Gray Day: My Undercover Mission to Expose America's First Cyber Spy | With Rick McElroy And Eric O'Neill

Many spy stories we read about and watch in movies are often fiction based on real events. In this podcast, we talk about a real American cyber espionage story, with the FBI agent responsible for the spy‘s capture.

That FBI agent, Eric O'Neill, is the author of the book, Gray Day, and the subject of Universal Studios' feature film, Breach. He is our special guest today, joining us via an invitation by this episode's co-host, Rick McElroy.

A cybersecurity expert and former FBI "ghost" tells the thrilling story of how he helped take down notorious FBI mole, Robert Hanssen, the first Russian cyber spy.

When you find yourself talking about a story as such, you realize that sometimes truth can be stranger than fiction, and the time you have available for the conversation is never enough to cover all the topics that come into your head. We think we made the best of the time we had. We spoke about the adventure in the movie and the book and what it means to be a real human and not just a character in a story. We also spoke about cybersecurity, manipulation, cybercrime, and, of course, espionage.

We will bring Eric back on ITSPmagazine to tell us more about cyber espionage and about his next book. Yes, there is that too.

Let's start with this podcast. Shall we?

"What was written in gray Day is a true story. And it's all completely true and accurate. One thing I did want to do having written the book after we made the movie was really tell the story in the way that it happened, which honestly, I think, is a lot more exciting, then the Hollywood version. ...I wanted to write the book first. But by the time I got clearance from the FBI, which took forever to tell my story because my part was classified, it was classified at the highest levels." —Eric O'Neill.

"To do that job. You can't tell anybody you're doing that job. ...The toll that actually takes on individuals who do that role. And there's a lot of us who have carried clearance. A lot of the folks in infosec have sort of come out of that world. And I think it just opens that up as a conversation in the community about how sometimes you lie with the greatest intention on the planet. But that has a personal impact." —Rick McElroy.

"The hacking is nothing more than the necessary evolution of espionage. We took all that stuff that used to be in on paper, and we put it in computer systems, and spies had to evolve. .... So all that technology, all the computers, all the cybersecurity, and cyber attacks, all the malware, all of those different techniques are really just to get to a person who will ultimately be the one who makes a mistake. So it is all about humans."—Eric O'Neill

About the book "Gray Day."

Eric O'Neill was only twenty-six when he was tapped for the case of a lifetime: a one-on-one undercover investigation of the FBI's top target, a man suspected of spying for the Russians for nearly two decades, giving up nuclear secrets, compromising intelligence, and betraying US assets. With zero training in face-to-face investigation, Eric found himself in a windowless, high-security office in the newly formed Information Assurance Section, tasked officially with helping the FBI secure its outdated computer system against hackers and spies–and unofficially with collecting evidence against his new boss, Robert Hanssen, an exacting and rage-prone veteran agent with a disturbing fondness for handguns.

In the months that follow, Eric's self-esteem and young marriage unravel under the pressure of life in Room 9930, and he questions the very purpose of his mission. But as Hanssen outmaneuvers an intelligence community struggling to keep up with the new reality of cybersecurity, he also teaches Eric the game of spycraft. Eric will just have to learn to outplay his teacher if he wants to win.

A tension-packed stew of power, paranoia, and psychological manipulation, Gray Day is also a cautionary tale of how the United States allowed Russia to become dominant in cyberespionage–and how we might begin to catch up.

Guest(s)
Eric O'Niell

Co-Host(s)
Rick McElroy

Resources
To learn more about Eric O'Neill and his book, Gray Day, visit ericoneill.net/book

Visit the Unusual Gatherings page to watch the video version of this episode: https://www.itspmagazine.com/unusual-gatherings

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