For instance, if you are looking for a job you are more vulnerable to a work-at-home scam.
[00:00:12] I stole from people I knew, people that I never met and didn’t care.
I was a despicable person then.
Frank, how are you?
[00:00:30] Frank Abagnale: Great to be back, Will, thanks.
Have you thought about this at all or is it just me?
[00:00:42] Frank Abagnale: Right.
[00:00:43] Will Johnson: Right?
Because our podcast is all about scams, we want to spend an episode talking about the Dark Web.
It was trying to get um, some communication channel for their operatives overseas to communicate anonymously.
And so they developed this software called The Onion Router, TOR.
Let’s try that.
That’s a good idea because we want to sell a lot of drugs.
About 80 percent of the criminal activity on the Dark Web is drug trafficking.
Every kind of drug you might imagine is for sale on the Dark Web.
There is also the buying and selling of digital goods.
This is your digital identity and my digital identity, Will.
What’s a digital identity?
Things like your Social Security number, personal information.
Many consider Brett the guy who made the Dark Web what it is today.
These days, Brett’s life is transformed.
But Brett has an incredible story, and he helps us get inside the mind of cybercriminals.
[00:02:53] Brett Johnson: They did.
I’m not proud of that title, but that’s what they said.
There may be some people that are still locked up that might know more than I.
[00:03:13] Will Johnson: We’ll get to them, eventually.
[00:03:23] Brett Johnson: Right, I built the first online, the first organized cybercrime community.
[00:03:35] Will Johnson: Brett Johnson grew up in eastern Kentucky.
He describes his mom as the captain of the fraud industry where he grew up.
She would leave me and my sister alone for days at a time.
My mom had been gone for a few days.
We didn’t have any food in the house.
And I’m the kid that uh was always scared that Mom was going to come back.
She was mad about it.
So we’re there for a few days.
One day Denise walks in the house and she’s got this pack of pork chops with her.
I’m like, where did you get those?
And she’s like, I stole them.
I’m like, hmm, show me how you did that.
[00:04:37] Will Johnson: Brett says his life of crime started right then at age 10.
Brett, his sister, and his mom all started shoplifting and stealing together.
They were my choices to break the law.
[00:04:56] Will Johnson: Well there’s something to be said though about environment.
It was a necessity.
[00:05:06] Brett Johnson: Right, right.
[00:05:07] Will Johnson: So do you remember the first time you logged onto a computer?
[00:05:09] Brett Johnson: The first computer I had was a Texas Instruments TI-994A.
I was uh, 11 I think was what I was at the time.
And that was basically just a glorified video game machine is all it was.
Um, more importantly, the first time I got on the internet was probably ‘94, ‘95.
[00:05:33] Brett Johnson: So I, I had been on computers and everything.
I was somewhat adept to that.
In a way, Brett stumbled into the world of cybercrime.
[00:06:10] Brett Johnson: Yeah.
[00:06:10] Will Johnson: Early on.
Alright, so I got the criminal mindset from my mom.
Just trying not to lose her love.
I didn’t want people to abandon me.
I didn’t want to go to work.
I wanted to verify I was there to help them all the time.
I was always justifying my crimes.
[00:07:21] Brett Johnson: Initially there was none.
[00:07:42] Will Johnson: So when does the Dark Web start?
So eventually you start one of the first online stores.
Am I jumping ahead too far?
[00:07:46] Brett Johnson: No, not, not at all.
[00:07:48] Will Johnson: The Dark Web, did it exist?
And I get upset.
I get really upset.
So I start looking around for anybody that can actually supply an ID.
I can’t find it.
So, about the same time I’m there, these two other gentlemen show up.
[00:09:03] Brett Johnson: My name at that point was Gollum Fun.
[00:09:05] Will Johnson: You came up with it?
Were you a Lord of the Rings fan?
[00:09:06] Brett Johnson: Yeah, I was a Lord of the Rings guy.
Yeah, that’s me.
And I’m like, you might?
He’s like, yeah, and I was like, well make one and send it to me.
I’m going to charge you $200.
And they’re like, yes, you might have it.
And I’m like, that’s a good idea.
Let’s do that.
[00:10:35] Will Johnson: I was going to ask.
[00:10:40] Will Johnson: And you’re just reviewing products?
[00:10:41] Brett Johnson: Just reviewing products.
[00:10:42] Will Johnson: People are putting on the site.
[00:10:52] Brett Johnson: Legitimate commerce, how?
[00:10:54] Will Johnson: Or I’ve got a weed whacker to sell.
[00:10:56] Brett Johnson: No, it was all, it was all illegal goods.
Same thing for fake IDs or credit cards or anything else like that.
It’s stolen credit card numbers and Brett knew how to cash them out.
Buying a product, cashing it out.
This brought in a lot more money.
[00:11:58] Brett Johnson: Right.
[00:11:59] Will Johnson: So you’d go to a couple different ones?
[00:12:21] Will Johnson: Sounds familiar.
I’m that guy.
I’m the guy that started that.
Um, so I started that back in 2003 at this point.
So that’s 2003 I’m doing that.
I’m stealing, at one point I was stealing 160,000 a week.
[00:12:43] Will Johnson: So you were doing that.
[00:12:48] Brett Johnson: Yeah I got real freaked out.
[00:12:54] Will Johnson: So you were getting freaked out.
Were you making a lot of money too at this point?
Now on the income tax fraud, it jumped up.
On income tax fraud I stole $160,000 a week for 10 months a year.
[00:13:13] Will Johnson: And you’re putting all this money under your mattress?
[00:13:15] Brett Johnson: I’m putting all this money initially in backpacks.
I already know, that’s exactly what it holds.
Alright, and I had this… Come back on Sunday; start back again.
And those rules were no counterfeit currencies, no drugs, no child pornography.
And we, we never dealt in child pornography at all.
He wo–, he worked at one of the factories.
So we started offering that.
Drugs, what happened was, my, my second-in-charge, he always wanted drugs to be introduced.
So for the last year of Shadow Crew, the first thing we allowed in was Ecstasy being sold.
So we had people that would be 40,000 tablets of this stuff.
Brett was the only one who got away.
But not for long.
In 2005 the law catches up with him.
He hands me the package, I hand him the check for, I think it was $23,000.
They cut him a deal.
In a few months he’s out showing the good guys the inner workings of the Dark Web.
[00:16:44] MUSIC SEGUE
[00:16:45] Will Johnson: Brett gets thrown back in jail.
But he’s out again in no time and breaking the law.
But he’s captured again, thrown back in jail, sentenced to 76 months.
Um, made it to about 300 miles away.
And uh, uh I get caught, and at this time I’m sent to Texas.
[00:17:39] Will Johnson: Were you doing like the whole disguises and everything?
[00:17:41] Brett Johnson: Oh, I had, you see me now.
I mean I dyed my hair this flaming red.
I had this big red bushy goatee and everything else.
And uh, um, yeah, I didn’t look like me at all at that point.
[00:17:52] Will Johnson: But they found you.
[00:17:53] Brett Johnson: They did.
The county jail had a visitation for 10 minutes.
And he asked me, he’s like, can I do anything for you?
And I’m like, uh, you might my sister I said hello to her.
[00:18:55] Will Johnson: Just doing soul searching on your own?
And I was fortunate enough to uh, to accept what I had done.
So I was under three years probation, could not touch a computer.
I was making $400 a week doing that and I was, I was good.
I was in a great and uh lawn season ended.
[00:19:59] Brett Johnson: Michelle’s the only one working.
She’s the only one bringing money in.
I’m like uh, I gotta do something.
I gotta do something.
I gotta, I gotta to be worthy of this.
And Michelle, she uh, she stood by me.
He gets out determined to do things the right way.
[00:20:41] Brett Johnson: So I get on LinkedIn of all place.
I messaged him on LinkedIn.
I’m like, hey I respect every single thing youve done.
And the guy, he believed me.
[00:21:06] Will Johnson: Brett gets the introduction he needs to start a new life.
He starts consulting with law enforcement, companies, and sharing all he knows about the Dark Web.
Last year, July 5th, a website called Alpha Bay on the Dark Web was shut down.
When it was shut down they had 240,000 members for just one website.
Is that a different guy than the one I’m looking at today?
[00:21:56] Brett Johnson: Naw, I dont think it’s a different guy.
I’m still that guy.
I don’t think I cared back then.
I stole, I stole from people I knew, people I never met and didn’t care.
Um, I think looking back on that it’s just um, I was a despicable person then.
Now it’s just much more sophisticated.
I only use a credit card.
Not credit debit, just a credit card, VISA, Mastercard, American Express, Discover Card.
Every day of my life I literally spend the credit card company’s money.
I don’t spend my money.
My money sits in a money market account, it earns interest.
Nobody knows where it is because it’s never exposed to anybody.
I get on the airplane to come this morning, I use my credit card.
It’ll stay the same.
So, I only use a credit card.
If I buy something online and they don’t deliver it, I’m protected.
If I buy something online that’s broken, they won’t take it back, I’m protected.
[00:25:31] Will Johnson: So what about cash?
Do you get cash out?
[00:25:32] Frank Abagnale: I ask my bank only for what is called an ATM card.
I do not want it with a VISA, MasterCard logo.
I do not want it to say debit.
[00:25:41] Will Johnson: They used to have these.
[00:25:42] Frank Abagnale: Right.
So I say to my bank, I only want a ATM card.
[00:25:52] Frank Abagnale: Right.
[00:26:32] MUSIC SEGUE
[00:26:34] Will Johnson: Jen, thanks for being here once again.
[00:26:35] Jen Beam: Hi Will, thanks for having me.
[00:26:37] Will Johnson: What a segment we have planned with you.
This is a Jen Beam tell al.
[00:26:41] Jen Beam: Oh, it is.
[00:26:42] Will Johnson: Jen Beam got scammed.
[00:26:43] Jen Beam: I did, I can’t believe it.
[00:26:52] Will Johnson: It can happen to anyone, anytime, anywhere.
So tell us what happened.
And these two charges were $19.95 a piece, and I saw red.
[00:28:19] Jen Beam: yo come and follow me on facebook.com/fraudwatchnetwork.
[00:28:23] Will Johnson: Alright, thanks once again.
Thanks to my cohost, The Fraud Watch web connection Ambassador, Frank Abagnale.
[00:28:31] Frank Abagnale: Great being here, Will.
Thanks for having me.
For AARP - The Perfect Scam, I’m Will Johnson.
