118. AI and the Holy Grail of conservation: Real-time monitoring

The US and UK made a splashy coordinated announcement last month about a years-long cyber espionage campaign by Chinese state-backed hackers. The US indicted seven, the UK leveled sanctions. They just neglected to do one thing --- let some of the victims know.

North Korea has a unique way of testing malware — they are less concerned about getting it right than getting it out… a kind of “smash-and-grab” approach to cyber attacks. Sentinel One’s Tom Hegel explains.

North Korea may be best known for the Lazarus group’s epic cryptocurrency heists. But there’s another special unit of state-backed hackers who have a different specialty: spying on journalists, dissidents, and cybersecurity experts. We look at the ScarCruft gang and their very crafty phishing campaigns.

Everyone is talking about the power of AI in conservation, but a professor at Arizona State University has found an even simpler, more elegant solution – and all you have to do is listen.

Cornell University’s Elephant Listening Project has been trying to get real-time monitoring of the Central African Republic’s forest elephants for years. FruitPunch AI and a roster of other AI researchers are closer than ever to making that a reality.

Matthew Page from the London-based think tank Chatham House pulls back to look at the potential economic fallout between Nigerian government and Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.

This week, Nigeria charged Binance and two of its executives with tax evasion in the latest twist in a month-long dispute between the cryptocurrency giant and the Nigerian government. Nigeria detained Binance’s regional manager and a former US federal agent for nearly a month after they flew to Abuja at the end of February to meet with officials there. Now, one executive has slipped away and the other has become a pawn.

We talk to Analyst1 senior researcher Jon DiMaggio about how hackers settle their disputes – think People’s Court without all the robes.

We speak with the leader of one of the most prolific ransomware-as-a-service gangs the world has ever known — LockBit. Just weeks after Operation Cronos, a global police action against the group, LockBitSupp tells us about the takedown, his attempt to rebuild, and his plans for the future.

Our interview of the week: LockBitSupp says his ransomware platform isn’t dead yet.