Covert Contact

The Blogs of War National Security Podcast

Covert Contact

The Jerry Chun Shing Lee Case

Jerry Chun Shing Lee, a former CIA case officer, is suspected by many to have compromised CIA activities in China but has only been charged with the less serious crime of unlawful retention of national defense information.

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North Korean Cryptocurrency Ops

In episode 91 security researcher and Stratfor Global Fellow Scot Terban (AKA Krypt3ia) joins me to discuss North Korea's sophisticated exploitation of cryptocurrency.

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Combatting Misinformation

Andrew Trabulsi (entrepreneur, consultant, and co-editor of Warlords, Inc.: Black Markets, Broken States, and the Rise of the Warlord Entrepreneur) joins me to discuss misinformation, the technology and platforms facilitating it, and the challenges faced in combatting it.

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Evaluating the North Korean Threat

Phil Walter joins returns to the show to look at how the U.S. processes and evaluates the threat posed by North Korea. We try to separate the rhetoric and action to cut through the hype. Is war with North Korea likely? Is it justified?

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Protecting the British Royal Family

Fred Burton, former deputy chief of counterterrorism at the Diplomatic Security Service and the author of GHOST: Confessions of a Counterterrorism Agent joins me to break down some of these security efforts and the challenges he faced on the job.

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Beyond Bitcoin: Cryptocurrency Investing

Andrew Trabulsi joins me to discuss Cryptocurrency investing. We look at how blockchain and cryptocurrency models have evolved since the introduction of Bitcoin. For those new to the technologies and markets we share the easiest way to get started and important things to consider before you do.

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Bullets of Palestine

Author Howard Kaplan returns to Covert Contact to discuss Bullets of Palestine (the second novel in his Jerusalem Spy Series), chronic tensions in the Middle East, the prospect for reconciliation, Abu Nidal, and his approach to writing.

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Terrorists and Technology

Levi West, Director of Terrorism Studies at Charles Sturt University in Canberra, returns to look at how terrorists leverage (or don’t) emerging apps and platforms ranging from social media, to encryption, to cryptocurrencies.

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Economic Espionage: No One Is Immune

William J. Tucker, a regular contributor on counterintelligence and security topics for Blogs of War and Covert Contact, joins me for a deep dive on economic espionage.

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Iraq’s Consolidation and the Kurds

Iraq has made surprising gains in its effort to undermine or eliminate Kurdish autonomy since mid-October when we first visited this issue. Phillip Smyth joins me again to look at recent developments and the potential implications.

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The Crypto Wars: Update from the Australian Front

Australian freelance journalist, commentator, and broadcaster Stilgherrian is back to discuss the battle over encryption and the seemingly irreconcilable differences between governments and privacy advocates.

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From CIA Case Officer to Rookie Cop

Former Air Marshall and CIA Case Officer Patrick Skinner has become a become a police officer in his community in an effort to drive change. We discuss the transition and what he is learning in episode 81.

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The Kurdish Problem

Phillip Smyth joins me to look at the complexities surrounding the Kurdish drive for independence and how that looks to play out given the recent setback.

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Propaganda, Influence, and Disruption

A look at recent developments in the social media component of the investigation into Russian meddling in the U.S. election and what the evidence says about our ability (or inability) to identify and address modern propaganda.

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Australian Cyber Policy

Episode 78 wraps up a full month of focus on Australian defense perspectives with a look at cyber policy with the highly-regarded freelance journalist, commentator, and broadcaster Stilgherrian.

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Australian Approaches to Counterterrorism

Levi West, the Director of Terrorism Studies at Charles Sturt University in Canberra, joins me for a wide ranging discussion on Australian counterterrorism programs.

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Australian Special Operations Forces

In episode 76 we’re taking a look at Australia’s special operations forces. We discuss how SOF are utilized, structured, and how they compliment and differ from similar forces in the United States.

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Understanding and Developing Resilience To Information Warfare

Dr. Clint Arizmendi, an Adjunct Senior Research Fellow for the Australian Graduate School of Policing & Security's Terrorism Studies program at Charles Sturt University, joins me to discuss information warfare in episode 75.

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Deep State Conspiracies

Alex Finley, a former officer of the CIA’s Directorate of Operations, joined me to discuss the rise of deep state conspiracies that often feature a monolithic, highly partisan, intelligence community at their center.

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Data, AI, and Ethics

Entrepreneur Evanna Hu joins me to discuss our rapidly evolving relationship with data. The explosion of data streams and technologies that offload challenging analysis to machines are creating interesting national security challenges and opportunities at lightening speed.

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Beyond Russia: Overlooked Counterintelligence Threats

Russian intelligence presents a significant challenge for the United States but it is far from the only threat. There are dozens of nations and non-state actors actively collecting against us at any given time.

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System Failure: It Only Gets More Difficult from Here

What if Charlottesville and the dysfunction in Washington are not aberrations? What happens if the challenges facing society and governance only get more difficult for failing systems to tackle?

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Iran in the Age of Trump

In episode 70 Phillip Smyth joins me for a quick look at how the change in U.S. leadership is impacting the balance of sectarian power and our policy toward Iran.

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Securing Data, Communications, and Identity with Keybase

Keybase is a small but ambitious company that aims to make cyrpto available and virtually seamless for everyone. Their approach to this problem, a massively challenging one that hasn’t really been cracked to date, has been creative.

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Egyptian, Muslim, American

My friend Angie Gad joins me for episode 68 of Covert Contact to discuss growing up as a first generation Egyptian-American Muslim. We cover a lot of ground in this episode including her family's struggle to maintain and establish roots in two very different worlds