Scams are old. Mesopotamia old. Snake oil old. They haven’t doomed us yet.

But investigative journalist Joseph Cox of 404 Media sees something changing: new technology is making the oldest cons more personal, more convincing, and much harder to check.

Ben Bradford follows the scam from fake bosses and Nigerian princes to AI tools, celebrity deepfakes, and live video masks that can make a scammer look like someone you trust. But with Joseph, he also finds a few hallmarks that have accompanied cons throughout history, whether in ancient Sumer or a phishing email. Because as long as we can spot the spell scams seek to cast, we still have at least a chance to break it.

Guest:

Joseph Cox, investigative reporter and co-founder of 404 Media

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In 1859, the sky turned blood-red, telegraph machines sparked and chattered, and some of their batteries exploded. Then humanity responded by building a civilization that runs on electricity, satellites, GPS, internet cables, credit cards, and cellphone towers.

Great work, everyone.

Ben Bradford investigates the Carrington Event — the massive solar storm that fried the technology of its time — and asks what would happen if something like it hit our much more wired world today. Was Carrington a one-off? Are modern power grids, satellites, and internet infrastructure any safer than an 1859 telegraph? And if the sun does cough another piece of itself at us, is there anything we can actually do?

Guests:

Jim Green, former chief scientist of NASA and founder of Metavisionaries

Elizabeth Butler at the NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center

For more threats from space, check out our episodes:

"Asteroids! The Doom We're Best At"
"We Are Losing the Moon" (also with Jim Green)

Also mentioned in this episode:

"We Try and Kill the Internet"

Support Are We Doomed?, get bonus episodes, and more: https://doompod.com/support/

Watch earlier episodes on Youtube! https://www.youtube.com/@arewedoomedpod

From mild runny noses to savage pandemics, viruses and other pathogens have tormented humans for all of history. We are locked in a perpetual race against tiny shapeshifting enemies that mutate, spread, and occasionally butcher us. Can we ever win?

Ben Bradford looks at the history and future of the race against our worst afflictions, from the dubious ethics of the first smallpox vaccine centuries ago, the strange and unbelievably gross story of the miraculous tuberculosis vaccine, and the current quest for a new breed of “universal” vaccines. It all points to a new puzzle inside our immune systems that, if solved, could allow an entirely different type of protection.

Guests:

Carl Zimmer, science writer and author of A Planet of Viruses

Juliet Morrison, microbiologist at UC Riverside

Watch earlier episodes on Youtube! https://www.youtube.com/@arewedoomedpod