#they did obviously go out to other places to do their work but like it was mainly there

[lacrimosathedark]

There's something that's bothering me about Alastor

I noticed something about Alastor's magic.

So Alastor's magic has either a red or green color at any given time.

Usually, it's green.

But, occasionally, it is red.

It's always red in flashbacks, and the two other times it appears red, Alastor is being intentionally threatening. It also may correlate to his shadow being active.

My concern with the green comes, partially, from this.

The bright green of his magic is the same as those stitching his mouth and arm. (Also now I'm worried his arm was ripped off at some point)

This could entirely be a stylistic choice, but if his magic only started being mainly green recently, maybe it has something to do with his deal.

Alastor's mouth being sewn shut and could mean he can't talk about his deal, or otherwise relate to being forced to smile.

I also think this because the spooky ghosty motif is also green, and might be representative of souls, in regards to Alastor at least, considering this:

and that Husk's leash is green too.

He also repeatedly rejects offers of collecting souls.

Rosie: Ya know, Alastor. I got a primo connect on a guy with about eight blocks of territory and not enough goons to run it. Prime pickins for a deal to be made, my friend. Alastor: Appreciate the offer, but we're here on business of another kind.

Gaining souls is how Sinners get stronger it seems. And we know he's not opposed to collecting souls as he already owns Husk and Niffty. So part of his deal could stipulate that he can't collect more souls for one reason or another.

What had me thinking, and what really worries me, is this.

The shield he makes in The Show Must Go On sticks out to me. Because the base of it is shadows, and there's that eye motif that is likely indicative of Roo. All of that is black outlined in red. But the veves are all outlined green, and there's this green mist near the base of the dome. Why are the symbols green but the eyes and other crack-like shadows aren't?

I think it might be possible that Alastor had a deal of some sort with Roo almost as soon as he got to Hell. But more recently, he has a new deal, one that limits him in some way, and likely one that forced him to the Hotel if Roo herself didn't order him to. And it's likely got something to do with Lilith, given their absences of the past seven years coinciding and then Alastor returning and going straight to Lilith's daughter.

Whatever this deal is, it limits his abilities. His figurative wings are clipped.

But this raises more questions for me. If he made some sort of deal with Roo or another entity for power, but he still owned his soul, what did he trade in the first place?

If he had so much power already, what would he have to gain from a deal that limits his strength and growth so much, especially at the cost of his own freedom? His own soul?

Who is this new contract with? Roo? Lilith? Eve? And why?

That also leads me to question, are he and Lilith allies or enemies?

Can your soul be owned between multiple parties if they make a deal with each other? Like, if Roo owned his soul and made a deal with Lilith to effectively share ownership, would that work? And what would that mean for them?

And, quite frankly, why Alastor? Was it convenience? Was it his connection to Roo?

This is in conjunction with something I noticed about those eyes that are all over Pride.

They don't appear naturally in any other Rings. And the motif only happens in two places.

There's Loo Loo Land in the Greed Ring.

Which, I'll remind you, is apparently a knock-off of a theme park Lucifer made, Lucifer's domain being Pride where these eyes are naturally occurring. Meaning the eye motif is probably just more mimicry. Especially since they aren't even red.

And then there's one room in Millie's family's house in Wrath.

It's obviously just a design, since none of them move and they look pretty flat, but that stylistic motif is present. The wide red eyes and black shadow tendrils.

And it reminded me of something.

Martha: Satan! We return your FILTHY creatures back to the pits of Hell! May the Root of Evil remain honored as we continue thy work!

If you look around during these scenes, you see a lot of eye imagery, both carved into the pole and scattered about the trees. And then on the top of the pole is Roo's emblem.

So, like, there's some kind of human cult around the Root of All Evil. Enough that the emblem is known.

Martha specifies Satan, who is the Sin of Wrath, where Imps originate. Wrath is the only place there's imagery outside of Pride and Pride-adjacent areas (Loo Loo Land being a knock-off would be just replicating)

So, like...does Wrath or Satan have some kind of connection to Roo??? I mean, Lucifer and Satan are often mushed into one character but are separate here, so maybe it's just human error? Or maybe Roo has some kind of connection with Satan but her influence doesn't extend beyond Pride? I saw somewhere that Imps tend to treat Satan like a god (and they say shit like "oh my Satan" instead of "oh my god") but do they also worship Roo maybe? Or does Satan somehow serve her?

And one of the few places in Pride free of Roo's eyes (to my knowledge at least) is Cannibal Town.

Where everyone's eyes are black voids.

Idk I'm tired and Alastor's whole deal has my head spinning in circles if I'm honest. And I needed to get it out somewhere.

[roslynvb]

Hey if you’re taking requests can you please write Mizu having a goth gf it’s fine if not^^

(hi bae!! yes ofc! also I would like to apologize for being so inactive! I hope you’ll forgive me and I do plan on writing more for blue eye samurai later so please be patient with me!! Also please take note that I try to be as gender neutral as possible in order to make my writings enjoyable for everyone!Thank you for requesting I really enjoyed this one! enjoy cuties<3)

ᴹⁱᶻᵘ ʷⁱᵗʰ ᵃ ᵍᵒᵗʰ ᵖᵃʳᵗⁿᵉʳ!

I Imagine that she’s very infatuated with you.

Obviously now, being goth is incredibly shamed upon. So you dressing the way you do during this period is definitely brave.

She most definitely appreciates your sense of style but also might be confused.

She probably wouldn’t understand why you dress the way you do, she might not even be very interested in the music you listen to.

She’s definitely more open than other people are, as she’s been through hate and such herself!

I Imagine she is very supportive of you and will try and get into this genre of music if you two are dating.

I honestly think she would enjoy romantic goth music if you make her listen to it enough.

Doing her makeup would be a fun activity for you both when you’re alone together.

She’s also very comfortable with you.

She knows you most likely have been laughed at, threatened, maybe all of the above.

She has too, and she understands.

“I- uh.. is this necessary?” Mizu complains, moving her face away from your hand. You’re currently doing her eyeliner, highly exaggerated and you’ve been working for almost 15 minutes on one eye. Wiping off and redoing many mistakes.

“You said it would be fine if I did this, please don’t back out now! All my hard work would go to waste Mizu.” You say back to her, moving her face back to where it was before. You steady your wrist on the bottom side of her face and continue with her eyeliner. She sighs dramatically, but rests her eyes after a bit, giving you a much better experience.

You finish a bit later and give her a mirror.

“So? What do you think?” You ask her, holding up the in front of her face as she opens her eyes.

“It’s..different. But I suppose I could get used to this.” She softly grabs the mirror out of your hands and places it down. She cups your face and smiles at you. “Thank you for this.” She kisses your cheek and leans into your neck.

“You’re welcome..also please don’t smudge it. It was a lot of work!”

[lovezbrownies]

Hide and Seek. (Yandere Queen x GN!Reader.)

Masterlist

Synopsis: First you hid from the queen, as she seeked. Then you both hide as the queen's assistant seeks you two.

Queen Nia x GN!Reader

Warnings: Panicking, oveethinking, interruptions, heavily suggestive at the very end. MDNI.

She felt crazy. Nia couldn’t find you anywhere! And she kept going in circles! She’d search the entirety of Khas, then she’d think “What if they went into one of the rooms I just left?” And search all over again. It’s been two hours and she’s starting to get depressed, are you hiding away from her? Did she do something to upset you? You should know by now Nia doesn’t mean to upset you, she just doesn’t know how to talk normally. Please please please pleas– “Ah! Hannah!!” Nia caught sight of her favored assistant, she literally did everything for her, she barely works with Hannah there.

Hannah turned to see her queen, bowing softly as she looked down at Nia, clipboard in hand.Queen Nia let out a tired breath, “Have you seen my loved one? I’ve been searching all over the place and I cannot for the life of me find them!” A frown was on Nia’s face, her arms crossed, her foot tapping impatiently against the marble floors. 

“Ah they’re at the park with the ducks at the moment.” Hannah stated plainly.

Nia scoffed, “We don’t have a park or ducks in the palace, silly!”

Hannah rolled her eyes, well obviously. “Why yes, we don’t. I let them go out to a recently opened park somewhere near the palace.” Nia gasped, no way she let you go out! And Nia thought Hannah was smart but since hearing this her outlook on Hannah is completely different. Oh goodness, her poor darling is probably distraught, oh my what if you were getting hit on? What if some random person strikes a small conversation with you?! Oh heavens! “Well, where is this so-called park! I need to save my darling from idle chit-chat!”

A smirk came across Hannah’s face, this all was revenge, because the day before Nia had called one of Hannah’s new ideas stupid and she did not take kindly to that. So, Hannah took you out to the aforementioned park. Spoke with you for a while, what a delightful person you are, and then went back to the palace, anticipating Nia to immediately bombard her with questions of where you currently were. Now this is the part where she finally gets her sweet revenge. “Well, my queen, don’t be so rash! You’re still 28, you cannot possibly show your face to the public now can you? Maybe have some faith in your love and let them come back on their own!”

Queen Nia huffed, stomping away to her room. Nothing is going to stop her today! She will save you from the dreaded short awkward conversations you always complain of! Who is she, as your wife, if she won’t sacrifice her dignity for you! Picking up the old cloak, the same one she used to go and see you before she married you. And went through that old passage she used to take to sneak out and see you. Now. She only has to find that pesky park! Although scared, she will persevere to save her spouse!

But thankfully, as soon as she stepped off the ladder to the outside world she bumped into someone she couldn’t see due to the hood that is hiding her face, Nia scoffed loudly. They spoke up, “S-sor- Wait, Nia? Is that you?” Nia froze, pulling the hood off she saw her angel! How independent you are! Her sweet dove! “Ah my darling! I was so worried that someone had forced you to chit-chat with them, but it seems like you already had given them a piece of your mind and moved on, right?” You were still so confused, she allowed you to go out after all, or that’s what Hannah had told you before accompanying you to that park.

You enjoyed your time, Hannah gave you some bird seed to feed the ducks and spoke with you for a while before going back. You tried to avoid other people, you didn’t like to speak to strangers at all, but you did meet this guy who you had bonded with over feeding the cute ducks. It doesn’t matter who they were since you didn’t share contact information. “What? Nia what? Didn-'' Nia gasped, suddenly realizing where you two are.

“Oh dear! Let’s get back to our room, or else the guards might hear us! Don’t want to get another lecture from the Chief of Police again now do we?” Nia grabbed your wrist and pulled you towards the ladder, “Come, let’s continue this in our room, I want to hear every detail of your amazing bravery!” Pushing you towards the ladder she motioned you to go first, even trying to pick you up and help you up but alas she’s still far too short and weak.

Once you two finally reached your shared bedroom, Nia launched herself onto her bed, twisting her body over to where you were sitting, a reading chair next to a big bookshelf, her head on her hands, she smiled widely, waiting for your amazing adventurous story. “Well, my love, do go on!” You sigh, drinking up a cup of water you opened your mouth, ready to speak your mind. “So the duck-” A knock interrupted you before you could even begin. Maybe this palace was cursed. You can barely speak a word in this palace without being cut off.

Nia jumped up, pulling you up from the chair she pushed you into the bathroom, gesturing at you to stay quiet. As she closed the bathroom door, the door to the bedroom opened, someone called out, “My queen?” It was Hannah. Nia could barely hold her giggles, she took you by the hand, whispering in your ear, “Stay quiet, but go lay down in the bathtub.”

You nodded, doing as you’re told, this was a little fun you must admit. Nia has her quirks but she makes life fun to live in. She stepped behind the tub’s curtains, closing them slowly so as to not create any noise. Even though there was enough space in the big bathtub for her to lay beside you she decided to just lie down on top of you, cuddling into you, almost purring at how nice you smell.

You heard the closet doors opening and closing, Hannah’s footsteps getting closer and closer, while you were focused on not getting caught Nia was focused on getting your attention back. Huffing as she saw you eye at the curtains, you weren’t looking at her! And that was something she decided to change, she began rubbing parts of your body as sensually as she can, you looked down at Nia, a devious smile on her face. “Nia wha-” Nia shushed you, “Stay quiet, don’t wanna get caught getting steamy in front of Hannah.” 

Just as she says this one of her hands made its way down to your crotch, she rubbed your crotch harshly once and then tiny feathery touches here and there, you squeaked as she played with you through your clothes. You slammed your hand against your mouth when you heard the bathroom door clicking open. “Nia? Are you here?” Hearing that Hannah had finally come into the bathroom Nia grabbed and rubbed at your crotch harsher than she did before, making it hard not to let out the lewdest of moans.

The evil queen had suddenly stopped, leaving you needy, softly thrusting up to her hand, wanting more. Nia, still grinning wildly, shook her head in disagreement. As soon as Hannah sighed in exasperation and you both heard the bedroom door closed, Nia immediately went back to work, leaving you a mess in the bathtub. Nia sat up, straddling your lap, she reached over and turned on the water nozzle. “Whoops, looks like we gotta take off our clothes and shower together~” You two spent a long while in that tub.

[eddiediazismyhusband]

lmao buck didnt ditch tommy last episode, he just made a pit stop before going to spend the night with tommy, like do you think he spent the whole night there? and yeah, this episode, if he does leave tommy to go help eddie, that's what friends do ?? like what do you expect him to do, just ignore his friends life completely falling apart? buck is an adult relationship and adults respect the fact that they arent always going to be no 1 first priority ALL of the time. tommy respects that, especially because eddie is actively in a spiral, and honestly it's really refreshing to see such a healthy depiction of the balance between romantic/platonic relationships. i mean how many times have other couples been interrupted by similar emergencies, this is literally the emergency show like. yeah obviously when there is an emergency, the characters are going to drop everything and go to it. I swear you people have never had adult relationships, romantic or platonic, because you see a normal healthy relationship and are incapable of enjoying it. "not anti bi buck, just anti tommy kinard" not anti bi buck, just anti any relationship buck has with a man that isn't eddie

wow what did i say?? that was quick!

if you think buck left eddie’s house after hearing eddie say the words “yeah me too” in reference to being worried about him, then you do not know buck at all.

also when have we seen tommy respecting anything with buck? you all live in these made up scenarios that lou blabs on cameo when in reality all we have seen is tommy constantly be dismissive towards buck unless buck is actively paying sole attention to him. that is not a perfect and healthy relationship.

tommy is constantly speaking down to buck, calling him “kid” and refusing to call buck by the name he chose for himself. that is not the sign of someone who cares about buck to me.

as for being against any relationship buck is in with s man…. give me a man who actually shows that he gives a flying fuck about buck. give me a man who isn’t constantly being condescending and rude. give me a man who’s whole backstory wasn’t as a tool to put hen and chimney through hell at the 118. if buck was dating literally any other guy i wouldn’t be anywhere near as fed up with this plotline; but the fact of the matter is we have BARELY seen anything between them that isn’t tommy being a dick to buck unless buck is kissing him. that doesn’t read as a positive and healthy relationship to me. you all claim to care about buck so much, but then actively defend everything tommy does that is rude and condescending to buck as if buck somehow deserves it.

i am capable of enjoying normal healthy adult relationships because i have watched this show for seven years. i have seen these characters drop things for emergencies. i have picked up on the patterns they have laid down in previous storylines. i have experience working in filmmaking and know how to read into things.

normally i look at these asks and laugh because i don’t like to give a platform to people like you who hide begind anon to try and make buddie shippers out to be monsters but the fact that that post hasn’t even been up for ten minutes and you already felt the need to type a whole anon ask about how wrong i am when none of what you’ve pointed out has any canonical evidence of living in the truth? i have to laugh.

the block button is free. filtering out the anti tags is free. if you’re one of my followers…. when have i ever posted anything that would make you think i was pro tommy in any way that got you to follow me in the first place?

since you sent the ask on anon and i have no way of doing it myself, i invite you to go to my page and press the block button… the anti tags exist for a reason and if you don’t wanna see anti tommy content, either filter out the tags or block my blog. simple as that.

[notaplaceofhonour]

Understanding Alex Jones’s place in the Bush-era anti-war scene would do the left a lot of good in understanding (and not repeating) similar mistakes that the current anti-war scene is making today.

For those who aren’t old enough to remember, there was actually a time when Alex Jones had a decent amount of goodwill on the far left. He was obviously always a lunatic conspiracy theorist, and most everyday people saw him as such, but there was a significant enough portion of the anti-war left that liked him, that actually promoted InfoWars, appeared on AJ’s show, and linked arms with him at anti-war protests.

Without the momentum that his Bush-era popularity gave him, Jones would not have become a recognizable or relevant media figure like he did. The model InfoWars pioneered, which helped pave the way for the entire far right griftosphere that sprang up around it—from Breitbart to OAN & the Epoch Times to the sea of smaller Q-fluencers—owes its success in part to this diagonal reach across political lines. The extreme right wing conspiracy theory platform that has all but consumed the GOP would not have been able to gain nearly as much of a foothold if it were not for the years of work InfoWars & outlets like it did to normalize it in the Bush years.

Obviously I am not going so far as to say “The Left Is Solely Responsible For Alex Jones™️”. But much of the anti-war/anti-government left absolutely participated in helping him rise to prominence. They were willing to jump in bed with Jones without paying attention to his work or else were willing to turn a blind eye to who Jones was, all because he was saying things that were convenient to their cause. It didn’t matter that he was a rightwing or grade-A bigot; he opposed the US government & the war.

And I’m fully aware that there’s a common refrain among a lot of that “I used to listen to InfoWars” section of the left that would push back against this and say, “well, yeah, Jones is obviously a fascist now, but back then he wasn’t like that; he was kooky back then, sure, but the pre-Sandy Hook, pre-Gay Frogs Jones wasn’t nearly as bigoted or rightwing as the ‘Hillary For Prison’ Trump-era Jones became”.

To that I say, no, that’s bullshit. If you actually go back and listen to his show from back then… holy shit. He was homophobic as fuck. He was racist as fuck. The entire NWO/Globalist framework that he hangs all his other conspiracy theories on is built around antisemitic tropes from the Protocols of the Elders of Zion he regularly hosted & promoted explicit antisemites like his pastor Texe Marrs, who openly espoused that Jews (often named as such) controlled the world politically, financially, and religiously through Zionism, a global banking cartel, and Communism. In some ways, Jones was even more transparent then than he is now.

“Okay, but what does this have to do with the current anti-war movement?” I hear you say. “I never fell for Alex Jones; I’ve always hated that guy.”

To begin with, you should be on the lookout for the internal biases and lack of vetting that lead the left to tolerate Jones in the first place, whether you think you’re liable to or not (arguably, it is all that much more important when you think you aren’t, because you are never more susceptible than when you think you aren’t). But unfortunately much of the anti-war left of today has been making the same mistake, just with different people and organizations.

Take for instance Jackson Hinkle, a tradcath & self-described “MAGA Communist”, who has gotten a lot of traction with the leftwing anti-Zionist crowd (and I would be remiss not to mention, has also been a guest on InfoWars). Or take another AJ, the media outlet Al Jazeera, which says a lot of things that are attractive to the left out one side of its mouth while spewing a bunch of rightwing theocratic garbage out the other, much like Bush-era InfoWars did. Take PSL/ANSWER (Pro-Putin Pro-Assad Pro-Xi atrocity denialists & conspiracy theorists) are one of the most common fixtures of the current protest movement, regularly advertised as organizers by other prominent organizations like JVP & SJP. A lot of people on the left have been embracing figures and organizations that espouse Khazar Theory, Deicide, Media Control, and Blood Libels not at all dissimilar to the accusations you could hear from Jones and his pastor friend Texe Marrs, with the same figleaf of “anti-Zionism” that Marrs frequently used himself.

Whether by sheer ignorance or willfully turning a blind eye, the left keeps making the same mistake of tolerating & even embracing figures & organizations with similarly noxious politics & conspiracy thinking now that was made with Bush-era InfoWars. We need to do better. We need to learn from the past so we can stop repeating its mistakes.

[kittycatxoxo1]

AU where a curse hits Gojo and Geto (and maybe Nanami) and it transports them in front of Shoko and obviously she's like "omg what the actual fuck?!"

After they calm her down and explain what happened thinking she would know what kinda curse it might be only to be shocked that she lives in a world where curses and jujutsu sorcerers don't exist, she calls Gojo and asks for him to come over.

Gojo gets to Shoko's and is also shocked at seeing another him, he is also completely pissed at Geto and won't tell the other Gojo why he's so pissed.

Shoko talks Gojo into letting them stay at his house since his is bigger (Cough rich Cough) going into the house Gojo and Geto see pictures that obviously has Geto cut out of them but they see more and more of the other Gojo with that world's Nanami and wonder why did they get closer.

AUgojo actually knows how to cook shocking the original Gojo and Geto since OGgojo doesn't know how to cook.

After AUgojo fixes up a nice supper AUnanami comes through the front door, he hangs his work jacket, puts on his slippers and walks up to AUgojo and gives him a kiss. OGgojo and Geto are even more shocked and they find out that this world's Nanami and Gojo got closer after the falling out with Geto and they are now three years married.

OGgeto also finds out that AUgojo thought that him and this world's Geto was in a committed relationship only to find out that AUgeto only thought of them as friends so that's why AUgojo was so pissed at OGgeto.

OGgeto and gojo were shocked to find out that toji was alive in that world and was also AUgojo's next door neighbor. He is actually pretty cool, he's sarcastic and has good dry humor, he's still not the best because he does still gamble but not as bad as OGtoji and he's actually raising Megumi pretty well and AUgojo babysits from time to time.

I don't know how I would end it maybe after they go back to their own world Geto keeps up his hatred for none sorcerers, Gojo starts hanging around Nanami's work place wondering if he should bother him and Nanami actually makes the first move by asking why he was there and they actually do fall in love or it could be a open ending.

........

Free to use! Just credit me and tell me you're gonna use it!

[bueris]

okay maybe I should seriously reconsider my path in life and sell my soul to marketing or journalism instead

[dashiellqvverty]

my opinion on season 11 is that ian and mickey were all over the place from episode to episode and i ultimately wasn’t very happy with where it ended for them

[yeonban]

It's lovely when I read a book and some random paragraph in it hits me in the face like a train at mach speed

[thetimelordbatgirl]

Watching a video on the woman who cleans graves on tiktok and oh my god, the inner used-to-walk-around-graveyards-when-visiting-dad-at-work is coming out of me in a bad way because holy shit, stop using products that will erode the grave stones faster??? Stop doing so many product placements while talking about someone whose dead??? Stop asking so many weird questions like, 'was she pretty?'??? Like, it'd be one thing if she was being respectful and using products that don't fuck up the grave stones chances further and actually not promoting other products and even her own, but she is only seemingly respectful to graves belonging to people who did stuff like fire fighter duties, everyone else just gets no respect.

[viir-tanadhal]

genuinely do not understand people's preoccupation with the idea that johnny and morrissey's friendship could have at all been long-lasting

[peapod20001]

I like to think that if my tumblr pals came to my house, they’d have a good time

[godsfavoritescientist]

Actual photo of me whenever I try to think of a Bill Redemption Arc that I could write without making it the angstiest plotline ever known to man

[llycaons]

something else I really love about feast and famine is how wwx isn't all 'wow lan zhan you're the best I can't believe you've been putting up with me I'm SO grateful you're literally perfect even though I'm so needy thank you so so so much' bc that sentiment arises in a lot of fics that handle his trauma or mental health and it's SO tiresome not to mention ooc. like it's not there for no reason bc wwx did express gratitude in canon and lwj IS a really good and supportive partner, but it's really refreshing to see wwx in a stable and reliable enough relationship where, except that one time he was triggered and panicking, he literally never once doubted that lwj would support and stand with him, nor did he ever feel the need to even thank lwj for being a good partner, even through the extremely heavy and difficult work of supporting him through what happened

and they DO communicate a lot, it's more that the gratitude is left unsaid because it's mutually understood to be unnecessary. and as much I'm in favor of them communicating their gratitude to each other, I feel like this dynamic for them is so much healthier and more mature and illustrates how strong their relationship is and how much they trust each other. also the idea of lwj as this...saintlike martyr who nobly supports and reassures a self-hating wwx is really tiring. he has his own struggles to be sure, but he has them away from wwx and the writing doesn't frame him as some tragic, self-sacrificing hero for it. like I love lwj but that's what it should be about, right? this was always going to be wwx's story first and foremost and I really appreciate works that let it be that

[cinematicbookworm]

.

[mostlysignssomeportents]

How I got scammed

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/02/05/cyber-dunning-kruger/#swiss-cheese-security

I wuz robbed.

More specifically, I was tricked by a phone-phisher pretending to be from my bank, and he convinced me to hand over my credit-card number, then did $8,000+ worth of fraud with it before I figured out what happened. And then he tried to do it again, a week later!

Here's what happened. Over the Christmas holiday, I traveled to New Orleans. The day we landed, I hit a Chase ATM in the French Quarter for some cash, but the machine declined the transaction. Later in the day, we passed a little credit-union's ATM and I used that one instead (I bank with a one-branch credit union and generally there's no fee to use another CU's ATM).

A couple days later, I got a call from my credit union. It was a weekend, during the holiday, and the guy who called was obviously working for my little CU's after-hours fraud contractor. I'd dealt with these folks before – they service a ton of little credit unions, and generally the call quality isn't great and the staff will often make mistakes like mispronouncing my credit union's name.

That's what happened here – the guy was on a terrible VOIP line and I had to ask him to readjust his mic before I could even understand him. He mispronounced my bank's name and then asked if I'd attempted to spend $1,000 at an Apple Store in NYC that day. No, I said, and groaned inwardly. What a pain in the ass. Obviously, I'd had my ATM card skimmed – either at the Chase ATM (maybe that was why the transaction failed), or at the other credit union's ATM (it had been a very cheap looking system).

I told the guy to block my card and we started going through the tedious business of running through recent transactions, verifying my identity, and so on. It dragged on and on. These were my last hours in New Orleans, and I'd left my family at home and gone out to see some of the pre-Mardi Gras krewe celebrations and get a muffalata, and I could tell that I was going to run out of time before I finished talking to this guy.

"Look," I said, "you've got all my details, you've frozen the card. I gotta go home and meet my family and head to the airport. I'll call you back on the after-hours number once I'm through security, all right?"

He was frustrated, but that was his problem. I hung up, got my sandwich, went to the airport, and we checked in. It was total chaos: an Alaska Air 737 Max had just lost its door-plug in mid-air and every Max in every airline's fleet had been grounded, so the check in was crammed with people trying to rebook. We got through to the gate and I sat down to call the CU's after-hours line. The person on the other end told me that she could only handle lost and stolen cards, not fraud, and given that I'd already frozen the card, I should just drop by the branch on Monday to get a new card.

We flew home, and later the next day, I logged into my account and made a list of all the fraudulent transactions and printed them out, and on Monday morning, I drove to the bank to deal with all the paperwork. The folks at the CU were even more pissed than I was. The fraud that run up to more than $8,000, and if Visa refused to take it out of the merchants where the card had been used, my little credit union would have to eat the loss.

I agreed and commiserated. I also pointed out that their outsource, after-hours fraud center bore some blame here: I'd canceled the card on Saturday but most of the fraud had taken place on Sunday. Something had gone wrong.

One cool thing about banking at a tiny credit-union is that you end up talking to people who have actual authority, responsibility and agency. It turned out the the woman who was processing my fraud paperwork was a VP, and she decided to look into it. A few minutes later she came back and told me that the fraud center had no record of having called me on Saturday.

"That was the fraudster," she said.

Oh, shit. I frantically rewound my conversation, trying to figure out if this could possibly be true. I hadn't given him anything apart from some very anodyne info, like what city I live in (which is in my Wikipedia entry), my date of birth (ditto), and the last four digits of my card.

Wait a sec.

He hadn't asked for the last four digits. He'd asked for the last seven digits. At the time, I'd found that very frustrating, but now – "The first nine digits are the same for every card you issue, right?" I asked the VP.

I'd given him my entire card number.

Goddammit.

The thing is, I know a lot about fraud. I'm writing an entire series of novels about this kind of scam:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865878/thebezzle

And most summers, I go to Defcon, and I always go to the "social engineering" competitions where an audience listens as a hacker in a soundproof booth cold-calls merchants (with the owner's permission) and tries to con whoever answers the phone into giving up important information.

But I'd been conned.

Now look, I knew I could be conned. I'd been conned before, 13 years ago, by a Twitter worm that successfully phished out of my password via DM:

https://locusmag.com/2010/05/cory-doctorow-persistence-pays-parasites/

That scam had required a miracle of timing. It started the day before, when I'd reset my phone to factory defaults and reinstalled all my apps. That same day, I'd published two big online features that a lot of people were talking about. The next morning, we were late getting out of the house, so by the time my wife and I dropped the kid at daycare and went to the coffee shop, it had a long line. Rather than wait in line with me, my wife sat down to read a newspaper, and so I pulled out my phone and found a Twitter DM from a friend asking "is this you?" with a URL.

Assuming this was something to do with those articles I'd published the day before, I clicked the link and got prompted for my Twitter login again. This had been happening all day because I'd done that mobile reinstall the day before and all my stored passwords had been wiped. I entered it but the page timed out. By that time, the coffees were ready. We sat and chatted for a bit, then went our own ways.

I was on my way to the office when I checked my phone again. I had a whole string of DMs from other friends. Each one read "is this you?" and had a URL.

Oh, shit, I'd been phished.

If I hadn't reinstalled my mobile OS the day before. If I hadn't published a pair of big articles the day before. If we hadn't been late getting out the door. If we had been a little more late getting out the door (so that I'd have seen the multiple DMs, which would have tipped me off).

There's a name for this in security circles: "Swiss-cheese security." Imagine multiple slices of Swiss cheese all stacked up, the holes in one slice blocked by the slice below it. All the slices move around and every now and again, a hole opens up that goes all the way through the stack. Zap!

The fraudster who tricked me out of my credit card number had Swiss cheese security on his side. Yes, he spoofed my bank's caller ID, but that wouldn't have been enough to fool me if I hadn't been on vacation, having just used a pair of dodgy ATMs, in a hurry and distracted. If the 737 Max disaster hadn't happened that day and I'd had more time at the gate, I'd have called my bank back. If my bank didn't use a slightly crappy outsource/out-of-hours fraud center that I'd already had sub-par experiences with. If, if, if.

The next Friday night, at 5:30PM, the fraudster called me back, pretending to be the bank's after-hours center. He told me my card had been compromised again. But: I hadn't removed my card from my wallet since I'd had it replaced. Also, it was half an hour after the bank closed for the long weekend, a very fraud-friendly time. And when I told him I'd call him back and asked for the after-hours fraud number, he got very threatening and warned me that because I'd now been notified about the fraud that any losses the bank suffered after I hung up the phone without completing the fraud protocol would be billed to me. I hung up on him. He called me back immediately. I hung up on him again and put my phone into do-not-disturb.

The following Tuesday, I called my bank and spoke to their head of risk-management. I went through everything I'd figured out about the fraudsters, and she told me that credit unions across America were being hit by this scam, by fraudsters who somehow knew CU customers' phone numbers and names, and which CU they banked at. This was key: my phone number is a reasonably well-kept secret. You can get it by spending money with Equifax or another nonconsensual doxing giant, but you can't just google it or get it at any of the free services. The fact that the fraudsters knew where I banked, knew my name, and had my phone number had really caused me to let down my guard.

The risk management person and I talked about how the credit union could mitigate this attack: for example, by better-training the after-hours card-loss staff to be on the alert for calls from people who had been contacted about supposed card fraud. We also went through the confusing phone-menu that had funneled me to the wrong department when I called in, and worked through alternate wording for the menu system that would be clearer (this is the best part about banking with a small CU – you can talk directly to the responsible person and have a productive discussion!). I even convinced her to buy a ticket to next summer's Defcon to attend the social engineering competitions.

There's a leak somewhere in the CU systems' supply chain. Maybe it's Zelle, or the small number of corresponding banks that CUs rely on for SWIFT transaction forwarding. Maybe it's even those after-hours fraud/card-loss centers. But all across the USA, CU customers are getting calls with spoofed caller IDs from fraudsters who know their registered phone numbers and where they bank.

I've been mulling this over for most of a month now, and one thing has really been eating at me: the way that AI is going to make this kind of problem much worse.

Not because AI is going to commit fraud, though.

One of the truest things I know about AI is: "we're nowhere near a place where bots can steal your job, we're certainly at the point where your boss can be suckered into firing you and replacing you with a bot that fails at doing your job":

https://pluralistic.net/2024/01/15/passive-income-brainworms/#four-hour-work-week

I trusted this fraudster specifically because I knew that the outsource, out-of-hours contractors my bank uses have crummy headsets, don't know how to pronounce my bank's name, and have long-ass, tedious, and pointless standardized questionnaires they run through when taking fraud reports. All of this created cover for the fraudster, whose plausibility was enhanced by the rough edges in his pitch - they didn't raise red flags.

As this kind of fraud reporting and fraud contacting is increasingly outsourced to AI, bank customers will be conditioned to dealing with semi-automated systems that make stupid mistakes, force you to repeat yourself, ask you questions they should already know the answers to, and so on. In other words, AI will groom bank customers to be phishing victims.

This is a mistake the finance sector keeps making. 15 years ago, Ben Laurie excoriated the UK banks for their "Verified By Visa" system, which validated credit card transactions by taking users to a third party site and requiring them to re-enter parts of their password there:

https://web.archive.org/web/20090331094020/http://www.links.org/?p=591

This is exactly how a phishing attack works. As Laurie pointed out, this was the banks training their customers to be phished.

I came close to getting phished again today, as it happens. I got back from Berlin on Friday and my suitcase was damaged in transit. I've been dealing with the airline, which means I've really been dealing with their third-party, outsource luggage-damage service. They have a terrible website, their emails are incoherent, and they officiously demand the same information over and over again.

This morning, I got a scam email asking me for more information to complete my damaged luggage claim. It was a terrible email, from a noreply@ email address, and it was vague, officious, and dishearteningly bureaucratic. For just a moment, my finger hovered over the phishing link, and then I looked a little closer.

On any other day, it wouldn't have had a chance. Today – right after I had my luggage wrecked, while I'm still jetlagged, and after days of dealing with my airline's terrible outsource partner – it almost worked.

So much fraud is a Swiss-cheese attack, and while companies can't close all the holes, they can stop creating new ones.

Meanwhile, I'll continue to post about it whenever I get scammed. I find the inner workings of scams to be fascinating, and it's also important to remind people that everyone is vulnerable sometimes, and scammers are willing to try endless variations until an attack lands at just the right place, at just the right time, in just the right way. If you think you can't get scammed, that makes you especially vulnerable:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/24/passive-income/#swiss-cheese-security

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en