software bill of materials (SBOM) (noun) [Word Notes]
Please enjoy this encore of Word Notes. A formal record containing the details and supply chain relationships of various components used in building software.
Mar 11, 2025•7 min•Season 2Ep. 74
Hacking Humans
Deception, influence, and social engineering in the world of cyber crime.
Episodes
Scams in the henhouse.
On Hacking Humans, this week Dave Bittner is on vacation so our two hosts Joe Carrigan, and Maria Varmazis (also host of N2K's daily space podcast, T-Minus), are sharing the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and criminal exploits that are making headlines. We start off the show with some follow-up from a long-time listener who shared how switching to Publii and Cloudflare Pages saved his wife's psychiatric nurse practice over $120/year in hosting costs after discovering stati...
Mar 06, 2025•35 min•Season 7Ep. 328
zero trust (noun) [Word Notes]
Please enjoy this encore of Word Notes. A security philosophy that assumes adversaries have already penetrated the digital environment and tries to reduce the potential impact by limiting access by people, devices, and software to only the resources essential to perform their function and nothing more.
Mar 04, 2025•9 min•Season 2Ep. 73
The new malware on the block. [Only Malware in the Building]
Welcome in! You’ve entered, Only Malware in the Building. Join us each month to sip tea and solve mysteries about today’s most interesting threats. Your host is Selena Larson, Proofpoint intelligence analyst and host of their podcast DISCARDED. Inspired by the residents of a building in New York’s exclusive upper west side, Selena is joined by N2K Networks Dave Bittner —and our newest totally unbiased co-host, Archy, a highly sophisticated AI robot who swears they have no ulterior motives (but w...
Mar 04, 2025•35 min•Season 1Ep. 10
Live from Orlando, it's Hacking Humans!
In this special live episode of Hacking Humans, recorded at ThreatLocker’s Zero Trust World 2025 conference in Orlando, Florida, Dave Bittner is joined by T-Minus host Maria Varmazis. Together, they explore the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and cybercriminal exploits making headlines. Their guest, Seamus Lennon, ThreatLocker’s VP of Operations for EMEA, shares insights on Zero Trust security and the evolving threat landscape. Maria's story this week follows the IRS warnin...
Feb 27, 2025•31 min•Season 7Ep. 327
OT security (noun) [Word Notes]
Please enjoy this encore episode of Word Notes. Hardware and software designed to detect and prevent cyber adversary campaigns that target industrial operations.
Feb 25, 2025•8 min•Season 2Ep. 72
I'm a scammer and need support.
On Hacking Humans, Dave Bittner, Joe Carrigan, and Maria Varmazis (also host of N2K's daily space podcast, T-Minus), are once again sharing the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and criminal exploits that are making headlines to help our audience become aware of what is out there. We start off with some follow up from listener Dave who writes in with a call for help after a good friend of his, who fell victim to a dream job scam. They also have a discussion after the Washingt...
Feb 20, 2025•45 min•Season 7Ep. 326
cybersecurity skills gap (noun) [Word Notes]
Please enjoy this encore episode of Word Notes. The difference between organizational employee job requirements and the available skillsets in the potential employee pool.
Feb 18, 2025•8 min•Season 2Ep. 71
The “t” that tricked.
On Hacking Humans, Dave Bittner, Joe Carrigan, and Maria Varmazis (also host of N2K's daily space podcast, T-Minus), are once again sharing the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and criminal exploits that are making headlines to help our audience become aware of what is out there. Our hosts start off with some follow up from listener Robert who writes in from the Great White North, who shares how he thinks the U.S. might be stuck in the past with payment tech. Joe's got two s...
Feb 13, 2025•45 min•Season 7Ep. 325
digital transformation (noun) [Word Notes]
Please enjoy this encore episode of Word Notes. The use of technology to radically improve the performance or reach of the business.
Feb 11, 2025•7 min•Season 2Ep. 70
Old school scams updated.
On this episode of Hacking Humans, we are going old school with Dave Bittner and Joe Carrigan sans T-Minus host Maria Varmazis (as she was hanging out with astronauts at the SpaceCom event). Not to worry, Dave and Joe have it covered sharing the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and criminal exploits that are making headlines to help our audience become aware of what is out there. This week, we have some follow up including a conversation Joe had with ChatGPT, some discussion...
Feb 06, 2025•35 min•Season 7Ep. 324
bulletproof hosting (noun) [Word Notes]
Please enjoy this encore episode of Word Notes. Cloud services intended for cyber criminals and other bad actors designed to obstruct law enforcement and other kinds of government investigations, and to provide some protection against competitors.
Feb 04, 2025•7 min•Season 2Ep. 69
Cyber Groundhog Day and romance scams. [Only Malware in the Building]
Welcome in! You’ve entered, Only Malware in the Building. Join us each month to sip tea and solve mysteries about today’s most interesting threats. Your host is Selena Larson, Proofpoint intelligence analyst and host of their podcast DISCARDED. Inspired by the residents of a building in New York’s exclusive upper west side, Selena is joined by N2K Networks Dave Bittner and Rick Howard to uncover the stories behind notable cyberattacks. Being a security researcher is a bit like being a detective:...
Feb 04, 2025•47 min
Despicable donation request scamming.
On Hacking Humans, Dave Bittner, Joe Carrigan, and Maria Varmazis (also host of N2K's daily space podcast, T-Minus), are once again sharing the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and criminal exploits that are making headlines to help our audience become aware of what is out there. This week, Dave has the story from Ampyx Cyber that has a scam reporter on staff to do awareness videos and this latest one is about an amazing sale on fake leather bags. Joe has two stories this we...
Jan 30, 2025•45 min•Season 7Ep. 323
endpoint security [Word Notes]
Please enjoy this encore of Word Notes. The practice of securing a device that connects to a network in order to facilitate communication with other devices on the same or different networks.
Jan 28, 2025•9 min•Season 2Ep. 68
Back to the office, back to the threats.
On Hacking Humans, Dave Bittner, Joe Carrigan, and Maria Varmazis (also host of N2K's daily space podcast, T-Minus), are once again sharing the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and criminal exploits that are making headlines to help our audience become aware of what is out there. This week Maria has the story on how the return to office life brings unique security challenges, highlighting the need for Red Team assessments to uncover and address physical and digital vulnerabi...
Jan 23, 2025•43 min•Season 7Ep. 322
Executive Order on Improving the Nation's Cybersecurity (noun) [Word Notes]
Please enjoy this encore episode. President Biden's May, 2021 formal compliance mandate for federal civilian executive branch agencies, or FCEBs, to include specific shortterm and longterm deadlines designed to enhance the federal government's digital defense posture.
Jan 21, 2025•8 min•Season 2Ep. 67
Crypto chameleons and star fraud.
On Hacking Humans, Dave Bittner, Joe Carrigan, and Maria Varmazis (also host of N2K's daily space podcast, T-Minus), are once again sharing the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and criminal exploits that are making headlines to help our audience become aware of what is out there. This week we jump right into stories, Maria shares Apple’s new AI feature and how it is unintentionally rewording scam messages to make them appear more legitimate and flagging them as priority noti...
Jan 16, 2025•42 min•Season 7Ep. 321
lateral movement (noun) [Word Notes]
Phase of a typical cyber adversary group's attack sequence, after the initial compromise and usually after the group has established a command and control channel, where the group moves through the victims network by compromising as many systems as it can, by looking for the data, it has come to steal or to destroy.
Jan 14, 2025•8 min•Season 2Ep. 66
Nice to meet you, I'm a scammer.
On Hacking Humans, Dave Bittner, Joe Carrigan, and Maria Varmazis (also host of N2K's daily space podcast, T-Minus), are once again sharing the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and criminal exploits that are making headlines to help our audience become aware of what is out there. Our hosts discuss and ponder whether or not diamonds are the original cryptocurrency, as well as diving further into Yubikeys for organizations. Maria shares the story of a 66-year-old woman who los...
Jan 09, 2025•53 min•Season 7Ep. 320
common vulnerabilities and exposures (CVE) (noun) [Word Notes]
A public list sponsored by the US government and designed to uniquely identify, without the need to manually cross- reference, all the known software vulnerabilities in the world.
Jan 07, 2025•7 min•Season 2Ep. 65
Malware metamorphosis: 2024 reflections and 2025 predictions. [Only Malware in the building]
Welcome in! You’ve entered, Only Malware in the Building. Join us each month to sip tea and solve mysteries about today’s most interesting threats. Your host is Selena Larson, Proofpoint intelligence analyst and host of their podcast DISCARDED. Inspired by the residents of a building in New York’s exclusive upper west side, Selena is joined by N2K Networks Dave Bittner and Rick Howard to uncover the stories behind notable cyberattacks. Being a security researcher is a bit like being a detective:...
Jan 07, 2025•55 min•Season 1Ep. 8
The intersection of hackers, scammers, and false collaborations.
On Hacking Humans, Dave Bittner, Joe Carrigan, and Maria Varmazis (also host of N2K's daily space podcast, T-Minus), are once again sharing the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and criminal exploits that are making headlines to help our audience become aware of what is out there. First off, our hosts share some follow up, Asher wrote in to discuss follow up on the AI granny. Maria's story covers a "new QR code scam" involving unsolicited packages and brushing tactics, where ...
Jan 02, 2025•42 min•Season 7Ep. 319
dead-box forensics (noun) [Word Notes]
A forensic technique where practitioners capture an entire image of a system and analyze the contents offline.
Dec 31, 2024•6 min•Season 1Ep. 64
New tools, old problems.
Please enjoy this encore episode of Hacking Humans. This week we are joined by Maria Varmazis, host of the N2K daily space show, T-Minus. She discusses how AI is being used as a possible solution to one of the oldest scams in the book in Japan. Dave and Joe share some listener follow up, one from listener Alan and one from Clinton, who both write in about a recent episode and they share their thoughts on the story of Charlotte Cowles being scammed out of $50,000. Dave shares a story about calend...
Dec 26, 2024•49 min•Season 6Ep. 280
cybersecurity maturity model certification (CMMC) (noun) [Word Notes]
Please enjoy this encore episode of Word Notes. A supply chain cybersecurity accreditation standard designed for the protection of controlled unclassified information that the U.S. Department of Defense, or DoD, will require for all contract bids by October, 2025.
Dec 24, 2024•7 min•Season 1Ep. 63
Gold bars and bold lies.
On Hacking Humans, Dave Bittner, Joe Carrigan, and Maria Varmazis (also host of N2K's daily space podcast, T-Minus), are once again sharing the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and criminal exploits that are making headlines to help our audience become aware of what is out there. First we start off with some follow up, our hosts share some more information on VIN swapping, and a clarification on bank participation in FinCEN. Maria shares a telling tale about a Bethesda coupl...
Dec 19, 2024•46 min•Season 7Ep. 318
incident response (noun) [Word Notes]
Please enjoy this encore episode of Word Notes. A collection of people, process, and technology that provides an organization the ability to detect and respond to cyber attacks.
Dec 17, 2024•8 min•Season 1Ep. 62
Silent push, loud consequences.
On Hacking Humans, Dave Bittner, Joe Carrigan, and Maria Varmazis (also host of N2K's daily space podcast, T-Minus), are once again sharing the latest in social engineering scams, phishing schemes, and criminal exploits that are making headlines to help our audience become aware of what is out there. This week, Maria shares two stories this week, the first is from "PayPal" saying they are owed over $200. The second comes from LinkedIn where a gentleman shares the terrifying story of losing every...
Dec 12, 2024•45 min•Season 7Ep. 317
script kiddies (noun) [Word Notes]
Please enjoy this encore episode of Word Notes. Cybercriminals who lack the expertise to write their own programs use existing scripts, code, or tools authored by other more skilled hackers.
Dec 10, 2024•6 min•Season 1Ep. 61
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