SpyCast

Latest Episodes:

Cyberattacks, Espionage & Ransomware – “Inside Microsoft’s Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC)” Oct 05, 2021

Show notes

From your Visa card to your Outlook account, and from the gas you pump into your Ford to your Windows operating system, a cyber struggle is taking place all around us. In this episode Andrew spoke to founder of Microsoft’s threat hunting intelligence center John Lambert, which tracks the world’s most dangerous cybercriminals and state-affiliated hackers, and the head of the Digital Security Unit Cristin Goodwin, who helps provide security support to governments and works closely with John’s team. Microsoft has billions of customers, serves millions of businesses, and works with almost every government department: to say it might have something to do with information and intelligence would be like saying perhaps it would have been a good idea to have bought buy some shares when it first went public in 1986 (June 2021 it was valued at 2 trillion dollars!).

“Leningrad, Molehunts, and Life After the CIA” - A Conversation with Christopher Burgess Sep 28, 2021

Show notes

He is the Horatio Alger of the CIA. His first job was punching paper. He went on to be a Station Chief. He worked for every directorate. He lived in several continents. He was in the Soviet Union for six years. He was caught up in the molehunt for Robert Hanssen. He survived to tell his tale.

Christopher is genial, hearty and now lives in the other Washington (the rainy state on the West Coast, not the rainy town in Northern England) in the foothills of the Cascade Mountains, where he writes for our friends at Clearance Jobs. He tweets @burgessct

“One of CIA’s Most Decorated Field Officers” – A Conversation with Marc Polymeropoulos Sep 21, 2021

Show notes

What do you get if you cross a Greek Orthodox guy from Athens and a Jewish girl from Long Island; and then mix in two Ivy League degrees and a 26-year career in the Central Intelligence Agency? If you haven’t worked out that this refers to Marc, given that he is mentioned in the episode title, you can probably forget ever having a career in intelligence. Mark is brimming with vitality, chock full of stories, and can talk baseball and wings as well as the finer points of Algerian politics or US grand strategy in the Middle East. If you ever pull up a bar stool next to Mark: you’ve hit a home run!

Mark’s new book, Clarity in Crisis: Leadership Lessons From the CIA, distills the insights he derived from his career and is available in the International Spy Museum’s bookshop.

Curator’s Corner: Osama bin Laden with Peter Bergen Sep 14, 2021

Show notes

As the 20th anniversary of 9/11 approached Peter Bergen sought to reevaluate the man responsible for precipitating America’s long wars with al-Qaeda and its descendants. Bergen produced the first television interview with bin Laden in 1997. He has had years to reflect on and study the man. In his new book The Rise and Fall of Osama bin Laden he captures all the dimensions of his life: family man, zealot, battlefield commander, terrorist leader, and fugitive.

Join International Spy Museum Historian and Curator Andrew Hammond in conversation with Bergen about the many contradictions he finds in bin Laden and why his legacy lives on despite his failure at achieving any of his strategic goals. Bergen, a Vice President at New America, is the author or editor of nine books, including three New York Times bestsellers and four Washington Post best nonfiction books of the year. He is a national security analyst for CNN and has testified before congressional committees 18 times about national security issues. Thanks to exclusive interviews with family members and associates, and documents unearthed only recently, Bergen has used the knowledge he has gained in the intervening years to discover who bin Laden really was and why he continues to inspire a new generation of jihadists.

“I was a Presidential Daily Briefer on 9/11” – Kristin Wood & Scooter Libby, With Special Guest Phil Mudd, Director of Gulf Affairs at the NSC Sep 11, 2021

Show notes

Kristin Wood was at CIA HQ on the morning of 9/11. Phil Mudd was at the National Security Council. Kristin was a PDB briefer for the VP’s National Security Advisor. Phil was Director for Gulf Affairs. They would go on to work counterterrorism together. Kristen has a Wheaton Terrier. Phil has a farm. For the rest, it’s best if you hear Kristin and Phil.

“… knowing that every day, you had to deliver relevant information to the nation's leaders, it is a feeling of enormous responsibility that all of the 1000s and 1000s and 1000s of intelligence officers who have done amazing work, you want to represent it faithfully.”

I just I didn't want to be alone. I didn't know what was going on. So I stayed at a friend's house, maybe a mile or two from my house just watching through the downing of the Towers. And at that point, I said, I'm going home. My only other memories are realizing I couldn't go to the White House.

“I was a Presidential Daily Briefer on 9/11” – Mike Morell & President Bush Sep 11, 2021

Show notes

Mike Morell was with President Bush on the morning of 9/11. He saw the President several times that day. Ten years later he was with President Obama for the bin Laden raid. He was former Acting and Deputy Director of the CIA. He comes from Ohio. For the rest, it’s best if you hear Mike.

“I believe that when we get to the end of the trail, we’re going to find al Qaeda, and we’re going to find an Osama bin Laden. I told him that I was so confident in that judgment that I would bet my children’s future on it.”

“I was a Presidential Daily Briefer on 9/11” – Dave Terry & Vice President Cheney Sep 11, 2021

Show notes

Dave Terry was with Vice President Cheney on the morning of 9/11. He started work as a PDB briefer the same day as Mike. He went on to be Chief of the PDB. He started out working on grain production at the CIA in 1979. He comes from Kansas. For the rest, it’s best if you hear Dave.

“And I think for any intelligence officer, what you're doing is often overwhelming, whether you're in front of the President, or a vice president, or the asset that you're trying to debrief, or your colleagues…And the stakes often are life and death.”

“Afghanistan, the Mujahedeen, Al Qaeda” – My Time at CIA & State with Diana Bolsinger Sep 08, 2021

Show notes

It was the 1980’s. “I don't think they'll ever have the fun I had that year, at 23 years old, going to the White House and the NSC, briefing cabinet members…I mean, you name it. It was just incredible!” Three years into her CIA career, Diana Bolsinger found herself on point as the sole person working on the Afghanistan account in her department. Thereafter, she was Acting Deputy to the Ambassador to the Afghan Resistance (“mujahedeen”), a political officer in Islamabad, an analyst at the Counterterrorism Center (CTC), and received multiple awards including for her role in investigating the Boston Marathon bombing. She has a serious Afghanistan/Pakistan resume; Al Qaeda were on her radar from 1990; and, she oozes calm, measured, thoughtful analysis. Ladies & gentlemen: Diana Bolsinger.

CYBER AUGUST: “National Cryptologic Museum” – With Vince Houghton Aug 31, 2021

Show notes

Turning the tide in the Pacific at the Battle of Midway, establishing secure communications on the beaches during D-Day, staving off nuclear Armageddon – what did cryptology ever have to do with anything, right? To discuss these big themes – and to celebrate our partnership on the exhibition “Codes, Ciphers and Mysteries” – we brought back you know who, Executive Director of the National Cryptologic Museum (NCM) and former SpyCast host, Vince Houghton (Retd). Through the end of September 2021, you can see the NCM’s superstar artifacts here at SPY before they return to their home base at Fort Meade. Sssshhhhh, though…No Such Museum.

CYBER AUGUST: “So, You Want to Be a Codebreaker?” – Elonka Dunin and Klaus Schmeh Aug 24, 2021

Show notes

Codes. Ciphers. Mysteries. This week’s guests are fascinated by codebreaking and cryptography: as well they should be! The Voynich Manuscript, the Dorabella Letter, The Beale Papers, the Zodiac Cipher, Kryptos – so much history, intrigue, and speculation. Andrew sat down with Elonka Dunin, code-breaker extraordinaire, and Klaus Schmeh, a world leading expert on the history of cryptography, to discuss the cat-and-mouse game between code-makers and code-breakers across the ages from ancient cuneiform up to quantum cryptography.

Word to the wise: their book has been described by Sir Dermot Turing as “the best book on codebreaking I have ever read, a must for would be recruits to GCHQ and the NSA.”

Our TOPPODCAST Picks

Follow Us

Stay Connected

Related Podcasts

Links

Stay Connected