Hack:Moscow Read Free Page B

passed the first test. Around us, coffee cups clinked.
    “Keep going.” I loaded other apps to filter the incoming data. It takes the right tools and experience to decipher all the numbers swirling by.
    Focus.
    The world dissolves around thirteen inches of glass, and I step through into another. Bits and bytes coalesce into meaning. A girl sends an email, a missive of love bundled with a picture, to someone in the United States. Her email promises undying love if he’d get her a green card. Someone is streaming porn, maybe the person squirming in the corner, his computer on his lap. A student is chatting online with his professor about a biology project. Another chat channel, this one with his girlfriend, reveals he thinks his professor a world-class idiot.
    A stubby finger broke the reverie. Luka pointed to the student’s chats. “Can you find out who he is?” He waved his hand around the café at the people. Eavesdropping online is one thing; pinpointing the exact person is harder. I pulled up the chat file, copied what the man was typing to his girlfriend and sent it to his professor. Five seconds later, the man in the corner looks wildly around him. Luka’s chin wobbled as he covered his laugh with a fleshy hand. “I was thinking of a technical solution for triangulation, but elegance is what matters, eh?” Elegance—that’s what Father said about coding. I felt myself straighten.
    “These little secrets and lies…” Luka nodded slightly, dismissively. “How about something more serious?”
    Serious? How serious? For a while, my mind ran wild, straying to the rumors one always hears about on the underground bulletin boards. Programs that control powerful ion satellites orbiting the world; Artificial Intelligences that can, or have taken over the world already; master hacks that control anything—do you want to copy the world, delete, ignore? Vaporware is mostly smoke and myth. What’s serious enough for him?
    “Well?” he asked mildly.
    I had to come up with something fast, so I expanded my network scan. Corporate hacking is usually a team effort. Any decent hacker will tell you it’s easy to force your way around, to smash and break things—but to do it without getting caught, that’s the hard bit. Bayesian analyzers use heuristics to study your techniques; honey pot traps lure you with fake promises. Professional hackers work in teams. They plan ahead. Sniffing programs are used to understand a system’s maintenance schedules, find all the loopholes. They lurk in the system for months, before getting out. Then, they have ways to sell the data they grab. Most importantly, they do everything with style. I considered my alternatives as I pinged the world. Small businesses are easy targets. Even a newbie can take them down. A brute-force attack algorithm can hurl permutations of characters, trying one set, then another, against their digital locks. Chance and frequency work in cahoots until the right key is found. Simple yet inelegant.
    So I do something different.
    A few clicks later, my shadow slips under a virtual door crack. Tack, tack, tack , Luka’s wedding ring makes a heavy sound as his fingers drum the table. I’m in, but the challenge has grown. From Root, the sub-directories spiral out like mazes. It’d take forever to find my way around, so I seeded my favorite hack for subnets. I call it Silver Rose after the flower Old Nelya puts in the vase before my mother’s picture. A few seconds is all it takes to creep and twine and blossom. Almost there.
    As I wait, I look up at Luka, then glance away as his shaded eyes study me. I feel like I want to prove myself. Tack, tack, tack , his fingers continue. Is this enough? Can I do more? I want to do more!
    Focus.
    Down the road, a digit flips in the inventory system of a supermarket. Soon, the store assistants will think all their milk expired three days ago. Across the street, a digital billboard on a pink and white building blinks into a