Speaker 1: Welcome back everyone. We're diving deep today into a world, well,
a world of secrets, codes and the like, and we've
got a whole bunch of sources here, really fascinating stuff.
We're going way back in time, talking ancient codes and
then jumping right into modern mysteries and even touching on
something that's a little well unselling, the whole idea of
a quantum apocalypse.
Speaker 2: You know, it really is quite a journey when you
think about it.
Speaker 3: You've got these ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, and then suddenly we're
talking about buried treasure and oh yeah, the possibility of
a world where everything's analog again, it's a lot.
Speaker 4: So let's start with the basics here. What is it
about secrets that's so I.
Speaker 1: Don't know, so fascinating to us humans? Why are we
so drawn to codes and ciphers.
Speaker 4: And all that.
Speaker 3: Well, you hit the nail on the head there. It's
this deep rooted desire we have to encode information. You know,
it's not always about hiding something malicious, but more about
I think signaling, belonging, exclusivity.
Speaker 1: Okay, I'm intrigued. Give me an example.
Speaker 3: Paint me a picture here, all right, imagine Egyptian scribes,
like four thousand years ago, they create these elaborate variations
on hieroglyphs, almost like showing off their linguistic skills.
Speaker 2: You know, it wasn't necessarily.
Speaker 3: About hiding the information itself, but more about demonstrating that
they have this mastery over it.
Speaker 1: So it's like an ancient form of intellectual bragging rights
like hey, look at me, I know the secret code
of knowledge.
Speaker 3: Exactly, and that same impulse it's still driving us today.
Think about it, the allure of unsolved mysteries, right, there's
a reason why stories like the Beal Treasure, with its
coded messages and all that hidden treasure, continue to fascinate
people even centuries later.
Speaker 1: The Beal Treasure, Now that's a name I haven't heard
in a while. Remind me about that one.
Speaker 3: Okay, So picture this eighteen twenties of Virginia. A man
named Thomas Bihal supposedly buries this massive treasure somewhere. But
he doesn't just bury it. No, he leaves behind three
encrypted messages, each one using a different book as the
key to decode.
Speaker 4: It, a different book. That's that's pretty clever.
Speaker 3: It is, until you realize we only know one of
the books, the Declaration of Independence. That's the key to
the first message. It tells you all about the treasure,
millions of dollars in gold, silver, jewels, the whole nine yards.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 1: So there are potentially millions of dollars buried out there
just waiting for someone to find the right books.
Speaker 4: That's incredible, it really is.
Speaker 3: And that's part of what makes this whole world of
codes and ciphers so captivating. You know. It's like this
giant puzzle that spans centuries and we're still trying to
put the pieces together.
Speaker 1: All right, So we've got ancient Egyptians showing off their
knowledge and buried treasure waiting to be discovered. Where do
we go from here? What are some other key moments
in the history of code breaking.
Speaker 2: Well, let's talk about the Spartans. Remember the side.
Speaker 1: Tale vaguely refresh my memory.
Speaker 3: So basically, it's this transposition cipher. You take a rod,
wrap a strip of leather around it, and write your
message on the leather. When you unwrap it, the letters
are all jumbled. Only someone with a rod of the
same diama can unscramble them.
Speaker 4: Clever, simple, but effective. What else.
Speaker 3: Oh, we can't forget Julius Caesar and his Caesar cipher,
shifting letters a fixed number of places down the alphabet, simple, elegant,
and it baffled his enemies. Of course, the key is
knowing how many places.
Speaker 1: To shift the letters, and without that key.
Speaker 2: You're stuck.
Speaker 3: Even the simplest cipher it can be impossible to break
without the key, which.
Speaker 1: Reminds me, didn't the Zodiac Killer use a pretty sophisticated cipher?
Speaker 3: Absolutely, the Zodiac Killer this was a real head scratcher
for a long time. He terrorized northern California, And yeah,
he used this cipher called a homophonic substitution cipher.
Speaker 2: What that means is that each.
Speaker 3: Letter could be represented by multiple symbols, so it really
threw people off.
Speaker 2: It took decades to crack some of his messages.
Speaker 1: Okay, so we've gone from ancient Greece to the Roman
Empire to twentieth century serial killers. It's amazing to see
how this desire to encode information pops up in such
diverse places throughout history. But there's one thing that all
these examples have in they all rely on traditional mathematics. Right, Yeah,
what happens when we bring quantum computing into the picture.
Speaker 3: That's when things get really interesting and complicated. All those
methods we've talked about, no matter how complex they seem,
they're all based on classical computing manipulating bits. A bit
can be a zero or one. Quantum computers, though, they
completely change the game.
Speaker 1: Okay, I'll admit quantum mechanics isn't exactly my forte. Can
you break down the difference between a classical computer and
a quantum computer for those of us who well, for
those of us who might not be physicists.
Speaker 3: Sure, you see, quantum computers operate on these principles of
quantum mechanics, which govern how matter behaves at the atomic
and subatomic levels. Instead of bits, they use what are
called kubits. And here's the mind bending part. Quibits can
exist in what's called a state of superposition. It means
they can be both a zero and one at the
same time.
Speaker 1: Hold on, a qubit can be two things at once.
How is that even possible?
Speaker 3: Think of it like a coin spinning in the before
it lands. It's not heads or tails, right, It's in
this state of potential. That's kind of like superposition. The
quibit in a sense, holds all those possibilities at the
same time. And that's where the power of quantum computing
comes in. Because it can explore all those possibilities at once.
It can tackle problems that would take a classical computer
billions of years, literally billions of years to solve.
Speaker 4: I see.
Speaker 1: So it's not about trying every combination one by one
like our computers do.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 1: A quantum computer can just sort of explore all the
possibilities simultaneously. It's like having a shortcut through a maze.
Speaker 3: That's a great way to put it, and that's exactly
why people are talking about this quantum apocalypse. If a
quantum computer can try all possible solutions at once, it
could theoretically crack even the toughest encryption in well a
fraction of the time it would take.
Speaker 2: A normal computer.
Speaker 1: So breaching bank accounts, exposing medical records, national security at risk,
I mean, the whole shit bang. This isn't just some
science fiction thing anymore. It's got real world consequences.
Speaker 2: You got it.
Speaker 3: And it's not just hypothetical anymore either. Back in December
twenty twenty four, Google announced that their quantum computer. Project
Willow had solved a problem that was, for all practical
purposes impossible for regular computers.
Speaker 2: And they did it in five minutes.
Speaker 1: Five minutes. That's incredible and terrifying. So this quantum apocalypse,
it's not some far off event. It's practically knocking at
our door, right.
Speaker 2: It definitely seems that way.
Speaker 3: The NSA, you know, they've been talking about this for
a while, something they call Y two Q, basically the
year when quantum decryption becomes widely accessible. They were thinking
maybe another decade or two. But Project Willow that changed everything.
Speaker 1: Okay, this is a lot to take in. So what
does this mean for us regular folks? What happens when
all our digital secrets are suddenly well, not so secret anymore.
It's kind of making me anxious just thinking about it.
Speaker 2: I get it.
Speaker 3: I think a lot of people are feeling that way.
The initial reaction, honestly was canic. People were imagining this
world where their bank accounts, their messages, is everything online
just exposed for anyone to see. It was a lot
of fear and uncertainty, for sure.
Speaker 1: So we're facing this potential global crisis, this quantum apocalypse
that could unravel everything we know about digital security. Where
do we go from here? How do we even start
to deal with something this big?
Speaker 2: Well, this is where.
Speaker 3: Things get even more interesting, maybe a little more unsettling too,
because it turns out the NSA might have been aware
of this whole quantum decryption thing.
Speaker 2: For years, maybe even exploiting it.
Speaker 1: Wait, hold on, you're saying the very people who are
supposed to protect our security they knew about this, maybe
even used it, knowing the chaos it could cause. That
sounds wow. That sounds a little like a conspiracy theory,
doesn't it.
Speaker 3: It does, Yeah, But when you really think about it, it
makes a chilling kind of sense. Imagine this, everything's public right,
no more need for surveillance warrants, no more privacy concerns.
The whole concept of privacy just becomes well meaningless.
Speaker 1: That's a pretty scary thought, honestly. So are you suggested
that this quantum apocalypse maybe it wasn't a technology failing
at all. Maybe it was something something deliberate orchestrated by
those in power to I don't know, to reshape the
world in their image.
Speaker 3: It's definitely a possibility, and we'll be digging deeper into
those implications as we go along.
Speaker 2: But here's the real kicker. You ready for this.
Speaker 3: While the digital world might be imploding, those same intelligence agencies,
they might be going back to analog methods to keep
their own secrets safe.
Speaker 1: Analog you mean like dead drops and secret meetings in
smoky back rooms. We're going back to the Cold War era.
Speaker 3: It's kind of ironic, right, The technology that was supposed
to connect us make information instantly available might actually end
up pushing us back to a world of physical interactions
and wow, secret squirrel stuff. It feels like we're taking
a step backward.
Speaker 4: So what does this.
Speaker 1: New reality look like for everyday people? How do we
navigate a world where our digital lives are suddenly so vulnerable.
Our sources had some pretty interesting examples.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, there's this one story about Liz Emmer's a
cybersecurity expert. She knew things had taken a really bad
turn when hospital records started showing up on those giant
billboards and Times Square.
Speaker 1: Hospital records on billboards. That's straight out of a dystopian nightmare.
Speaker 3: It just goes to show how vulnerable our digital infrastructure
really is. We rely so much on these interconnected systems
on this constant flow of information that we don't often
stop to think about what happens when it all breaks down.
Speaker 1: And it wasn't just medical records, was it. Our sources
mentioned other things going a wyre too.
Speaker 3: You name it, dating apps, bank accounts, even things like
traffic lights and self driving cars. Everything was going crazy
as the encryption just crumbled. It was like society was
having a technological heart attack, with vital systems shutting down
one after another.
Speaker 1: That's a pretty terrifying image. It's not just about losing
access to our social media or our bank accounts anymore.
It's about the potential for complete societal breakdown exactly.
Speaker 3: And it's not just about the tech itself. It's about
the human element too. How do people react when everything
they thought was secure suddenly isn't. How do you rebuild
trust when privacy basically doesn't exist anymore?
Speaker 4: These are some pretty big questions.
Speaker 1: Did our sources offer any insights into how people are
adapting to this new world?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 2: They did. There was this fascinating story about Donald Janik.
Speaker 3: He was a security consultant and well, his whole business
model just went out the window overnight. His expertise in
digital security was suddenly obsolete. He had to adapt learn
how to protect things in this new analog world.
Speaker 1: So instead of firewalls and algorithms, he's dealing with physical
locks and secret hiding places.
Speaker 4: That's a huge.
Speaker 3: Shift, it is, but his story shows how adaptable we
humans can be. When the rules of the game change,
we find a way to play. And we saw this
in other ways too. There was this rush for physical assets, gold, silver, land,
things that couldn't be affected by a quantum computer.
Speaker 1: It's like going back to the basics, back to survival
mode exactly.
Speaker 3: And with that came this really interesting resurgence of pre
digital skills. Typewriter repair shops that became super popular. People
who knew shorthand or how to fix a car with
our lying on a computer, those skills became incredibly valuable.
Speaker 1: I can picture it now, people digging at their old typewriters,
trying to remember their grandparents' shorthand lessons. The things we
thought were outdated suddenly they're essential again. It's like a
post apocalyptic movie.
Speaker 2: It really does.
Speaker 3: It created this generational divide. People who remembered life before
the digital age. They suddenly had all this valuable knowledge
and experience, and.
Speaker 1: The rest of us, the ones who grew up online,
were scrambling to catch up. It's like the world flipped
upside down in an instant.
Speaker 3: It's a steep learning curve, that's for sure.
Speaker 2: Yeah, But it shows.
Speaker 3: How important it is to preserve knowledge and skills, even
the ones that seem outdated. You never know when they
might become vital again.
Speaker 1: So progress isn't always a straight line, is it. Sometimes
we have to take a few steps back to move forward.
But there's something else here, Isn't there something even more
unsettling beneath all this talk of societal upheaval and technological disruption.
Speaker 3: You're right, maybe this quantum apocalypse, maybe it wasn't a
technological failure at all. Maybe it was a deliberate choice,
a way for those in power to reshape the world
the way they want.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's talk about that. We talked about the possibility
that intelligence agencies could use this technology knowing the chaos
it could cause. Are you saying they actually triggered this
whole thing on purpose.
Speaker 3: It's a possibility, and it's one we can't just ignore.
That's what makes this whole story so unsettling. We're not
just dealing with a tech glitch or a natural disaster.
We're talking about the possibility of a deliberate manipulation of society,
our lives, our reality.
Speaker 1: So we've been exploring this idea of a quantum apocalypse,
you know, where everything we thought was secure online suddenly isn't.
But now we're dealing with something even more disturbing, the
idea that this wasn't some accident, some tech clitch. What
if this whole thing was planned orchestrated.
Speaker 3: It's a pretty dark thought, isn't it to think that
the people who are supposed to be protecting us, they
might actually be the ones behind this whole mess, using
this technology, this quantum decryption, to well, to control everything.
Speaker 1: Yeah, exactly. And it's not like we haven't seen this
kind of thing before, right now. Throughout history, people in power,
well they've used crises and chaos to you know, to
grab even more power.
Speaker 3: It's a classic move. And this quantum apocalypse, it's like
a crisis on a scale we've never seen before. It
could disrupt everything, I mean everything, how we communicate, how
we do business, how we govern ourselves.
Speaker 2: Everything.
Speaker 1: So let's say just for a minute that this was
all planned. What's the motive? What are these these puppet masters?
What do they get out of creating all this chaos?
Speaker 3: Well, the simplest answer is control. Imagine a world where
nothing's private, where everything you do online can be watched analyzed.
You know, that's a lot of power.
Speaker 1: It's like this digital pinopticon where everyone's being watched all
the time, even if they don't know. That's some seriously
dystopian stuff right.
Speaker 3: There, Yeah, it is, But think about it from the
perspective of like an intelligence agency, right, like have got
access to every message, every financial transaction, every conversation, but
they can't act on it, not without revealing what they know,
how they know it.
Speaker 2: It's like this frustrating paradox.
Speaker 1: So they're swimming in information, but they can't use it
without tipping their hand, showing everyone that they're being spied
on exactly.
Speaker 3: So what's the solution, Well, get rid of privacy altogether.
If there's no such thing as privacy, then there's no
need to justify surveillance, no need for warrants, no oversight, nothing.
It's a free for all.
Speaker 1: It's like they're saying, if we can't have secrets, nobody
can and.
Speaker 3: The ironic thing is they didn't even have to force
it on us. We gave it to them willingly. We
wanted the convenience of the digital world. We shared everything online,
and while we basically built this system that could be
exploited so easily.
Speaker 1: So we wanted connection, convenience, instant gratification, and it turns
out it might have cost us everything. We sleep walked
right into a surveillance state, pretty much.
Speaker 2: And while everyone's panicking scrambling.
Speaker 3: To adapt to this new analog life, you know what
the intelligence agencies are doing. They're going back to the
old ways, the stuff that supposedly became obsolete.
Speaker 1: Dead drops, one time pads, those secret meetings. It's like
they're playing a totally different game, one that most of
us don't even know exists.
Speaker 3: And this whole thing creates a major power shift. It's
not about who controls information anymore.
Speaker 1: It's about who can keep secrets in a world where
everything's supposed to be transparent.
Speaker 4: That's that's a pretty big deal.
Speaker 3: In the NSA well, with all their resources, all their
expertise and cryptography, they're in the perfect position to take
advantage of this. They've become, well the gatekeepers of secrets
in a world where secrets are the most valuable thing
there is.
Speaker 1: So what about Karl Bishop, the scientists, He kind of
started this whole thing. Where does he fit into all
of this?
Speaker 3: Carl's story it's a tragedy, brilliant guy, a visionary, but
he stumbled onto something, something that could have changed world
for the better. But he didn't realize the forces at play,
the agendas behind it all.
Speaker 1: So he was a pawn used to advance someone else's agenda,
an agenda that only benefits a few at the expense
of everyone else.
Speaker 3: That's right, And in the end he realized something pretty chilling.
In a world without secrets, the NSA, they might be
the most powerful force there is. They operate outside the rules.
They can change the world without anyone knowing, without anyone's consent.
Speaker 2: It's scary stuff, it is.
Speaker 1: So is privacy just gone? Are we stuck in this
world where everything we do is watched?
Speaker 3: Those are the questions we have to ask ourselves now,
this quantum apocalypse, it's changed the game and we're only
beginning to understand how much. It's a wake up call,
a reminder that progress isn't always what it seems. We
have to be critical, question everything and fight for what
we believe in.
Speaker 1: Knowledge is power, right. The more we know, the better
we can protect ourselves.
Speaker 3: Well, this has been a wild riode. Fascinating but yeah,
definitely unsettling. A lot for our listeners to think about.
Speaker 1: A lot to think about. The world's changed, and it's
up to all of us to decide what happens next.
Speaker 3: Thanks for joining us on this deep dive. Until next time,
stay curious, stay informed, and most importantly, stay vigilant.