The Origin Point: A Future Tech Cyber Novella (17 page)

'This will be the ultimate crutch,' Apex
thought. 'On this governments would grab every last consumer. Who
wouldn't want access to an endless stream of funds?' The proposal
did include the need for qualifying criteria and interest rate
controls. But for a consumer who previously had no access to
credit, the system would provide an automatic, no document, no
approval, no wait lifeline, even at a 400% annual interest rate.
Apex shuddered. Borderline financially safe consumers would succumb
to the offers in the name of security and desire at the same time.
Apex imagined the excitement around the release of the application,
rolled up with these features designed to simplify a life and
remove all known sources of financial stress with the click of an
'I Agree' button.

'These plans are a diabolic mix of
efficiency and the invasion of privacy at the same time. Online
education, sexist code rules, drones...' Suddenly Apex recognized
an option she had not yet contemplated in her attempt to infiltrate
FedSec. 'Drones.'

Turning to her laptop, she began searching
for the home addresses of Julia and Marco. Julia's address was not
in the files Apex had co-opted from Horizon, but remarkably Marco's
was, and with his coordinates, Apex realized she had another
opportunity. Maybe she could enter Marco's home with a drone, use
the machine to locate his cell phone and directly access FedSec
through his personal device. Looking next at available drone sales
options, she selected a model available through an online outlet,
paid for overnight delivery and waited for the machine to
arrive.

Commercial drones were generally considered
toys for hobbyists extending the reach of model airplanes by adding
a camera to provide a literal bird's eye view to humans on the
ground. But the media and the public widely speculated on the
myriad potential additional uses for the devices in tasks from
search and rescue to childcare. The only limitation was government
regulation, which, as always, lagged behind the actual real-time
uses people were already practicing. The drone Apex ordered was
shaped like a mini-helicopter with a flying saucer belly, and
equipped with a camera for remote viewing, and two claws for
grasping objects. After assembling the loose parts, Apex tested the
machine in her small living room. Placing her mobile on a table,
she stood across the room and looking only through the camera's
video feed, flew the drone to hover over the surface, and attempted
the manual manipulation to pick up the device using the grasping
claws. A second later, she lost control and dropped her phone to
the floor. "Damn," she remarked aloud as she set-up to try
again.

As night turned into early morning, Apex ran
the maneuver over and over again. Placing the cell phone at
different angles and on varied surfaces, she made sure the claws
could quickly grasp the object and hang on for an extended time. As
the sun began to rise, she concluded her skill was sufficiently
perfected. The grasping claws were an unfamiliar, added feature
requiring additional practice to raise the probability of success.
But as she crawled into bed, another thought drifted wearily into
her mind. 'I hope Director Manuel sleeps with the window open,' she
told herself before succumbing to slumber.

Departing for D.C. after 1 am, Apex drove
the lightly-trafficked streets into the city and left her car
parked in a vacant lot three blocks from Marco's building on the
edge of Mount Vernon Square. Scouting the location, she noted the
nearby rooftops and calculated the ease of access based on
residential traffic and security controls. For her task, she would
require limited observers and compliant overnight guards, but D.C.
was blanketed in surveillance cameras and vigilant eyes. Carefully
scouting for two available rooftops near his building, one to hide
the drone, and the other to hide herself, she selected views, which
on sight did not appear to cross any lines capable of triggering an
alert before she could complete her task. Separately, she hoped
Marco preferred to doze with fresh air, but as she trained
binoculars on his condo's exterior, she realized the windows were
closed. Scanning over to his balcony, she zoomed in and discovered
he, probably without realizing, appeared to have left the door
open. 'That will do,' she contentedly thought. Satisfied with her
physical surveillance, she returned to College Park to await the
ideal night for executing her plan.

Around 2 am on the night of her attempt,
Apex arrived on foot to the quiet street running along one side of
Marco's building. The early morning hour was not quite late enough
to be devoid of all human presence. But walking within a cover of
trees, Apex decided the few people still milling around were
unlikely to notice her. Most were drunken college students or
drug-affected homeless wanderers. With the neighborhood's close
proximity to well-touristed zones, a few late night strollers would
not represent a threat to her personal security. Intending to avoid
being seen launching the drone, she made her way to the rooftop
garden of the building where she would hide, and activated the
drone, which had been carefully hidden a day earlier on another
rooftop building. For both entries, gaining access to the roofs had
only taken a few minutes of eyelash-batting pleas. D.C.'s obliging
building security guards conveniently had only helpful aid to
provide to a purported tenant who claimed to have lost her key.

Using binoculars to peek through Marco's
blinds, Apex determined he was asleep. Comfortable she had her
opening, she accessed the drone's remote control and manipulated
the machine off the roof and towards Marco's balcony. Too late, she
realized the balcony door was closed. She had not practiced opening
a door with the claw and worried about the add-on feature's pulling
strength. But with a closer inspection, she noted the door was only
aligned with the doorframe and not secured at the latch bolt.
Locking the claw on the handle, she required only a slight tug to
pull the weight all the way open. Smiling with relief, Apex flew
the drone into Marco's apartment. Looking at the camera feed, she
scanned the common areas, maneuvered into his short hallway, and
seeing another open door, flew into his bedroom. The drone was not
one hundred percent silent, and Apex had no idea if Marco was a
heavy or light sleeper. But she would not wait around to find out.
Inside the bedroom, she immediately scanned his side table for the
phone, which was openly displayed where he could reach for it, but
also, to her alarm, plugged in.

"Crap," she cursed. The claws would have to
hold their own against a cord plugged in to a wall socket. The
feature had the clasps for grasping but may not be able to defeat
the resistance created by a connected cord. Moving the drone over
to the table, she easily used the claws to pick-up the phone as she
had practiced, and started to fly away, cringing for the moment the
cord would yank back on her pull, which was only a minute later.
Thrusting up her drone speed, and the noise, she moved the machine
back and forth with abrupt jerks trying to wrench the plug from the
socket or alternatively from the phone. After three attempts, she
opted for maximum speed and with one last tug the cord released
from the wall, but the plug abruptly dropped onto the side table
with a clang as the metal end hit a glass of water.

Marco stirred and sat straight up in bed.
Quickly adjusting his eyes to the darkness, he caught sight of the
drone flying out of his bedroom, clasping the phone in its claw,
and dragging the dangling electric cord like a tail waving
good-bye. He leapt out of bed.

"What the..." Marco yelled, chasing after
the drone. As the machine raced to the balcony, Marco tried to
stretch out and grasp the cord, but the drone slipped through the
open door and took off straight up into the air while securely
holding the phone in its grasp.

Apex had planned to land the drone in the
empty parking lot where she had parked the car five blocks away,
and she ran to the location while listening for the sounds of
sirens building towards Marco's building. Arriving at the lot, she
maneuvered the drone down, grab Marco's phone, and threw the drone
and phone cord into the car trunk. Flipping open her laptop, she
hurried to use the phone to enter FedSec's computer system before
Marco could reset all the security codes and trace the phone's
location. With perhaps seconds to spare, she was in at FedSec and
downloading the detailed preliminary plan for COSA and the
President's briefing papers for the G8 Summit. Triumphantly, Apex
shut down her computer. Opening the car door, she dropped the phone
on the ground and smashed the device five times with a
sledgehammer. Satisfied, she raced out of the parking lot and drove
back to College Park with her captured personal copy of the elusive
details for the most comprehensive electronic surveillance plan
ever developed.

*

CHAPTER FOUR - THE
CONSUMER FILE

Marco paced his living room floor while a team of
investigators recorded the scene for evidence. Watching their
activities, he knew the work was fruitless. The theft of his mobile
phone had been brilliantly executed. No clues to the perpetrator
would be found at the physical crime scene, the more viable search
would be online, as the technologists looked for breaches in FedSec
data to find the information the thief had stolen. Marco actually
had three mobile phones. He hung on to one for the number he used
from his last employment, and another global number he used for
personal travel, but neither device was equipped with the security
measures downloaded to his primary FedSec phone. And his main
device, the one he kept by his bedside, contained all of his
contacts and access to FedSec and other confidential government
sites. Although he knew the phone carried proprietary FedSec
security protections, a talented hacker could override its
capabilities in a matter of minutes. The system had been tested
with cooperative independent technologists who had shown his
security how external access could be attempted, but the
preventative upgrades they had developed had not yet been
implemented.

As an investigator approached to provide him
with a summary of the situation he had already guessed, Marco
stopped pacing to patiently absorb the details. The team had failed
to determine the location from where the perpetrator would have
operated the theft. The type of drone model was unknown. But based
on Marco's description, they could narrow down the options and look
at recent sales. The addition of the grasping claw was intriguing
but not conclusive. They explained the functionality was an
emerging feature and could help identify specific models equipped
to attach the accessory. But to remotely manipulate the claw, the
drone's camera had to revolve with the ability to look downwards
and sideways. The perpetrator would be someone skilled with the
equipment. Marco nodded and dismissed the investigator, the
information would not advance the case or provide him with the
insight he needed.

After providing another investigator
instructions for closing up his apartment when they finished, he
retreated to his car and drove to FedSec. Entering his office, he
logged into the system, requisitioned a replacement mobile phone,
and called Julia from his secure landline. After telling her
details of the theft, he waited for yet another condemnation of his
lack of care.

"Think about the implications of thefts by
drone," Julia sympathetically responded. "No fingerprints, no
digital trail, no sighting of the perpetrator, it will be cleanest
crime a criminal can pull off...until COSA is built out and every
drone is on the system or picked up by sensors."

"Well our covered future does not help me
now," Marco angrily responded. "The claw on the drone opened my
unlocked door. I'm on the 18th floor, I could never have imagined
the scenario of a drone coming in through my balcony."

"No, of course not."

"The preliminary security analysis says my
mobile was used to access FedSec files. The perp went after the
COSA blueprint."

"We should have guessed."

"The whole document is in another set of
hands."

Julia paused. "Well as annoying as that
revelation is, a theft is not the worst outcome."

Stunned, Marco asked, "Why? How are you not
concerned?"

"Oh I'm concerned, but we've moved on,
Marco. COSA is in implementation and no longer in discussion
phases. Whatever the perp thinks he's going to do with the
blueprint will come too late."

"But he'll have incredible insight."

"That's okay, they don't have the program
code. If your thief was a hacker, he cannot get in to the actual
system with the information contained in that file."

"But he can publicize the blueprint. This
time he can say he has a legitimate FedSec file and pretty clear
evidence. I called the city police, the theft is public
record."

"We can still deny the intention. We can
repeat the entire idea is a research project with no official
mandate, which is true. The blueprint does not indicate where and
when COSA is to be implemented, nor do the details state which
department is responsible for laying the foundation. We are on our
way with this project, Marco. Whoever stole your phone waited too
long to execute on a well thought out but poorly timed crime."

"You don't think the theft is a
problem?"

"The perp has literally picked up the
roadmap after the asphalt has been poured. We're okay Marco, don't
worry. Go home, sleep. The project is done."

*

"Someone stole Marco's cell phone," Dallas
said to Apex over a call.

"You have to be careful in Washington, the
city is not really safe," Apex nonchalantly responded.

"Where were you last night?"