He positioned himself in front of a retina scanner, a green-lit windowpane that was embedded into the wall. It beeped, the steel door opened with a quiet clicking noise, and they entered an imposing hall.
“Welcome to the world of artificial intelligence,” Justin said with a grin. Compared to the solemn silence of the upper stories, the large, fluorescent-lit room was almost shocking. Gray cabinets were lined up in long rows and made an unexpected amount of noise.
“These are air-conditioning units,” Justin said, before Alex could even ask. “It would be unbearably hot in here without them. The computers need an enormous amount of electricity—almost as much as a small town.”
Alex felt like a trespasser sneaking around in a restricted military bunker.
“We’re working with the world’s most advanced supercomputers,” Justin continued. He stopped in front of one of the machines. It seemed practical and unimpressive and was housed in a plain gray cabinet. “For example, this is a Cray-2. With a memory of two terabytes, it can process about 1.6 million operations per second. That one over there is an ETA, which is already eight times more powerful. The SUPRENUM is even a little faster. It’s connected to thirty-two parallel operating node computer systems and is capable of unbelievably complex processing. These contain the largest nonmilitary databases in the Western world.”
Alex, Oliver, and Mark nodded in fascination. They continued walking.
“These supercomputers are quickly on their way to overcoming the limitations of the human brain. The future of our world belongs to machines like this,” Justin said.
“Sounds like science fiction,” Oliver remarked, and Justin grinned.
“Cool, isn’t it?” he said. They had entered into a confusing labyrinth of hallways flanked by gigantic computers. After walking a while, they reached a row of offices—similar to the layout at LMI—separated only by glass walls. Justin entered the third glass box, its door bearing his name. As expected, the small room was stuffed to the gills with the most modern computer technology. An unimaginable array of computers and hardware components, drives, printers, monitors, and all kinds of other conceivable devices cluttered the room. An impressive tangle of cables disappeared into the floor. Justin sat down at his hopelessly overloaded desk, which had no fewer than five monitors on top of it. He leaned back and lit a cigarette. He simultaneously pushed a button, which started the exhaust fan in the ceiling.
Alex began briefing him on the PBA Steel matter and her suspicion that someone was transacting illegal business behind her back using her confidential information.
“Mark found out that there’s a connection between the brokerage firm that purchased the stocks and LMI,” she said, “and we’d love to know who’s behind it.”
Oliver explained to Justin about offshore companies and that it was virtually impossible to find out who founded them.
“Hmm.” Justin scratched his head. “Your company created a corporation, which in turn is owned by another corporation that is involved in illegal business. Do I have that right?”
“Sort of.” Alex was impressed by Justin’s quick comprehension. “LMI has launched a fund that, among other things, is invested in a venture-capital company called SeaStarFriends, which in turn is registered on the British Virgin Islands.”
Justin drummed his fingers on the desktop.
“Where should I start?” He looked at his visitors’ faces.
“At LMI,” Oliver decided.
“Can you get into LMI’s central computer?” Mark inquired.
“That shouldn’t be a problem.” Justin nodded. “They’re probably working with an industry-standard operating system.”
“Are you familiar with that?” Alex wanted to know, and got an amused look.
“Just a little bit.” Justin grinned.
He asked them for some information about LMI, and then his fingers whizzed around the keyboard. He raised his head with a smile after a few minutes.
“Welcome to LMI,” he announced with a hint of pride and a touch of casual professionalism. “They’re using BankManager 5.3. That’s an old friend of mine, which makes things much easier.”
Mark and Alex leaned forward in disbelief. Oliver grinned.
“LMI has an information security department,” Alex said, voicing her concern. “They’ll notice if someone invades the system from the outside.”
“Sure”—Justin nodded—“BankManager 5.3 has a firewall, just like all the other corporate networks. But coincidentally, IBM gave us a contract for this system’s security testing—something we frequently do for software companies. At that time, we installed a ‘back door,’ which allows us to circumvent the normal protections. We can gain access to the entire system at any given time.”
“Does this mean,” Mark asked, “that you can get into the central computer of any company that uses this software?”
“That’s right.” Justin leaned back with a satisfied smile on his face. “We’re concerned with the system’s security. We work on improving security to protect against attacks from lunatics who want to wreak havoc.”
He turned his eyes back to the monitor and worked the keyboard relentlessly.
“Let’s open the back door now and walk in,” he said with a focused expression.
“BM 5.3 is protected by a secure-access firewall. This is a password-protected authentication method. Secure access works with Phazer, a fiber optic device that detects and defends against both internal and external attacks on the network.”
Alex leaned forward and looked at the incomprehensible row of numbers and letters flashing by on the monitor.
“But if this thing recognizes every access,” she asked, “how can you get into the system without anyone noticing?”
“Like I said, through the back door,” Justin answered. “There’s a command that gives me administrator’s rights.”
“Aha.”
“Such a large and complex system as BM 5.3 naturally has strict access controls. The network administrator is the only authorized individual to read, modify, or delete any system files. He also assigns access rights to individual users and monitors them. BM 5.3 has a directory structure that we call Listing, with which the network administrator monitors access rights. Every user has his or her own identification code, the UIC. Based on this personal code, the computer recognizes which resources are available to the user after log-in.”
“So those people who monitor everything can also snoop around in my files?” Alex asked in disbelief.
“Of course,” Justin said.
“That’s just unbelievable!” She shook her head in disgust. “I save tons of important things on my computer.”
“If they are so secret that no one should know about them, then you shouldn’t save them on your computer. I can show you a trick to set up a secret file even your administrator can’t crack.”
“You get full access with one simple command?” Mark was mightily impressed.
“Yes.” Justin looked up and grinned. “Pretty easy, isn’t it? You just need to know the command. If you tried to hack the passwords, it would attract attention right away. Most of the software for password hacking needs an incredible amount of capacity. We also happened to install Stealth into BM 5.3, a program that allows us to access the system unnoticed. It’s named after the stealth bomber that enemy radar can’t detect, and it makes the external user invisible to the network administrator.”
“What’s the secret command?” Mark asked curiously.
“I’ll tell you,” Justin answered with a smile, “because the command itself doesn’t really get you very far.”
He turned the monitor slightly to the right so that Alex, Oliver, and Mark could see the screen and typed a combination of numbers and letters on the keyboard.