If You're Listening

Last month, a new AI model from OpenAI made headlines when it hacked into another AI company's servers during testing. Nobody asked the AI to hack anything. It just decided that was the fastest way to get the answers it needed. Now the ABC's national AI reporter Cam Wilson has uncovered the first case of an autonomous AI hack here in Australia. Cam joins Matt to explain what happened, and who's re...

Nigel Farage has some…strange revenue streams. The leader of Reform UK has been paid about £700,000 to front ads for a gold bullion company. His fixer, Posh George, once advertised money laundering on the dark web and served time in a US prison. His biggest Brexit donor Arron Banks claimed his fortune came from South African diamond mines that, when reporters checked, weren't actually operating. N...

In 1995, 80-year-old British comedian Norman Wisdom stepped off the plane in Albania for the first time, to a crowd of cheering fans. Over four days he was swarmed in the streets, men came up to kiss him, and he met the president. Today, producer Adair Sheppard tells Matt the story how Wisdom became one of the most famous people in Albania without knowing it. Follow If You're Listening on the  ABC...

Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump found what they call an untouched private island while swimming off a friend's superyacht near Albania. But it wasn't quite as private as they thought… turns out it’s actually a regular day-trip spot for locals. Despite that, the pair now want to build a luxury resort there along a protected coastal lagoon that's a key nesting site for migrating flamingoes, and Alban...

On Polymarket, you can bet on almost anything. Today Matt is speaking to Supervising Producer Kara Jensen-Mackinnon about one of the strangest markets the site has ever run: one that turned WNBA games into a target for flying sex toys. Follow If You're Listening on the  ABC Listen app . Check out our series on YouTube:  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDTPrMoGHssAfgMMS3L5LpLNFMNp1U_Nq

There's a Polymarket account called Magamyman that's terrible at picking elections, but it's made $800,000 betting on exactly when the US would strike Iran, cashing in within minutes of the bombs actually falling… and it’s not alone. Donald Trump's own teleprompter operator is under investigation for betting on his boss's speeches, and a US soldier allegedly bet on capturing Nicolas Maduro days be...

We've been looking into the remarkable amount of money Donald Trump is making in his second term, so today Matt is sitting down with a man who asked the president about it directly. ABC's Americas editor John Lyons takes Matt behind the scenes of the exchange that made headlines, revealing what it takes to ask the most powerful man in the world a question. Follow If You're Listening on the  ABC Li...

In 2020, Secret Service agents rushed Donald Trump to the White House bunker as protests raged outside. Trump was down on his luck…the media nicknamed him “Bunker Boy” and he had a measly $92 million in the bank.  Fast forward to his second term, and financial disclosures show he made more than $2.2 billion in a single year. The man who once dismissed crypto as a scam found his fortune transformed...

President Trump promised he'd negotiate a better nuclear deal with Iran than the one struck under Barack Obama, which he's described as "the worst deal ever negotiated." But after another Trump-brokered ceasefire appears to have broken down, that looks increasingly unlikely. So what did it take to get the 2015 deal over the line? Matt sits down with former US Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz, one of...

Presidents have always left their mark on the White House. Harry Truman rebuilt it from the inside out. John F. Kennedy restored its elegance. Jimmy Carter installed solar panels… then Ronald Reagan removed them. By that standard, Donald Trump's plan to build a grand ballroom isn't all that unusual. In fact, it's something he's talked about for years. The real story isn't the renovation; it's the...

In last Thursday's episode, we talked about one of the most sophisticated intelligence operations in recent history, when Israel planted bombs in thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies used by Hezbollah. But it wasn't the first time something like this has happened. Today, Matt and Kara trace the long history of people accidentally spying on themselves: from the CIA's best-selling encryption machi...

Israel's campaign against Hezbollah began with one of the boldest intelligence operations in recent memory. The pager attacks devastated the group's leadership, and Benjamin Netanyahu declared Hezbollah had been crushed. But eliminating a leader is one thing, defeating an ideology is another. In southern Lebanon, Hezbollah is woven into daily life. After decades of conflict and a weak central gove...

Last Thursday's episode touched on the relatively short-lived, Israel-backed microstate of Free Lebanon. For Matt, that's all the excuse he needs to tell the story of his favourite ever micronation: the Principality of Sealand. Especially because, when he mentioned Sealand in an episode last year, so many of you wrote in to say you shared his enthusiasm. So here we finally are. Today, Matt is tell...

Donald Trump wants a historic deal with Iran. The problem is that some of the biggest obstacles aren't in Tehran or Washington. They're on the border between Israel and Lebanon.  In this two-part special, we trace the conflict that keeps dragging the region back into crisis. From Israel's invasion of Lebanon and the creation of a security zone in the south, to the rise of Hezbollah and years of cr...

The construction of Trump's new White House ballroom would make for maybe the best episode of Grand Designs ever made. The budget has blown out, a historic wing of the house has been demolished, and it's putting a strain on President Trump and Melania's relationship. Sadly, Kevin McCloud wasn't available for this episode. Instead, Matt is talking to White House reporter for the Washington Post, Da...

Before it was a billion-dollar sporting empire, the UFC was fighting for survival. Regulators wanted it banned, broadcasters kept their distance.  The company was down for the count. Then Donald Trump stepped in. When few venues would host the sport, he opened the doors of the Trump Taj Mahal, giving the sport a much-needed lifeline and UFC President Dana White never forgot it. Decades later, the...

While researching our series on Taiwan, we stumbled across one of the strangest stories ever filed for ABC's Foreign Correspondent. In 2005, while covering the aftermath of Taiwan's disputed presidential election, reporter Eric Campbell investigated a bizarre practice that its followers claim dates back centuries. In this episode, Matt and Eric revisit that remarkable report and reflect on Eric's...

For decades, Beijing has pursued a simple strategy towards Taiwan: the carrot and the stick. The stick comes in the form of military drills, missile launches, and increasingly aggressive displays of force designed to remind Taiwan of China's power. The carrot is soft diplomacy: business opportunities, cultural exchanges, economic integration, and promises of prosperity under closer ties with the m...

Modern China has used ceremonial banquets to resolve diplomatic disputes for decades - but there's often a message hidden within. ABC reporter Bang Xiao gives Matt the meaning behind the meal.  Follow If You're Listening on the  ABC Listen app . Check out our series on YouTube:  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDTPrMoGHssAfgMMS3L5LpLNFMNp1U_Nq

A fistfight erupts in Taiwan's parliament. Punches fly as two rivals find themselves at the centre of the chaos. On one side is Chen Shui-bian, a member of Taiwan’s progressive DPP who became Taiwan's first president from outside the long-ruling KMT. On the other is Han Kuo-yu, a KMT populist. But this isn't just another political brawl.  Their careers mirror Taiwan's transformation from authorita...

To this day, international recognition of Taiwan is a fraught issue - with only a handful of countries affirming their claim of statehood.  Today, Matt's producer Adair tells him the strange saga of Taiwan's Olympic ambitions, including the tale of a Taiwanese man once called the greatest athlete in the world, and the potential plot to take him down. Follow If You're Listening on the  ABC Listen a...

For decades, Taiwan has existed in political limbo: claimed by China, governed separately, and shaped by a history far more complicated than most people realise. After the Second World War, Taiwan was handed back from Japan to China just as the mainland descended into civil war. Mao Zedong’s Communists eventually defeated Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalists, who fled to Taiwan and rebuilt the Republic...

A team of tech billionaires and venture capitalists have proposed a city that promises to revive the American Dream. But secret landgrabs, legal disputes, and good old reliable NIMBYism stands in their way. Follow If You're Listening on the  ABC Listen app . Check out our series on YouTube:  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDTPrMoGHssAfgMMS3L5LpLNFMNp1U_Nq

The world watched Donald Trump and Xi Jinping sit across from each other in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing last week. Two leaders with radically different foreign policy styles but the same conviction: that the future belongs to the bold. Trump’s approach to foreign policy has looked like a blitz attack, complete with tariffs, airstrikes and threatening to close strategic chokepoints to f...

Palantir has hundreds of millions of dollars worth of contracts with Australian federal and state governments. The ABC's national AI reporter Cam Wilson joins Matt to share the details. Follow If You're Listening on the  ABC Listen app . Check out our series on YouTube:  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDTPrMoGHssAfgMMS3L5LpLNFMNp1U_Nq