Lock and Code
Episodes
Cyberattacks are raising your prices (feat. Eva Velasquez)
03 May 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Your prices could be going up because of a little something that one group has started calling the “cyber tax.”Not a “tax” in any regulatory s...
Big Tech can stop scams. They just don’t (feat. Marti DeLiema)
19 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
A dreadful thing happens far too often whenever an older adult falls for a scam: They get blamed for it. Not the scammers who lied and cheated their v...
Killer robots are here. Now what? (feat. Peter Asaro)
05 Apr 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Big news: Lock and Code is nominated for a Webby Award! You can help us win the People’s Voice Award by voting here.---We have to talk about ki...
This is all it takes to stop a train (feat. Rachel Swan)
22 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
Forget the runaway train thrillingly shot in Buster Keaton’s 1926 film “The General,” and never mind the charging locomotive rescued by actors D...
Won't you see my neighbor? (feat. Matt Guariglia)
08 Mar 2026
Contributed by Lukas
On February 8, during the Super Bowl in the United States, countless owners of one of the most popular smart products today got a bit of a wakeup call...
What can't you say on TikTok?
22 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
A funny thing happened on TikTok last month, and its brought allegations of censorship, manipulation, and control.It was the week of January 22, and a...
Is your phone listening to you? (feat. Lena Cohen) (re-air)
08 Feb 2026
Contributed by Lukas
In January, Google settled a lawsuit that pricked up a few ears: It agreed to pay $68 million to a wide array of people who sued the company...
One privacy change for 2026
25 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
When you hear the words “data privacy,” what do you first imagine?Maybe you picture going into your social media apps and setting your profile and...
Enshittification is ruining everything online (feat. Cory Doctorow)
11 Jan 2026
Contributed by Lukas
There’s a bizarre thing happening online right now where everything is getting worse.Your Google results have become so bad that you’ve likely typ...
ALPRs are recording your daily drive (feat. Will Freeman)
28 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
There’s an entire surveillance network popping up across the United States that has likely already captured your information, all for the non-suspic...
Pig butchering is the next “humanitarian global crisis” (feat. Erin West)
14 Dec 2025
Contributed by Lukas
This is the story of the world’s worst scam and how it is being used to fuel entire underground economies that have the power to rival nation-states...
Air fryer app caught asking for voice data (re-air)
30 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
It’s often said online that if a product is free, you’re the product, but what if that bargain was no longer true? What if, depending on the devic...
Your coworker is tired of AI "workslop" (feat. Dr. Kristina Rapuano)
16 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Everything’s easier with AI… except having to correct it.In just the three years since OpenAI released ChatGPT, not only has onlife life changed a...
Would you sext ChatGPT? (feat. Deb Donig)
02 Nov 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the final, cold winter months of the year, ChatGPT could be heating up.On October 14, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said that the “restrictions” that h...
What does Google know about me?
19 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Google is everywhere in our lives. It’s reach into our data extends just as far.After investigating how much data Facebook had collected about ...
What's there to save about social media? (feat. Rabble)
05 Oct 2025
Contributed by Lukas
“Connection” was the promise—and goal—of much of the early internet. No longer would people be separated from vital resources and news that wa...
Can you disappear online? (feat. Peter Dolanjski)
21 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
There’s more about you online than you know.The company Acxiom, for example, has probably determined whether you’re a heavy drinker, or if you’r...
This “insidious” police tech claims to predict crime (feat. Emily Galvin-Almanza)
07 Sep 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In the late 2010s, a group of sheriffs out of Pasco County, Florida, believed they could predict crime. The Sheriff’s Department there had piloted a...
How a scam hunter got scammed (feat. Julie-Anne Kearns)
24 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
If there’s one thing that scam hunter Julie-Anne Kearns wants everyone to know, it is that no one is immune from a scam. And she would know—she fe...
“The worst thing” for online rights: An age-restricted grey web (feat. Jason Kelley)
10 Aug 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The internet is cracking apart. It’s exactly what some politicians want.In June, a Texas law that requires age verification on certain websites with...
How the FBI got everything it wanted (re-air, feat. Joseph Cox)
27 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
For decades, digital rights activists, technologists, and cybersecurity experts have worried about what would happen if the US government secretly bro...
Is AI "healthy" to use?
13 Jul 2025
Contributed by Lukas
“Health” isn’t the first feature that most anyone thinks about when trying out a new technology, but a recent spate of news is forcing the issue...
Corpse-eating selfies, and other ways to trick scammers (feat. Becky Holmes)
29 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
There’s a unique counter response to romance scammers.Her name is Becky Holmes.Holmes, an expert and author on romance scams, has spent years respon...
The data on denying social media for kids (feat. Dr. Jean Twenge) (re-air)
15 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Complex problems often assume complex solutions, but recent observations about increased levels of anxiety and depression, increased reports of loneli...
What does Facebook know about me?
01 Jun 2025
Contributed by Lukas
There’s an easy way to find out what Facebook knows about you—you just have to ask.In 2020, the social media giant launched an online portal that ...
How Los Angeles banned smartphones in schools (feat. Nick Melvoin)
18 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
There’s a problem in class today, and the second largest school district in the United States is trying to solve it.After looking at the growing bod...
The AI chatbot cop squad is here (feat. Emanuel Maiberg and Jason Koebler)
04 May 2025
Contributed by Lukas
“Heidi” is a 36-year-old, San Francisco-born, divorced activist who is lonely, outspoken, and active on social media. “Jason” is a shy, biling...
Did DOGE "breach" Americans' data? (feat. Sydney Saubestre)
20 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
If you don’t know about the newly created US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), there’s a strong chance they already know about you.Creat...
Is your phone listening to you? (feat. Lena Cohen)
06 Apr 2025
Contributed by Lukas
It has probably happened to you before.You and a friend are talking—not texting, not DMing, not FaceTiming—but talking, physically face-...
What Google Chrome knows about you, with Carey Parker
23 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Google Chrome is, by far, the most popular web browser in the world.According to several metrics, Chrome accounts for anywhere between 52% and 66% of ...
How ads weirdly know your screen brightness, headphone jack use, and location, with Tim Shott
09 Mar 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Something’s not right in the world of location data.In January, a location data broker named Gravy Analytics was hacked, with the alleged cybercrimi...
Surveillance pricing is "evil and sinister," explains Justin Kloczko
23 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
Insurance pricing in America makes a lot of sense so long as you’re one of the insurance companies. Drivers are charged more for traveling long dist...
A suicide reveals the lonely side of AI chatbots, with Courtney Brown
09 Feb 2025
Contributed by Lukas
In February 2024, a 14-year-old boy from Orlando, Florida, committed suicide after confessing his love to the one figure who absorbed nearly all of hi...
Three privacy rules for 2025
26 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
It’s Data Privacy Week right now, and that means, for the most part, that you’re going to see a lot of well-intentioned but clumsy information onl...
The new rules for AI and encrypted messaging, with Mallory Knodel
12 Jan 2025
Contributed by Lukas
The era of artificial intelligence everything is here, and with it, come everyday surprises into exactly where the next AI tools might pop u...
Is nowhere safe from AI slop?
29 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
You can see it on X. You can see on Instagram. It’s flooding community pages on Facebook and filling up channels on YouTube. It’s called “AI slo...
A day in the life of a privacy pro, with Ron de Jesus
16 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Privacy is many things for many people.For the teenager suffering from a bad breakup, privacy is the ability to stop sharing her location and to block...
These cars want to know about your sex life (re-air)
01 Dec 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Two weeks ago, the Lock and Code podcast shared three stories about home products that requested, collected, or exposed sensitive data onlin...
An air fryer, a ring, and a vacuum get brought into a home. What they take out is your data
18 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The month, a consumer rights group out of the UK posed a question to the public that they’d likely never considered: Were their air fryers spying on...
Why your vote can’t be “hacked,” with Cait Conley of CISA
03 Nov 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The US presidential election is upon the American public, and with it come fears of “election interference.”But “election interference” is a b...
This industry profits from knowing you have cancer, explains Cody Venzke
21 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
On the internet, you can be shown an online ad because of your age, your address, your purchase history, your politics, your religion, and even your l...
Exposing the Facebook funeral livestream scam
07 Oct 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Online scammers were seen this August stooping to a new low—abusing local funerals to steal from bereaved family and friends.Cybercrime has never be...
San Francisco’s fight against deepfake porn, with City Attorney David Chiu
23 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
On August 15, the city of San Francisco launched an entirely new fight against the world of deepfake porn—it sued the websites that make the abusive...
What the arrest of Telegram's CEO means, with Eva Galperin
09 Sep 2024
Contributed by Lukas
On August 24, at an airport just outside of Paris, a man named Pavel Durov was detained for questioning by French investigators. Just days later, the ...
Move over malware: Why one teen is more worried about AI (re-air)
26 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Every age group uses the internet a little bit differently, and it turns out for at least one Gen Z teen in the Bay Area, the classic approach to cybe...
AI girlfriends want to know all about you. So might ChatGPT
12 Aug 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Somewhere out there is a romantic AI chatbot that wants to know everything about you. But in a revealing overlap, other AI tools—which are developed...
SIEM is not storage, with Jess Dodson
29 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
In the world of business cybersecurity, the powerful technology known as “Security Information and Event Management” is sometimes thwarted by the ...
How an AI “artist” stole a woman’s face, with Ali Diamond
15 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Full-time software engineer and part-time Twitch streamer Ali Diamond is used to seeing herself on screen, probably because she’s the one who turns ...
Busted for book club? Why cops want to see what you’re reading, with Sarah Lamdan
01 Jul 2024
Contributed by Lukas
More than 20 years ago, a law that the United States would eventually use to justify the warrantless collection of Americans’ phone call records act...
(Almost) everything you always wanted to know about cybersecurity, but were too afraid to ask, with Tjitske de Vries
17 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
🎶 Ready to know what Malwarebytes knows?Ask us your questions and get some answers.What is a passphrase and what makes it—what’s the word?...
800 arrests, 40 tons of drugs, and one backdoor, or what a phone startup gave the FBI, with Joseph Cox
03 Jun 2024
Contributed by Lukas
This is a story about how the FBI got everything it wanted.For decades, law enforcement and intelligence agencies across the world have lamented the a...
Your vacation, reservations, and online dates, now chosen by AI
20 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
The irrigation of the internet is coming.For decades, we’ve accessed the internet much like how we, so long ago, accessed water—by traveling to it...
"No social media 'til 16," and other fixes for a teen mental health crisis, with Dr. Jean Twenge
06 May 2024
Contributed by Lukas
You’ve likely felt it: The dull pull downwards of a smartphone scroll. The “five more minutes” just before bed. The sleep still there after waki...
Picking fights and gaining rights, with Justin Brookman
22 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Our Lock and Code host, David Ruiz, has a bit of an apology to make:“Sorry for all the depressing episodes.”When the Lock and Code podcast ex...
Porn panic imperils privacy online, with Alec Muffett (re-air)
08 Apr 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A digital form of protest could become the go-to response for the world’s largest porn website as it faces increased regulations: Not letting people...
Securing your home network is long, tiresome, and entirely worth it, with Carey Parker
25 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Few words apply as broadly to the public—yet mean as little—as “home network security.”For many, a “home network” is an amorphous thing. I...
Going viral shouldn't lead to bomb threats, with Leigh Honeywell
11 Mar 2024
Contributed by Lukas
A disappointing meal at a restaurant. An ugly breakup between two partners. A popular TV show that kills off a beloved, main character.In a perfect wo...
How to make a fake ID online, with Joseph Cox
26 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
For decades, fake IDs had roughly three purposes: Buying booze before legally allowed, getting into age-restricted clubs, and, we can only assume, com...
If only you had to worry about malware, with Jason Haddix
12 Feb 2024
Contributed by Lukas
If your IT and security teams think malware is bad, wait until they learn about everything else.In 2024, the modern cyberattack is a segmented, prolon...
Bruce Schneier predicts a future of AI-powered mass spying
29 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
If the internet helped create the era of mass surveillance, then artificial intelligence will bring about an era of mass spying.That’s the latest pr...
A true tale of virtual kidnapping
15 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
On Thursday, December 28, at 8:30 pm in the Utah town of Riverdale, the city police began investigating what they believed was a kidnapping.17-year-ol...
DNA data deserves better, with Suzanne Bernstein
01 Jan 2024
Contributed by Lukas
Hackers want to know everything about you: Your credit card number, your ID and passport info, and now, your DNA.On October 1 2023, on a hacking websi...
Meet the entirely legal, iPhone-crashing device: the Flipper Zero
18 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
It talks, it squawks, it even blocks! The stocking-stuffer on every hobby hacker’s wish list this year is the Flipper Zero.“Talk” across low-fre...
Why a ransomware gang tattled on its victim, with Allan Liska
04 Dec 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Like the grade-school dweeb who reminds their teacher to assign tonight’s homework, or the power-tripping homeowner who threatens every neighbor wit...
Defeating Little Brother requires a new outlook on privacy
06 Nov 2023
Contributed by Lukas
A worrying trend is cropping up amongst Americans, particularly within Generation Z—they're spying on each other more.Whether reading...
MGM attack is too late a wake-up call for businesses, says James Fair
23 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In September, the Las Vegas casino and hotel operator MGM Resorts became a trending topic on social media... but for all the wrong reasons. A Tik...
AI sneak attacks, location spying, and definitely not malware, or, what one teenager fears online
09 Oct 2023
Contributed by Lukas
What are you most worried about online? And what are you doing to stay safe? Depending on who you are, those could be very different answers, but...
What does a car need to know about your sex life?
25 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When you think of the modern tools that most invade your privacy, what do you picture?There's the obvious answers, like social media platforms includi...
Re-air: What teenagers face growing up online
11 Sep 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In 2022, Malwarebytes investigated the blurry, shifting idea of “identity” on the internet, and how online identities are not only shaped by ...
"An influx of Elons," a hospital visit, and magic men: Becky Holmes shares more romance scams
28 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Becky Holmes is a big deal online. Hugh Jackman has invited her to dinner. Prince William has told her she has "such a beauti...
A new type of "freedom," or, tracking children with AirTags, with Heather Kelly
14 Aug 2023
Contributed by Lukas
"Freedom" is a big word, and for many parents today, it's a word that includes location tracking. Across America, parents are snapping up Ap...
How Apple fixed what Microsoft hasn't, with Thomas Reed
31 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Earlier this month, a group of hackers was spotted using a set of malicious tools—that originally gained popularity with online video game chea...
Spy vs. spy: Exploring the LetMeSpy hack, with maia arson crimew
17 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The language of a data breach, no matter what company gets hit, is largely the same. There's the stolen data—be it email addresses, credit card numb...
Of sharks, surveillance, and spied-on emails: This is Section 702, with Matthew Guariglia
03 Jul 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In the United States, when the police want to conduct a search on a suspected criminal, they must first obtain a search warrant. It is one of the foun...
Why businesses need a disinformation defense plan, with Lisa Kaplan: Lock and Code S04E13
19 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When you think about the word "cyberthreat," what first comes to mind? Is it ransomware? Is it spyware? Maybe it's any collection of the infamous...
Trusting AI not to lie: The cost of truth
05 Jun 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In May, a lawyer who was defending their client in a lawsuit against Columbia's biggest airline, Avianca, submitted a legal filing before a court...
Identity crisis: How an anti-porn crusade could jam the Internet, featuring Alec Muffett
22 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
On January 1, 2023, the Internet in Louisiana looked a little different than the Internet in Texas, Mississippi, and Arkansas—its next-door state ne...
The rise of "Franken-ransomware," with Allan Liska
08 May 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Ransomware is becoming bespoke, and that could mean trouble for businesses and law enforcement investigators. It wasn't always like this. Fo...
Removing the human: When should AI be used in emotional crisis?
24 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In January, a mental health nonprofit admitted that it had used Artificial Intelligence to help talk to people in distress. Prompted first b...
How the cops buy a "God view" of your location data, with Bennett Cyphers
10 Apr 2023
Contributed by Lukas
The list of people and organizations that are hungry for your location data—collected so routinely and packaged so conveniently that it can easily r...
Solving the password’s hardest problem with passkeys, featuring Anna Pobletts
27 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
How many passwords do you have? If you're at all like our Lock and Code host David Ruiz, that number hovers around 200. But the important follow up qu...
"Brad Pitt," a still body, ketchup, and a knife, or the best trick ever played on a romance scammer, with Becky Holmes
13 Mar 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Becky Holmes knows how to throw a romance scammer off script—simply bring up cannibalism. In January, Holmes shared on Twitter that an account ...
Fighting censorship online, or, encryption’s latest surprise use-case, with Mallory Knodel
27 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Government threats to end-to-end encryption—the technology that secures your messages and shared photos and videos—have been around for decades, b...
What is AI ”good” at (and what the heck is it, actually), with Josh Saxe
13 Feb 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In November of last year, the AI research and development lab OpenAI revealed its latest, most advanced language project: A tool called ChatGPT.ChatGP...
A private moment, caught by a Roomba, ended up on Facebook. Eileen Guo explains how
30 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
In 2020, a photo of a woman sitting on a toilet—her shorts pulled half-way down her thighs—was shared on Facebook, and it was shared by someone wh...
Fighting tech’s gender gap with TracketPacer
16 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
Last month, the TikTok user TracketPacer posted a video online called “Network Engineering Facts to Impress No One at Zero Parties.” TracketPac...
Why does technology no longer excite?
01 Jan 2023
Contributed by Lukas
When did technology last excite you? If Douglas Adams, author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, is to be believed, your own excitement ende...
Chasing cryptocurrency through cyberspace, with Brian Carter
19 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
On June 7, 2021, the US Department of Justice announced a breakthrough: Less than one month after the oil and gas pipeline company Colonial Pipeline...
Security advisories are falling short. Here’s why, with Dustin Childs
05 Dec 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Decades ago, patching was, to lean into a corny joke, a bit patchy. In the late 90s, the Microsoft operating system (OS) Windows 98 had a supportive...
Threat hunting: How MDR secures your business
21 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A cyberattack is not the same thing as malware—in fact, malware itself is typically the last stage of an attack, the punctuation mark that closes o...
How student surveillance fails everyone
07 Nov 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Last month, when Malwarebytes published joint research with 1Password about the online habits of parents and teenagers today, we spoke with a Bay Are...
A gym heist in London goes cyber
24 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
A thief has been stalking London. This past summer, multiple women reported similar crimes to the police: While working out at their local gyms, so...
Teen talk: What it’s like to grow up online, and the role of parents
10 Oct 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Growing up is different for teens today. Issues with identity, self-expression, bullying, fitting in, and trusting your friends and family—while a...
Calling in the ransomware negotiator, with Kurtis Minder
26 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
Ransomware can send any company into crisis. Immediately following an attack, the notoriously disruptive malware can spread across networks and m...
The MSP playbook on deciphering tech promises and shaping security culture
12 Sep 2022
Contributed by Lukas
The in-person cybersecurity conference has returned. More than two years after Covid-19 pushed nearly every in-person event online, cybersecurity has...
Playing Doom on a John Deere tractor with Sick Codes
29 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
In 1993, the video game developers at id Software released Doom, a first-person shooter that placed a nameless protagonist into the fiery depths of ...
Donut breach: Lessons from pen-tester Mike Miller
15 Aug 2022
Contributed by Lukas
When Mike Miller was hired by a client to run a penetration test on one of their offices, he knew exactly where to start: Krispy Kreme. Equipped with ...
Have we lost the fight for data privacy?
31 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
At the end of 2021, Lock and Code invited the folks behind our news-driven cybersecurity and online privacy blog, Malwarebytes Labs, to discuss what ...
Roe v. Wade: How the cops can use your data
17 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
On June 24, that Constitutional right to choose to have an abortion was removed by the Supreme Court, and immediately, this legal story became one of ...
When good-faith hacking gets people arrested, with Harley Geiger
04 Jul 2022
Contributed by Lukas
When Lock and Code host David Ruiz talks to hackers—especially good-faith hackers who want to dutifully report any vulnerabilities they uncover in t...