Maria Varmazis

223: Booze, nudes, and insurance dudes

April 15th, 2021  |  51 mins 34 secs

alcohol, domain, insurance, malware, motor vehicle, phishing, ransomware, scam, wine

Should insurance companies be banned from helping companies pay ransomware demands? How has malware messed with motorcars in the United States? And how are cybercriminals exploiting alcohol drinking during the pandemic?

212: Dutch leaks, Peeping Toms, and researchers under fire

January 28th, 2021  |  44 mins 12 secs

apt, cctv, coronavirus, data breach, google, malware, netherlands, north korea, privacy, surveillance, vulnerability

Google warns security researchers that North Korean hackers are pretending to be their buddies, sensitive information connected to Coronavirus testing is available for sale in the Netherlands, and is a Peeping Tom at your home security provider spying on you through CCTV?

209: Vengeful ex-staff, bad Santas, and iOS app nutrition facts

December 17th, 2020  |  1 hr 5 secs

amazon aws, apple, christmas, cisco, ios, opera, privacy, rogue employee, santa, scam, zodiac killer

Watch out for Santas wearing hoodies! A rogue employee takes down WebEx for thousands of people, and Apple forces apps to show a privacy health warning.

200: Two flipping hundred

October 15th, 2020  |  1 hr 11 mins

ballet, career, cyber, cybersecurity, cybersex, fatima, privacy, smart watch, women

We're in celebratory mood as we celebrate our 200th episode, but there's still time to discuss Fatima the ballerina who the UK government wants to become a cybersecurity expert, why women are quitting the tech industry, and a smartwatch which might be putting your kids at risk.

187: Huawei ban, MGM hack, and a contact-tracing cock-up

July 16th, 2020  |  1 hr 3 mins

contact tracing, coronavirus, data breach, huawei, mgm resorts, password, seminconductors

Login chaos for England's contact tracing service, our drill-down on the Britain's Huawei 5G ban, MGM's blockbuster breach, and how to pronounce "Gigabyte."

183: MAMILs, gameshows, and a surprise from eBay

June 18th, 2020  |  46 mins 18 secs

bahrain, coronavirus, ebay, fitness trackers, mars, noel edmonds, privacy, strava, tracing, twitter

A TV gameshow with cash prizes if you're obeying Coronavirus lockdown rules, ex-Ebay staff charged in crazy cyberstalking case, and when the wrong cyclist was accused by the internet bearing pitchforks.

175: Zoom deepfakes, Zardoz, and 'Rona tracing

April 23rd, 2020  |  49 mins 45 secs

coronavirus, deepfakes, facebook, privacy, surveillance, tracking, zardoz, zoom

Will deepfake disguises hit a video conference near you, can Coronavirus-tracing apps be trusted, and should Facebook shut down anti-quarantine events?

169: Burglaries, breaches, and bidets

March 12th, 2020  |  51 mins 5 secs

burglary, coronavirus, data breach, google, location data, microsoft, ultimate chicken horse, virgin media

How one guy's exercise routine made him a burglary suspect, how multi-factor authentication can cause headaches as well as stop hacks, and how Virgin Media got itself in a pickle over its sloppy data security.

160: SNAFUs! MS Word, Amazon Ring, and TikTok

January 9th, 2020  |  53 mins 6 secs

amazon, amazon ring, dracula, fraud, microsoft word, ricky gervais, the witcher, tiktok

We discuss how Microsoft Word helped trap a multi-million dollar fraudster, how Amazon Ring may be recording more than you're comfortable with, and how teens are flocking to TikTok (and why that might be a problem).

157: A biometric knuckle duster

December 5th, 2019  |  1 hr 5 mins

biometrics, disney+, fingerprint, hacking, kaspersky, nordvpn, vpn

What is Kaspersky's ugly ring for? Is there something suspicious about how NordVPN lets you stream Disney+? And why did a hacker impersonate a music producer?

Plus we have a bonus feature interview with Rachael Stockton from Logmein, the folks behind LastPass, all about behavioral biometrics!

148: Billboard boobs, face forensics, and Alexa gets way too personal

October 3rd, 2019  |  50 mins 24 secs

alexa, amazon, billboard, deepfake, hacking, porn, privacy

Drivers are distracted by a hacked billboard, Maria takes a deeper look at how the deepfake problem has... uh... deepened, and Carole is less than happy about Amazon's announcement about new Alexa integrations.

140: Love, PINs, and 8chan

August 8th, 2019  |  54 mins 51 secs

8chan, banking, cloudflare, dating, monzo, passcode, pin, romance scam, the boys

Is the PIN you use for your bank card secure? How did one woman get duped into giving a romance scammer $200,000? And Cloudflare and other online services take aim at a vile corner of the internet...

137: Porn trolling lawyers, Insta hacking, and Ctrl-Alt-LED

July 18th, 2019  |  44 mins 8 secs

hacking, instagram, keyboard, lawyers, porn, vulnerability

Erection your honour! Lawyers find themselves behind bars after they make porn movies in an attempt to scam internet users, boffins in Israel detail a way to steal data from an air-gapped computer, and Instagram coughs up $30,000 after a researcher finds a simple way to hack into anybody's account.

132: CBP cyber attack, an iPhone privacy boost, and Twitter list abuse

June 13th, 2019  |  48 mins 14 secs

apple, cbp, data breach, firestorm, gerry anderson, ios, iphone, troll, twitter

United States Customs and Border Protection had sensitive data stolen, but the hackers didn't have to breach its network. Apple has ambitious plans to make iPhone users safer online. And trolls are using Twitter lists to target their victims.

129: Too Long; Didn't Listen

May 23rd, 2019  |  51 mins 34 secs

2fa, china, google, hackers, phishing, scam, social media

Don't hire a hacker, they might scam you! What works and what doesn't when it comes to protecting your email account? And China's controversial social credit system comes under the microscope.

123: Backups - a necessary evil? (replay)

April 11th, 2019  |  30 mins 45 secs

backups

In this special "splinter" episode of the "Smashing Security" podcast from September 2017 we tackle the tricky subject of backups - When did you last backup your data? How and what should you backup? And where should you store them?

Lots of questions and Graham gets to do his Tina Turner impression.