This man hid $400 million in a fishing rod. Then it vanished
Smashing Security
Graham Cluley
4.7 • 579 Ratings
🗓️ 1 April 2026
⏱️ 46 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
A cannabis-growing, beekeeping, gyrocopter-flying Irishman invested his drug money in Bitcoin back in 2011 - and now sits on a fortune worth $400 million. There's just one small problem: the access codes were tucked inside his fishing rod case, which has mysteriously vanished. Or has it? Because this week, one of his frozen wallets suddenly woke up and moved $35 million - and someone had to identify themselves to do it.
Meanwhile, Ajax Football Club scores a spectacular cyber own-goal, as a data breach that the club claimed affected "a few hundred" fans turns out to may have exposed the personal details of 300,000 supporters - along with the ability to steal match tickets and quietly remove people from the stadium ban list.
All this and much more in episode 461 of the "Smashing Security" podcast with cybersecurity expert and keynote speaker Graham Cluley, joined this week by special guest journalist Danny Palmer.
EPISODE LINKS:
- Iran-linked hackers breach FBI director's personal email, publish photos and documents - Reuters.
- Windows PCs crash three times as often as Macs, report says - TechSpot.
- Wife used CCTV to steal $176M of husband’s crypto, UK court told - Coin Telegraph.
- Gardaí open €30m bitcoin virtual wallet, first of 12 accessed since seizure in 2019 - Irish Times.
- Irish Drug Dealer’s Lost BTC Stack Worth $400m Has Woken Up - Arkham.
- Ajax FC data breach exposes 300,000 fans, hacker steals tickets an stadium ban details - Cybernews.
- Small Prophets - BBC iPlayer.
- RPG Taverns - Dungeons and Dragons tavern in London.
- Smashing Security merchandise (t-shirts, mugs, stickers and stuff)
SPONSORS:
- Action1 - Keep your systems safe (and your sanity intact) with the patch management platform that just works. The best part? Your first 200 endpoints are free, forever, with no functional limits.
- Meter - Network infrastructure for the enterprise. Get a free personalised demo.
- Vanta - Expand the scope of your security program with market-leading compliance automation… while saving time and money. Smashing Security listeners get $1000 off!
SUPPORT THE SHOW:
Tell your friends and colleagues about “Smashing Security”, and leave us a review on Apple Podcasts or Podchaser.
Become a supporter! Join Smashing Security PLUS via Patreon or Apple Podcasts for ad-free episodes on our early-release feed!
FOLLOW THE SHOW:
Follow us on Bluesky or Mastodon, or on the Smashing Security subreddit, and visit our website for more episodes.
THANKS:
Theme tune: "Vinyl Memories" by Mikael Manvelyan.
Assorted sound effects: AudioBlocks.
Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Imagine that you were a fan and you had this hacking access. |
| 0:09.0 | Could you not add to the list of banned people who aren't allowed to the stadium, |
| 0:13.8 | the strikers bought Iax? |
| 0:17.4 | And so they would not be able to compete. |
| 0:20.1 | That is a very cunning plan. |
| 0:22.5 | That's what I do. That's what I do. |
| 0:27.6 | Smashing Security. |
| 0:34.1 | Episode 461. |
| 0:36.6 | This man hid $400 million in a fishing rod. |
| 0:40.1 | Then it vanished with Graham Cluley and special guest Danny Palmer. |
| 0:44.3 | Hello, hello, and welcome to Smash Insecurity Episode 461. |
| 0:47.8 | My name's Graham Cluelly. |
| 0:49.2 | And I'm Danny Palmer. |
| 0:50.8 | Danny, great to have you back on the show. |
| 0:53.4 | Now, of course, last week was the RSA conference in San Francisco. |
| 0:58.2 | Now, I know you weren't out there, but as a cyber security reporter, you're probably having to churn |
| 1:03.1 | out a few words regarding that. Well, I was actually on leave last week, and I came back and my |
| 1:08.6 | inbox was extremely full of emails about RSA, which was a lot of |
| 1:14.0 | those to get through, a lot of announcements, a lot of thoughts, people are having some interesting |
| 1:18.5 | things in there, some less so, lesse, a lot of your sort of standard sort of our product is the |
| 1:24.0 | greatest ever thing. But it's really interesting to see what people are talking about |
| 1:28.6 | in the industry. There's always so many things happening. Yeah. Especially in 2026. It's all go. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Graham Cluley, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Graham Cluley and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.