Smashing Security17 Sep 2025

Lights! Camera! Hacktion!

When "bad actors" stop being hackers and start being... actual actors.

This week, Graham and special guest Jenny Radcliffe play “Hacker or Ham?” (yes, Steven Seagal, we’re looking at you), before diving into a campaign which saw an Iranian gang luring Israeli performers with fake casting calls for a serious film. We unpack why positive lures can short-circuit scepticism just as effectively as fear.

Plus, the UK's ICO says students are increasingly hacking their own schools.

Meanwhile, Graham heads to 1960s Oxford with Endeavour, while Jenny investigates the Wirral’s mysterious "Catman".

All this, and more, in episode 435 of the "Smashing Security" podcast.

EPISODE LINKS:

Shai-Hulud Worm Compromises npm Ecosystem in Supply Chain Attack - Unit 42.
Jaguar Land Rover extends production shutdown after cyber-attack - The Guardian.
AI-Driven Deepfake Military ID Fraud Campaign by Kimsuky APT - Genians.
Israel says suspected Iranian hackers targeted actors in phishing attack - Iran International.
Iranian Educated Manticore Targets Leading Tech Academics - Check Point.
Children hacking their own schools for 'fun', watchdog warns - BBC News.
Endeavour - ITVx.
Crowds armed with torches hunt the “cat man” every night - Liverpool Echo.
Smashing Security merchandise (t-shirts, mugs, stickers and stuff)

SPONSORS:

Vanta - Expand the scope of your security program with market-leading compliance automation... while saving time and money. Smashing Security listeners get $1000 off!
Adaptive Security - request a custom demo featuring a real CEO deepfake simulation today from adaptivesecurity.com.

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THANKS:

Theme tune: "Vinyl Memories" by Mikael Manvelyan.

Assorted sound effects: AudioBlocks.

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Episoder(470)

High-speed train hacks and homicidal lawnmowers

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20 Mai 55min

How ShinyHunters hacked the world's biggest universities

Welcome to the largest educational data breach in history - affecting nearly 9,000 institutions, every Ivy League university, and 30 million students mid-finals. When Canvas's parent company refused t...

13 Mai 1h 4min

Meta sees everything, Copy Fail, and a deepfake gets hired

Meta's smart glasses promise privacy "designed for you" - but everything they record was being beamed off to workers in Nairobi to label by hand. When those workers blew the whistle, Meta sacked all 1...

6 Mai 1h 2min

This developer wanted to cheat at Roblox. It cost millions

A developer at an AI startup wanted to cheat at Roblox. They downloaded a dodgy script on their work laptop. That one decision triggered a cascade of failures that ended with a $2 million data breach ...

29 Apr 1h 4min

Rockstar got hacked. The data was junk. The secrets it revealed were not

A company that ran anonymous tip lines for 35,000 American schools - handling reports of bullying, weapons, and self-harm - boasted on its website that it had suffered zero security breaches in over 2...

22 Apr 51min

This AI company leaked its own code. It's also built something terrifying

A hacking group claims to have broken into the flood defence system protecting Venice's Piazza San Marco - and is offering to sell access to whoever wants it. The asking price? A frankly insulting $60...

15 Apr 50min

LinkedIn is spying on you, and you agreed to nothing

LinkedIn has been secretly scanning your browser for over 6,000 installed extensions — on every single click you make. It can tell if you're job hunting, what religion you are, and whether you have AD...

8 Apr 41min

This man hid $400 million in a fishing rod. Then it vanished

A cannabis-growing, beekeeping, gyrocopter-flying Irishman invested his drug money in Bitcoin back in 2011 - and now sits on a fortune worth $400 million. There's just one small problem: the access co...

1 Apr 45min