U R NEXT | 5. Super Spy

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Listen to every episode of you are next at free right now when you subscribe to the binge. You'll hear the entire series before anyone else. Get exclusive bonus episodes and unlock more than 60 other true crime podcasts. Just head to the binge channel on Apple podcasts and tap subscribe or visit getthebinge.com to listen wherever you are. The binge. Feed your true crime obsession. Sergeant Ben Finley isn't the kind of guy who backs down easily, especially when he's on the trail of someone as dangerous as vicious.

It's around early spring, 2014. Ben's been busy for weeks, tracing all the homes and businesses that vicious has swatted. All the people he's been terrorizing. Ben's convinced vicious is a Canadian teenager.

“When he first contacted the Canadian police, he was hopeful that they could share information to help him build the case.”

Maybe even work together with him in bringing vicious to justice, but the Canadian authorities couldn't share any information. So who does this country cop who won't take no for an answer? Turn to next. Well, the FBI, of course. I called the computer crimes unit down at the FBI on Atlanta. "Hey guys, this is what I've got." Ben eventually gets put through to an agent named Andrew Young.

Andrew's been with the FBI for nearly 20 years. He's part of the FBI's cyber security program. I picked up the phone and we began a conversation and set up a time to meet and discuss. Sometimes phone didn't get action, sometimes face-to-face gets action. And I'm an action counter guy. I like to, you know, be the guy to make stuff happen. Quite frankly, he said he needed some help, right? Because the way our law enforcement system is designed here in the U.S.

It's very hard for local jurisdictions at the city or county level to work across international orders. And so it's helpful to have the FBI who has the resources and the connectivity across all borders to kind of facilitate.

So next week he shows up in my office. We first met and he's got this big box full of folders, lots of

Manila folders, full of police records, with different cities and jurisdictions on him. And he kind of walked me through what happened in John's Creek. Why he felt so passionate about this particular incident, reviewed all the files and expressed me why he felt like they were all linked together. And, you know, he's not an emotional type, but he is passionate. After Ben's done with his pitch, he stops for breath. He's waiting for Andrew to break down how the

case is going to go from here. How the FBI is going to help him chase down this perp all the way to Canada and back again. Because, well, we can't really help until it's prolific and I said, well, I know what prolific means

“Andrew, but what does it mean to the FBI? What is, is there a number or is there a type of incident?”

And he's like, "Yeah, I don't know." And I was like, "Well, Andrew, if you don't know, how am I supposed to know?" He goes, "Well, all I can say is just keep working. If anything changes, you got anything good, just let me know." Ben is dejected and surprised by this latest setback. To him, vicious is a hundred percent prolific. The FBI dragging their feet only gives vicious more opportunity to target young women, more opportunity to cause harm. But Ben uses this as fuel.

Staying on vicious as tracks, he manages to link him to a few more cases. Soon, the numbers are racking up. 10, 15, 20, 25. Each time Ben reaches a new milestone, he calls Andrew back.

Probably, I don't know, five or six times. But the answer is always the same.

Find out the white colony no more Andrews shit. I know it's not your fault, but it's ridiculous. It's going to be only matter time for something bad happens. Someone is going to get hurt or die. From Sony Music Entertainment and novel, this is You Are Next.

This is Episode 5. Super spy.

“The authorities being slow off the mark to take the threat of vicious seriously has been an”

unfortunate running theme with this story. Esther and Natasha both told us that they felt like the police weren't doing enough that they felt ignored, un-listened to, and unprotected. The streamer's vicious was targeting often had to take matters into their own inexperienced hands and become unlikely crime fighters. I'm very risk-averse as a person generally. This is Eva. We've changed her name and her words are voiced by an actor. By 2014, Eva's in college, she's been streaming for a

few years mostly playing League of Legends. I used to play a lot of support, and this support

role is mostly about like keeping your team safe and making sure the other team doesn't harm them. Eva's building herself a pretty impressive fanbase. I was probably averaging around 300 to 400 viewers' stream. I had like 20,000 followers on my YouTube and then also 20 to 25 on my twitch. Even though she's got tens of thousands of followers, Eva's not looking at streaming as a potential career. Some of that comes from her parents' influence. I had parents that were immigrants,

“so I think that shaped a lot of my worldview of just working hard, making sure I get good grades”

and school. Obviously, like video games and anything entertaining or fun, or cool as a kid,

was not a priority. It's also Eva's own risk-aversion that's stopping her from pursuing streaming professionally. Streaming didn't seem like a super stable career. The internet was kind of like a wild west, and I mean, it is still wild west now. With the rises streaming and just like the live element of it, there is obviously bad actors that would crash someone's stream, or disrupt them, or do something that would get a lot of attention and then take credit for that attention.

It's approaching summer 2014 when Eva starts to hear rumors about one of the worst actors of all. Vicious. He was definitely gaining notoriety at the time, especially within the League of Legends community because that's where he found a lot of his targets. You would hear rumblings of like, "Oh, this person got dedaust, or this person had something happened to them. I didn't think what happened to me." But Vicious already has Eva in his sights. Like with so many other victims,

it starts with a dedaust attack while Eva's own stream. My stream is being really slow and laggy. Eva decides to log off. Call it a night. I say, "Hey guys, so sorry. Something is happening. I'm gonna end my stream today." And then a couple minutes later, I get this DM on Twitter from this person called Vicious. Hey, I was the one dedausting your stream. I'll keep doing it unless you add me on Skype. Curiosity really drove me, so I added him on Skype either that same day or the next day.

“I just wanted to see what was going on. Like, why was he doing this? What he wanted?”

Vicious wants exactly what he wanted from Natasha, from Esther, and from every young woman in girl he comes across. Access, attention, and control. Eva's heard about Vicious and his tactics, so she knows that ignoring him does not work. Ignoring really wasn't a strategy that was viable for a lot of people. Unfortunately, if people would ignore him or try to brush him off, he would get quite angry about it.

Eva decides to try a different tactic for attending more friends. If she can keep him on side, she might be able to keep streaming and more importantly keep herself safe. But she knows how risky it is. He's happy with me now, but if I say something that he doesn't like or one day he changes his mind, then I could be next. Eva keeps up the friendly facade and indulges Vicious to protect herself. Initially it was just I aming, so he would message me daily. He expected

five times being like, "Pick up, pick up, pick up. If I ignored him for too long,

“he would start publicly tweeting at me." In their messages back and forth, Vicious asks Eva”

to send photos of herself multiple times. But she's able to bat him off, distract him by asking about his life. He gave very little in terms of actual personal details, but then occasionally he would like let his real self leak through saying, "I'm so lonely and why won't you talk with me?" It definitely at the impression he wasn't very mature as a person. He acknowledged the fact

that he was doing malicious things intentionally to harm people, but he never seemed guilty,

absolutely no remorse at all, like for him everything was hilarious and funny and, you know, women crying or people begging him to stop, he just found it entertaining. And part of the motivation for him to do these things is to feel like his power over these women.

“Even with Eva pretending to be his friend, giving him the attention he's so clearly craves. Vicious”

isn't satisfied. Eventually, with all his victims, he finds out your phone number, your dress. He would call my house at very odd hours, probably one or two in the morning. He was like, "Hi, it's me. I just wanted to call and chat." Like, he was nonchalant. I knew he wanted to get a rise out of me, so I was just like, "Okay, hi, like, how are you?"

I just tried to pretend it was a totally normal two-way am conversation from a stranger who was targeting me on the internet and just not give him the reaction he wanted. Eventually, we just ended up hanging up. I was totally freaked. I couldn't sleep at all the rest of the night, because I was like, "Oh my gosh, even despite my best efforts to play KTM and act friendly and pretend like I'm

interested in his hacking community, he can still reach me."

“I think it's important for people to realize that he had personal details on every single person.”

And if you wanted to ruin your life, he really could pretty easily on his end. It's not that easy to just quote unquote log off. Eva's trying to stay calm and not let Vicious get to her, but she's constantly seeing him brag about the terror he's raining down. He was so public with his actions on Twitter, he would tweet at a lot of streamers being like, "Hey, did you enjoy me calling your

house?" or like, "Hey, did you enjoy that pizza," I said. Like, he was very, very outspoken about

taking credit for these things. I'm definitely worried that he's gonna swap me next. It was always a risk.

Eva's treading water, but she's scared she's about to get pulled under. A message comes through. This time it's not from Vicious. It's from another streamer who will call Melissa. Melissa is one of the biggest League of Legends streamers out there. I knew that she, in particular, was a big victim of his because he was very public about his actions towards her. Melissa tells Eva that she's building a case against Vicious and that she wants

Eva's help. She was contacting the police so she wanted to find more witnesses and just look of her evidence and like, we don't really have anything on this guy that's like solid. Even though Vicious brags often on social media about the streamers he's harassing and the swaddings he's responsible for, there's not a lot of hard evidence actively showing him swadding or hacking someone. Melissa said it'd really help if you could speak out as well because that

would add to the case. Eva realizes this is an opportunity to do a lot more than just speak out. This is her chance to find the smoking gun and take out Vicious once and for all. It was a big risk but I can stop it. I gained his trust a little bit so he was kind of like letting me in into this almost like

inner circle of him and his hacker friends and these group Skype calls. So that's when I first

got the idea to start recording things. Eva starts plotting a risky undercover operation. The mission to catch Vicious hacking, extorting or swadding in the act. It was waiting for the right opportunity. There was this whole anticipation of setting it up,

I find this so funny. Seemingly I was interested in getting more involved in helping out. And then he'll open up and kind of let me in and then maybe slip up or let something go that he probably shouldn't have because he trusts me. Then I'll be able to record that. Eva's laid her trap. Now all she has to do is wait for Vicious to take the beat. And she doesn't have to wait long. Vicious has something to ask her.

He said, hey, I'm in this color right now. I'm doing this thing. I'm going to try and figure out this person's address. Do you want to be added to this? Showtime.

I can't believe it's the best price. Wow, it's in the third season.

“A couple of years after the high school. I don't know if that's what I wanted.”

Stream up to the 13th April, parallel to the U.S. start, really a new episode. That's the problem. And you're a part of the title track. There's no way back. Before I go out, I'll go back to the house of the dragon and wake it up. All of it is only $2.08 and $90. Streaming won't be so wow. Meditating yoga doesn't really mean anything.

Really? I'm really a part of my story, totally. Stoyer? How do you feel about it? The story is real?

Yes, I've got a lot to come up with.

Ha, you've got some connections. No, just like Stoyer Ep. Wow. And that's just a bit. Of course, the match is almost automatic. Suddenly, I feel like I'm so exciting. Hold it and get to cook. Tiefen and Span with Wiesel Stoyer.

The once risk of Earth's Ava is now in a Skype call with Vicious and some of his friends. His fellow hackers who follow and encourage his every move. They're plotting to break into someone's internet provider. An authorized access to someone's computer or a private account is legal and can be punishable with up to five years in prison.

Ava knows the moment is now or never.

She steals her nerve and discreetly starts recording her screen. Capturing everything Vicious is doing. It was definitely very, very nerve-wracking. My heart was racing and my ponds were sweaty. There's so many things that could go wrong. If somehow we found out that like there was this recording going on,

he wouldn't have taken that very lightly. I don't want to pretend like I'm some hero because I was scared.

“I was definitely scared but I think bravery just comes from doing things scared honestly.”

Some of the faces Ava can see in this call shock her. There was another streamer within the Skype call. I was very surprised to see her there and maybe she was also very surprised to see me there. Ava can't tell if this other streamer is on her own undercover mission or if she's one of Vicious's gang.

It was hard to say, obviously I couldn't communicate with her in the call. Vicious doesn't seem to pick up on Ava's nervousness or her shock at seeing this other streamer on the call. He's busy trying to find a way into his next target's life. Yes, A.C. 137. You're hearing a re-enactment of a real recording made by Ava.

Vicious is on the phone to an internet service provider. He's trying to gain access to the account so he can take it over. Possibly to cut off his victim's internet.

“In order to get that information, you actually dig with my kids who did you want to hold?”

Sure. Vicious seems annoyed. The call isn't going as easily as he hoped. He clearly wants to impress Ava and all his hacker friends without quickly he can crack into the account. Maybe his luck is starting to run out.

But it's so done right now, I don't want to call back. Vicious ends the Skype call.

My mind was running wild with all these ways that he could have found out.

“But the axe never falls. Ava's pulled it off.”

Super spy. She's managed to become part of Vicious's inner circle. He starts inviting her on to more calls. It's not like he would just add me to these calls every day. He was very sporadic about things.

It would just be like a random like 2pm on a Tuesday and he would just drag me into the call basically.

Ava risks her own safety time and time again by getting onto these calls with Vicious. Each time she joins one and witnesses Vicious trying to hack into more accounts or talking about extorting or even swatting someone Ava secretly records what he's doing and sends it on. But Ava doesn't hear anything back from Melissa. Nothing about how the case is coming along or what the police are doing with the evidence that she's

sticking her neck out to get.

“She was pretty tight-lept about it and honestly I was a little sad that no one provided me”

and update as to like what happened.

Like did my evidence help you at all? Did this recording help?

My team and I reached out to Melissa. She didn't want to be interviewed for this series. But she did tell us that the police were incredibly slow to act, which sounds awfully familiar, doesn't it? I actually thought the case went nowhere and that he just like disappeared off the phase of the earth. But Vicious hasn't disappeared. He's simply moved on finding new victims to terrorize.

In September he swat's a high school in Florida. He calls them up and says, "I'm going to kill everyone on campus." The whole school has to be evacuated and then that same month Vicious zeros in on a popular

“streamer who will call Katie. The link she went to go after that girl and her family is unbelievable.”

After a barrage of harassment and threats, Vicious swaps Katie in September.

"Well, I just showed my parents with a loaded AR-15." This is a reenactment of a call Vicious made to Katie's local police department. "In my hands and I'm going to go to my neighbor's house and kill them too. I'm going to go to my other neighbors and I'm going to shoot up the entire block." Police swarm into Katie's apartment only to find her there alone and terrified.

Five days later, Vicious swats her again. He also swats her parents' house at the same time. "In this call, Vicious is acting a lot more. He's not as nonchalant as he's been in some of his previous swatting calls." "I'm so scared, ma'am. I just want to kill myself. I just want to shoot myself." "I don't want to go to jail." Vicious sounds breathless and terrified. An Oscar worthy performance designed to get the police to mobilize their swat team and get his audience a big show.

"How many shots have you fired?" "I shot four times." "Well, you'll feel when it's right now." "I can't go away. I'm scared to even look at them, ma'am. Oh, God." Police descend once more. Katie's at her apartment with her mum while her dad and brother are in the family home. They're let out at gunpoint. The double swatting hits the news and Vicious posts the link to his Twitter account,

bragging that he's responsible. "That was me, hello, wow." "He tweets at Katie's mum saying, "I heard you got shot. You all right?" Vicious doesn't stop at the double swatting. He calls and messages Katie constantly uses a program that spams her phone by sending 218 text messages simultaneously. He hacks into her university account, changing her passwords. He takes over her Twitter account,

posting her and her family's addresses, credit card details, and social security numbers. He hacks into their cell phone provider, signing them up for a $500 a month plan. He even tries to have their water shut off. My team reached out to Katie, but she couldn't face talking about what she'd been through. He traumatized his girl. He traumatized us to the point now. She's not going to all to us.

She's not going to say anything. She wants absolutely nothing to do with us. It's a shame to know that these many years have gone by and she's still scared of death of this animal.

trying to build a case as he wades through the destruction, Vicious is leaving in his wake.

“He gets so caught up in it and looking through the stuff. It'd be like 7.30.”

It'd not have been my office and the cleaning crew would come through the building. I'm like, "Oh Lord, I've been here too long." So it's probably about time he got a lucky break. Despite his promise not to call any more, Ben's still been keeping Agent Andrew Young from the FBI updated.

One night, he calls Andrew up again. Let's have know how many cases he's been able to tie to Vicious. Last time they spoke, it was 25. I said, "Is the number 44 prolific?" He's like, "Jesus Christ, he's serious." Yeah, I stopped it 44, but is that enough?

I think you can probably call that prolific. I was shocked at how many of these swatting incidents were taking place. Like, weekly. I mean, it was disturbing to be quite honest with you. And it was a great motivator to help him.

With the FBI finally on board, Ben at last has some much-needed backup in his fight against Vicious.

“An internet terrorist. That's the best thing to describe him as.”

Instead of using a bomb or a gun, he's using the internet. Ben just needs to hold out hope that it's not all coming too late. This stuff's not going to stop. It's not going to slow down. He loves to terrorize girls. This isn't just one or two. This is Guy's full-time passion.

The first time I've seen a lot of people in the world, I've seen a lot of people in the world. And Vieta Gates, Einfach Laoschen und Genießen, Eidi. So now, wherever you get your podcasts.

It's winter 2014. Since finally convincing the FBI to join his fight, Ben's been back,

diligently working the case with Agent Andrew Young right by his side. There are all but certain they know Vicious's true identity. The 16-year-old from Canada, whose details Ben found on all those online message boards where teenage gamers docks each other. To move forward, Ben and Andrew need cold, hard proof that shows Vicious really is this Canadian teenager.

Proof of his hacking, his harassment, his attempts to extort photos, proof that would stand up in court. For months and months went on, there was just nothing there. There was nothing we can act on. Something that's been clear to me in the many months I've spent making this series is that Vicious wants what Esther, Natasha and Eva have, not just their attention, but their success.

He wants desperately to be somebody that people notice. It's why he's so publicly brags about all the crimes he's committing. But while Eva and the others built their audiences from the ground up, using their personalities and their passion for gaming as a way to genuinely connect with their fanbase, Vicious doesn't seem like he's capable of doing that.

“It seems like the only way he can get anyone to notice him, to watch his live streams,”

is by amping up his behavior to more and more extremes. And the thrill he gets from forcing a reaction, from being noticed, even as a villain, makes it all worthwhile. Whatever it takes to get those views, right?

Though he's only attracting an audience of people exactly like him, which of course is never big enough.

And we have 20 followers right now. We're just fucking gay. It's early December. Vicious is on stream with some of his friends. What you're hearing is a

While he's scrolling through a website featuring camgirls, women who perform sex work on camera

“for a live audience. What girl should we tip, guys? They're all really ugly on here right now.”

Vicious clicks on one cam girl's live video and starts streaming it to his audience. She's slim with long brown hair and the polka dot headband. She looks very young. She's being a bitch. I'm tipping one dollar. This girl's the biggest bitch ever. I'm paying her to moan stuff and she won't even do it. Vicious is communicating with the camgirl via a live chat. His audience on stream keeps egging him on, telling him to instruct her

to do increasingly degrading things. Like draw on her face or bark like a dog.

Vicious is all too happy to comply as they laugh at her together.

It's extremely difficult to watch. The girl looks increasingly uncomfortable with each new

“request. Vicious and his friends constantly comment on her body on what they can get her to do”

on how funny it would be if she was under 18. Oh, you shit. She's doing it. Oh, she's going to fucking do it. After about half an hour, the cam girl shuts off her performance. For now, Vicious is not so private, peep show is over. It seems like he has other things on his mind anyway. Oh, wait, I forgot. I have to do a swap for someone. So I guess I'll do that right now. Vicious calls up a police department in Minnesota while he's on stream. Everyone watching can hear

his end of the call. Okay. What happened is I came up to their door and I knocked on it and then they opened the door and I pointed my AR15 at them and they let me in. He sounds almost bored. Guess if you do it enough, no high hits the same after a while. I tied up all the family members in the house, being one boyfriend and one girlfriend there and they're currently in the other room. And what I want you to do is I want you to get one officer, only one unarmed. I don't care if he's

wearing a vest or something to get a clear plastic bag with 20 grand in it. Walk up to the door, knock on it three times, leave the money there and walk away. If I see you guys trying to

“raid the apartment, I will kill everybody. Okay. Is that clear?”

But a portion of his live stream audience isn't on board. Yeah, you guys would receive a call with an aim on America's an aim on 15 and a house. I don't remember where it would ever be sure. It's a hope. His viewers are reporting him to the police. There's a guy on the internet saying that there's a gun in the guy house and he's not on my stream. It's something called swanning. More and more calls are flooding in.

I wanted to call you guys so you can back out into the swan, because it's a must be serious. I appreciate that very much. It's thank you so much for calling in, so I'm thank you very much. Have a great night guys. There's a shift happening here.

For a long time, it seemed like fishest would just never stop.

That his captive viewership would keep fueling his hunger for attention and the toxic cycle would continue forever. But now, fishest is starting to lose control of his audience and the tide is turning. Maybe some of his viewership are starting to discover a long awaited conscience. Maybe some of them are just growing up full stop and their taste for his particular brand of teenage sociopathy is diminishing. But there's still one dedicated viewer who's not going

anywhere, which is bad news for vicious because it's Andrew from the FBI. He's been watching vicious on stream for months now. Every morning, I would come in, grab my first cup of coffee, sit down at my desk. I would turn my computer on and go to the various Twitch channels and recordings that we were making. Watching a bunch of teenagers on stream is not where Andrew thought his glittering FBI career would lead him. It was painful to be quite honest with you.

It was hours upon hours of watching and listening to teenagers, just play regular video games, talking back and forth about nothing, trying to up the other one in their outlandish comments. The comments from Vicious and his degenerate friends ranged from the outlandish to the outright

she would say, "How was your day today?" I said, "Well, I listened to six hours of streaming videos,"

“and she's like, "Are you kidding me?" I had to watch these videos because we were just not coming”

up with any leads on the technical side. And based on my experience, I just knew that at some point in time, somebody's going to slip up, somebody's going to say something, and it's my job to be there and catch it when they fall. One day, Andrew is in his office watching his least favorite show. Like every other morning, I was into it for a couple of hours. Nothing was happening. Didn't expect anything to happen. And all of a sudden, at that point, it was like a big

light flash moment. Somebody slipped up. Somebody had turned the camera around. Someone, either Vicious or one of his friends he's on live stream with, shows Vicious's desktop on stream. It's barely there for a few seconds, but it's enough. Vicious hasn't had time to hide what's on his screen. Andrew can see what must be a treasure trove of folders and other personal information. All of it proves without a doubt that Vicious is that same teenager from Canada that

they've suspected all along. That was the game-changing moment. At first, it's unbelievable. I can't

“believe what I just saw. And then you have to go back and play it again, and you're like,”

your excitement level just starts to climb. We wanted and fought heavily for the Canadians to prosecute him, not to just let him walk because he was a minor. Andrew and Ben hand over all the evidence they've painstakingly collected to the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. Before long, they get the call. Not only are the RCMP joining the case, they're on their way to arrest Vicious. Right now.

On the final episode of You Are Next. With these not changed,

he's always going to be a threat. You can sense the air gets behind it. He thinks it's funny.

“He reached out and he wanted to talk. I can't believe he's still thinking about me.”

10 years later. Hey, remember me. Unlock all episodes of You Are Next. Add free right now by subscribing to the binge podcast channel. On the first of every month of brand new series drops for subscribers, all episodes all at once. And between drops, every Thursday and new episode of crime scene plans add free in your feed. Plus, you've got instant access to over 60 true crime and investigative podcasts,

shows like wild boys and blink, so you'll never be short on stories. Search for the binge on Apple

podcasts and hit subscribe. Not on Apple, head to getthebinge.com. This is You Are Next. An original production of Sony Music Entertainment and Novel, hosted by me, Lee Alexander. Lee Meyer is our senior producer. Varity DeCalla is our assistant producer. Sandra Schmoulli is our editor. Production management from Shuri Houston, Joe Savage, and Charlotte Wolf. For Novel, our executive producer is Max O'Brien.

From Sony Music Entertainment, our executive producers are Catherine St. Louis and Jonathan Hirsch. Story development by Nell Gray Andrews, Willard Foxton, and Selena Metta, who is director of development for Novel. Special thanks to Carolyn Scherlevin at Miller Coorsonic Raymond LLP and to Ford Collier, who performed the woodwind for our theme music. And a big thanks to the whole Sony Music Entertainment team.

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