IEEE Spectrum Story: Vegas 911

Vegas 911 - "A sin city programmer busted some of the biggest swindlers of all time.  Now he's helping the Feds nail terrorists."

This story by David Kushner in the April 2006 edition of IEEE Spectrum is one of the most accurate stories about my work that I have ever seen.  David’s attention to detail and magazine’s fact checking process was unparalleled.

I would have never guessed that my work to help the gaming industry to better understand who they were doing business with – and all those weekly meetings with the principals and investigators behind Griffin Investigations where we developed strategies and tactics to deal with the “MIT team” (as described in Ben Mezrich’s book “Bringing Down the House”) – would have turned out to be so widely known.  I guess at the time I thought this behind-the-scenes and somewhat private story would go untold.

Come to think of it, I may have to add some more color to this story one day.  Like how we closed the gap in the window between “detect and preempt” to minutes – even when dealing with their brand new, never before seen, recruits.  Or, the other highly organized team that was operating at the same time, which seemed even more threatening, that to this day is hardly talked about.  But, I’ll have to check with my old friends from “back in the day” to make sure such fun stories don’t effect any trust half-life curves. 

Stay tuned, I have a few Las Vegas "cops and robbers" stories of my own.

Comments

[Louie Montion]

Jeff, I have been fascinated going through your blogs. You live a fascinating life old friend. I have a hard time believing that you are the same guy that I had so many fun times with. Give me a call if you ever have time for an old friend.

Louie