The OPSEC Podcast

For the past decade, people have underestimated the most powerful surveillance system ever built, not by intelligence agencies, but by corporations. Every movement you make, every store you walk into, every website you open, every conversation near your phone, it’s all collected, correlated, sold, and fed back into behavioural models more invasive than anything that Langley or the Kremlin could ever have dreamed of.Your phone doesn’t just listen. It watches how you walk. It measures how you move. Not only that, but it predicts your emotional state, loneliness cycles, purchasing intent, and even what you’ll search next, before you search it.And you’re paying for the privilege.In this episode of The OPSEC Podcast, Allen and Ahmed break down how modern surveillance works when everyone (from convenience stores to dating apps to foreign intelligence services) is harvesting your data. Not by hacking you, but by exploiting the sensors you voluntarily carry.You’ll discover:How retail stores use enhanced camera networks to track your movement, biometrics, and purchasing behaviourWhy your phone’s gyroscope, accelerometer, and Bluetooth signals can identify you even if everything else is turned offHow dating apps use motion-sensor analytics to determine when you're lonely, then target you.Why are executives travelling to China with their personal phones are walking SIGINT targets.The truth about burner phones, why 99% of people use them wrong, and how surveillance teams detect them instantly.Why Europe is sleepwalking into a surveillance state through digital ID, KYC expansion, and anti-encryption laws.The hidden danger of bringing compromised devices back into your home network after international travelHow modern ads appear seconds after conversations,  and why it’s not a coincidencePrivacy isn’t dying, it’s being optimised out of existence.Your devices broadcast more intel about you than most people will ever realise. And unless you actively shut down those signals, someone is always listening.Your privacy is your responsibility. Do your due diligence, or accept the consequences.

For more than a decade, intelligence agencies, data brokers, and criminal syndicates have quietly relied on the same vulnerability: your wireless signals. Your phone, your credit cards, your passport, your key fobs — they all broadcast data constantly, whether you realise it or not. And every signal can be intercepted, cloned, profiled, or used against you.In this episode of The OPSEC Podcast, we break down a hard truth: modern tracking doesn’t require hacking — just proximity. Bluetooth skimmers, RFID harvesters, rogue NFC readers, silent ping collectors… they’re everywhere, especially during the holiday travel boom.You’ll learn how Faraday sleeves, RFID-blocking wallets, and shielded travel kits shut down these attacks by cutting off the signals entirely. Not with software. Not with “anti-tracking apps.” But with the same electromagnetic isolation techniques used in classified facilities and intelligence operations since the 1940s.In this episode, you’ll discover:How Bluetooth hijacking and RFID skimming actually work (and why tourists are the easiest targets)Why your phone still broadcasts identifiers even when it’s “off”The difference between consumer-grade Faraday products vs. intelligence-grade shieldingWhy doubling-layer protection (sleeve + wallet, sleeve + bag) mirrors professional tradecraftThe silent rise of contactless credit card theft in crowded holiday shopping zonesWhy a $10 RFID sleeve can stop a $500 attack before it beginsThe truth about Faraday backpacks, travel organisers, and which brands actually hold upHow to integrate Faraday protection into daily OPSEC without looking like a tactical wannabeIf intelligence agencies rely on signal isolation to protect classified hardware, identities, and operational assets, why shouldn’t you use the same principles to protect your phone, passport, and money?Your devices broadcast more about you than you think.Your security is your responsibility.

From an operational-security perspective, financial metadata is one of the most actionable intelligence vectors available to adversaries and fraudsters alike. In this episode of The OPSEC Podcast, host Alan Pace — speaking from field experience — delivers a concise intelligence-grade briefing on masked payment cards (e.g., Privacy.com) and how to incorporate them into a practical OPSEC posture for the holiday shopping surge.What you’ll learn: • The threat model: how e-commerce breaches, merchant telemetry, and secondary data linkages convert routine transactions into persistent identifiers. • Capability assessment of masked card services: merchant-locking, single-use tokens, disposable virtual cards, and how each mitigates specific attack vectors. • Operational procedures: safe account linking, rotation of credentials post-link, and handling of recurring payments to deny blindside billing. • Regional tradecraft: practical alternatives when Privacy.com isn’t available (Revolut, IronVest, Moon/PayWithMoon) and the tradeoffs imposed by KYC/GDPR regimes. • Rules of engagement: when a masked card improves your security posture — and when it merely shifts trust to another third party.This episode reads like a field directive: adopt masked payment cards as a standard control for online purchases, instrument them with strict lifecycle management (create → limit → monitor → kill), and treat payment tokens as mission-critical assets.Practical, repeatable, and defensive — because operational security begins at the point of payment.

For 50 years, 130 governments trusted Crypto AG to protect their most secret communications. Every single message was being read by the CIA and German intelligence. Operation Rubicon was the longest-running espionage operation in history. The CIA secretly bought a Swiss encryption company in 1970, installed backdoors in every device, and sold “secure” communications to governments worldwide. Nobody suspected a thing – until 2020.Now it’s happening again. But this time, they’re buying your VPN companies. Kape Technologies – an Israeli company founded by former adware criminals with ties to Unit 8200 (Israel’s NSA) – quietly bought ExpressVPN in 2021. They also own CyberGhost, PIA, and Zenmate. Plus all the VPN “review” sites that conveniently rank their products at the top.In this episode of The OPSEC Podcast, you’ll discover:Why Chinese VPNs like Turbo VPN are 51% owned by the Communist Party (and why they target American teenagers on TikTok)How Russian VPNs like Kaspersky are legally required to give the FSB access to all your trafficWhy “free VPNs” turn your computer into a botnet zombie (the Hola VPN scandal)What VPNs actually do vs. the anonymity BS they claim in their marketingThe only 3 VPN companies that pass the trust sniff test: ProtonVPN, Mullvad, and NordVPNA VPN does not equal automatic privacy. It’s outsourcing trust from one party to another. If you take trust from your ISP and give it to a malicious actor, you’re worse off than having no VPN at all.Free VPNs make YOU the product. Israeli companies inject adware. Chinese companies feed data to the CCP. Russian companies hand everything to the FSB.Check who owns the VPN – not just where the servers are located. Because if the CIA launched a VPN service promising “guaranteed privacy,” they’d sell exactly zero subscriptions. So why trust companies with the same intelligence agency connections?Your privacy is your responsibility. Do your due diligence or accept the consequences. 

Courts can’t agree if geofence warrants are constitutional – but law enforcement is using them anyway. Your phone is volunteering you for mass surveillance operations right now.In 2024, one court declared geofence warrants “categorically unconstitutional” mass surveillance. Another court said they’re perfectly legal. When the law can’t agree on what’s legal, you need to take matters into your own hands.Google Play Services is spyware. It takes over your Android device, harvests all your data, and hands it to law enforcement in dragnet operations. The January 6th investigation proudly used geofencing to track everyone in the area – including innocent bystanders caught in the dragnet who had to defend themselves against crimes they didn’t commit.In this episode of The OPSEC Podcast, you’ll discover: • Why GrapheneOS is now 90-95% functional as a daily driver (the excuses are dead) • How sandboxed Google Play Services gives you control without sacrificing functionality • The Aurora Store’s tracker-counting feature that exposes which apps are spying on you • Why airplane mode on stock Android doesn’t actually turn off your cell tower beacon • The two-factor screen lock that stops you from checking texts while driving (inconvenience as a feature)If you don’t volunteer the information, they have no right to use it. Stock Android and iOS are designed to make you volunteer everything – your location, your patterns, your entire digital life.GrapheneOS gives you back control. The flashing process is now stupidly simple. The functionality is there. The only sacrifice is convenience – and convenience is a trap.Take the leadership role with your family. Build devices for your parents like Alan did. Show them the small differences. Be their tech support. Your care for their privacy is leadership in action.Remember: Your privacy is your responsibility. Your vulnerabilities are on you too.

Russian soldiers are dying because stolen Ukrainian iPhones are broadcasting their every move. Your phone is doing the same thing to you right now.In the Russia-Ukraine conflict, troops are being hunted down through cell phone signatures. One Ukrainian soldier used Apple’s “Find My Device” to track Russian forces who stole his iPhone and earbuds. They thought they got free electronics – instead, they got a death sentence.Your daily life is no different. Every app, every search, every conversation near your phone creates a signature that’s being collected, analysed, and monetised.In this episode of The OPSEC Podcast, you’ll discover:Why the CIA calls your smartphone “the single best spying device ever invented”The 10-step signature reduction (SIGRED) strategy used by offensive cyber operationsHow your car’s “emergency service” is actually a location beacon you can’t controlWhy those “coincidental” ads after private conversations aren’t coincidences at allThe metadata in your photos reveals everything about your life and locationYou’re walking around with multiple tracking beacons in your pocket every single day. Your advertisement ID, GPS location, Wi-Fi connections, and app installations – they all create a signature that follows you everywhere.Convenience breeds weakness. Every easy login, every auto-connect, every smart device is another way for adversaries to track your patterns and predict your behaviour.The same signature reduction tactics that keep special forces alive can keep you invisible online. Stop broadcasting your life to corporate surveillance networks. Your signature is your vulnerability – and reducing it is your responsibility.