201: We Relive The Lawsuit that Silenced Napster, META's VR Education and Data Privacy Debates, AT&T's Settlement for Data Throttling, and Spotify's Jamming Software, and Bankruptcy on User Data Privacy | Air Date: 4/14 - 4/20/24

Prepare your virtual time machine, as we embark on a spellbinding journey through the digital era's defining moments, including the notorious Napster lawsuit and an unexpected visit from space debris in sunny Florida. We not only revisit history, but we also peer into the future, debating Spotify's groundbreaking idea to let you remix songs, and Meta's bold quest to revolutionize education with VR – albeit with privacy hurdles to leap over, as Turkey's closure of Threads reminds us.

It's not all binary banter; we also serve up a masterclass on fortifying your digital domain against phishing scams with Windows Sandbox. Meanwhile, amidst the tech talk, we uncork a bottle of Hirsch The Single Barrel Double Oak and deliberate on its rich nuances. Does it tickle the palate as much as our love for bourbon tickles the soul? You bet!

Closing the digital dossier, we examine the thorny side of tech, from AT&T's hefty settlement for data throttling to the precarious situation at 23andMe and the implications of bankruptcy on user data privacy. We wrestle with the ethical dilemmas of corporate responsibility while savoring another sip of our whiskey, revealing whether this day's libation earns our coveted stamp of approval. Pour yourself a glass and plug in – it's an episode you won't want to miss.

Episode 201: Starts at :30

Episode 201:  Welcome fellow tech enthusiasts to the radio show, where we blend bits and bytes into a delightful digital cocktail with a little whiskey on the side! 

This week on TechTime with Nathan Mumm®, We're winding back the clock to revisit the lawsuit that silenced Napster, the platform that changed the music industry forever. In a cosmic twist, NASA has confirmed that debris from the space station made an unexpected house call in Florida. Meanwhile, Spotify is tuning up to potentially introduce 'Music Pro,' a new paid tier that could let users remix their favorite songs. 

Stay tuned, dear listeners, as we unravel the mysteries of code, circuits, and whiskey. So grab your VR headset, adjust your tinfoil hat, and join us—it's TechTime Radio, and I am your Host, Nathan Mumm. #TechTimeRadio Join us weekly on TechTime Radio with Nathan Mumm, the show that makes you go "Humm" Technology news of the week for April 14th - April 20th, 2024

--- [Now on Today's Show]
--- [Top Stories in Technology]

• Meta wants to put students and teachers in Quest VR headsets
• NASA confirms mystery object that crashed through roof of Florida home came from space station
• Spotify testing new TikTok inspired remix feature
• Meta to close Threads in Turkey to comply with an injunction prohibiting data sharing with Instagram

 --- [Pick of the Day - Whiskey Tasting Reveal]
HIRSCH The Single Barrel Double Oak | 112 Proof | $150 / 750ml ($220 Secondary)

--- [Letters]
TechTime Staff share this week's informative emails that were received during the week. This includes scams, phishing emails, and all-out mistruths disguised as legitimate emails. We also explain Windows Sandbox.

--- [This Week in Technology]
April 13, 2000 - The Lawsuit That Kills Napster
 
--- [Marc's Whiskey Mumble]
Marc Gregoire's review of this week's whiskey

--- [Technology Fail of the Week]
This week’s “Technology Fail” comes to us from At&T

--- [Mike's Mesmerizing Moment brought to us by StoriCoffee®]
Question: Bankruptcy and Data Privacy

--- [Pick of the Day Whiskey Review]
HIRSCH The Single Barrel Double Oak | 112 Proof | $150 / 750ml ($220 Secondary)

Mike: Thumbs Up
Nathan: Thumbs Up

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Broadcasting across the nation, from the East Coast to the West, keeping you up to date on technology while enjoying a little whiskey on the side, with leading edge topics, along with special guests to navigate technology in a segmented, stylized radio program. The information that will make you go mmmm. Pull up a seat, raise a glass with our hosts as we spend the next hour talking about technology for the common person. Welcome to Tech Time Radio with Nathan. Mumm a glass with our hosts as we spend the next hour talking about technology for the common person. Welcome to.

Nathan Mumm: 0:30

Tech Time Radio with Nathan Mumm. Welcome to Tech Time with Nathan Mumm. The show that makes you go. Technology news of the week, the show for the everyday person, talking about technology, broadcasting across the nation with insightful segments on subjects weeks ahead of the mainstream media. We welcome our radio audience of 35 million listeners to an hour of insightful technology news. I'm Nathan Mumm, your host and technologist, with over 30 years of technology expertise. Our co-host here, mike Rodea, is in studio. He's an award-winning author and a human behavior expert. Now, of course, we're live streaming during our show on five of the most popular platforms, including YouTube, twitchtv X, facebook and LinkedIn. We encourage you to visit us online at techtimeradiocom and become a Patreon supporter by visiting us at patreoncom forward slash techtimeradio. We are friends from different backgrounds, but we bring the best technology show possible weekly for our family, friends and fans to enjoy. We're glad to have Odi, our producer, at the control panel today. Welcome everyone. Let's start today's show.

Speaker 1: 1:34

Now on today's show.

Nathan Mumm: 1:38

All right. Today on Tech Time with Nathan Mumm, we're winding back the clock and revisiting the lawsuit that silenced Napster, the platform that changed the music industry forever In a cosmic twist. Nasa has confirmed that debris from a space station made an unexpected house call in Florida. Meanwhile, spotify is turning up the potential to introduce Music Pro, a new paid tier that will let users remix their favorite songs. Over in the realm of education, meta is setting the stage to transport students and teachers into a new dimension with Quest VR headsets. However, they also have to navigate the complex web of data privacy, leading to the closure of threads in Turkey due to legal constraints.

Nathan Mumm: 2:19

Then, in our main feature, we unravel the complexities of phishing and scam emails and showcase how Windows Sandbox that's right, if you got a Windows PC, listen today. The Windows Sandbox can be your digital fortress against these threats. Now stay tuned, of course, dear listeners, as we unravel the mystery and cold of circuits and whiskey. Grab your VR headset, adjust that tinfoil hat and join us on Tech Time Radio. We're getting ready to go. Mike, of course we have your mesmerizing moment. It's going to be a pretty large topic we're going to talk about today, so we'll probably have a banter between all four of us in studio regarding that. Dang it. We have our technology fail of the week and, of course, our pick of the day whiskey tasting with our selected pick of the day getting zero.

Speaker 1: 3:09

one or two thumbs up at the end of the show, though now we're going to move on to the latest headlines in the world of technology.

Nathan Mumm: 3:12

Here are our top technology stories of the week. All right, Meta wants to put students and teachers in Quest VR headsets. Let's go to David Larson with more on this story.

Speaker 3: 3:23

If Meta has its way, students will tour faraway museums, walk among dinosaurs and view human intestines up close, all from the comfort of their classroom using Quest Virtual Reality VR headsets. Nick Clegg, president of global affairs at Meta, said in an interview conducted remotely using Quest VR headsets we accept that it's going to take a long time and we're not going to be making any money on this anytime soon. We're investing billions of dollars in constantly iterating on the technology, and teachers have been clamoring for such a product. Meta is searching for a killer app for its Quest headsets, which today are primarily used for gaming. Could it be education Back to?

Mike Gorday: 4:09

you guys in the studio.

Speaker 3: 4:10

You know that beat sounds like Casey Kasem.

Mike Gorday: 4:11

Does it sound like Casey Kasem? Have you noticed that?

Nathan Mumm: 4:14

Okay, I did not notice that. Okay, is it Casey Kasem?

Mike Gorday: 4:17

Yeah, you remember Casey Kasem, Wasn't he?

Nathan Mumm: 4:18

shaggy. He was also shaggy Okay so here's what we got going on, you remember, back in the 80s.

Mike Gorday: 4:24

There's this company called Apple and they decided to go to and this is how Apple did it.

Nathan Mumm: 4:30

This is exactly how Apple became the computer of the educators of the elite at the time, because what they did is they worked with educational school systems to bring the Apple II to the classroom, allowing every teacher to have an Apple II computer.

Marc Gregoire: 4:47

If you signed up for it.

Nathan Mumm: 4:48

they would just ship it to you for free, give you a disc. I remember playing Jungle Hunt on this. Our teacher, mr Juarez, had this set up and so if you got done with your math quiz or you got done with your spelling quiz, then you could go on the back and if you're the first one there, you could choose your game. And man. Go on the back and if you're the first one there, you could choose your game. And man, my math quizzes never got so many zeros. I just would write 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2 down.

Mike Gorday: 5:10

turn that in so I could go and play Jungle Hearts. You saying that makes absolute sense. Your impulse control and your ability to not try to get to the goal instead of doing what you need to do. What do I need math for? Okay, what do you need math for? Who cares about?

Nathan Mumm: 5:27

that All right. So last fall, meta announced it was supplying VR equipment and resources to 15 US universities to use essentially training nurses, teaching languages and helping businesses students learn soft skills like interviewing. Now, though, for this fall, they're making a huge switch to go for the students ages 13 and up. They are essentially engrossing education apps and the teachers with not only a free Quest device for the teacher, but one for the classrooms. Now you're going to give a free Quest device to a teacher and one to be used in the classroom itself. Now, the problem with this to be used in the classroom itself, now, the problem with this, though, is, essentially, these things have to be sanitized, because they're a whole immersive VR set. Yeah, they also break quite easily, so it's not like a computer that's sitting on a desk. You're going to have this you have your two control panels that you have for your hands to simulate your hand punching and grabbing and everything else You're not supposed to be punching anybody.

Mike Gorday: 6:25

Well, you do punch anybody. This is for educational purposes.

Nathan Mumm: 6:29

Well, okay, working out lifting weights or whatever they're going to have you do Okay.

Mike Gorday: 6:34

They're going to use it for PE now, yeah $15 million.

Nathan Mumm: 6:39

Infrastructure costs $15 million. To get these in the hands of teachers and students for this upcoming fall, Do you think this is going to work or do you think this is something?

Mike Gorday: 6:49

that— you know, this is one of the uses of VR that I support. You know, this is something that I think is cool. If you know, immersing a student in like being able to take a trip to the Louvre just by using a VR headset, that would be awesome. You know, and you know how much I love dinosaurs, and that would be cool, as long as the stuff is properly done and it's not like a video game. Okay, so you're all about this and I think this is a. I think this is a great idea.

Marc Gregoire: 7:30

Okay.

Mike Gorday: 7:30

You know, I think, I think this is where I think this was probably a wise choice for meta to make, because we, we, we all know that VR is really not catching on like they hoped.

Nathan Mumm: 7:44

Yeah, but you know what I actually think this has a chance, right? If you're going to have all these devices, you spend all this time. I mean because Meta has been in this space for 10 plus years.

Nathan Mumm: 7:55

Yeah, they've been trying to conquer this for 10 years, and they really haven't gone anywhere, and so Apple just came out with their new device and they haven't thought about doing this at all. So is this a time where Meta actually beats Apple to? What made them successful If I was going to release this new device although it's three grand a pop which is probably why Apple doesn't want to give it away to the schools versus $300 to $900 to make another one?

Mike Gorday: 8:18

I don't know. You know what? I think Apple is going to follow up on this a little later and be like hey, you saw how well we did with the Apple in the classroom. How about the Apple VR headset?

Nathan Mumm: 8:33

Yeah, so maybe They'll be like yeah, and then they throw all those metal ones away.

Mike Gorday: 8:37

Yeah, we know how devoted Apple people are. I mean they are I mean once you get an Apple device.

Nathan Mumm: 8:42

I like Apple. So what do I have here in the studio? The Apple cult. You are a part of the Apple cult, but I still like PCs too. I have a PC that I use. I'm split between both. I like them, both about the same. One does something a little bit better in my opinion, and one does something else.

Mike Gorday: 8:57

Yeah, it depends on what you want to do with it. We both know that Apple is really good at the video editing and stuff like that.

Nathan Mumm: 9:03

Sound and music. They have that market, but do you know what they're not good at? Having 30 different apps that you need to use for different stuff on a PC, which is much better. Yep, all right, you know what? Things are falling from the sky? Chicken Little. What do we have?

Mike Gorday: 9:18

on our next story. Okay, well, imagine you're sitting at home. Okay, you know what do you do in the evening. You know you're playing video games or, you know, eating dinner and something comes crashing through your roof, I would be freaked out. Would you be freaked out? Well if you were in Naples, florida, on Monday, that might have happened to you. Oh boy, a cylindrical object came crashing through the roof of a Florida home last. Oh, this was last month, not last Monday.

Speaker 3: 9:50

Yeah okay and was identified as a that's confirmed on Monday though.

Mike Gorday: 9:53

Yeah, it was confirmed on Monday that this is what the it was a chunk of space junk that was discarded from the International Space Station. This is one of those things that we have. I think we have feared since we have started putting, because you put stuff up there and it just turns into trash.

Nathan Mumm: 10:14

Does anybody collect it and recycle it? No, it just goes across the atmosphere right.

Mike Gorday: 10:18

It usually falls into the atmosphere and burns up, which was what this was expected to do. Uh-oh, so this was a metal support that was used to mount old batteries on a cargo pallet for disposal. The pallet itself was jettisoned from the space station in 2021, and the load was expected to burn up on entry into Earth's atmosphere, but this piece survived. Oh, into Earth's atmosphere, but this piece survived, this chunk of metal. It weighed 1.6 pounds, or 0.7 kilograms, and was 4 inches, or 10 centimeters, tall, and roughly 1.5 inches, or 4 centimeters wide in diameter.

Mike Gorday: 10:58

Homeowner Alejandro Otero told television station WINK at the time that he was on vacation. When his son told him what had happened, he came home early to check on the house, found the object had ripped through the ceiling and torn up the flooring.

Nathan Mumm: 11:12

That sucker had to be humming in there right.

Mike Gorday: 11:16

Yeah, we're talking about something that's falling at terminal velocity.

Nathan Mumm: 11:20

So that's like 300 plus miles per hour, that's a lot. That's a lot.

Mike Gorday: 11:25

I don't know my math on that. I failed my math classes to play Jungle Life, but I do know that that was about 300 miles per hour. He basically said he was in complete disbelief and was grateful that nobody was there to get hurt. But yeah, it's happening now.

Nathan Mumm: 11:45

Now all that space junk is coming, so there should be a recycling group that goes on out there and tries to pull all that right. That's cost prohibitive.

Mike Gorday: 11:55

They're not going to be able to do that. I mean it's eventually going to, especially with all the Starlink satellites, and everything it's going to be so cluttered but there's going to look like what's that show? Wall-e? Have you ever watched that movie?

Speaker 3: 12:07

WALL-E.

Nathan Mumm: 12:08

I've seen WALL-E yep, yep, and how bad that was.

Ody: 12:09

Thank you for the reference.

Mike Gorday: 12:10

Yep, wall-e is my favorite human behavior reference, is it yeah? Okay, yeah because it has one of the best future future predictions of how humans are All right.

Nathan Mumm: 12:24

Okay, Well, that's, that's a great story. Now let me just tell you everybody, if you're trying to watch our Facebook feed, maybe meta got mad with us on our first story and they're definitely going to get mad at us at our fourth story, so our stream is not streaming on meta right now.

Mike Gorday: 12:36

So make sure you just go to YouTube to find on Facebook.

Nathan Mumm: 12:39

I'm sure it'll be back there tomorrow.

Mike Gorday: 12:41

Why, Mark? Why Well, I don't know. We're just saying the facts, buddy.

Nathan Mumm: 12:45

I know that there were some configuration issues, so I'm sure it'll work next week. So join us over on YouTube there.

Mike Gorday: 12:50

Facebook people, I just don't like.

Nathan Mumm: 12:51

it All right, let's go to story number three.

Mike Gorday: 12:53

You've been having a whole bunch of problems with these guys lately.

Ody: 12:56

Facebook is my number one enemy oh okay, odie, yeah, um it's blue it's blue thank you nathan?

Ody: 13:05

no, not a problem tiktok is rolling out a new feature for anybody that wants to be a wannabe music editor. Essentially, okay yeah, so they're partnering with spotify and they're it's going to be a paid tier which kind of sucks but you know, nothing's free in this world nothing's free anymore, unless you give away your data. Yeah, a lot of things free as long as you're giving away your data and essentially it lets people, it lets users speed up, slow down, mash up and edit songs in the app.

Nathan Mumm: 13:34

Is it on the fly or is it pre-done and you have to reload it? It's on the fly, okay Is this something cool that you would do. It's like a DJ kit that you'd have built into it.

Ody: 13:41

Yeah, which is really interesting because DJs in themselves a lot of people are now. I've seen or I know that's catered towards me because it's my For you page but a lot of people that I've seen are buying little mini mixers and creating the most horrendous mashups like. Spongebob with Soldier Boy. Okay, you know and I find that entertaining, so I'm glad to see that that's becoming a thing on TikTok.

Nathan Mumm: 14:08

Are you a big Spotify user? Yes, okay, I like Spotify too.

Mike Gorday: 14:11

Are you a TikTok user? Yes, oh, okay, but you know, tiktok is on the forefront of music.

Ody: 14:17

Right now it is you know I work in the radio station.

Nathan Mumm: 14:20

You work at a studio.

Ody: 14:21

I listen to the music on all of our stations, and a lot of them are coming from TikTok first.

Mike Gorday: 14:27

Well, isn't TikTok in everybody's face all the time anyway?

Nathan Mumm: 14:31

Right. Well, it's the number one social media app now.

Ody: 14:34

Nowadays, the music is coming from TikTok and then it's trending on the station, when it used to be the reverse.

Nathan Mumm: 14:39

It used to get on the station first and it was really popular, somebody put it, but yeah. So new artists are coming out and they're released right to TikTok, sometimes to Reels also. So it's not that they're skipping the meta platform, but it's going right out there so you can listen to it live first, and then you can get the replay on the radio station.

Ody: 14:57

And a very common thing is that a song will come out, the original song will come out. The original song will come out on tiktok and then, let's say, a month or so later this is just all hypothetical a remix of that will come out, but it's really just a song, either sped up or slowed down. So now the fact that you can do that specifically on tiktok, right then, and there is just really quick there you go.

Mike Gorday: 15:18

Yeah, there you go. I'm not gonna be doing it, you're not gonna be doing it.

Nathan Mumm: 15:21

come on, you're gonna be mixing it could. Come on, you're going to be mixing it could be DJ Mike.

Mike Gorday: 15:24

Yeah, I'll do it In the house on the main stage, that's right, dj Mikey. Mike, there you go. All right, that's right, dj Mikey.

Nathan Mumm: 15:30

Mike. All right, let's go to story number four at our reporter on the story just breaking this week.

Speaker 7: 15:48

Meta said on Monday that it plans to temporarily close threads in Turkey on April 29th in response to an interim injunction imposed by the Turkish Competition Authority last month over the way Meta shares data between Threads and Instagram. The Turkish competition authority TCA, known as Recebet Kurumu, noted on March 18 that its investigations found that Meta was abusing its dominant market position by combining the data of users who create Threads profiles with that of their Instagram account, without giving users the choice to opt in. This is the latest in a long line of regulatory battles Meta has faced in the European region.

Mike Gorday: 16:29

All right, so Meta is in trouble again. Meta is in trouble again, and they are complying with an injunction.

Nathan Mumm: 16:36

So they're actually obeying the injunction, but they are spamming all their users. Over 100 threads has amassed 130 million users. Essentially, all of those users are going to get this deal. That says we disagree with the interim order, but we believe in compliance with the Turkish legal requirements. But we, of course, are going to appeal. Meadow wrote in a blog post the TCA's interim order leaves us with no choice but to temporarily shut down threads in Turkey. Yeah, temporarily.

Mike Gorday: 17:08

That's the key word right there.

Nathan Mumm: 17:10

You're going to receive the buildup happens on April 29th and users in threads. If you want to piss off your users, this is how you do it. They're going to receive daily emails reminding them that thread is going to be disabled in Turkey. Now I get these. I have a DirecTV system and every once in a while they'll go through a station combative issue where the local station wants to get paid more money for DirecTV to sell them, and you'll go to that station and they'll have this little reader bar that says our station will be temporarily removed if you don't call now, somebody's flexing their power, yeah but how would you, as a user, get an email daily from threads telling you that this is going to be taken care of?

Nathan Mumm: 17:55

There's two things that happen. Either One you call up and you complain to the Turkish government, saying why are you doing? This or two you delete the freaking app because it's so darn annoying. That's what.

Mike Gorday: 18:03

I would do.

Nathan Mumm: 18:04

Yeah, that's exactly the wrong thing of what I would be doing here is, of course, what Meta's doing.

Mike Gorday: 18:11

At least they're not Google who was shutting off stuff in California, because California is trying to get them to do stuff.

Nathan Mumm: 18:18

Yeah, that was one of our stories that didn't quite make our top stories. That's a very interesting story that's going on there too. Well, you know what that ends our stories for our top technology stories of the week. Moving on, we have our letter segment up next with a few different items for us to talk about in the studio. Each of us have one letter to read and they're very tricky. There's a couple that really one almost got me to click on a link that I shouldn't have. So we're going to break right now for a commercial. We will see this show hitting 88 miles per hour in our next segment. See you after this commercial break.

Speaker 9: 18:53

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Nathan Mumm: 19:56

Well, welcome back to Tech Time with Nathan Mumm. Our weekly show covers the top technology subjects Without any political agenda. We verify the facts and we do it with a sense of humor, in less than 60 minutes and, of course, with a little whiskey on the side. Today, mark Gregoire, our whiskey connoisseur, is back in the studio. So what has Mark chosen for us today?

Marc Gregoire: 20:14

Today you are drinking Hirsch the single barrel double oak Now from Hirsch's website. This is Hirsch's the single barrel double oak. It is age eight years, a new American oak barrel with a char number four and finished in a custom char number one. New American oak barrel for one year. Only 30 barrels are available. In the second Hirsch the single barrel double oak release. This bourbon is maple sweet on the nose with layers of caramel, fig and tobacco, all held together by a soft oak presence. On the palate you get leather, baking spice, vanilla and caramel. Now this is from the Holterling and Company. It's an unknown distillery in Bardstown, kentucky. It's straight bourbon aged nine years, 112 proof. The mash bill is 72% corn, 13% rye, 15 malted barley. The price is $150, but it is a little bit in short supply so we're seeing the secondary being around $220.

Nathan Mumm: 21:11

Ooh, $220.

Mike Gorday: 21:13

Yeah, this isn't going to be on your shelf.

Nathan Mumm: 21:16

No, well, you know what. It'll be on Mark's shelf and I'm just going to go over and visit Mark all the time so I can have sips of it. What was your first taste of it? What did you think so far? It's not bad. I liked it. I thought it was actually a smooth. I always wait for that first bite to be there, and that was not a bite at all.

Mike Gorday: 21:36

Most of the time my first sips aren't really that awesome, and after it's sat around for a little bit they just get better. What?

Nathan Mumm: 21:44

proof is this again 112. 112. You know what's bad about this I did not feel, because, like last week's, was that 119 last week 119.

Marc Gregoire: 21:53

I got the bottle right here because I'm taking it back.

Nathan Mumm: 21:56

Okay, you're taking it back 116. 116. So that actually I really felt like a wow.

Ody: 22:04

That was a lot. Well, that had rye in it. Yeah, that was brutal. Last, week.

Nathan Mumm: 22:06

That was brutal.

Ody: 22:07

But you liked it at the end, I liked it, you liked it at the end. We just had our first commercial break.

Nathan Mumm: 22:12

It's going to take a couple sips, I know.

Ody: 22:19

That's what you told me, so now I'm kind of like Well, there's a couple things.

Marc Gregoire: 22:21

Number one this is everybody's first sip of whiskey for the day, so it always takes a while for your palate to Warm up. Warm up as such, which is me, your juices really are not flowing and it's a hard sip otherwise.

Ody: 22:38

Yeah, let me tell you it was Okay all right.

Nathan Mumm: 22:41

Well, I can tell you that I actually was pretty fond of it. Is there anything else that we have to look forward to in our mumble? Oh, of course.

Marc Gregoire: 22:49

Okay, Of course. So stay tuned and don't forget to like and subscribe. There you go and put those comments in there about the whiskey, and especially about a whiskey you would like us to review.

Nathan Mumm: 23:00

There you go, whiskey. That way Mark can buy it and then I can sip it and it can go back on a shelf. Mark's got a pretty high. He's got like three different tiers of shelving at his place. Yeah, I know, the high tier stuff and the middle tier stuff.

Marc Gregoire: 23:14

Plus pretty bottles and open bottles, and then Nathan. When Nathan comes over.

Mike Gorday: 23:21

Nathan bottles. Nathan bottles, the cheap stuff. Alright, there you go Alright.

Nathan Mumm: 23:25

Well, with our first whiskey tasting completed, let's move on to our feature segment. Today we bring back the funny yet informative reading of emails that I received during the week. This includes scam, phishing emails and all out mistruths disguised as legitimate emails. In the segment we call Letters, letters, we get letters. We get back back, back the letters, ah, letters. We get letters and the letters all have fun.

Nathan Mumm: 23:52

All right, before we kick off Letters, this is where I'm going to start. We're going to talk about a device called the Windows Sandbox. Okay, the Windows Sandbox and Mike, feel free to do this on your machine as we go here. Now, essentially all of us probably don't have a spare computer, that they have on a specific network that is tied in so they can load illegal software and spam software and different devices that they format at a constant rate every month or so. So essentially what happens if you don't have a Nathan setup? You can essentially create a setup here where your computer can become a sandbox, and what that means is essentially this is a place where you can test links. This is a place where you can test loading software and essentially it creates an instance of a virtual machine, which means it's not your real machine. You can test it, make sure it's safe and then when you close it, it essentially erases everything that you just did into an environment, so you don't have to worry about your main machine getting hacked or taken care of or compromised, and all of this is available for anybody that has a Windows 10 or a Windows 11 PC. So here's kind of a Nathan nugget and a letter segment we're going to be talking about Now.

Nathan Mumm: 25:01

The first thing you need to do is go to your search bar and you want to type in there and type in Windows Sandbox and see if Windows Sandbox is preloaded on your computer or not. If you have a Windows 11 PC that you've upgraded to, some of them by default actually enable the Windows Sandbox. Some people do not enable the Windows Sandbox. So if you type in in your search bar just Windows Sandbox, and nothing comes on up for your application, then what we're going to do is we're going to help you install it right now. So the first thing, if that does not happen, so everybody's hopefully going to their start bar and they're typing in Windows Sandbox If they do not see anything. Here's what I need you to do instead Go into your start bar and type in the word Windows Features.

Nathan Mumm: 25:46

Now this essentially will open up the Windows features of your operating system in itself, and all you got to do is hit Enter and it will bring up a whole list of applications that you can load on your device itself Windows 10, windows 11, this is the internal components of your Windows system. So, again, you typed in Windows feature. Now, if you scroll through there, you're going to see this thing called Windows Sandbox. You're going to want to put a little check next to the Windows Sandbox. This will essentially then start downloading applications onto your machine, or, if they're already pre-cached on your machine, it will just download those automatically, and it takes about a minute or two to download the Windows Sandbox. It will then require you to do a reboot of your machine, and once you reboot your machine, you are now able to move into the Windows Sandbox environment. So did you find it, mike?

Mike Gorday: 26:36

I don't have it on here.

Nathan Mumm: 26:37

Keep on scrolling down. Take a look for Windows.

Mike Gorday: 26:39

I scrolled down the entire thing. I do not have Windows Sandbox on there Windows.

Nathan Mumm: 26:42

look in your operating system area there.

Mike Gorday: 26:45

This is an early version of Windows 10.

Nathan Mumm: 26:47

It's an early version. Well, it should still absolutely be in there. Take a look for it under the features. You're going to take a look under the search box options. You'll have it. So once you do that, you're going to restart your machine itself and then you're going to to the start bar and you'll search for the Windows Sandbox.

Nathan Mumm: 27:07

Now this is essentially going to open up a window. Mark has it on his machine over here in the corner. Essentially, it opens up a window that looks just like your standard Windows PC, except for it's a window that has a start bar. It has a browser and defaults to the Edge browser. So if you want to load Chrome on there, you're going to have to load Chrome. But don't close the window, because once you close the window, it essentially erases everything. But this is a place where you can test URLs. You can test phishing URLs Instead of having a separate machine. In itself, the Windows Sandbox keeps your environment safe, so does everybody understand that? Hopefully you got a little bit of a Nathan Nugget at the same time before we get into letters on how to use a Windows Sandbox.

Mike Gorday: 27:51

Now, Mark, I think you've been using it. That's a true Nathan Nugget.

Nathan Mumm: 27:54

That's not a Nathan rant, there you go, so you have it on your machine, do you like? Using the Windows?

Marc Gregoire: 27:58

Sandbox I love it, you love it. I absolutely love it. I use it all the time.

Nathan Mumm: 28:02

Okay, so that way, if you have a link that you don't know about or something that was in there, you can just drag and drop it. You can take, see if it's legit and see what happens. Yep, all right, let's have. You start with our letter segment. What letter did we have here?

Marc Gregoire: 28:18

Well, I got a letter from Best Buy. Okay, it was awesome. It's from Best Buy, it's a valid email address. They're telling me I can save up to 50% on all these different specialty items and to click on the shop now. Okay, do you know that?

Nathan Mumm: 28:32

Best Buy has been hacked not once, not twice, within the last year. How many times do you think it's been hacked? Three times a lady? That's correct, three times. So essentially, this email comes to me and this is a spoofed email. It absolutely looks like it comes from Best Buy. And take a look at the front of it. It's got, like, my account information in there. Yeah, it says shop now save up to 50% off. And I am a very frugal individual. Some people call it another thing, but I call myself frugal, that's a euphemism.

Mike Gorday: 29:04

When you click to shop now.

Marc Gregoire: 29:05

It does not go to the website to shop.

Nathan Mumm: 29:09

It does not. So all of a sudden it came up and it started asking me for my username and password. I'm like, well, shop now. Shouldn't it open up the page itself? Go and take a look at what's available in Best Buy. That would be my expectation, and 50% off. There should be some great things available. So I thought I made a mistake. So I clicked on the link again and it asked for my username and password.

Nathan Mumm: 29:28

Now I typed in my actual username and password and it did not work on the second time and I said, uh-oh, I may be in trouble. It all looked legit, everything was there. So I immediately then went to BestBuycom, logged into my account, immediately changed the password. Now I have a stored credit card on my Best Buy account and I just gave them the credentials with my username and my password. I had also given them my extra bonus points that you get for buying stuff that was available there. I had also given them my extra bonus points that you get for buying stuff that was available there. Now I realized that it was a fake after it didn't go and click on the link to more items to buy and after I typed in the password for the second time. So it got me. So I mean it got me.

Marc Gregoire: 30:14

But I was quick reacting, went in and changed my username and password and no one had time to go in and have a look. I got two lessons from this one. Number one don't use the same password for every site because even if you had changed the Best Buy, if you use that for a lot of other sites, they'll try that on your Gmail and they'll try logging in everywhere else to get stuff. So it's good to have unique passwords. And number two this was a real email address. It really came from Best Buy. They just hijacked that account. So even if it comes from a valid email address, you still have to be careful.

Nathan Mumm: 30:39

You got to be careful, go and click on the site itself, so it was really good.

Mike Gorday: 30:42

Yeah, it took advantage of you not paying attention.

Nathan Mumm: 30:47

Yeah well, it also took advantage of Best Buy security, which Geek Squad should be all on top of this. So get in charge of your security and make sure nobody's hacking in we have learned?

Mike Gorday: 30:55

The one thing that I have learned on this show is that nobody's safe. That is correct. That is correct.

Nathan Mumm: 31:03

All right. So I got an email here from hello at mailprotectorcom. Now I didn't look at mail protector really well, so the O has a little two ellipses above the O. So that means it's not really MailProtectorcom, it's MailPRSpecialO Protectorcom and it says, let's face it, email is broken. What does that mean? Threats like phishing and impersonations are the aspects of the problem, but now why is email broken? It essentially has a seminar that I can sign up to Find out more. Come and learn about our Zero Trust approach. That stops all threats.

Mike Gorday: 31:37

Wow, that's so meta.

Nathan Mumm: 31:39

So this is really good. It says see for yourself Friday, april 12th, at 11 am Eastern, so I could sign up and learn more from Mail Protector, which Mail Protector is a company that does protect your email, and when you click on this link, it essentially asks you for your username. It asks you for your email, so it wants you to create an account to attend this event on Friday April 12th. Why is it doing that? Because it wants to know if I use a password repeatedly on a different site. So when I create this account on a fake site in itself, they will now have a username for me, they'll now have a password and they can go and hit all my social media accounts with this password I just put in there, because most people reuse their passwords on each of their logins. So another very tricky email, and I did not get caught on this one.

Mike Gorday: 32:33

I think the message here is don't ever do anything that your email inbox has. Okay.

Speaker 3: 32:44

Don't do anything. Yeah, no.

Mike Gorday: 32:45

Just leave your email alone and don't even respond to them.

Nathan Mumm: 32:49

If it's really important, they'll mail you a real letter. Is that what you're saying?

Mike Gorday: 32:51

If it's your boss. He'll eventually call you and yell at you, but don't use your email anymore Okay, all right, so what do?

Marc Gregoire: 33:00

you have over there.

Mike Gorday: 33:03

Well, I have two letters in my hand, two letters, okay. I will read the body of the letter, okay, and then I will tell you what happened. All right, hi, I came across your website and noticed a few errors that could be easily fixed and may be harming your rankings in Google. I get these, okay. I would like to send you a quick video highlighting these and offering some tips for improvement. It's completely obligation-free and you should get some value from it. Are you the right person to send this to? If so, I can send it to you sometime this week. Regards Okay. Now, these two letters say exactly the same thing.

Nathan Mumm: 33:40

Oh, there's two letters that are with exactly the same thing. It must be from the same person, then.

Mike Gorday: 33:45

No one is from Oliver and one is from Randy.

Nathan Mumm: 33:48

Oh, they must be from the same company, though.

Mike Gorday: 33:50

Oliver is from onlinereportco and Randy is from randyatflashauditco. Okay, and randy is from randy at flash auditco how's that possible?

Nathan Mumm: 34:00

they have exactly the same email this exactly the same thing, so maybe randy just decided to send it to his buddy and his buddy cut and paste to help out randy. Who knows man, or, or?

Mike Gorday: 34:12

this is a scam. It was a scam from a factory yeah, one was. One was sent on april the 9th and the second one was sent on April the 15th, and almost everything exactly the same, except for the subject line on one that says free video audit. It doesn't have the same, but two recipients is the exact same thing. Okay, but it's completely the same. So you got two people sending you the same email from two different company quote unquote accounts. Have you seen the movie?

Nathan Mumm: 34:42

Beekeeper.

Mike Gorday: 34:44

Yes, I really like that movie.

Nathan Mumm: 34:45

You really like that movie? Yes, so everybody should watch the Beekeeper that came out with Jason Statham.

Mike Gorday: 34:49

I was completely on board with what Jason Statham did to the or Statham.

Nathan Mumm: 34:54

That's what it was. Jason Statham I, what Jason Statham did to the or Statham, that's what it was.

Mike Gorday: 34:56

Jason Statham. I was completely on board with how he handled that particular problem.

Nathan Mumm: 35:00

Now, it kind of glamorizes really the hacking environment of people but a lot of those aspects of how those hacking situations work. It's very much like a kind of a showcase.

Mike Gorday: 35:16

Very much glitzy and glamour and lots of different stuff. You know that's how the car business is yeah. The car business is almost exactly the same as some of that stuff that they were talking smack about on that show.

Nathan Mumm: 35:25

Yeah, it's very much the same type of deal. All right, last but not least, I think Odie has a letter to read to us too.

Ody: 35:33

Yeah, mine's from SV Media Virtual Conferences. Okay, and it has a com com, so I don't think it's that crazy the subject says learn from expert-led sessions how to rectify common security oversights, and then it basically goes off about software licenses that can be used on the cloud and how it's great to be moving to the cloud. And and it says something at the bottom of the little button view agenda.

Nathan Mumm: 35:58

Okay.

Ody: 35:59

What happens when you click on it. So when you clicked, on the view agenda.

Nathan Mumm: 36:01

It came up with a list of an agenda that was there and then it says to find out. So actually is legitimate to a point. It comes from a com. Somebody purchased a com that is in there. But then all of a sudden, if you want to learn more about the agenda and the speakers that are going to be speaking at this event, they come with PDFs. Now when the PDF comes on up immediately it opens up another redirect. So it doesn't open up the PDF, and it has anything from porn to video game sales, to illicit drugs and the PDF.

Mike Gorday: 36:33

No the PDF is a command that opens up another. That's correct, that is. And the PDF no. The PDF is a command that opens up another link, that's correct, that is correct.

Nathan Mumm: 36:38

So essentially it looks all legit. It's really there and so if you actually do research on that company, that company actually exists out there. But each of their PDFs that they have for each of their speakers on their agenda essentially goes to a redirect and sends you spam information to click on before you open up the.

Mike Gorday: 36:56

PDF. Is this a spoof site that's using? Them or is this them using the technique?

Nathan Mumm: 37:02

So I think this is a site that probably has free advertising that they got through some type of third party that they paid for to get clicks, because they have ads down at the bottom, like you see, on a Google ad type of thing.

Ody: 37:13

Right.

Nathan Mumm: 37:13

But the redirect part of it. I don't know if the company even knows I reached out to them that the company that they're using to create these agendas and have everything essentially redirects you first before it opens up that PDF file.

Mike Gorday: 37:26

I think we should send the beekeeper in.

Ody: 37:28

You should send the beekeeper in, that's right, have them take care of everything, yeah let's get Jason on that, get him with a big shark and just.

Nathan Mumm: 37:34

Have you ever opened up a website where, like you, click on a link and then, all of a sudden, something else pops up? Yes, every time I do that.

Mike Gorday: 37:39

Yes, those were very common in the 90s. Those were so essentially you would click on a stupid link and then suddenly, like all these other, pop-up windows would show up.

Nathan Mumm: 37:49

So it's kind of the same type of deal. So it's an inadvertent way. The company may not even know that they were paying for this service to host their files and essentially that service was selling out to somebody to have each of those links.

Ody: 38:01

You know, Mike, you said it earlier At this point just throw away the whole computer, there's no point in having to say it no, you've got to have a computer man.

Mike Gorday: 38:09

But what did?

Ody: 38:10

I think about it Like no one sucks.

Mike Gorday: 38:13

No, the best strategy We've talked about it before, the best strategies of combating this stuff is write stuff on a pencil pad.

Nathan Mumm: 38:23

Yeah, yeah, write stuff out, because nobody can hack that. Go back to analog. Yeah.

Mike Gorday: 38:27

Carry a non-connected wallet with your cryptocurrency in it.

Ody: 38:32

I told my dad that he's like I don't remember these passwords. I'm like, well, the best way is just to write it in the same place. He's like how am I going to remember where to put it? I'm like, ah, you're a lost cause at that point.

Mike Gorday: 38:43

Well, he should know. He should know. We used to tape it on our drawer, our keyboard drawers.

Nathan Mumm: 38:51

So it's really interesting because when someone comes on in to steal stuff from your house, they're not stealing your notebook pad. Not anymore, Not anymore. They're going to be going for the television, your computer and they're jetting out In the safe.

Mike Gorday: 39:02

No, what? No, I don't even think they go for the big stuff anymore. They don't go for the big stuff. When I first moved here, I got hit, okay.

Marc Gregoire: 39:09

And they took all the small stuff, your laptops, they took laptops, jewelry, music instruments and weapons that you can have as a resale value on.

Nathan Mumm: 39:22

It has to be click in, click out. You have to be able to sell it at a launch shop.

Mike Gorday: 39:24

Yeah, the police actually caught the person and their car was full of stuff that they had B&R'd. Oh okay.

Nathan Mumm: 39:34

All right, well, guys, that ends our letter segment. Up next, we have this Week in Technology, so now would be an art. Oh, okay, all right, well, guys, that ends our letter segment. Up next, we have this week in technology, so now would be a great time to enjoy a little whiskey on the side, as we're going to be doing so during the break. You're listening to tech time radio with Nathan mum See, in a few minutes.

Speaker 3: 39:47

Join the fun and grab tickets to GeekFest West, the three-day geek festival extravaganza of fun and entertainment that will take place on the third weekend in July. Learn more at GeekFestcom. Geekfest will feature diverse activities, including a film festival, vendor hall, street fair, outdoor music festival, cosmic cosplay and video game tournaments. Join us at GeekFest West, the ultimate celebration of geek culture. To learn more, visit GeekFestcom. That is GeekFestcom.

Speaker 1: 40:19

And now let's look back at this week in technology.

Nathan Mumm: 40:25

All right, are you ready to look back into this week in technology, mike?

Speaker 3: 40:29

Yeah, let's do it All right April 13th 2000.

Nathan Mumm: 40:34

The lawsuit that kills Napster, this heavy metal group have you heard of Metallica? Yep the size to sue Napster, alleging copyright infringement and racketeering. The lawsuit, later joined by Dr Dre, as well as other lawsuits from the RIAA, eventually caused the original Napster service to shut down and file bankruptcy. However, the Pandora's box the Napster opened could not be closed, and digital distribution changed the music industry forever. As for Metallica, their reputation was tarnished a bit for some time by this move. Ironically, metallica owned much of their early popularity to the spread of unauthorized copies of their early albums. As the heavy metal genre in general, metallica in particular did not get much airplay at the time. It was reported that Metallica quietly encouraged the free spread of their music in the early 80s. Therefore, many viewed Metallica's actions against Napster as hypocritical and greedy. Well yeah.

Mike Gorday: 41:33

So if you're not making money and you're shipping out free copies.

Ody: 41:36

So you're sending out little tapes and all of a sudden a big deal.

Nathan Mumm: 41:40

But then all of a sudden Napster gets there.

Mike Gorday: 41:42

And then Metallica's a big deal, and then they're losing money, see, there is a difference there, but are you really losing money?

Ody: 41:50

Yeah.

Nathan Mumm: 41:51

I downloaded thousands and thousands of songs when Napster was up.

Mike Gorday: 41:56

Yeah, and you took money away from those creators.

Nathan Mumm: 42:00

Really yeah, yes, because they did not get paid.

Mike Gorday: 42:05

So when an artist has a song that gets played on the radio, they make a royalty off of that.

Nathan Mumm: 42:11

But what if I liked a whole bunch of albums that I did not know about and then I went out and I actually ended up purchasing CDs and sealed some things?

Mike Gorday: 42:18

back.

Ody: 42:19

That's another argument. Well, that's helping in the end, but in the beginning you're more of a threat than anything.

Mike Gorday: 42:25

It's still piracy.

Ody: 42:26

Yeah, which is not a victimless crime.

Nathan Mumm: 42:31

I see that in every single movie I watch or DVD I get you.

Mike Gorday: 42:33

The FBI is coming for you. I get you Now?

Nathan Mumm: 42:35

did you download stuff from Napster? Because I did, I just said it no, no I did not Okay. Odie, you weren't probably even born then were you no, but I had another of that.

Ody: 42:43

How is a 12-year-old going to get?

Nathan Mumm: 42:46

money, you know.

Ody: 42:52

When iTunes was around.

Nathan Mumm: 42:53

You know what I remember taking digital tapes and recording off the radio and selling those to people in school, are you?

Mike Gorday: 43:00

serious, yeah, see, this is the difference between me and you. When I would do stuff like that, I would give it to a girl.

Ody: 43:07

Oh, wow, you know you do a mixtape you give it to a girl that you like. Okay, okay, okay. But you're getting it for affection, yeah.

Mike Gorday: 43:13

No, I'm not trying to get money off it. He's over here hawking stuff on the corner.

Nathan Mumm: 43:17

Yeah, I was much more upfront. You're a little dealer. I wasn't trying to get a love life out of it.

Mike Gorday: 43:22

No, you were trying to get money.

Nathan Mumm: 43:23

Five bucks you were trying to make money on to watch Tech Time History with over 200 weekly broadcasts spanning four plus years of video podcasts and blog information. You can visit us at techtimeradiocom to watch our older shows. Now we're going to take a commercial break. When we return we have the Mark Mumble Whiskey Review.

Speaker 4: 43:42

See you after this Hello, my name is Arthur and my life's work is connecting people with coffee. Story Coffee is a small batch specialty coffee company that uses technology to connect people to each product resource, which allows farmers to unlock their economic freedom. Try our Medium Roast Founder Series Coffee, which is an exotic bourbon variety that is smooth, fresh and elegant. At storycoffeecom that's S-T-O-R-I coffeecom. Today you can get your first bag free when you subscribe at storycoffeecom with code tech time that's S-T-O-R-I coffeecom.

Speaker 1: 44:23

The segment we've been waiting all week for Mark's Whiskey Mumble.

Marc Gregoire: 44:29

All right, gentlemen, I have been waiting all week actually two weeks to get back in the studio to chat with you guys and talk about today, april 16th.

Nathan Mumm: 44:39

What is April 16th?

Mike Gorday: 44:41

This should be national. I drank everything in my liquor cabinet day because yesterday was tax day.

Nathan Mumm: 44:46

Yeah, tax day was, so today should be national relax day. That's what it should be Tax Day and National Relax Day.

Marc Gregoire: 44:51

It's kind of related, you guys are close, are we? Close. Wow, it is National Bean Counter Day. Oh, okay, count those beans.

Ody: 45:04

How is that relaxing, that's an accounting day.

Nathan Mumm: 45:07

It's a National Accounting Day because the accountants all get a vacation.

Marc Gregoire: 45:10

This day is specially set aside to give accountants and other financial experts, collectively called bean counters their much-deserved break and honor for all that important work they do for the benefit of their clients.

Mike Gorday: 45:23

My accountant doesn't know that my accountant delayed ours.

Nathan Mumm: 45:25

We got ours in time, and then she delayed it.

Mike Gorday: 45:28

My accountant is still working on it. What a bunch of whiners.

Marc Gregoire: 45:31

Well, thanks to all you bean counters out there because many people have their finances and orders because of you, that's right. I do like my accountant. All right, okay, all right.

Ody: 45:43

So let's talk about our whiskey now.

Marc Gregoire: 45:45

Okay, so the original, the very first Hirsch bottle was distilled in 1974 in Pennsylvania by AH Hirsch. He was an investment banker, aka he was a bean counter.

Nathan Mumm: 45:59

I like that. Now, that's a clutch tie in there. Good job, thank you Nathan. All right, he worked on phonics.

Marc Gregoire: 46:08

Now the current brand is loosely part of the lineage that traces itself back to this bottle, which was once considered the best American whiskey ever produced. Now AH Hirsch Reserve's 16-year-old was the centerpiece of Chuck Cowdery's book the Best Bourbon You'll Never Taste. Now we have not had two thumbs up from our host for a month. I hope this whiskey changes that. I was told by my friend Lee to grab this bottle. At the time I did not realize it was double oak, which I usually do not care for at all. I finally cracked this open and, much to my surprise, I find this a phenomenal whiskey, one of my favorites of the year so far. For those in the know, this is said to be the same juice as a coveted Willett Purple Top for a fraction of the cost.

Nathan Mumm: 46:57

Okay, I'm liking it, but I liked it from the beginning.

Mike Gorday: 47:02

Are you sure?

Nathan Mumm: 47:03

Yeah, no, I liked it from the beginning. I said I liked it.

Mike Gorday: 47:05

Are you liking it? The jury's still out. It's not bad, but it hasn't done anything yet. That makes me want to. Yeah, I've been wrong, it's not a thumbs up, thumbs down yet Okay.

Marc Gregoire: 47:18

I thought this was a for sure thumbs up for Mike and a maybe for Nathan. Oh no, I'm liking it a lot, though, Because it's very wood forward and Mike has really liked the wood lately. All right, yeah, and it's been a little tannic for Nathan when he gets too much wood.

Nathan Mumm: 47:33

All right, I don't know, we'll see, you know what? Whisking technology. A perfect pairing, Just like olive oil and red wine vinegar on a salad.

Marc Gregoire: 47:41

That's a good one there, you go Put a little garlic in there you had the.

Mike Gorday: 47:45

AI come up with that. One didn't you. You didn't do that on your own. No, I did that myself.

Nathan Mumm: 47:48

Let's get ready for our technology fail of the week, brought to you by Elite Executive Services. We are out of time. Congratulations, you're a failure.

Mike Gorday: 47:57

Oh.

Speaker 9: 47:59

I failed. Did I yes, did I yes Did.

Nathan Mumm: 48:04

I yes, all right, our technology fail. At&t customers get 6.3 million in data throttling refunds. At&t throttled their data. Now the FTC essentially already awarded the current AT&T wireless customers, but, as a part of the ongoing lawsuit and settlement, those that used to be AT&T individuals, essentially from 2020 before, are now available to get 5200 no 5200, essentially from 2020 before are now available to get $52,000 that are available.

Mike Gorday: 48:44

That's $52 million online. $52 million, sorry, that's $52 million online $52 million out of the $60 million settlement.

Nathan Mumm: 48:49

Essentially, if you are a former AT&T customer, you can go online to the FTC and submit for a refund and get a valid claim to receive your funds. They come in PayPal payments or a check that will be sent in 90 to 30 days respectively.

Mike Gorday: 49:07

So it's 52 million divided by 267,000. So there's plenty of money available for former employees.

Nathan Mumm: 49:15

All right Now let's move to Mike's Mesmerizing Moment. This is Mike's Mesmerizing Moment presented by Story Coffee. Visit storycoffeecom. I know this is going to take us all the way up to our pick of the day, so here's what we got Mike. 23andme is facing financial difficulties, with its valuation crashing 98% from its peak and the Nasdaq threatening to delist its sub $1 stock. The company has never made a profit and is burning cash so quickly that it's going to run out by 2025. We talked about their compromise also. Once valued at $6 billion, 23andme now faces multiple class action lawsuits and a possible stock delisting. Now, what's going to happen to this company is what our conversation turned to last night during our prep show.

Mike Gorday: 50:04

Yeah, what's the question?

Nathan Mumm: 50:05

Companies are going out of business and filing for bankruptcy. When a company files for bankruptcy, most of the time they get sold for pennies on the dollar. People leave the company and there is now a whole group of people that are going on in to these companies, taking their PCs, taking their data. And since they don't have any agreement on the user data, 23andMe has a user data agreement. People are buying the data and then importing it and you are losing all of your confidentiality that you signed with the company.

Mike Gorday: 50:38

You didn't mention that the fact that they are considering selling the data so that they can get out of bankruptcy.

Nathan Mumm: 50:46

So there's a bunch of companies on the market that are facing bankruptcy right now. So if they were to sell that data and compromise what they had for their user agreements, they could stay in business. And companies are having a moral dilemma on do they break the user agreements that they have out there so they can stay in business, or do they suffer without selling that data and go bankrupt?

Mike Gorday: 51:09

Yeah, my problem this is the crux of the problem is a moral dilemma. If they have a user agreement that says they can't, they're not going to sell their data, they can't sell their data.

Mike Gorday: 51:18

Okay, so what happens if the company goes bankrupt? That is another problem that comes up. So you're saying the way you pose this last night is, if they do this and sell the data to save the company, the company is saved, but the data is not Correct. If they do not save the company by selling the data, the data is still lost. So either way, it's a lose-lose situation for the consumer and my problem is that whoever is the judge in this matter or who ever can regulate this, that should be taken off the table completely. But it's not. The data should not be a part of the settlement as part of the problem.

Nathan Mumm: 52:02

So here's what happens to a company. They go bankrupt. They have all their computers laying there. Somebody comes on up as a wholesaler, buys all of their hardware, then decides to go in and farm that data. Now there are companies across the nation that are specifically going on in for bankruptcy to buy companies to grab the data, export that and then they never have the user agreement so they can sell that data.

Mike Gorday: 52:25

It doesn't matter. The problem is that either way, the data is gone. The problem is that either way, the data is gone. The question is does 23andMe survive? And now that they've compromised their quote, unquote ethics which I have a problem with corporate, because corporations and ethics are very, not very good bedfellows Okay, if 23andMe sells the data and goes against their own user agreement, they are telling you straight to your face that they don't care. Okay, and so if they survive, are they really going to survive in the long run? Probably not.

Marc Gregoire: 53:06

Okay.

Mike Gorday: 53:07

Because who's going to trust them after that?

Nathan Mumm: 53:12

So if they choose not to sell the data, For me.

Marc Gregoire: 53:23

I think it's clear that they should honor the agreement.

Mike Gorday: 53:25

Because the data is going to be lost anyway. Mark, did you?

Marc Gregoire: 53:28

have a comment there. No, I'm agreeing with Mike on this one. Either way, the consumer is in trouble because if they sell the data, their data is being sold even though they're promised not to, and if it goes to bankruptcy court and they don't, it becomes an asset and nobody's going to protect that.

Mike Gorday: 53:43

That's the problem. That's the that's the real problem. The problem isn't whether or not they're going to sell the data and save the company. The problem is that nobody's protecting that data outside of the system. That's correct. That's the real problem.

Nathan Mumm: 53:56

All right, let's go to our pick of the day here. We are running out of time.

Mike Gorday: 53:59

I haven't even finished you haven't finished. Yours and now our pick of the day for our whiskey tastings. In fact, you've got more than I do.

Speaker 1: 54:06

Let's see what bubbles to the top. Still busy talking.

Nathan Mumm: 54:08

All right, so I'm going to give this a thumbs up. Absolutely, I liked it from the beginning. Mike, I will give it a thumbs up, okay.

Mike Gorday: 54:15

Odie, what did?

Nathan Mumm: 54:15

you think?

Ody: 54:16

I'll give it a thumbs up as well, okay.

Marc Gregoire: 54:18

Unanimous thumbs up.

Mike Gorday: 54:30

There you go.

Nathan Mumm: 54:31

That's a value. Just don't click on too many values. He got a smuggling ring. No, no.

Mike Gorday: 54:35

That was legit purchase. That wasn't his underground little, his underground whiskey yeah.

Nathan Mumm: 54:40

He's got his little cronies that are all there grabbing their little whiskey, selling it Okay.

Mike Gorday: 54:46

Could you call that the brown market? That's a brown market, the brown market, the brown market.

Nathan Mumm: 54:50

Yeah, All right. If you enjoyed the show, make sure you give us a five-star review on any podcast service. You listen to us. Remember the science of tomorrow starts with the technology of today. We'll see you next week.

Marc Gregoire: 55:01

Later.

Mike Gorday: 55:04

Bye-bye.

Speaker 1: 55:05

Thanks for joining us on Tech Time Radio. We hope that you had a chance to have that hmm moment today in technology. The fun doesn't stop there. We recommend that you go to techtimeradiocom and join our fan list for the most important aspect of staying connected and winning some really great monthly prizes. We also have a few other ways to stay connected, including subscribing to our podcast on any podcast service from Apple to Google and everything in between. We're also on YouTube, so check us out on youtubecom. Slash tech time radio. All one word. We hope you enjoyed the show as much as we did making it for you. From all of us at tech time radio, Remember mums the word. Have a safe and fantastic week.