What is fbi?

Jack Rhysider on how 30 overlapping vacations proved identity in the Bayrob investigation.

“There was something like 30 vacations. And I remember we talked to him and I said to him, look, we created a spreadsheet or a diagram to show this. And I said like, you know, look, if there were five overlaps in vacations, that would be curious. If there were 10, hm, something's going wrong here. But with 30, you are the guy.”

A suspect was identified not through technical forensics but by correlating 30 vacation periods in photo metadata with criminal account inactivity, a behaviorally-driven method.

“There was something like 30 vacations. And I remember we talked to him and I said to him, look, we created a spreadsheet or a diagram to show this. And I said like, you know, look, if there were five overlaps in vacations, that would be curious. If there were 10, hm, something's going wrong here. But with 30, you are the guy.”

A bipartisan bloc including Ron Wyden, Jamie Raskin, the Freedom Caucus, Andy Biggs, Rand Paul, and Mike Lee is pushing to require FBI warrants before searches of Section 702 mass surveillance databases.

“There is this combination of Ron Wyden and Jamie Raskin, people on the left, and the Freedom Caucus, Andy Biggs and Rand Paul and Mike Lee, you know, people who do not agree with each other very much are all saying, "Look, we think the FBI needs a warrant before it starts searching the mass spying databases for its targets.”

In long-running cybercrime investigations the security asymmetry flips: criminals must maintain perfect operational security indefinitely, while investigators only need one mistake to close in.

“In this scenario, the hackers were essentially on defense since they had to be super careful not to reveal anything about themselves because one slip up and the FBI would swoop in on them.”

Even Google lost its challenge to National Security Letters and was compelled to hand over requested data, showing that litigation resources alone do not guarantee a successful fight against NSLs.

“Even Google couldn't get this to change and was forced to give the FBI whatever data they were asking for.”

Despite the near-universal rule against writing custom crypto, Nicollescu's self-authored encrypted container was strong enough that the FBI could not break it.

“Everybody will say, you know, the first rule of encryption is don't write your own. But in this case, Nicollescu was so good that he wrote a pretty solid piece of, you know, encrypted container.”

The FBI issued hundreds of thousands of National Security Letters between 2001 and 2005, a period that produced only 550 terrorism prosecutions.

“Since 2001 through 2005, they had put out hundreds of thousands of these letters.”

Jack Rhysider on the deterrent effect of Bayrob extraditions on Romanian cybercriminals.

“Cyber criminals in Romania felt like the worst thing that could happen was they'd be prosecuted in Romania if they were caught. And in Romania, you kind of got a slap on the wrist. You wouldn't spend much time in jail. So, this was like seismic when these arrests happened in Romania.”

The FBI has no use-of-force continuum, only a deadly force policy, while DHS agencies do have a continuum, creating a structural gap in how the two institutions can respond to varying threat levels.

“The FBI famously does not have a use of force continuum. We have a deadly force policy. like we don't have a lot of options. If our life is in danger, we can draw our weapon and, you know, shoot somebody. If somebody's just being annoying, we have less than lethal techniques, but you know, it's not always clear what you can do. DHS, on the other hand, depending on what agency you're in within the department, does have a use of force continuum.”

National Guard personnel receive far less Fourth Amendment training than FBI agents (21 weeks) or DHS agents (47 days).

“Whatever training the National Guard is getting, I feel quite confident they didn't get the 21 weeks of training on the Fourth Amendment and its various nuances that I got in the FBI or the DHS agents are apparently getting in 47 days now.”