November 10, 2025
James Altucher
Eric O’Neill once took down the most dangerous spy in U.S. history with nothing more than a PalmPilot.
And yes, there was a movie about it—Breach.
His new book, Spies, Lies, and Cybercrime, reads like a spy thriller. Except it’s much scarier than Hollywood can imagine.
That’s why I had Eric, now a leading cybersecurity expert, on my podcast last week.
We talked about his past, his story, and what he learned. We also talked about the new battlefield: the dark web, where hackers, spies, and criminals fight a war most people never see.
The Spy Who Hunted Himself
Eric was a young FBI operative when he was asked to do the impossible: go undercover and catch a man so deeply embedded inside U.S. intelligence he was asked to find himself.
His name? Robert Hanssen.
Hanssen was the FBI’s top counterintelligence analyst on Russia, so when the Bureau realized a mole was leaking secrets to Moscow, they turned to him for help. They told him, “We need you to identify who’s betraying us.”
For years, he led that investigation—creating fake leads, misdirecting agents, and sending the FBI on wild goose chases. All while covering his own tracks.
Turned out, he’d been spying for the Soviets for 22 of his 25 years in the FBI.
He gave up America’s nuclear launch plans, our “continuity of government” strategy (where the President and Congress would hide during war), and the names of every spy we had inside the USSR.
Between 1984 and 1985—now known as the “Year of the Spy”—America lost every single asset in the Soviet Union. All of them were executed or imprisoned. We were blind. Hanssen was the reason.
Eric had to live with him. Work beside him. Earn his trust. And somehow—without training in undercover work—catch him red-handed.
When Hanssen bragged about spycraft, Eric took notes. When he boasted about tradecraft, Eric paid attention.
And eventually, Eric stole Hanssen’s PalmPilot, cloned it, and replaced it before Hanssen noticed. That data led to Hanssen’s capture on a cold bridge in Virginia in 2001.
And, if you can believe it…
That turned out to be the least terrifying story Eric shared.
The Dark Web Is Real—And Worse Than You Think
The “dark web” isn’t some mysterious separate network. It’s part of the same internet you and I use—only hidden beneath the surface.
Imagine the internet as a cave:
- The surface web is the sunlit mouth of the cave—Google, Amazon, social media.
- The deep web is deeper in—your medical records, your bank accounts, the places protected by passwords.
- And then there’s the dark web, the black abyss where the worst of humanity thrives.
Eric described “markets” where you can buy anything—hacked identities, ransomware software, even human beings.
Yes, he said that. Human trafficking markets where you can “bid” on victims and even download PDF instructions on how to build a soundproof dungeon.
It sounds like dystopian fiction. It isn’t. It’s happening today. And millions of people access it every year.
The Rise of the Cybercrime Cartels
Eric told me about LockBit—a Russian ransomware syndicate that attacked a humanitarian NGO working in Ukraine. They demanded $5 million to avoid releasing sensitive refugee data.
They even called Eric directly. The hacker had his personal number, scraped from stolen files.
“Just get them to pay,” the hacker said. “They’ve got insurance.”
Then there’s Scattered Spider, the group that shut down MGM Resorts in Vegas.
They didn’t hack firewalls. They picked up the phone, pretended to be MGM IT staff, and convinced another employee to reset passwords.
Ten minutes later, every casino was offline—elevators frozen, keycards failing, slot machines dark. MGM lost hundreds of millions.
But it gets worse…
The AI-Scam Era Has Begun
Eric estimates there are six billion stolen passwords floating around the dark web. Most of them cost pennies.
If you’re reading this, yours is probably one of them.
Your only defense? Two-factor authentication. Updates. Awareness. The boring stuff that prevents catastrophe.
One of the scariest stories Eric shared: scammers cloning a loved one’s voice using AI.
You get a call. It’s your daughter, crying. “Dad, I’m in jail. I hit someone with my car.” Then a lawyer gets on the line asking for bail money. It’s all fake—but the voice sounds exactly like her.
It’s a perfect scam.
The solution? Eric says every family should create a secret “code word.” Something only you know. If the code word isn’t used, hang up.
What I Learned
Espionage never ended. It just moved online.
The new spies don’t wear trench coats. They sit behind screens. They don’t steal nuclear plans—they steal you.
The battle for your data, your identity, your trust—that’s the new Cold War.
And if you’re not protecting yourself, you’re already losing.
You can listen to my full conversation with Eric O’Neill here: Spies, Lies, and Cybercrime: Former FBI on the Dark Web and FBI Secrets.
Read his book. It’s terrifying—but it’ll make you smarter, safer, and harder to hack.
Because as Eric told me: “The only defense against cybercrime is knowledge. Once you see the punch coming, it’s a lot harder to get hit.”
