Aussie Tech Heads - Episode 752

·1 hr·5 clips

Jason explains how he can get anybody's birth certificate with just a name, date, and hospital.

Episode 752 arrives with Christmas in the air and sweat everywhere. Jason Oakley and Wilt Hopkinson open with a plug for Blue Ocean Web Hosting, covering business grade hosting, domain registration, SSL certificates, website security, update services, website builds, email hosting, and other internet-presence help. Then the temperature muscles in. The hosts talk about a very hot week that hit 43 while joking about tight undies and a Christmas beard. A VZ demo sits in the background, with two- or three-colour reindeer and a two-colour Santa, and the conversation points listeners toward Wok's YouTube channel, website, Twitter, and Facebook. From there, the chat moves into what happens when somebody gets hold of another person's details. Identity theft becomes the central worry as the hosts wonder whether ID care from Service NSW is going to recover money spent from an account, and what that recovery would even look like. Centrelink fraud gives the discussion a grim example. They talk about people using multiple IDs to claim multiple Centrelink payments, then laugh at one person booking appointments with the same worker on the same day. The joke works because the underlying problem is so blunt: stolen details can leave everyone arguing over who the real person is. The hosts then link identity theft to the ongoing flood of breached passwords. A UK National Crime Agency and National Cybercrime Unit discovery of 225 million stolen emails and passwords on a hacked cloud server becomes the next warning sign. Those compromised credentials were handed to Have I Been Pwned, the free service that tracks credentials stolen and leaked through data breaches. The number lands beside the service's existing 613 million passwords. The hosts meet those figures with alarm and disbelief, keeping the statistics tied to actual account trouble rather than abstract cyber-noise. The episode keeps its loose shape as the tech news slips into side comments and small arguments about how any of this is supposed to work. Near the end, the show points listeners to Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Patreon, Ko-fi, email, and Aussie Tech Radio's 24/7 playback. Christmas and New Year wishes follow. Then The Song That Doesn't End keeps going until the repeated singing is finally cut off and the door is told not to slam.

As heard by us

A hot Christmas catch-up turns identity theft and stolen passwords into a grounded Australian tech conversation.

Episode 752 takes a Christmas catch-up and lets it drift into the everyday tech problems that can suddenly become personal. Jason Oakley and Wilt Hopkinson open with a very hot week, a 43-degree day, and a VZ demo dressed up with two/three-colour reindeer and a two-colour Santa,…

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

You get Christmas heat, identity-theft disbelief, and 225 million stolen credentials in one gloriously loose Aussie tech catch-up.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

Listen to the show on

Apple Podcasts Spotify

Play clips from this episode More from Aussie Tech Heads