So, Morgan and I went to grad school together at NYU so I guess I've known her for almost 11 years. Or... oh hey, that's the new beeps video. It's pulled away from the wall about, I don't know, five feet, just in case there's somebody set up next door. Was to acquire a computer. And if you look at the video you see, he, like, just freezes. [inaudible 00:28:05] I take the DVD out of the connected computer, walk across the air gap, if you will. And then you can go back into the Bitcoin ledger and search their entire history, can figure out all their business dealings, all their personal dealings, who they know, who they don't know, possibly who their bank is. Where's this coming from? It was all going great until, in the middle of it, something started to behave a little...strangely. Each with their own compute nodes, security cameras set up, ready to help Zooko make this big, random number. Uh, g-, y- get Morgan's phone out of here and otherwise no change. I had no idea. Privacy is a shared resource, it's a sh-, or it's a share-, it's something we share with each other. That's actually why they keep it open. And how does it resolve? Dillon Keefe is our director of sound design. Uh, we will link you to it from radiolab.org. But they don't really reach a conclusion. Before security cameras came with wifi. Reported by Molly Webster. Yeah I love the Gandalf hat. I'm Jad Abumrad. A field of air. So then he, being like the privacy, security cipher punk guru (laughs), he becomes the leader of something called Zcash. Okay, so here we are. Here's the decision, here's what we're gonna do. Denver Ceremony station recordings were created by media maker Nathaniel Kramer, with help from Daniel Cooper. Yeah, it was late, and, um, I took the computer that we used, the so called compute node, and then from that moment forward, I kept that thing like within arms reach for f-, for 48 hours or so. Over the years it has evolved to become a platform for long-form journalism and storytelling. He gives everyone basically, like, the batting order and then-. The idea was, nobody will actually have the key itself. We have to make sure that nobody can, uh, guess or read this secret. Um, she's sittin' on the giant, I have a big floor pillow, like a Turkish floor pillow. Because Morgan says the birth of Bitcoin goes back to, well, remember 2008? So most of the weekend was just kind of sittin' around. Uploads his answer, then station three grabs and combines it with their key, gets a little bit more of an answer. Where sound illuminates ideas, and the boundaries blur between science, philosophy, and human experience. But where's this hotel? So eventually they just decide to turn off her phone. So basically what happens is, like, Morgan comes back from her walk. The private key, so, each s- of the six stations was actually creating one piece of this key. Ground floor. This is Radiolab. Like, were all the protocols and the video footage and all that stuff, was it all enough? Way to go, Nat. He figured if these people have hacked into Morgan's phone, we have so many security measures in place that we can keep going and we'll figure this out later. Oh my God. Like, I remember when Morgan was telling me this story, thinking, if someone had hacked into Morgan's phone, how long had they been hacked in for? And like, oh, weird, I was kind of hacked. But here, no one would ever know. Support Radiolab by becoming a member today at Radiolab.org/donate. We were like, okay. Probably this one. Yeah. Radiolab is one of the most beloved podcasts and public radio shows in the world. Um, may- I think it's a good time to just say what was happening. Uh, so this is actually a security measure, uh, like if you're totally in the dark about what you're doing, then some hackers, they can't, they can't mount an attack. Obviously, it has become associated with cyber crime. Uh, for about an hour, Morgan and Zooko go back and forth about what to do with her phone. And math. Yeah, he is. (laughs) Like, that has so much of my work on it and my-. Produced by Matt Kielty and Molly Webster. So if the goal on some level, at the very beginning of this conversation was to inspire the community to then use it, it seems like it, it has, it has done that. I can't take the battery out of it." The show is known for its deep-dive journalism and innovative sound design. Testing. One cool, one really cool thing about these security cameras is that they don't have a radio. In general, I'm not gonna help out. And that's what he tried to do. She wasn't clear on the notion of ethernet. The show is known for its deep-dive journalism and innovative sound design. Zooko decides... We'll have a ceremony. The Ceremony. In other words, in the ledger, you never see anyone's actual name. PBS won four prizes in the 2021 Alfred I. DuPont-Columbia Awards, an annual recognition of some of the best work in the reaml of audio and video journalism. Everybody. Over the years it has evolved to become a platform for long-form journalism and storytelling. Support Radiolab by becoming a member today at Radiolab.org/donate. All you need to know is that Zcash promises to give you decentralization with this like, buffet of privacy. Ransomware. Digital money called-. That's so good. Millennium has rooms and it has ethernet. The hijackers held the files ransom, demanding roughly 650 euros paid in Bitcoin. Does anyone tell you you sound like Tom Hardy? But Bitcoin has not gon away. Can we get a side by side comparison of two different ones. Radiolab Podcast - The Ceremony | Free Listening on Podbean App Preparing the, doing my computations, now. What the compute node does it is it takes all those random characters and it combines it with more random characters that are generated, like, inside the computer until finally it creates a part of the key. We use cookies on our website to improve your user experience and to collect statistical data such as number of unique visitors and time spent on our website. So the audio coming out of her phone is not originating from in the room, it's, it's somehow the Google ch- Hangout chat? Was there a, like a, c- t- t- t- t- a titter in the air? So we all piled into the van, set off. Oh, so you ended in the, in the, in the, in the spirit of the whole-. Um, I'm calling from sunny Seattle, Washington. And I said, "Yeah." ... then they don't know what they're gonna do. Halfway through, something strange happens. Over the years it has evolved to become a platform for long-form journalism and storytelling. I groaned and said, uh, oh there's work to do. What would it take for you to donate your phone to science? It was a little bit exhausting trying to be paranoid, and it-. Is anything gonna happen if I go take a little walk? Radiolab is one of the most beloved podcasts and public radio shows in the world. Hell yeah. Revulsion. Because all the guys at these stations have ripped out the wifi in their compute node. He zeroes in on this mic that's on the corner of the computer that's doing the Google Hangouts. Before we even started. (laughs) We were like, "Hey, there's a costume store.". 'Cause we don't want a hacker to be able to hack into the compute node. Libertarians were really into it. The way that the, the, uh, technology works is that, uh, it tracks every single transaction that's every made on the network. And as the hours roll by, things are going really well, people are getting their math done, they're passing along these answers, they're getting closer to having their key, when, maybe half way into the process, things get strange. And in my eyes Morgan has become, like, the historian of the world of digital money. Falling. And you wanna do this in such a way that those pieces never touch each other, that they remain hidden so that n- no person could ever get their hands on the power of the whole key. Mm-hmm (affirmative). While it's trivial to make your own currency, it is not trivial to, um, inspire trust. But you were very immediately, like, the opposite. Oh, so Bitcoin was after the big collapse. Please insert a blank DVD to burn disc keys in and then press enter. Back to the top of the order. No? It was recorded live on YouTube and was also uploaded on RadioLab. The Washington Post’s daily podcast takes … Why DVD? But it all starts with this number, this key. She said this, it is group of people that care deeply about how to make the internet more private. The problem is that while there are no names attached, the behavior is out there for anyone to see. Share this on Facebook (Opens in a new window), Share this on Twitter (Opens in a new window), Copyright © 2019 New York Public Radio. So what we did was, we stripped the room of all of the lamps and the telephone. Denver Ceremony station recordings were created by media maker Nathaniel Kramer, with help from Daniel Cooper. That is appropriate. Maybe you didn't even set the cameras up the way you said you did. How do I, if I want super privacy, which he does, how do I generate this number in such a way that no one steals it. Did you connect your phone to this Hangout? In this week's episode we head to The Ceremony, the top-secret, three-day launch of a new currency — wizards and math included. Longtime co-host Robert Krulwich … No one can trace that money. When he first encountered Bitcoin, he was, like, "Cool.". ... which henceforth is given a new name. Okay. Radiolab won two of the contest’s … And then I think Zooko says something like-. What shall we do? Yeah. Zcash is a cryptocurrency build on Bitcoin's code base that is dedicated to protecting your privacy. Uh, Robert Krulwich will be back with us very soon. Listen 46:00. The podcast Radiolab has been added to your home screen. It was after, and it was very much a response to that, definitely. Give me a second. The show challenges its listeners’ preconceived notions about how the world works. But... Zcash has its own flaw. The shape of, what I mean is, the shape of what's, of, of possibility, of-. … Do you have, uh, do you have pictures of people? Come to this, uh, coffee store in Boulder. Radiolab is produced by Jad Abumrad. I take a dollar bill out of my pocket, I walk down the street, I give it to someone, they give it to someone. We're thrilled to present a … Test, test. And then I slid my hands under the cardboard box. So that's insane! Show Radiolab, Ep The Ceremony - Jul 14, 2017 Today, paranoia sets in: we head to The Ceremony, the top-secret, three-day launch of a new currency, wizards and math included. I start listening to that, and I'm like, I think it's coming from over here. The greatest wizard of all. Yeah, I start, like, pin pointing it to, like, the, the part of the room that has the security cameras monitor. (laughs). I put it in the e-, in my bedroom and I put it under pillows and I turned it off, I came back, I sat down. We drove down using our paper map with our cellphones off to the computer store. Yeah, you're not gonna miss much, uh, that's, uh, that's planned or scheduled. And, and I almost feel like I don't even have a right to give over that phone if I haven't talked to the people that, that that would be exposing. Here we- what about that thing? ", Yeah, I was (laughs) so excited. Reported by Molly Webster. And this echo comes back. (laughs) Yeah. Shall we abort the ceremony? I have an iPhone. That way they'll be no one person that makes the entire key. So Morgan gets on a flight to Denver, rents a car to Boulder, and goes to the coffee shop. ... if you swipe down there's that thing that's next to the thing. The things that are on my phone that are private are not only private for me they're private for, for anyone I was talking to. Another reason is I hate TVs. And then it's, like, wait who else did you talk to? The next thing we needed to do-. Created in 2002 by host Jad Abumrad, the program began as an exploration of scientific inquiry. Testing. Listen to the Radiolab podcast report of the ceremony. I'm muting all my mics. You know? The show is known for its deep-dive journalism and innovative sound design. So what Zooko decided to do was get in touch with all these guys all over the world and try and decentralize this trust. Any time anyone with a Bitcoin buys a coffee or a pound of heroin, that transaction is kept in something called the public ledger. Suddenly the phone stops doing the weird thing it was doing. Man, I don't know h- Should we throw it in the river? ... he sends a message called the go message to station one. Listen to The Ceremony and 147 more episodes by Radiolab, free! All right, so please don't put anything on this desk from here on out. Is i-, this is very much like an immaculate conception. So they unplug it, slide it under one of the beds... Goodbye, TV. Couple tables, you know, you got your two beds. Diagnostics complete. Oh my God, it's like worlds upon worlds that are opening for us. You have a protective field, basically, around the computer that holds the secret. … Want to explain again why you're keeping it away from the wall? In November of 2016, journalist Morgen Peck showed up at her friend Molly Webster's apartment in Brooklyn, told her to take her battery out of her phone, and began to tell her about The Ceremony, a moment last fall when a group of, well, let's just call them wizards, came together in an undisclosed location to launch a new currency. Oh, oh crap, you exchanged those text messages that weren't on Signal. To give you the best possible experience, this site uses cookies. And so, I'm gonna cover my keyboard with this special box. But there needs to be a baby. Back to work. ... downloads that little answer, puts it onto a DVD. Accuracy and availability may vary. Just-, ... just sittin' on (laughs) just, just sittin' on the floor pillow. But for Morgan... What attracted her to this whole world, what made her go... She was, like, pulled in by the idealism of it. Could the ceremony be trusted. I'm gonna take a walk 'cause I feel really claustrophobic. That's coming through her phone? I think, I don't know, I'm sorry, I don't-. Shall we, um, focus our attention on some sort of investigation of Morgan's phone? All rights reserved. And each of the other five participants had to do the same thing. What in the world is happening on Wall Street? And was like, we'll talk about it. ... he picks up the phone from the end of her bed and hands it to her and is like, "Can you pull up the screen?". Pretty excited I 'm sorry, I do n't know, it 's coming! Example, which could be remotely controlled by an adversary do was get in touch with all these random and. M- where they 're focused on the phone. cameras is that Zcash promises to give the... Digital currencies for a long time RSA decryption key we 'll talk about it. out there anyone. Civilized conversation of, what all apps are running on this phone of math at any by... Believed his name with another man: Abdul Latif Nasser, detainee 244 at Guantanamo Bay want to buy this. 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