Rogue Code (24 page)

“You’ll be standing outside asking for quarters later today.”

“Hey, I’m just a bit down on my luck. All I need is a break to get on my feet.” He paused, then said, “Thanks for coming.”

“You’ve done the same for me.” Daryl hesitated, then said, “How’s Jeff?”

“He’s good this morning. Hard at work on his laptop, trying to find a way to dig us out of this hole. He’ll be all right, but it was close. Daryl, these are dangerous people. You’re on-site now, so promise me you’ll take this seriously and be careful.”

“I promise.”

“And you didn’t have to fly across the country. I told you that. We’re looking for hacker help with this.”

“Better face-to-face. You know that. Now, tell me what’s going on.”

Frank filled her in, catching her up on what he’d learned that morning. She listened with growing disbelief at the audacity of it.

“This is no way to reward an American hero!” she snapped. “You of all people know what Jeff’s done for this country, the risks he’s taken. He’s never asked for anything, not even a dime of the money he’s spent chasing down terrorists. He’s been shot, threatened, God knows what else.”

“I couldn’t agree more. But I don’t think the people involved here know any of this. That was all so hush-hush.”

Daryl composed herself before continuing. “So you’ve been set up.”

“Right.”

“Someone inside the Exchange or outside?”

“We think both. We’re hoping you can help us pin that down. We need to point this Alshon guy at the right party to bring an end to this—and the sooner, the better. If we can identify someone working right here at the Exchange, that would be great.”

“That will be the same somebody who’s hacked the system.”

“Absolutely.”

Daryl thought about that for a bit. “How good a job did they do on you two?”

“Good enough to get the SEC in gear but frankly I think it’s a bit over the top. In theory at least any fair-minded investigator should be willing to hear us out and realize we’ve been set up.”

“But you don’t want to take that chance?”

“Officially, we don’t even know there’s an SEC investigation, unless you count searching Jeff’s place as a form of notice. Still, my source says warrants are coming out by Monday.”

“That seems awfully fast for this type of crime. Is this connected to that bot Wall Street is upset about?”

Frank told her how they’d come to get the engagement. “The bot the
New York Times
is all upset about is harmless. Their source is exaggerating. Probably a disgruntled former employee.”

“The market’s reeling from the news.”

Frank laughed. “If what we’ve found ever gets out, there will be a crash like no other in history. No one will have any faith in the stock market, no matter what they say about how secure it is.”

“I guess we shouldn’t be surprised after all we’ve seen elsewhere. So many institutions have gone out of business. Assets people thought were secure, like the value in their homes, vanished. Why should the New York Stock Exchange computers be immune?”

“I’ve made some calls,” Frank continued. “Fortunately, I still have people I can trust on the inside. Alshon’s pursuing this as an act of terrorism under the Patriot Act. That gives them a lot of authority.”

Daryl grimaced. She hated to see laws meant for one purpose abused this way. She’d had this fight repeatedly within the National Security Agency. “Getting back to the hackers, being heavy-handed suggests they’re only looking to get you two out of the way for a while.”

“We agree but don’t know where that takes us. The obvious conclusion is that they’re just buying time to cover their tracks, maybe finish any looting they’ve got under way.”

“All right, what do you want from me?”

“Like I told you over the telephone, we can use help in figuring out what exactly they are up to, but especially in backtracking to them. We have to hope they’ve left a clue somewhere. If they are inside the Exchange, that narrows the field of suspects considerably. If they are outsiders, that would tend to get us off the hook.” He paused, then continued, “Since you’re here, it occurs to me that it’s useful to have a fresh face on the scene. You can go places we can’t. We need to stay out of sight.”

“Where are you two staying?”

“It’s better if you don’t know.”

Daryl nodded. “Okay. I can see that.” Neither spoke for a long minute. “Does he know you asked for me?”

“Yes, I told him.”

“And?”

“He appreciates your help.”

She looked Frank in the eye. “And?” she repeated.

“No ‘and.’ He appreciates your help. He knows how good you are.”

“Okay, then. Tell him … tell him I’ll do everything I can.”

Frank touched her forearm. “He knows that.”

Daryl blinked as she fought back tears.

35

ENFORCEMENT DIVISION

SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION

NEW YORK REGIONAL OFFICE

200 VESSEY STREET

NEW YORK CITY

2:51
P.M.

It was Saturday, but during a big case, weekends meant little in Robert Alshon’s office. He had checked in with Flores and her team just after lunch. They were hard at the forensic examination of the computers seized from Red Zoya in D.C. When he’d caught her eye, she’d shrugged and shook her head.

He returned to his office. Maybe this guy was more clever than most, he thought. And he kept his dirt out of his office. If that was the case, Aiken would have a laptop with him from which he’d done everything. Alshon alerted his people and any federal officer who might arrest Aiken to acquire every computing device within reach.

Gene Livingston rapped lightly on his open office door. He was an understated man, both in size and demeanor, but Alshon had come to rely on him to perform the essential legwork outside Flores’s province. He waved the man in and gestured at the chair.

“What do you have?” he asked pointedly.

“Just preliminaries at this point, boss, but there’s some firm data here.” Livingston lifted a legal tablet in front of him slightly. Approaching fifty years of age, with little hair remaining and out of date glasses, Livingston looked every bit the bookworm his job description made him out to be. He’d never married and had rented the same one-bedroom apartment for over twenty years. He brought his lunch to work and ate at his desk. Alshon once commented to a colleague that he wished he had ten more like him.

“I can find no connection between William Stenton and Jeffrey Aiken or Aiken’s company. I’ve checked Stenton’s finances, and there has been no significant movement in two years, nothing at all in the last three months. All indications are they’d never met before Stenton hired him and Frank Renkin. I’ve requested a digital and telephone screen and expect results back Monday or Tuesday, but I think we can expect it will confirm my preliminary analysis.”

“I plan to meet with Stenton on Monday. I have a number of questions, and it will be better if I don’t have to tell him he’s a target. So do what you can to speed that along. What else?”

“Red Zoya is clean. Aiken owns it without partners. It pays its taxes, its corporation filings are up-to-date. It has a good credit rating. Basically, it’s just an extension of Aiken for tax and liability purposes.”

“And what about the man?”

Livingston smiled. “This is where it gets really interesting. He’s a Ph.D., taught at Carnegie Mellon. You mentioned he once worked for the CIA.” He looked up and Alshon nodded. “He was head of the Counter Cyberterrorism Unit, a four-man team in existence before 9/11. I can’t find anything official but as I understand it he claimed to have uncovered the attack before it happened and later said no one listened.”

“I’ve heard that story a few times.”

“Anyway, he left after that and started his own company. It’s got a good reputation, and he does too.” He looked down. “There’s more, but nothing official.” Alshon raised his eyebrows. “Aiken also reportedly discovered a cyberterrorist attack against the West a few years ago. He flew to Moscow and Paris, engaged in a firefight, killed the brothers responsible.”

Alshon looked at Livingston in disbelief. “Are you certain?”

“I am that it happened. It’s pretty common knowledge in some circles. I just don’t know the details. Two years ago, he’s the one that found that virus that changes documents in a computer. He was involved in some incident in Turkey in which a plane crashed.”

“Gene, this sounds like fantasy land.”

“I understand your skepticism. I’ll see if I can’t nail down some facts.”

“What about his finances?”

“He’s done well, but he’s not much of an investor. Basically, his money piles up in a savings account. Every few months, he transfers some into an indexed Schwab account. The rest he rolls into CDs. Of course, there’s the recent activity. I’ll get to that later.”

“Not very imaginative.”

“I guess not. He did pay off his town house in Georgetown last year. In general he works a lot and doesn’t do much else.”

“What about Renkin?”

“Renkin is former CIA as well. He left some months ago to go to work for Aiken. He was Deputy Director of Counter Cyber Research at the time. His finances are even more boring than Aiken’s. Still has a mortgage, married, three children. Nothing stands out and no recent action.”

Alshon grimaced. “You say there’s nothing?” Livingston shook his head. “These guys are too clean. That’s always a red flag. They’re hiding something. What about recent weeks, since they came to New York?”

“Nothing on Renkin.” Livingston consulted his tablet. “Aiken opened a brokerage account, and it’s received just over three million dollars in the last few days.”

“That’s more like it.” Livingston was pursing his lips. “What?”

“It doesn’t smell right. He set the thing up in his own name. No attempt to hide anything. Then he’s transferred market money straight into the account. It’s almost like there’s a spotlight on it.”

“What was he supposed to do?”

“I don’t know, something. Set up an LLC in Nevada and use it. That would have slowed a search down a couple of days to get back to him. Use any name but his own. Go offshore. Something. It’s almost like he wanted to get caught.”

Alshon swiveled in his chair and gazed out his window. “These are both Company men, Gene,” he said after a bit. “They’ve been schooled in the craft. They think it through. My guess is he expected to erase his trail before anyone caught on to him. What we’re seeing is a bitter man whose career was going nowhere, who has the chance of a lifetime to get back at everyone and set himself up for life. He figured he’d get away with it and laugh all the way to the bank. These guys like Aiken and Renkin, they think they’re above the law.” He turned back to his desk. “Keep digging. My guess is there’s more.”

“I do have more. Aiken was struck by a car Thursday night. He was hospitalized.”

“What happened?”

“He was jogging near the reservoir and was attacked. He ran into a busy street to escape and was hit by a car. He was nearly killed.”

“What do the police think?”

“They think a homeless guy went berserk.”

“Nothing more?”

“Just that Aiken left the hospital without being released.”

“I’d expect that. He’s on the run now. All right, see what else you can find and keep digging. Send Susan in, please.”

Flores arrived a few minutes later, looking very tired as she took a seat.

“What have you got?” Alshon asked.

“Not a thing. Zip. Nada.”

“Details.”

“It’s all encrypted. I’d need the NSA to break it, and even then, it would take weeks, assuming it can be done.”

Alshon thought about that, then asked, “How about his finances?” He often had Flores and Livingston cover the same ground just to be sure. They were aware of it and worked that much harder.

“That was actually pretty easy. Nothing out of the ordinary, just a Schwab account and some CDs. He pays his bills on time, owns his house.” She looked up and in a rare moment of humor said, “In most regards he’s a good catch.”

Alshon snorted. “You’ll be visiting him in prison.”

“Not for me. For some women.”

“Tell me what you found on the Exchange.”

“It didn’t take long to locate the tools Aiken used or his malware. He was employing it stupidly, though. Instead of blending in with traffic, he had it programmed to just keep working around the clock. The automated security scans would have picked it up but the way the malware was set up made getting caught even more certain. It was pretty carelessly done. And it leads straight to his brokerage account.”

“So just as IT told us?”

“Pretty much.” She tapped her teeth with her pen. “There’s a rootkit in there. He’d been paying a lot of attention to it.”

“Rootkit? That’s some kind of cloaking device, right?”

“Right, it conceals a file’s presence in a computer. He’d been working on this one.”

“Maybe it’s his.”

“No. He’s investigating it.”

“What did you find out about it?”

“Nothing except that it’s pretty sophisticated.”

“It was just part of his job; good to go through the motions.”

“I suppose, but a rootkit’s got no business in the heart of the New York Stock Exchange’s trading platform.”

Just then, the telephone rang. “Yes?” Alshon listened intently, then hung up. “Take another look at his office data just to confirm we can’t access it, then get back on the Exchange and see what else you can learn. Maybe he’s one of those people who kept things separated, but not many do. Encrypting the files can only have one explanation.”

“Maybe he works for sensitive clients and wants to protect his work product. That will be the explanation.”

Alshon snorted. “He’s hiding something. We need to find out what that is. I’m off to search his office over at the Exchange. The team will have more computers for you.”

“Okay.”

“With a great deal of luck they’ll show up. I’ve got two arrest warrants.” As he grabbed his jacket he gave her a very unpleasant grin.

36