all have cell phones? Well, of course, every every kid, and they all raise their hands and stuff, and he goes, how many y'all have y'all phones locked? You know? Because, yeah, you need to have it locked. And so they're like, yeah, yeah, okay. How many else parents know your code to your phone? Oh? And then a bunch of them like, Oh, my parents know my phone. Well, we got a problem with you and your parents, because they should yeah. And he would always say, because when I come to make that arrest, when we run that warrant, yeah, the name coming back is your mom or your dad, and guess who's going to jail? Your mom and dad, one of the two. And it's like, you know, they need to have access to your phone, and there shouldn't be anything you doing if you wouldn't want to show them. Yeah, and I know we say that of right? But you know, kids have their secrets. People have their secrets and stuff. So, but, but that. Kind of resonated a little bit. I was like, man, and you looked at the kids and and, hey, I'm on Discord, I'm on Twitch, I'm on all these different things. And you're like, oh, you know,
Jason
yeah, so brandy, what about some of this, the these websites that you know that deal with? I mean, I've heard of the term like tour, in these kind of world where Dark Web, yeah, dark web stuff, because I know one of my next questions, part of that world that you probably dealt with was things through that. What's that all about? For people out there who, who've just kind of maybe heard the term dark web, and what exactly is going on with that stuff there,
Randy Hidalgo
we're trying to think of the best way to explain it and and so what's, what's, um, what's the demographics of your audience, what's the age, everything.
Stoney
But we have one of the most intelligence, intelligent audiences we are. Our audience is so smart that they can't do the 40 character thing. We had to come up with an email. We get two and three page responses to our episodes. We have some smart people really.
Jason
I mean, I realize there's, there's different levels where you can explain this, but just see where, remember, most people can.
Stoney
How do you say? What a 10,000 foot view? The 10,000
Jason
foot view, yeah.
Randy Hidalgo
So, you remember, remember back in the day when Napster came out, yeah, it was sharing music, you know, and, and so, so you had us, you know, we all had computers, and so you had part of a song, and you, you know, each one of us had part of a song, but you could go and download it and kind of get it. And so that's kind of like your I guess, the best way is, you know, you're getting stuff from somewhere. Not so is a shared information, okay, I guess. And so they'll go and and they'll get the information or download, let's say they don't download some child born or whatever. And so there's a couple sites like kicks. If I hear the word kicks, I'm like, Oh yeah, job writer, no doubt. Because kicks is one of the biggest ones for like, child images, kids on there. You said, kicks, kicks, k i k, x, k, i k, let me make sure these k, i k, s, but yeah, when we whenever I would see that, I'm like, Oh, yeah. And I think just recently, yes, the kicks messaging app girl, I know her husband was arrested, and she was like, Oh, he wouldn't, oh no, and, and it was some kick out. I'm like, it's done. I was like, yeah, it's over. Because that's everything we've seen from there. It's, it's been that, and now, you know, they're doing it more on their phones, not the computers anymore, and the layers of encryption that they think that you know as an agency or as you can't get past, but you can get past it and get into the things. And then most, most of these platforms are very law enforcement friendly. I know a lot of people talk about meta, but, but meta you will never see, I think you will never see an image, a child image, on the meta platform, because everything is scrubbed before it goes. So, yeah, that tell you how well
Stoney
meta is just a CIA front. I mean, all you have to do is look back right when? No, it's a proven fact. It's a CIA front when it came back to show your picture from 30 years ago, next to your picture today is when all this facial recognition was coming out. And people willingly turned in their face to be programmed into the facial recognition. And then all of a sudden, they started coming out with, what's your favorite color, What's your dog's name, what street did you grow up on? And these people were listing these 20 Questions on meta. That were the 20 Questions that normally you ask on your password protection stuff. Never give that information out. But that was, that was what was happening on meta, yeah, because that's what they were doing, that that is a Mark Zuckerberg front. He is, I believe him. And what's, what's the dude's name? No, that committed suicide that's living in Argentina.
Randy Hidalgo
How did he commit suicide? If he's in jet, Epstein, he didn't
Stoney
Epstein. Epstein was the CIA operative. He's living in Argentina right now. He's not dead. That's why, when Trump and Bondy and Patel come find out, they can't release all this information, because his ass is in Argentina. So that. That's all they were doing. There they are information trackers, and they're selling that information to people, CIA, NSA, advertisement companies, that's how they make their real money. So I
Randy Hidalgo
don't know about the conspiracy theory part of it, I guess,
Stoney
right now, just for the records, conspiracy theorists are up 72 to nothing,
Jason
but good old Stoney, I always trust him to throw that out there, in case
Ian
you're interested, I was able to find some analytics. We're predominantly male, and it is between the ages of 20s and 30s and 50s and 60s. Is our show. We had mentioned that before, right? I was able to find it somewhere. So I knew I knew. I was like, I knew we have it in there somewhere,
Randy Hidalgo
right? But, but meta scrubs like any child type image prior to it, it ain't going out. And so my thought will always when I heard it, I was like, Man, how many images go across their platform. I'm like, damn,
Ian
I wonder how many they're scrubbing. I've heard, I've heard, like, testimonies about people, I think, before they moved over to, like, a more AI scrubbing software, before it was good. I think it was human based. And there was people that were like, Oh yeah, I've seen some of the most un heinous things doing that work. And it was a not good, apparently for them, because they're like, I there's some of the most awful stuff in the world that came across their screens. And I was like, that's scary.
Randy Hidalgo
Yeah, it's a bad, bad thing. Oh, yeah. And did a lot
Jason
of that is, is I mentioned tour, is that still a thing today?
Randy Hidalgo
Still a thing? Is still a thing. They
Ian
it's like a, it's a, it's a way to access the
Jason
That's my understanding, that was, that's the nexus point that you go through to get to some of this unsafe
Ian
we would use, like, yeah, we would use layers, yeah. We have, like, Google Chrome, all right, Internet Explorer, or whatever you I guess that that's actually correct, equated. Now, I think it's Microsoft Edge, but like, you use these like browsers to access the internet, quote, unquote, right? The nice public side of it. But then there's this kind of underbelly that you can't actually get to these browsers that you can get that apparently, can.
Jason
I think my understanding I read Tor was actually developed by the CIA, actually as, I mean, no, come on. I believe it was. It was originally as a way to to basically deal in the unsavory side of the underworld where they could, I mean, look, if you're gonna that's where they were to mingle right with these kind of characters, then you have to go into their world and and deal with them so but I understand that it's kind of tours, kind of out of the it's new, newer
Stoney
things. Well, there's other thing, you know, the FBI has that whole floor of 15 to 17 year olds, hackers working every day. They've got the monster just, just dispensers, and the pot dispensers, you know, you go where the people are, and right kids are the smartest. The FBI hires them. The CIA hires them. I've said for years, they need to get Magnus and bring him. I know he's only 15. Go ahead and get him. Now start grooming him. When he's 18, he'll be their best operative.
Randy Hidalgo
So, you know, the thing about it is, is, like, I want to say, can't remember what the stats were on, where the real internet is and where the dark web is, yeah, and I think the real internet's like only 20% dark web is like 80, or it's a high number. And so the torrent, the BitTorrent, you have to get through an onion you got it. It's like layers. I always think it's rack. You know, onions have layers and layers, so it's changing, yeah, you know, it's like a password sequencing. Once you get into it, then it's not something that that we would enjoy, because when we're on the internet, we're used to browsers. Yeah, we're used to, you know, ease of access and stuff. This is like the old school where, oh yeah, it's, you better know where you're going and you type it in. And you also better know how to protect yourself, right? Because there's been you wide open. Yeah, I've had some friends that have, that have been curious and tried to do some, I mean, like, just, you know, young teens in the back in the day trying to, like, you know, get to places you're not supposed to belong and have, like, gotten themselves into some pretty scary situations. They're like, Oh, I'm in over my head. That's like, Yeah, well, you're playing in a place you want to be playing in, right? Because you can buy anything, yeah. I mean, you can buy it all. But it's like, it's kind of like, back in the DOS days, yeah, that's what it looks like. It's really what it looks like. And you have to know what you're typing in, and then you can pull up different categories, and you click on it and stuff, and it's just the basics of the internet and stuff. And I mean, if somebody's going to the dark web, they're kind
Jason
of beyond. Beyond. They're beyond the normal, casual type of person that's somebody that's looking for trouble. Yeah,
Stoney
you know, well, for years and years, especially when I started in protective services in the early 80s, information brokering was where it kind of was everything was about the information. Who had this on what on this, on that and the web is kind of the same thing. What about kids clicking on the Disney site and getting 15 trackers, information, trackers, just from what can we do there to protect you? Because they know kids are going to go to Disney. They know parents are going to go Disney, to book the flights, I mean, the the hotels and things like that. How can we protect ourselves, just in the normal cruising the web?
Randy Hidalgo
So, I mean, if you want to do that, then no cruiser. Well, no, I understand honestly, honestly, and it's unfortunate, but if that's what, that's the answer, then that's why I asked the expert. But that's how they make their money, sure you know, and that's how you know. That's the whole scheme of it. Is your information. I mean, ad services on your phone, like, how does it, how does it know that you're in Houston, and now, now, Hey, have you? Have you eaten at this place? Or have you is the ad services that your phone's broadcasting out and stuff, and it does that. And I'm like, Man, I just use it to my advantage. I'm like, All right, I wonder what. I wonder where I'm gonna be able to
Stoney
eat. You know? Well, it's like, with you go to Japan, and you have your cell phone, and you're walking in the mall, right? There's little antennas outside some of the shops. And as you walk by, ooh, if you walk in right now, 15% coupon, right? You know, Japan has some of the best technology on their cell phone. They use. We use our cell phones to probably about 20 to 25% of the capacity. They're probably in the 60 to 75% capacity of using their phone for what it can do.
Jason
Like, what do you what do you mean? Yeah, I mean, just what
Stoney
you can do with we use it. We Doom scroll. Well, yeah, has 10,000 the computing power of what they put the man on the moon with, right? There's a
Randy Hidalgo
lot these fire encyclopedia Britain. Thank you.
Stoney
Yes, you know. It's like I said the other day. You know the Japan, the Japanese have the greatest toilets, but they have no Mexican restaurants and no Taco Bells. That's like having a Ferrari and driving at 15 miles an hour. Okay, we're not using our phones to the full potential that they really could you and I like what you said here. I use it to my benefit. I do this for my benefit. And I think that's kind of like a call to action there, start using this technology for our benefit, and not just Doom scrolling with it, right?
Randy Hidalgo
And then so a lot of people get on the different platforms, I think Tiktok, Tiktok, Instagram and all that, and they, they search whatever. And then it'll, it'll, okay, this is what he's searching. So now we're gonna, we're gonna start sending him stuff that he's searching, but then, then they're gonna they're gonna go with algorithm, oh, this is what he's searching, but he's a male. What do, whatever, what are most of your mail seeing? So we're gonna start sending that to see, because they're looking at how long you stay on it, right, you know, and stuff and and so, like, I usually use Tiktok because zero term, or I'm looking at for a zero term, boy, let me tell you, there's some good videos on that and stuff. And then every once in a while I'll get, like, I'm trying to think of the one I got the latest was like, home building great videos, right? So I'm thinking about finishing my upstairs. I'm like, Man, I don't remember ever typing this in, but, but now I'm looking at home building, and then what I hate is I Hate, like, when I'm looking at the different videos, they'll go to this live, the live video. I'm like, so I'm trying to figure out a way I want to block that. I want to stop that live stuff coming in because it's interfering with me, trying to look at, yeah, and then the live videos have nothing to do with what I'm looking at. I'm like, I don't want to see a person fishing. Where did that come from? You know, but I'm a man. Men fish.
Stoney
But I think it's part of that, that that system of, well, let's see how long he will throw this at him, and see how long he it takes him to click off if he clicks it, we know that's not for him. Everyone.
Ian
Everyone knows at least in this or maybe not our guest, but everyone in who listens to this show knows that I've talked about being interested in flying and potentially getting my license and working in that progress as well. And I have been looking up things, and I've been downloading apps for certain stuff, and been tracking certain flights and just kind of having fun with like looking at radars for our local area, and all the stuff, all the fun little things, I think is cool and and I've also made mention recently. I've not looked up anything about it online, but I've made the joke before where I was like, probably, if there is an alternate life, there's probably an alternate version of me out there somewhere that, like, right after high school. I joined the Navy to go fly fighter jets. Like, that's just a thing, like, I have it's a little secret thing that I've always felt deep down that was like, I don't think in this lifetime I'll ever actually do that. I don't think I want to do that, really. But there's this side of me that's like, man, fighter jets are really cool, and I would love to fly one. And I've said that before. And then, sure enough, on Instagram, I was, like, scrolling through and, man, I get some of the coolest F 22 raptor videos. I get some of the coolest videos about stuff. And I'm like, Okay, I see you're, you know me, you know when
Randy Hidalgo
I'm start getting pile ice, gonna be like, hey, yeah,
Ian
exactly. But look at this cool jet though,
Randy Hidalgo
right? Yeah, he's gonna, he wants to, yeah, exactly. So, yeah. So, I mean, you got to the technology's there. It's not going away. You got to use it to your benefit. And so the other big thing is, like, I use Grammarly, and I like it because, you know, I'm like, Oh yeah, comma goes there, and I'm pretty good at picking up words and pretty good I'm well spoken. I feel and understand, you know? But sometimes it's like, oh, you talk a past tense present, you know? Yeah, well, I don't really want to know that, you know, yeah, that's what I got Grammarly for. And a lot of people's like, well, you're using the AI. I'm like, Yeah, I'm using it is helping me, because I'm reading like, when it says, Hey, a comma goes here, it tells you, hey, this is why the comma goes here, this and so. So it's educating me on stuff I learned. And I'm thinking, Man, I know I learned that a long time ago, but, but it wasn't important to me that, you know. So there's little things that kind of stick in your head and stuff. So it's about about learning as well, because we're not using it for learning, we're using it for, you know, oh man, this is just a fun tool or something. Or are just a mental get away from the world. Because a lot of people do use it mentally to get away from the world, yeah, because they're either a bad place or stuff. And I say, Yeah, but use it. But use it cautiously. Don't take everything to heart. And most people know what's right and wrong. And if people are asking you, because when I was at the school we were at, it was a Catholic school, so I'm about to get Catholic a little bit. So they would always talk about, you know, bullying, and they always say bullying. And so I was sitting in the meeting, and I was, I was a president of school board. I was sitting in the meeting. They kept saying it and saying it, and I'm sitting and we had a priest on the thing. He's sitting next to me and stuff. He's like, man, what are we gonna do? I said, Well, you know what? Why don't we tell these kids before they send anything out that if they're mad or whatever, they should pray it before they say it. He was like, Oh, like that. I like that. I'm thinking now to this day, I'm like, Man, I should trademark that, because we're talking about money so and but it is just not, even if you want to use pray it before you say it, but before you say anything like that's the louder or something like that. Really think about it, you know. And think about, you know, you're about to send something out. That's not only a reflection on you, but but then you're sending something out. Do you really need to say something or hate and because I've always went to the thing when people say they hate people, yeah, that's like, how can you hate somebody? I mean, how can you hate somebody? You don't know. If that makes sense, I've had to meet you, talk to you, and be with you for a while before either I like you or don't like you. But a person that's on the computer, a person, how do I know you are, right? I think it gets in this whole concept where you know, Oh, I hate this person, the star or whatever, because of this and that, or what they said? Well, how do you how do you hate them? You never sat in the same room? Parasocial relationships. It's like, that's, I've always found that disheartening a little bit.
Jason
Relations are digital now. Oh yeah, you know, oh Randy, I've got a kind of looking off into the future. You know, what do you see as the next frontier in online safety? So, what do you see in down the road that's coming that we've talked about, AI, but I mean, what does that mean? Kind of to the labor What do you see, kind of coming down the road, next 10 years? Not back me notable.
Randy Hidalgo
So think about this. As far as that goes, what you have through Microsoft, you're gonna have Windows Defender, and that's your your defender thing. You have the different, I think the different operating systems for the phones, because Apple, you know, whenever they update, they're updating because, hey, we found a vulnerability. Want to fix that vulnerability. We're gonna go to the
Stoney
next one, or they want to shorten the battery life's, you know, so they got to make you buy another phone,
Randy Hidalgo
right? And change the to go to the type cable. I'm waiting to see what the next power cable is going.
Ian
Yeah, it's all wired. I love that we're finally like the Universal Serial Bus is actually finally becoming universal.
Randy Hidalgo
Do you know there's a side to it? What you mean? The Type C, there's a side to it. So sometimes when you plug it in, it says, oh, charging or whatever. But sometimes, when you turn it over and plug it in, it says, super fast charging. Decide to it. I know it's just round, look it up. Okay, it's the craziest thing. And the only reason why I noticed
Ian
it was that maybe that may be a, is it all cables? Or is that, like, it's
Randy Hidalgo
pretty much, yeah, okay, I had a cable and it said, make sure you put inside in Right? Like, interesting, like, getting saw red. And it's like, the Type C certain way. There's one side that's better than and I'm like, This is crazy, this craziest thing I ever seen. I just
Ian
love that we're finally getting to a point. Because there was a again, me growing up, it's like, oh, it's Universal USB. And it's like, but it's not, there's four different, seven different kinds of USB. But now we're finally getting to a point where everyone, even Apple, right, is going towards the USBC and
Jason
like, finally, I think the EU drove that they
Randy Hidalgo
should because, because over there, the market wasn't there for them. Yeah, that's all been Android. So they want that market, of course, and you know that's why they're trying to get more into the business sector and stuff. But you know, most of your stuff is Windows base. That's where it's all at. But back on the different security platforms, I mean, you got your Windows Defender. You got, you know, you different.
Stoney
Thing that bothers me with that is, you know, Bill Gates stole Microsoft from somebody else, but he promoted it and changed it and did it right. But who invented the first virus? Probably somebody in there, Bill Gates invented the first virus. So he should be the one, you know, they're not really, they should be the forefront of virus protection. And they're not, you know, he showed that there's a vulnerability, and then sold you the protection for the vulnerability for his own damn platform.
Randy Hidalgo
So you remember Norton used to Norton still is good. Norton still is good. I have malware anti malware and and you can have all these different platforms, but if you're not updating it, oh, right, useless. About useless. And so I run the malware platform, because that's that's how it's coming. I use malware and C cleaner, yeah, and I'll use C cleaner to clean every once in a while, and stuff like right now had the big windows 1011, thing going on. This another world but, but I think in the future, the the AI is going to get so much better at being able to be ahead of some of these things, because right now everything's on the back end, so something will happen, and then we need to fix this, you know, right? And then that's how they've kind of been. So hopefully they're because I know they're doing some stuff where they're actually trying to create stuff and get ahead of it so that, and I think the AI will get better, and most of these platforms use it, and that's where I think the future will be. It'll probably be a little bit more locked down, which
Stoney
I think the new one they're going to call Skynet.
Jason
Do you foresee them employing AI? We talk about AI from an offensive Do you see the implementation of AI into defensive frameworks, into firewalls and stuff like that, to prevent any type of intrusion? Do you, I mean, you see that coming more and more.
Stoney
I would like to interject on that one a little bit. There was a company, was a company here, and it was a true AI virus checker that never needed updating. It was mutant. Did you hear about these guys? And they got bought out by Norton and destroyed because you never had to buy another platform again combat. Think I do remember them. Yes, I still on my and I even got a attorney letter saying on my little three by five or the floppy disk, I still have a copy of that somewhere, and all my stuff, they wanted that back, because I was a beta tester for them, and that was, that was the last, and I believe they were using some type of an early AI, because it mutated to anything new on your computer. Because what you did was, was, when you bought a computer, you installed it, and so anything that happened from then on, it was ready for it.
Jason
So it's almost like an immune system, an immune system,
Stoney
kind of. It was fascinating stuff, but Norton came in, bought it up and destroyed it. And that's that company, that's the little, big build. It was a huge building. I
Jason
remember, oh, now I'm thinking about it. Yep, I do remember them. That
Stoney
was, I think, I believe. Eve. I didn't know then because, but I think that was probably an early form of AI, just the way it mutated and did. I'd like to find that. I may have to find that copy of that stuff.
Randy Hidalgo
So, you know, you know how many viruses the max Apple computers?
Ian
I mean, obviously, I know you don't hear a whole lot about it, because I think they it restricts so much, which I think is a good thing and a bad thing. Sometimes it
Randy Hidalgo
does restrict so much. But where is your biggest market of people on, like, industry wise, it would be Apple, wouldn't it? They're going to be on Windows. Windows, yeah. Android, yeah. So what platform Do you think they're going to try the hardest to be able to get into Yeah, we're going to go where the money's at and go where the where the businesses are, you know, yeah, they're all using it. And it's kind of funny now, because you're seeing a trend shift a little bit, and I think that that'll be coming too, is most kids coming out of school right now, most of them are dealing with either the iPad or Apple Computer, right? Most of your schools, high schools and stuff and and then, like, when my kid got my son got to LSU, it was like, if you're not in creative design or whatever, you really don't need a Mac. You need a Windows based computer. And it's like, what's when? What's his, you know? Because he's had a Mac, yeah, oh, you know, his whole life growing up. And they both have Apple iPhone so and me and wife both have androids. But that's the mess. That's what Apple's trying to do. Apple wants to get into the marketplace because they're saying, hey, you know you're having to retrain all your workforce when they know this platform, right? The problem is the back end of it, because everything you know Windows Server, yeah, that's again,
Ian
for me, it's, you know, I be me being in, like, the creative design world. That's what I do. I edit videos, I do Photoshop, I do camera stuff. Like, that's, that is my and I do, like, the big thing is now it's even it's branching out into music for me now too. So like, I'm using, I'm going to be using Mac for music production as well, right? So it's like, it's good for what it does, but a lot of times other aspects of the work place, use Microsoft Word, use Excel, use a Microsoft based server. And so, like, they're there. And then again, there's, like, I try to be respectful of people's money. There's some older people that have been like, Hey, what should I get for? Like, a computer? I want to get a new laptop. Because my one, the one I got, is, and it's an old, you know, whatever Windows based, you know, one that got down the road at the nearest Best Buy or whatever, and there's a couple of people have been, they've been wanting to transfer over to Apple, and they want to get themselves a new laptop. And I'm like, that's totally fine. You're gonna, you're gonna pay for the name. You paying for it. You're gonna pay for the name and potentially some security that you don't know that you have. And is it worth that much to you? Because again, you're gonna I can get you a I can get you a Windows based laptop that's good, that can get you off the ground. It's gonna be nice, and you're gonna be able to peruse Google and do your Word documents. Is that what you want to do? Or do you want you know? And so I think that. So I I'm saying that because I also tell people the same thing where I'm like, if you're not going to be, if you don't have to spend the crazy amount of money on getting a MacBook, yeah, or getting MacBook Pros, or, yeah, very expensive, especially the one that I have right now I got, I think that I got the latest one, whatever three years ago was whatever that version, yeah, so, and I don't have any of that stuff. So I think, I think I was like, m3 or whatever it is, yeah. But so, yeah, there has its aspects. Again. I love that. My personal stuff I have here is all Windows based stuff, because I've used that for years. And I also like to protect myself, and I like to peruse the files and get into places that normal people, the lay person, doesn't want to get into,
Randy Hidalgo
you know, so, you know, so Microsoft, so Apple's seen it, and they've got great vision, honestly, yeah, so they brought in Microsoft, and really, yeah, well, Microsoft now is software driven, yeah, just about any app now, Any because, you know, I used to download the Adobe, oh, I got Adobe. I download the CS file. I got it. Yeah, you can't get it. Everything subscription based. Everything is subscription based. Microsoft subscription based. A lot of the money. But guess what? Subscription base can run on a Mac. And so they're like, yeah, we can partner here. We can, we can start working and, and that's because Microsoft wants all the market, of course. So, so they're like, well, partner with Apple. We'll partner with Windows. We'll have both markets and apples. Like, we want the market. Well, everybody uses Windows, so we'll partner with Windows, you know? So, and I think you're gonna, you're gonna see that you're. You see more people trying to transition over to the max just because, but the price and but they're saying their price is going to be competitive, yeah, that's what they're trying to do. And they're trying to lower that price. And then, you know, with the vision, oh my gosh, Apple vision, that's
Ian
we'll get there one day, but that's not, that's not meant for a consumer.
Randy Hidalgo
I'm telling you. That is bad, yeah, that is,
Ian
it is really, it's so cool. But it is definitely without it, what I mean. So it's like augmented reality, so you put this, this headset, oh, that sort of, yeah. So I have the Oculus quest, which is like a real VR headset. That's what, it closes you off to everything around you, and then, like, you're in this virtual space, whereas the vision pro his space shut it on, yeah, it you're looking at your real world. But then there's things overlaid over it. So you got, like, text messages here, you got a whole window. You can have, like, a whole huge theater movie screen and like, and it will darken the world around you. It's, it's just cool stuff that. But again, but the price tag on it is, like, this is definitely the first iteration, right? And I do not it'll get it's not been cheaper. It's not right. I think the later versions of it,
Jason
we're going to that, what was that? Movie ready? Player one? Oh yeah, that's where we're going. I
Ian
think the first, the first kinds of Apple watches were in that same vein where I think they were, like, not very great, but like, super expensive. And I think it's like, any tech, yeah, of course, we'll get to that point. But right now, yeah, I think, I think their concept behind it was great, oh, yeah, but
Randy Hidalgo
because they want an industry, and then what's cool about it is, like, you could be working on, let's just say, a generator, and you could pull the schematics of the generator up, yeah, and you're in what you would call a HUD, yeah, and have it on a 4k through 4k frame. And then actually, you could put overlays over what you're working on and actually physically work on it with the display.
Ian
If you've ever seen, like, Iron Man, like, he will, like, he, like, can move a thing, yeah? Like, Star Wars or something. Like, you have like, a 3d model, right? You can, like, move it around, yeah, get bigger. It's, like, same sort of stuff. Just be on your coffee table in your living room, and you're like, Okay, let's look up this, like, threed model of this thing, and I can spin it around and
Randy Hidalgo
take it apart, yeah, yeah, that's cool stuff. But then you could actually work on stuff. Like, that's, that's, and they were talking about online collaboration, like, when a surgeon is doing surgery, and he could collaborate with other surgeons from around the world, yeah, and they could be in there with you, you know? And, man, I'm like, Yeah, but there's a price tag.
Ian
Cutting Edge has a price
Randy Hidalgo
Yeah. And so, yeah. Yeah. And I know it kind of skirted around what you would ask, but I hope you know just I think AI is going to make the viral protection stuff better. I think
Jason
so, yeah, you see more of that being built in on the defensive side to basically combat the offensive side of AI. So okay, and that makes sense. I mean, that's kind of where I thought, I thought, you know, just if there was something else maybe you're aware of,
Randy Hidalgo
is there any might be coming
Ian
you want to touch on specifically before we round out the show, or is anything that you want to touch
Randy Hidalgo
on? There's just so much we could have talked about. Of course,
Jason
we can do a second episode on another topic. You know,
Stoney
now that you're a pro at the podcast, how it goes, we can think about it and do a whole nother episode.
Randy Hidalgo
Yeah, I told my son because I guess, I guess I didn't tell him. I got caught him. Yeah, I'm about to call on a podcast.
Stoney
What you just got some points with your son.
Randy Hidalgo
And I said, I said, I've been watching Sean Ryan, so I'm getting ready, you know, yeah, that's a great joke. And he's like, what? I'm like, yeah, yeah, Shawn Ryan, you know, yeah. And he's like, no, no. And then when I call home to tell him, Hey, reminder it's like, oh yeah, you're doing that tonight. Yeah? Okay, that's so it kind of puts you into perspective, I guess. But no, I mean, well,
Stoney
I'll put it in perspective for you 65 countries and 1100 cities across the world. Oh yeah,
Randy Hidalgo
that's incredible, awesome. Yeah, we've come a long way. Yes, reach one person at a time. Yeah, that's it. But yeah, I think, I think the topic that we were talking about just Internet safety, or just any type of safety, as far as the electronic devices go, you could there's so many different type topics. We could have talked, you know, specifically cyber security. We could have talked about just basic internet safety for kids on their phones. You know, we could have talked maybe
Ian
that's where we're going to see if this is the, if this is the the maybe the introduction.
Stoney
We have another guest like that. His name is Brandon, and he talks about fifth generation weapon systems, non kinetic weapons. And we've done what four with him. I think three or four, three by three or four. So we're not opposed to that. You know,
Ian
we're. We'll hone in on one topic and and have another episode about it. Yeah, yeah. Thank you so much, because that's kind of everywhere. Yeah, that's okay. Thank you for coming out and thank you for this conversation. Randy for coming out with us. Is there? Do you have anything that you want people to, you want us to point anyone towards, anything in particular for you, or just kind of any links or anything like that, or websites? I
Randy Hidalgo
mean, they got to do it on their own. They got to they got to educate themselves. Do what they feel comfortable. Never share, never share, never share information online with somebody you don't know. And then if you ever have a question about a text or a question about an email, you know, call them. Yeah. Talk to them. Talk to the person, yeah, and, you know, I think that's a lot of times we miss out on that. We miss out on the whole actually talking context. Communicate with people. We don't, we don't, we don't communicate that well. And I'm saying that, and I'm sure that my wife listens to that, well, you don't communicate
Stoney
with me better. And whenever you don't, she's gonna have that as a little snippet, and she's gonna get on,
Randy Hidalgo
yeah, you don't talk to me, you know, but yeah, so I think, I think that's the biggest thing, is when, when you have a question about something, and if it doesn't look right, you know, ask, like, physically, ask, don't, don't. Text, ask, you know, call about it and stuff. Be safe out there.
Ian
Well, we have, obviously for for our listeners. You you know the the spiel as normal. We have comment sections on Spotify and on YouTube where you can leave your more short form responses if you'd like. We also have our email address get offended together@gmail.com, where you can send a little bit more of a long form response if the comment sections aren't big enough until next week. Thank you so much for listening. Bye, bye,
Jason
goodbye everyone, and God bless thank
Randy Hidalgo
you for allowing me to be here, and I appreciate it. I look forward to doing it again. The future,
Stoney
looking back, every generation has faced new dangers, from the factory floor, to the front porch, to the feed. Ours just happens to live behind a glowing screen, but history reminds us of something simple. Every threat loses its power when people start paying attention. So let's make online safety more than a buzzword. Let's make it a habit, a household rule and a generational promise, because the future deserves more than our data. It deserves our protection. Thank you for hanging out with us today. You're the best, Peace.