The Origin Point: A Future Tech Cyber Novella (19 page)

"Yes Mr. President, the benefits of this
project are fantastic. Really, if we can solidify this testing
everyone will profit. We only wish to ensure future administrations
understand the implications and are as insightful as you in
recognizing the potential for our nation and the world."

On those words, the President broadly smiled
at Julia, as he signed the paper permanently locking the system
into place for the duration of its global implementation.

*

After convincing the President, Julia
traveled with him to work on selling the experiment to
multi-lateral organizations, while Marco took the project details
to global law enforcement agencies. Beginning with his domestic
colleagues who had been co-opted into COSA, but did not know the
full extent of the project's implementation, he followed Julia's
script and example to obtain broad consensus for an experiment
which, they all assumed, had no further agenda. All law enforcement
agencies were fiercely engaged in developing cyber defense
solutions for presentation to governments for approval. None were
particularly concerned about experimental R&D usurping their
detailed, and legislated, work. As Marco ran the project details
through each agency, he received indifferent feedback and limited
engagement. In the range of known and unknown security
organizations operating across borders, he found no objection from
those interested in joining the global experiment.

After a meeting with British Intelligence,
he called Julia. "No conflicts, no concerns," he told her of the
British response to COSA.

"Has anyone read the details?" Julia
asked.

"No. They're espousing one of those, 'I'm
too busy to fix a roof full of holes because I'm putting buckets on
the floor to catch the rain,' excuses."

"Short-term vision?"

"Exactly."

"Even with our international colleagues we
are operating at the right moment in history."

"Yes as I go through these global meetings I
realize the winds are blowing in our favor. No country has
world-defying leadership. We have a strength and courage vacuum,
that's why terrorists are going for destruction with impunity. They
do not see the galvanizing of global forces prepared to destroy
them. But when we talk about COSA, everyone is ready for exactly
this type of response."

"Because we can't find the terrorists. But
COSA will."

"Maybe we could find them if we had the
people. But the discontent is everywhere Julia, like dust. All of
the global law enforcement agencies know they must be able to
answer questions about cyber security. They prepare their people
and the work to meet the challenge as a technology issue. But our
work is different, we are not just looking at protecting computer
systems. Our version of cyber security includes using cyber to
ensure security. We're investing for the long-term in a
comprehensive system, but our counterparts do not have the vision
or the money to pursue that option. At the same time, there is an
extraordinary amount of money available in the world. Taxes are
generally low in most developed countries or tax loopholes are
high. Real assets of value like real estate, artwork and jewelry
are increasing in price at a rate consistently exceeding inflation.
China is only part of the story, the rest of Asia, the Middle East,
Africa, there is new wealth everywhere. And we have access to these
growing financial funds. Someone can afford to buy at those prices,
and those people can afford to invest in their own cyber
infrastructure. In a way, I cannot believe our luck to have this
project success at this point in history."

"We have worked very hard to get to this
point. Luck is opportunity meeting preparation, my friend. Do not
discount our individual efforts."

"No, no of course not. But we have this
unprecedented world situation of feckless non-cooperation in
Washington, inert global capitals, multi-billion dollar wealth
funds..."

"Don't forget the media. True investigative
journalism is dead. The media companies are giant conglomerates
focused on a bottom-line aimed at generating advertising dollars by
capturing eyeballs. I would bet the average reporter is some
social-media-addicted college kid who has no idea of the role of a
traditional newspaper journalist to go out and research and
investigate, and to provide readers with uncovered insight into
vital stories."

"They certainly write that way."

"The news media has reacted to social media
in exactly the opposite fashion one would have expected from
traditional journalists. They follow social media around for
stories, instead of going out and finding and making news with
their own curiosity."

"It's sad."

"Yes it is. Your friend Dallas could have
been a journalist from another era but even she was intimidated
into dropping the story. Back in the day, she would have taken a
risk to make sure the public was informed."

"In her defense, we made the story
impossible to find. She would have looked like a crackpot if she
tried to write about a grand conspiracy to take everyone's personal
data."

"But she would have been right."

"Except no one would have known until after
she was dead."

"No one will ever know even after we're all
dead."

"You think this story will never leak
out."

"What's to leak? A recording of this
conversation?"

"No, not today, but only because we assume
our technology is superior to the plans and ideas of those who will
seek to bring this system down."

"Who?"

"You know, the hackers."

"The hackers do not have a cohesive idea of
our plans."

"But as the project is rolled out, as the
system becomes public information one day, the hackers will realize
what has happened and take their revenge."

"They'll be too late."

"With technology, you cannot be too late if
you have the brainpower and time to push further ahead."

"We'll have to keep them from pushing
ahead."

"How will we prevent an inevitable quest to
attack us?"

"By staying on top of the information they
think they have."

"Planting deceptive stories?"

"Maybe."

"Or a completely deceptive system?"

"Possibly."

"You're going to camouflage COSA?"

"Of course. The system cannot be an open
website one logs in to. We have to make sure the connections are
untraceable, tied behind other systems and locked through
inaccessible doors."

"But eventually the project will encompass
all of those other systems and other doors."

"Yes but at that point, the whole world will
be connected through their smartphones and every other electronic
device in their house and workplace. At that point, people will be
so dependent on the functionality one will not be able to sabotage
the software or servers because of the potential to destroy whole
swathes of society like airports, schools and hospitals. Once
everyone around the world is on COSA, the hackers will have no
scope for attacking. They would shut themselves down too, lose
electricity, water, even contact with each other. Mutually assured
destruction is still a deterrent."

"Yes okay, but only if they have no insight
today, as we want to believe."

"If they have any information, the details
will not be enough to stop us. On that I am completely
certain."

*

Julia's rollout of the COSA experiment to
world leaders at the G8 and NATO summits was equally flawless. With
the President as the project's unwitting champion, Julia placed him
in front of his colleagues to quietly proclaim his excitement over
the project and its potential. For those expressing reluctance,
Julia prodded the President to remind them the project was 'in test
phases,' and the research was required in the name of global
security.

On the sidelines, she exerted her own
additional words of influence.

"
Monsieur le Président
," Julia said,
waylaying the French President during a dinner party at the G8.
"You of all world leaders know this project is a crucial step in
the fight against terrorism. Your support will encourage your
government and businesses to participate. That's all that's
required at this stage, participation."

To the British Prime Minister she emphasized
the value of interconnected functions and early alerts about
border-crossing hackers.

Both leaders agreed.

At the NATO Summit, smaller countries were
eagerly overwhelmed given every major country appeared informed,
enthusiastic, and prepared to engage and share in the results of
the project's functionality and potential. As Julia told the Baltic
and Scandinavian nations, "Participating is straightforward. You
will want to learn how well the software works. You do not want to
be left behind on technological developments. At the least you will
have a front-row seat to the latest innovations and capabilities of
advanced surveillance technology. Really in this day and age, you
can never be too careful. You should at least know which tools are
available in the event of a real fight."

By the time she completed her rounds, all 28
member states unanimously agreed the need to have a global
surveillance approach to fight terrorism required an advanced
interconnected global technology solution, and all committed their
governments to joining the COSA framework within the year, and to
participate in the experiment and analysis of the tracking
results.

On the final night of the summit, Julia
called Marco. "I will see you next at
Eglwys Gadeiriol
Tyddewi
," she said with a hint of humor.

"Where?"

"We are meeting there, in the Library."

"Library? What library?"

"At
Eglwys Gadeiriol Tyddewi
."

"Those are not even words."

"Don't be such a nativist, get into the
spirit of the location."

"Where am I going?"

She laughed. "To St. David's in Wales."

"Wales? And this mysterious unpronounceable
place you apparently mentioned?"

"The Cathedral."

"The Cathedral? The library in the Cathedral
in St. David's in Wales, sounds like a 'clue-risk' marriage gone
wrong. Could there be a more obscure location?"

"Another uninformed comment. St. David's is
not obscure at all. It's a perfect place for us to go, but not
readily accessible to our potential followers. Bring reading for
the haul from Cardiff. I'll see you tomorrow."

"Okay, " Marco reluctantly agreed.

The narrow roads of Wales cut through the
low hills and lush green flatlands as thin pencil lines tracing the
outlines of clouds floating in the sky. Every twist brought a
renewed view of the territory jutting out from the west of England
into the Irish Sea. Having snuck away from the NATO Summit's
delegates' hotel before sunrise, Julia caught the unobstructed
crisp scent of a waking day and failed to doze as planned, as her
private car carried her across the length of the territory to the
tip of the peninsula and settlement named for the Welsh people's
patron saint, David. With Tudor perfection the restaurants, pubs
and shops of a village insisting on being called a city, emerged in
front of Julia as if stepping out of the postcard describing its
medieval beginnings. 'The U.K. never disappoints in its maniacal
commitment to the past,' Julia thought, as the car moved on towards
the reconstructed stonewalls on the 1,500-year-old cathedral
grounds. Despite an ends-of-the-earth location with no rapid
transportation options, St. David's dared pilgrims to find its
hollowed ground as the finish to an inconvenient journey. But here,
Julia and her GCS group would be lost to the official media
covering the summit more than one hundred miles away. Instead her
colleagues would be incorporated among the pious and the curious
who would assume, like them, the trip had been made only to take
account of the historian's and the believer's confidence in its
importance. Disembarking on arrival, she made her way to the
Cathedral Library, which had been privately closed, and joined her
global GCS team ready to celebrate their victory in persuasion.

"Congratulations," were the first words to
greet Julia as she shook hands with the meeting participants. Those
who had been at the G8 or NATO summits did not need a recap of her
ability to obtain cooperation for the global rollout of COSA.
Within a half hour Marco and all the others arrived for their first
and possibly last in-person meeting as GCS.

"What we have achieved around the world is
remarkable," Julia stated, addressing the entire group. "You have
all done an excellent job. COSA has been established for the long
term, for the future we all want to see happen. Within the next ten
years, Western governments, many businesses, universities, and law
enforcement will be connected, and we will be able to see the
profiles of millions of citizens. As each year goes by, we will
extend the functionality until the foundation is completely unseen.
In the future, the average person will use COSA to go about their
daily business as if the system's commands were a voice in their
head. We should catch every terrorist before he acts. COSA cameras
and sensors will always know when danger is near and law
enforcement will be immediately alerted. This ability to use
technology to change human behavior is the 21st century equivalent
to the domestication of animals, the cultivation of crops, building
a public school system, inoculations..." She laughed. "You get the
point. We have single-handily set-up the best law enforcement tool
the world could have, and we accomplished our task without
government interference or public protest. If people ever get to
the point of complaining, which I do not believe they will, another
story will rapidly be told about how the benefits of this system
improved the lives of millions...billions of people. We may not
have the opportunity to be publically congratulated for the work we
have done, but we will know and celebrate our achievement among
ourselves. In places like this remarkable cathedral, surrounded by
beauty, arts, culture, spiritual guidance and history...we will
celebrate and remind ourselves of the incredible pinnacle we have
reached.