In this episode of Ready Radio, John Rush and Bill Anderson delve into the evolving landscape of cyber threats and economic disruptions. As the world faces unpredictable weather patterns and geopolitical instability, understanding the power dynamics at play becomes crucial. They explore the orchestrated efforts of nations engaging in cyber warfare, discussing the potential involvement of global players like China and Russia in empowering Iran with hacking capabilities. John and Bill provide insights on how these threats may manifest in affecting the everyday lives of individuals and industries, urging listeners to bolster their defenses against these digital invasions.
SPEAKER 08 :
This is Ready Radio, preparing you to be ready for anything. Now, here’s your survival guide for Ready Radio, John Rush.
SPEAKER 09 :
And it’s time. Ready Radio, KLZ 560. Myself, Bill Anderson, joining me today as well. Bill, how are you today? I’m doing well, John. Thanks for asking. How is the week? Surviving the weird weather, wind, all the other stuff we have going on?
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, I was watching the news a little bit earlier today, and I guess 32 or something tomorrow, maybe, maybe Saturday, and then 80s to 90s next week.
SPEAKER 09 :
That’s just crazy. Yeah, it really is. It’s all over the map. So sort of like bipolar weather. Now, one of the things I want to talk about today, we touched on this a little bit last week with, you know, war going on Iran and You and I talked about, you know, is there going to be any sleeper cells and things like that? And I think what we have seen is, you know, you might see some rogue people here and there. I don’t know that you would even say those are directly orchestrated by Iran itself. And we talked last week why. Yes, we’ve seen some activity from, again, what I would call, Bill, some rogue actors. I don’t think these folks are in any way, shape, or form connected to Iran other than in their belief system. What are your thoughts?
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, I mean, we don’t know how deep it goes, but I don’t think you’re going to really see anything majorly organized, if you will. You know, their country, their government, their political system is all in chaos right now. I don’t know if they’ve got the infrastructure to to organize such a thing, nor I don’t know if they would want to on a high scale, like we talked about last week, you know, and what we said last week was you’re more likely to see those individuals participating online. Uh, like we saw with the New York, uh, kid where the, the kid said that, you know, he, he got involved with, with, you know, the, the Islamic and the, the Isaac stuff, uh, based on what he read online and was motivated by the propaganda he was reading online. So I think If anything, the sleeper cells that everybody’s worried about are doing more of that type of stuff. They are promoting protests. They’re getting people to cause division within America. And then you probably do have some level of cyber attacks. I think I texted it to you the other day.
SPEAKER 09 :
We’re going to talk about that today. That one I do think is a real threat. We’ll get into that one today because that one I do think is a threat. Well, it’s happening, so that’s something that we need to make people aware of. Right. Right. So that’s what they’re doing. Yeah, it is. And so, you know, for those of you listening, let’s move into that because it is it’s happening literally as we speak. And the thing I am not fully aware of and I. I’m guessing that there’s probably some Russian influence on the hacking end of things when it comes to Iran, probably both Chinese and Russian influence when it comes to the hacking end of things. And the reason I say that is – and I’m sorry, this is just the way it is. Iran itself, the Muslim countries, are not well known for being hackers. They just aren’t, Bill. They’re more of – The terrorists, I guess I could say. I mean, they know how to fund terrorism, how to plant bombs, you know, do the things necessary along those lines. I wouldn’t say that in the past they’ve ever been really big on the whole cyber warfare. So given the fact that they’re now attacking in that way, you’ve got to believe that, you know, China and Russia both are behind this.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, and, you know, just because they haven’t done it in the past doesn’t mean that, you know, they couldn’t have. had help, like you said, with China, Russia, or even got some level of recruitment outside of their sphere of what their capabilities are, but they could bring people in that possibly have that you know, that education or that technology. You know, so that could be possible, John, where they could grow into that. But then themselves, I don’t think they’re there. But, you know, we’ve got to remember, too, with the supply of the oil and stuff that they have, you know, what they have there is they have They have the power with the money and the oil. Trading power.
SPEAKER 09 :
And that can purchase things, right? Yep, very true. And for those of you listening, they have already hit Verifone and Stryker. Stryker actually, that’s interesting there, Stryker is actually Pat Stryker, who’s here in Fort Collins, who’s a big, huge Colorado Democrat funder. She is well-known and has helped flip this state blue. I’d have to go look and see how much of a stake in the company she still has, but that’s her family’s company. And yeah, they have hit that one really hard. They have got offices all over the world. I believe I’m reading that they have, Stryker has offices in 79 countries. The group claimed it wiped out more than 200,000 systems, servers, and mobile devices and stole 50 terabytes of data from Stryker. Now, Again, that’s the group claiming that it did that. You’d have to figure out from Stryker whether or not that’s exactly correct or not. But I think a lot of people, Stryker’s Hub in Ireland, there’s 5,000 workers. They were already sent home. So it is having an impact on that end of things. And, again, what we want to talk about today is, again, we always talk about, Bill. how to be prepared for the what-ifs of life. Well, I think in this case, and not that I think they’re going to be striking any one of us directly, that’s not what I’m saying, but the things that we use, our banking system and so on, yeah, we’re going to talk about today what you need to be doing, have backups and so on, because, yeah, it could affect that end of things. I don’t think, Bill, directly as far as citizens of the United States, there’s far too many in I just don’t see them trying to go after a little guy. Sorry, I just don’t see that. They’re going to go after the big fish. The big fish, of course, like in this case, are, you know, Stryker Verifone is a big cell company in other parts of the world. You start looking at our banking industry and some of our big corporations and so on. That’s what they’re going to target, in my opinion.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, they’re causing disruption within the economical arena, if you will. And, you know, if you create chaos, then the unit itself, meaning the nation, is now weakened. And now there’s other things that are distraction points, if you will, that may cause them to not worry about, you know, maybe the war not so much because now they’ve got other things to work on. So it’s attacking arms of the same tree, if you will, or branches of the same tree. You know, and you’ve got to remember, too, that we have the issue with the Transformers and the Transformers being outsourced to other countries and what communications. I mean, there was a video, and I don’t know. It’s just so hard, John, to really believe what you read or see anymore. But there was a video on these new Roombas. These new Roombas have cameras on them. Right. Somebody had posted that they were on the john there and the Roomba came in and the camera was able to see it. How far does that get outside of your firewall? I don’t know, but that’s the point. You don’t know. You would assume that it’s going to be protected within your firewall, within your home. Is anybody going to be watching somebody sitting on the toilet? That’s not the point. The point is if there’s a weakness to get in and now you come home and hook your cell phone up to your wi-fi you know and now they’ve got the contacts and they may not directly attack you they may just use you as the trojan horse if you will to collect data on a whole bunch of other people you know um so and really quick i’ve got some data so for those of you listening that maybe think we’re over the top we’re not i was had an article that was sent to me that was written by
SPEAKER 09 :
A person, as I read through this, I’m like, yeah, this this all makes sense. I didn’t go out. And this is really hard, of course, to verify these things. So you’re relying on some trusted news publications that are coming my way. But the threat’s not limited to one or two headline grabbing incidents in early March. Advisory SOFAS warned that likely tactics could include website defacements, DDoS attacks, ransomware, destructive wipers, hack and leak operations, phishing, of course, and password spraying. Researchers also say the infrastructure for the next wave may already be in place. Threat Labs identified more than 8,000 newly registered domains tied to the Middle East conflict, warning that many may still be weaponized or used in threat campaigns in the near future. The lure includes fake news blogs, conflict-themed malware files, and other content designed to exploit panic and curiosity while tensions remain high. Going back, Bill, to what we’ve talked about for the past several weeks, Be careful what you see and or read and or view on the Internet because it may not actually be true. Right, right.
SPEAKER 11 :
And in fact, just this week. Wednesday I did a special teaching at church about discerning the current environment, the current temperature, if you will, in light of what we would know as eschatology, the study of end times. Because here’s what happens as soon as we attack Iraq. We talked briefly about this last week, but somebody may have not listened, so I’ll just give a quick rundown. They go, oh, that’s the Ezekiel 38 war. And it’s like, you know, or they’re so quick to to point any type of Middle Eastern war to a biblical prophecy. They’re so quick to point any kind of a leader to the Antichrist. And they really don’t know. But the key verse in all of this, if you have Bible students out there or Christians out there, the key verse that I want. every Christian to focus on is Matthew 24, 4. And Jesus says this, take heed that you’re not deceived. And that is the number one thing right there, because in the day, the last days, that’s the number one tactic of the enemy is deception. And he’s got us busy going, oh my gosh, this is this war. He’s the antichrist. This is the mark of the beast. And, and it’s all deception. It’s none of it. You know, you gotta, you gotta know, you gotta be able to, to, discern the truth and to know the truth. And at the end of the day, you know, you gotta shore your house, get your house in order, both physically, spiritually, all of those things that we talk about here on this show. And, you know, come what may, John, I hate to say that, but come what may, you know, you’re not gonna stop it. No one person in this country, no one talk show or, you know, blogger or whatever, podcaster is gonna stop any of this These are things that are happening at a much higher level with forces that are way higher than the average person can even hope to defend against. So the point is, as you know it’s coming, you’ve got to get your house in order, John, and don’t be deceived.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah. And again, folks, we’re not trying to scare anybody here, but the things that they are and will be targeting. And this is one of those things where, yes, I do believe these threats are out there. I believe it’s happening as we speak. This isn’t something where, you know, we’re talking about sleeper cells and things like that, which may or may not ever happen. And Bill and I think probably won’t because of things we talked about. in last week’s program, but in this particular case, Bill, yes, I do think they’re going to do these things because they know that they can cause quite a bit of chaos, and it’s their way of lashing back at the United States of America, of course, and even other countries that are involved in this particular conflict. The targets, by the way, will span banking, aviation, technology, and believe it or not, nonprofit organizations. So they’ve got the ability to, if you will… you know, hack in and really go down the path of, you know, this is cyber war now at this point in time. This is not, you know, a human war in this case. This is cyber warfare. And as I said earlier, and I think I’ll stand by this, I would venture to guess, and yes, Iran could bring some folks on their teams that may be able to help them with this. But they’re not known for this. The Chinese are. The Russians definitely are. In fact, we’ve heard about Russian hacking, Bill, for ages now. So the reality is, yes, those guys are very good at this. Iran is tied in very closely with China. And Russia, is it possible they’ve got both on their team doing some of these things? I would highly, highly believe. That it is team members they’ve got working with them or for them or, by the way, telling them what to do, by the way, which could be China and Russia both using basically Iran as a proxy at this point in time trying to get back at us because neither one of those countries like us either. And so I don’t believe, by the way, that this is strictly Iran’s doing. This has got other forces behind it. And the reason I say that is, guys, these are forces that know full well how to hack in and do things. And to Bill’s point a moment ago, you’ve got to keep in mind that a lot of our power grid – has been funneled in through, has been basically produced by China. And there has been conversation in the past and discoveries that they embedded certain software in certain things that gave them the ability to have access. I don’t know how much of that’s been caught and shut down, Bill. I really have no idea. But I do know that in the past several years, that’s been a problem. It’s a known problem.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, it’s a known problem. And, you know, it should be no surprise about this. this interference, whether, you know, people want to get off on election interference or the meddling like you’ve talked about. You know, you’ve got to remember, let me tell you who the number one player in that game is. Do you know who that is, John? It’s America. America is very much influencing the world at that level, so we get all kind of paranoid when people do it to us. But, you know, we’re doing it to a lot of people, and we tend to forget that. We think we’re just the nice kid around here but, you know, we’re the ones that started all this stuff, you know. I would probably go that far as to say, you know, after World War II, you know, and maybe even a little bit before, you know, we were the ones that were doing this with that level of espionage and things like that. So, you know, it’s a reality. It’s a known thing. It’s been going on for a while. The planting of the the chips or the communication within the electronics coming across. And you got to remember too, everything that is sold out of China is, is approved or, you know, associated with the government. That’s what it means to be communist, right? There’s no, you know, like here we say, Oh, Apple is protective and we won’t turn over things to the government. Baloney, by the way. And they’ll say that Microsoft is the same way. They won’t turn things over. No, that all got passed, especially after 9-11 when the terrorist thing came in. They will get into your system. There’s nothing they can do to stop it. Well, in China… it’s mandated by the government that they have access to everything, whether it’s in-country or out-of-country. So if it was manufactured in China and it goes out, you better believe they got their hands in it. Now, what they will do with it, who knows to what level, back to our original point.
SPEAKER 09 :
And for those of you listening, where are the sources of what I’m telling you guys? This is coming from Stephanie Schappert. She’s a senior journalist at Cyber News. She’s an accomplished writer. She’s got a master’s in cybersecurity, immersed in the security world since 2019. She’s got decade-plus experience in America’s number one news market, including Fox News, Gannett, Blaze Media, Verizon. In other words, Bill, this isn’t just some fly-by-night person saying these things. This is somebody that’s very well ingrained in what’s going on in that particular end of things. Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah. And, you know, I crack up to wherever you’re watching a news council or you watch, you know, MSN or CNN or even Fox for that matter. You know, they’re like, well, we need to know the exact details when this war is going to be over. What’s your next move is? And are you kidding me? Do you think they’re going to just openly state what their plans are? You know, I mean, these reporters, I don’t think, have any common sense at all because they’re not going to get the goods. They’re not going to sit there and go, yeah, here’s a play by play of our next attack. you know, our next campaign. Here’s what we’re going to do because all those countries are going to do is turn on the news and see what’s going to happen. I mean, come on. You think that, you know, we really know what’s going on because we hear of a source or we don’t hear of a story or whatever? Do we really know? I’ll guarantee you, folks, you don’t know what’s going on at that level, nor should you probably.
SPEAKER 09 :
Right. Good point. Great segue. We’ll come back. I’ve got more to talk about on this and pulling this back into what may affect all of us. And I want to get into that and what you can do to make sure that you stay protected because there could be things that affect you directly. We’ll get into that here in just one moment. Again, Bill Anderson with me. He’s got his own website, Prep2ProtectCO.com. Bill, real quick before we go to break, what kind of classes, what else do you have coming up here in the near future?
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, actually the last Saturday of this month, we’re going to kick back off of our CCW classes. So if you need a permit or if you need renewal, all right, we’re going to have our first class because we were outside range. So we kind of, little did we know we could have ran them all winter long, but we had paused those because you just don’t know what the weather, but we’ve scheduled one for the last Saturday this month. And then there’ll be regularly scheduled from that point forward through the rest of the summer.
SPEAKER 09 :
All right, that’s it, folks. Don’t forget our website, ready-radio.com. We’ll be right back. This is Ready Radio, KLZ 560.
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SPEAKER 09 :
All right, we are back. Ready Radio, KLZ 560. Thanks for joining us. Bill Anderson with us. And real quick, I want to add a few things in on the whole cyber warfare end of things when it comes to Iran. Some would say, okay, I get what you guys are saying, but at the end of the day, how does this really benefit Iran? iran at the end of the day i mean yeah they could disrupt some things and so on but folks let me tell you what this is this really does come down to cash and let me explain yes the chaos is one thing that they do and they’ll love to do and that that’s just one aspect of this but keep in mind if they go through and do the things that i’m reading that they potentially could end up with and the millions upon millions of user data credit card info and so on. That all gets sold on the dark web. They can collect billions, I’m not exaggerating, billions of dollars from what I just said a moment ago. They can also run scams on just regular individuals. That’s what we’re going to talk about in a few minutes. And the phishing and the scams and so on, and the direct money they can extract from you individually. And then don’t forget about the ransomware when it comes to big companies and the dollars they can collect there as well. So at the end of the day, this is really, Bill, about funding their war effort. This is another revenue stream for them. And frankly, Bill, I’m shocked that there isn’t more news agencies talking about this because, frankly, this is, in my opinion, this is a bigger deal than even what they’re doing in the Strait of Hormuz.
SPEAKER 11 :
yeah what’s the saying always follow the money because really that’s what it’s all about and you know and a lot of people engage in war uh through proxy wars i mean if you think about it the whole ukraine russia deal is a proxy war for america it’s it’s enabling us one person told me that and i don’t know if it’s true or not you know but they say hey we’re selling our old stuff to to ukraine and, you know, like canned goods, you know, they go bad after a while. The emissions and stuff like that go bad after a while. So, hey, let’s go ahead and Let’s get rid of the old stuff. Let’s test our new stuff. Because how do you really test something? You know, if you’re not in a really war, you could run them in the desert or whatever. But, hey, let’s go ahead and sell it here and test there. So, you know, there’s very much a vested interest in prolonging that war as long as possible on multiple fronts, right? Not just America, by the way.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, and again, folks, believe me when I say that in Iran’s case, this is a collection effort. I mean, this is like being at church and passing the collection plate. This is no different. They’re collecting money. They need money to continue their war effort. And, yes, they built up quite an arsenal on the front side. Of course, we’ve taken a lot of that arsenal out. They’ll need to replace some of those things. That doesn’t happen for free. For everybody listening, China and Russia doesn’t just give money. these things to Iran. As you know, Bill, there is a cost to that, and there’s an exchange of cash or goods or oil or whatever it happens to be going back and forth to make sure that that debt is paid. Iran doesn’t get things for free, is my point.
SPEAKER 11 :
Nobody does. Nobody does. There’s always a deal. There’s always a… Even look at what Trump is doing. You know, hey, we’ll help you, Ukraine, if you give us mineral rights. If you do this, there’s always a cost, right? And honestly, John, there should be. There should be. That’s right. I mean, nothing in our Constitution that says we have to be the world police. You know, and there’s always going to be… You know, I love when people go, hey, humanitarianism, you know, the human right. there’s no human right written into our Constitution. I might make somebody mad about that, but what’s written into our Constitution is citizenship rights. Not just because you’re a human, but because you are a citizen of this nation. That’s what gives you your rights. That’s exactly right. If somebody wants, John, a biblical verse or a biblical prophecy, if you will, with Iran, if you want to track that down and play with that, check out Jeremiah 49, verses 34 through 39. Elam is the modern-day Iran, and it says the military strike or the military bow will be broken. They will be scattered to the four winds, and then they will be gathered. And so, you know, we could go back to 1979. Prior to 1979, Iran was You know, very Western, very looked a lot like America, right? The, the women had, they were doctors, they were professors, there was no oppression of them. And then these guys came in and they, they, uh, took control. And a lot of the Iranians at that point scattered. to the world, and this prophecy says that that will happen, and there’ll be a time when that power structure, the bow, is broken, and once that’s broken, they will return back to the nation, and they will return back to the Lord. During COVID, they did some internet data, and the highest downloads of Bibles, sermons, Christian contact was in Iran. It was up 566%. And right now, it is the evangelistic association to say right now, at this current time, Iran is trending as the most gospel conversions in anywhere in the world right now as we speak. So you could kind of, if you wanted to try to plug that into some biblical prophecy, that would be Jeremiah 49, 34 through 39, if anybody’s interested in tracking that down.
SPEAKER 09 :
Very cool. We’ve got Dave joining us now. Dave, go ahead, sir. You’re up.
SPEAKER 07 :
Hey, John. This is a little bit off topic, but it’s a preparedness issue that I have.
SPEAKER 09 :
No, you’re fine.
SPEAKER 07 :
Go ahead. I bought some batteries, AA, AAA, some C-cells a couple years ago from Lowe’s, a Lowe’s that was going out of business, and put them in one of those special little plastic containers to store them and stuff, kept them in the basement. It’s a finished basement, so there’s no wide uh variations in temperature the other day or not the other day a couple weeks ago i went down to get some batteries out of there and only the triple a’s for some reason they’re they’re corroding in there is there any way to store batteries long term i mean because i’ve had that done like when i haven’t put in like a remote control or a flashlight or something like that that hasn’t been used for a while and like you know i open it up and they’re corroded okay well And it’s because it was exposed to temperature variations. But these ones aren’t.
SPEAKER 09 :
Interesting. Bill, your thoughts on that? You’re more of a battery expert and electrical guy than I am.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah. Did you keep them in the original packaging or did you put them in a different packaging?
SPEAKER 07 :
I took them out and I put them in one of those. It was one you can buy at Lowe’s or Home Depot. It’s a double-sided. It looks like a small little suitcase with individual compartments and a great battery. You know what I’m talking about?
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah. Yeah. Is it red, the battery caddy or something? I think I got a couple of those. Yeah, the biggest thing is you don’t want the batteries really touching each other. And so those are good, but they can… Not that particular one, because that one stores them up and down, so there shouldn’t be any touching. But the first thing that you need to do, not in your case, but you need to keep those batteries in the original storage package because you don’t want anything touching the ends. Also, heat is a big factor. So if you get a little bit of, you know, anything above 77, anything below 59, will start to tamper with that battery life. Humidity, if you put them in a place where there happens to be humidity, which is kind of crazy, but in Colorado in our basements and our mechanical rooms where our water closets and stuff can be, you can get a little bit of humidity, especially even in Colorado basements, you can get it. But humidity can cause corrosion and leakage. And that’s really extreme temperatures. Don’t put them in the refrigerator. That is not true. That does not do anything for them. But the typical battery life the triple-a double-a should five to ten years right yeah if you get lithium yeah 10 to 15 so you could have got a bad batch of batteries I mean we don’t know the shelf life do they put an expiration date or a manufacturer date on battery packaging usually you yeah yeah so you could you could have bought they could have sat in Lowe’s for two years and then they clearance them out you don’t you know you’d have to check that for sure
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, okay. I’ve just never had that happen before.
SPEAKER 11 :
Were they a name brand, or were they like Home Depot had that HDX?
SPEAKER 07 :
No, they were kind of a name brand that’s been around forever, Rayovacs.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, Rayovac, yeah, sure.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, so they’ve been around for a long time. The thing is, I usually store my batteries in my junk drawer, but in the original packaging, and I’ve never had a problem with them. So, you know, it was just too many batteries. to store in my junk drawer so i put them in that caddy and i like i said it’s a finished basement you know with a small living room downstairs on a shelf there and when i went to go get some they were you know corroded out you know uh acid leakage though they weren’t touching so it just kind of surprised me i didn’t know if i wasn’t storing them right i mean obviously possibly maybe it was just a bad batch that was produced but i’d never had it happen before
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, I have seen those batteries leak. I’m not a fan of, of that brand personally. Um, I’m, I’m a pretty much a Duracell guy. I’ve tried the energizers. They’re okay. But those Rayovacs there, uh, I don’t, I don’t think they’re, they’re good because you do have a high, I just Googled it here. There is a high report of leakage with that brand.
SPEAKER 07 :
Okay. And a little bit on subject for what you guys are talking about with, um, What’s going on with Iran? I just heard recently that they’d fired some missiles into Jordan and actually those missiles that hit some German bases a couple days ago, they fired some missiles at Turkey. So obviously those are two NATO countries. Do you guys anticipate NATO getting involved in this, finally saying, hey, you know what, enough is enough. We need to invoke, I can’t remember if it’s Article 6 or 7 of the NATO treaty, treaty that says if one member’s attacked, they’re all attacked, they will come to the attack of those members?
SPEAKER 09 :
That’s a really good question. I think you’re going to see them hold off as long as they possibly can, and the reason I say that is because I think a lot of those countries, this is me personally, use Iran as a proxy for all sorts of things, and they don’t want to get caught with a you-know-what in the ringer when it’s all said and done. So that’s my own opinion, Dave. I think a lot of those countries are in bed with Iran, but I do think there’s a, no matter how much in bed they are, there will be a tipping point where if it gets too bad, yes, I think they’ll engage.
SPEAKER 07 :
Okay. The way it’s affecting the oil markets, eventually that’s going to have to hit to Europe at some point. There was a graphic I was seeing the other day.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, it’s hitting them, as you know, Dave. It’s hitting those countries, and the world supply, 20%, comes through there. We don’t get much. I mean, we’ve got the ability here to probably ramp up enough production to really even overcome what we import. So at the end of the day, we’re the best suitor. We’re the largest oil producer now in the entire world, so it really has the least amount of impact upon us.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, the graphic that I saw the other day showed North America, and they didn’t split up North America between U.S. and Canada, just North America. They said right around 39.8% of the world’s oil pop-ups comes from North America. But the Middle East, and they didn’t break that down specifically, I’d have to go back and look at that graphic, but the Middle East accounts for like 37% of the world’s oil, and then the rest came from Central and South America and, you know, Russia. And it surprised me how little Russia actually produces onto the world market. So I’m assuming with that kind of disruption, there’s going to have to be, they’re going to have to pick a side. And, you know, either side with us or, you know, side against us.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, Dave, Jordan is not a NATO nation. So that would, the attack on NATO would not… Attack on the German base there?
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, it was an attack on the German base there.
SPEAKER 11 :
Oh, I thought you said Jordan. I’m sorry. I thought you said Jordan.
SPEAKER 09 :
Well, it’s in Jordan, but the German base in Jordan, Bill.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yes, correct. Oh, okay. Okay. I was going to say, yeah, Jordan’s not NATO. They cooperate and they allow NATO bases to be in there, but I don’t think… You know, that’s a slippery slope, right? Because, yes, they attack the German base, but… That was in Jordan. Will NATO respond? I don’t think so because I think they’re more looking towards did you attack actual NATO land and not necessarily an embassy or whatever. Because if that was the case, when they attacked the American embassies, that would have triggered it too, but it didn’t. So, yeah, I don’t think they’re going to do anything.
SPEAKER 07 :
All right. All right, well, thanks. I appreciate your show.
SPEAKER 09 :
You’re very welcome, Dave. No, appreciate it very much. Okay, that’s a great segue up against a break. We’ll come right back, give you guys some exact things you can do to help avoid some of the things cyber-wise that we were talking about earlier. Again, don’t forget Bill’s website, prep2protectco.com. Ours, of course, ready-radio.com. We’ll be right back. Myself and Bill, this is Ready Radio, KLZ 560.
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SPEAKER 09 :
Okay, we’re back. Ready Radio KLZ 560. Myself, Bill Anderson. And, all right, talking about cyber, basically cyber warfare. And the fact that there is all sorts of things going on right now with Iran. And I read you a lot of the news that… I had sent to me, by the way, here just a couple of days ago, and this is real-life stuff. Now, I’m not trying to alarm anybody, not trying to get you guys to where anybody’s running around in fear. Bill, we never do that. We don’t operate that way. I never will. It’s not how we run things here. But I do think people need to be aware that – and by the way, some of the scams and things that are going on, the phishing things and so on, they’re going on all the time anyways. There’s countries all over the world – Bill, as you know, there’s farms as in slave farms, I guess what I should call these. A lot of these folks are operating literally as slaves where they’re trying to scam you out of whatever, everything from their calling that your computer needs updated to it’s a credit card scam to right now there’s a big toll scam going on in Colorado where they’re sending you text messages saying, if you don’t pay this, you’re going to have to go to court, blah, blah, blah. So All of those things, by the way, are originating out of all sorts of different places around the world. So this stuff’s going on all the time. Now, all that being said, Bill, you’re going to see it increase. So for everybody out there listening with everything happening with Iran right now, you’re going to see it increase. In fact, number one thing I would do. If I were anybody listening, lock down your credit. You guys have the ability to go on to some of the different credit reporting agencies. In some cases, there’s a small fee. Other cases, it may be free. You may have some options with certain credit cards and things that you own. Check all of that out first. But first things first, lock down your credit. What I mean by that is no one has access to even run a credit report until you, say, Okay, and that can be done. So literally lock down your credit. Nobody gets into that in any way, shape, or form. On top of that, make sure you’ve got good reporting. And, Bill, I don’t know exactly what name I’m looking for there, but basically a good reporting website. You can join lots of them to where they’re looking for these things whereby you may have become victim to something, whether that be something on the dark web where your name was released, your Social Security number is out there, and so on. By the way, speaking of Social Security, Go to your Social Security account. You can do that through the government website. And double-check to make sure everything there is accurate. In other words, has everything been reported correctly? You should do this on a biannual basis anyways, but is everything being recorded correctly? Has anybody stolen your ID, your Social Security number, for example? These are things that each person can do on their own, Bill. It’s not that time-consuming, but these are things that you should routinely, I should say, be checking.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, I think it’s called a credit freeze.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yes, credit freeze. There you go. Credit freeze is what I was looking for. Yes.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, and it’s not that big of a deal. You just got to remember to turn it back off if you’re trying to get a loan or something like that. You got to remember to do that. But yeah, there’s a lot of companies you can use. I use Avast. I use another company called Penster, which checks the, you know, and it’s really a trust thing, to be honest with you. You know, you’re paying them a monthly fee, and whether they are or whether they’re not, I mean, who knows? There’s, what, LifeLock. There’s several of them out there.
SPEAKER 03 :
That’s right.
SPEAKER 11 :
You know, you could do the free ones, but, you know, you’ve got to remember, especially with AI and AI going from, There’s three different levels of AI, by the way, and you should know all of those, not that you’ll be interacting with all of those. The two upper ones are more of the behind-the-scenes ones. But when you get into AI, and now AI is getting in the game because AI is merely a tool of whoever is using it, good guy and or bad guy. And so the pressure is on, let’s just say that, right? And it’s learning and it’s growing every day. Every chat, every input, every program, it’s learning on itself. And, you know, for the good guys and the bad guys. I mean, I’m a part of what’s called Logos Bible study software. It’s, you know, a lot of pastors and stuff buy this. And it’s kind of funny because when you start to say to pastors, hey, I’m using AI to Bible study, they’re like, you know, it’s like you got a third eye growing in your forehead or something, but you know, now Logos has an AI study tool. And I’m like, Hmm, that’s kind of interesting. Oh, that’s okay. But the others aren’t funny, but you know, this stuff is growing all the time. So the free ones, John, I mean, I don’t know. I don’t know if you get what you pay for. Um, and I, I do have a little bit of a trust issue with, yeah, these, programs are saying they’re doing this they’re paying the monthly fee are they uh yeah i don’t know but you know hey something’s better than nothing i guess if you’re you know well and like i said i think there’s certain things that you guys can be doing on your own be looking at your own credit on a routine basis and probably should be doing that right now with everything going on
SPEAKER 09 :
On a weekly basis, you should be blocking any unknown numbers that come in. Don’t talk to these people. If it’s somebody that’s important, they’ll leave a message. You can call them back. Every family, I’ve talked about this before, but every family needs a safe word. And what I mean by that is there’s a lot of… out there where they use AI. They’ll make somebody sound like a family member, son, daughter, grandson, granddaughter, whatever, and they will call saying something to the effect of, oh, hey, grandma, I’ve been involved in an accident, and I’m okay, but my car is wrecked, and I’m going to need some money for the tow, and this, that, and the other. Can you You know, can you send me this? Can you send me that? And those are all scams, by the way, but they make them sound so legitimate. And the key there is if you have a safe word, you could say, well, okay, Susie, I understand everything that’s going on right now. I’m here to help. What’s the family safe word? Well, if they don’t know that safe word, you just automatically hang up and don’t worry about it. nine times out of ten bill it’s going to be a scam anyways but you know there are situations with family members where things come up and there is somebody in a real need situation and make sure you’ve got a family code word a password if you would that everybody understands that by the way the scammers won’t know and these are things that you should not be sharing amongst anyone else so no one else would ever know that they’re not written down it’s just something that you guys have you know internally so you know what that is but But point being, Bill, is these scams are going to increase. You all listening have to really be diligent. And by the way, share the information we’re talking about today with friends and family and some of the elderly folks that are in your family. They tend to be picked on more than others. But by the way, even some young people now, Bill, because unfortunately, they’re not much more tech savvy than the old generation is. They’re getting hit just as well. Right. It’s, it’s too commonplace for them.
SPEAKER 11 :
So, you know, they’re, they’re too trusting. Whereas, you know, the, the older generation is probably working out of ignorance. Right. And so I think that’s it. And, and, you know, if you don’t recognize the number, don’t answer it because that’s another way that they get you. I mean, how many calls, I’ve personally done, and it’s kind of hard because you own a business, it’s really hard, so you’re like, ah, is this an inspector? Because an inspector comes from an 800 number, and I’m like, I’m expecting an inspection, so I guess I better answer it. But yeah, you pick it up and you’re like, hello, hello, hello, hello, you know, and I mean, nobody’s there. And you’re thinking, oh, it’s a bad number. No, that call was intentional. Maybe they’re trying to read your voice. Maybe they’re trying to pick up on the hello. Maybe they’re trying to see if you answer, whether it’s a workable number or not. So I would just give that habit of, if you don’t know it, don’t answer it. And either text me or… I mean, I don’t even really check voicemails much anymore, so usually I just, hey, just text me, right? Just text me, and then I know who you are, and then maybe I’ll answer it. Then once I know that number, I’ll program it in my phone. So, hey, it’s John Rush. I’ll answer this one instead of a 72072. I don’t know that number, you know. So that’s one way you can handle that, too. And, you know, right now, they could pick up yours and mine’s voice. very easily because we’re public, right? You know, people go on Facebook, TikTok, all that stuff they can pick up. That’s right. You know, all these voices that they can generate. I just listened to an audio book that the whole thing was generated in the author’s voice, and he said it was AI-generated. He did not read it. Wow. Amazing. He just read, you know, a couple sentences or whatever, and it got what it needed, and it used his voice and did the whole entire book.
SPEAKER 1 :
Hmm.
SPEAKER 09 :
Unbelievable. Point being, guys, be careful. Be very diligent. As I said a moment ago, spread this word out to others that are in your circle, your family circle, those of you that have small groups even at church or whatever else you’re involved in. Make sure people understand what’s actually going on. I know that these scams and things have already been out there and been around, but the point is right now with what’s happening in Iran and It’s going to be increased. That one, guys, if there’s anything I can pretty much guarantee you, it’s that. I mean, yes, the sun’s going to come up tomorrow, and Iran and their cyber warfare is going to be in full strength, and they’re going to do this as long as they possibly can. They have a war effort to fund. Keep in mind right now they’re not selling a lot of oil, so they need that money coming in, Bill. They’ve used up a lot of money, and the reality is they’re going to need to replace that money in their coffers. hour yeah yeah you just got to watch you get prepared and not walk in fear but but be proactive not reactive John that’s our that’s our saying right yes yeah and along those lines for some of you listening please you know we talked about phone calls a moment ago that’s a big one these guys will try to call you they’ll also text you there’s all sorts of text scams going on out there they will try to message you via an email and things along those lines so you Be really diligent. Don’t open any email that you don’t recognize. Again, if you think somebody’s sending you an email and you think it’s really important, send them one back first. Hey, did you send me something that had an attachment on it that I need to open? I’m really nervous right now about opening things. I’m not sure where they come from. I just want to make sure that, in fact, Bill, you did send me this particular email with an attachment. Now, if you knowingly have some conversation going back and forth, that’s different. But keep in mind, uh… these hackers i guess you could say they are looking at everything they’ve got the ability to intercept all sorts of things in one of the other areas for those of you that do any kind of you know mortgage work or loans or some of your buying homes and selling homes Be really careful of the wire end of things. There’s lots of wire fraud. These guys get in the middle of a wire. They watch the communications going back and forth. They know exactly when to intercede. It’s how they end up gaining access with your routing number and other things. And they end up taking the money and running. And good luck on getting it back. And, Bill, there’s so many horror stories along those lines where people have lost money. hundreds of thousands of dollars and things I just mentioned. And in a lot of cases, it’s simply just being slower, being more aware of what’s going on, double-checking everything. And one of the things, too, folks, when you get emails from people or you might think it’s your friend, really look at who it’s from email address. Make sure there’s not some weird – you know, letter or number or something that is off. And these guys have a really good way of disguising things where, you know, they can make a zero turn into an O or an O turn into a zero. And yes, those are two different characters. Just so everybody knows, there is a big difference between an O and a zero. And at the end of the day, Bill, they’ve got so many ways of masking these things and making it look like it came from somebody you know. and all of a sudden you click on something, and now you’ve got ransomware or malware or all sorts of other things that may be taking play, and now they’re into your banking, and it just becomes a real mess. I have a family member I won’t mention by name, but fortunately, fortunately, the bank was very diligent in working for her, but it could have been a huge, huge, high five-digit loss, Bill, at the end of the day, had the bank not intervened.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, yeah, I’ve gotten in the habit. I just, I mean, I’m Like I said, I pretty much do everything text message and I reluctantly open any emails, any Spanish looking emails, just go straight to the trash. I just delete, delete, delete emails becomes such a, such a bad place now. And to your point though, it’s, it’s hard. if they get that recognizable name. But, you know, hey, everybody’s got the phone. Everybody’s attached to that anyway. Hey, John, did you send me an email? Right. You know, did you send me an invite to like this page on Facebook? Did you do this? You know, and a lot of times they’re like, no. Okay, your account’s been hacked. Right.
SPEAKER 09 :
Right. And again, for all of you listening, Bill has just gave some great advice. If you think somebody sent you something, you’re close enough to them that you’ve got their phone number, send them a text message really quick and say, hey, just, you know, sending text message, making sure that you sent me an email a moment ago with an attachment. If not, I’m not going to worry about it. But just let me know. Did you send something or not? I mean, these are really quick, easy things to check. Keep this in mind as well. I talked about this this past week when it came to the texting scam that’s going on right now through the toll end of things and so on here in Colorado. They don’t send text messages. They do everything via mail, believe it or not, still snail mail. If you owe them something on your FastPass or you even just went through with your license plate itself and you now owe them money, believe me, they will let you know that you owe them money and it will not be in the form of a text message or an email message. or frankly, even a phone call. And the way that works is if you somehow slip through the cracks and you didn’t pay your toll, a collection agency might actually be calling you at some point. But Bill, they’re not going to call you directly. Very few government agencies, IRS, the Social Security Department, I can go down the list. These places will not call you. They will not send you emails. Believe it or not, we still live in a day and age where those departments, maybe it’s the way it should be, Bill, they still use snail mail.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, and certified mail at that, too. If you’re really in trouble, you’re getting some type of certified letter that’s going to show whoever’s sending that that you received it. That’s right. They’re tracking it. That’s exactly right.
SPEAKER 09 :
There’s all sorts of scams out there that make things look super legitimate. And, guys, I mean that when I say that. They make it look – I’ve seen these. I mean, I get them. They look so real. I talked about a story here, oh, I don’t know, a month, month and a half ago, where I had a situation where somebody was trying to scam me. They very much made it look like Chase was trying to get a hold of me. And I mean, Bill, the recording, the phone number, the conversation – If I hadn’t been on my game and had been asleep at the wheel, I would have gotten taken. Fortunately, I was sharp enough to know at that time that, yeah, this just doesn’t sound right. I get my card out. I call the 800 number on the back. I explain what’s going on. They’re like, yeah, no, this is a scam. We didn’t call you. You don’t have any issues going on at all. That’s somebody trying to get your information. But, Bill, I’m here to tell you, it was so real, it was hard to tell the difference.
SPEAKER 11 :
Yeah, they’re getting really good. Like I said earlier, AI, and they’re utilizing AI, and that thing is constantly, that thing doesn’t sleep. That’s right. It doesn’t need breaks.
SPEAKER 03 :
That’s right.
SPEAKER 11 :
It just goes and goes and goes, and it continues to learn, and depending on the programmer, it is going to do what it’s asked to do.
SPEAKER 09 :
That’s exactly right. That’s right. And differ. And again, because of that as well. And now the fact that we’ve got a war going on with Iran and they’re ramping up things, as I said earlier, they’re trying to collect money. They’re doing this through all sorts of things that they will do through, you know, data breaches and scams and selling information and so on. And remember that information that they have sold and garnered money off of. they may not be the ones actually trying to scam you now. It could be somebody else from the dark web. This has been sold to one of the slave farms, I call them, where they’re all over the world, and these people are indebted. They’re indentured servants, literally, that are now out trying to scam you, and if they don’t, they stay in prison, basically, and they’re indentured. Something’s happened to whereby they end up there, and it’s sad, Bill, but at the end of the day, I feel bad for them, but I’m not paying them and getting scammed at the same time because I work too hard for what I have, and it’s not my problem they’re there.
SPEAKER 11 :
Well, and here’s another thing too that I think people don’t realize. We’re looking for big-time scams, right? But, you know, if they’ve got… a million people, and they get you for $5 each. It’s $5 million.
SPEAKER 09 :
A lot of people don’t question $5. That’s right. That’s exactly right. And do that, Bill. Let’s say it’s 20 million people at $5. Now it’s $100 million. So, folks, really, it adds up super fast. That’s right. It adds up really fast. Bill, I’ll let you go. Great conversation, and we’ll talk next week. All right. Talk to you later, Charlie. Yeah, man. Have a good one. I appreciate it. Ready Radio. Don’t forget our website, ready-radio.com. Any questions, send me a text message, 307-282-22. This is KLZ 560.
SPEAKER 02 :
The views and opinions expressed on KLZ 560 are those of the speaker, commentators, hosts, their guests, and callers. They are not necessarily the views and opinions of Crawford Broadcasting or KLZ management, employees, associates, or advertisers. KLZ 560 is a Crawford Broadcasting God and country station.
