Chapter 26
Midnight, Tuesday, January 19
Scarsdale, New York
Scott Mason awaited Kirk’s midnight call.
Now that they had a deal, a win-win situation, Kirk and his phriends had become gung-ho. Kirk agreed to help Scott in the dGraph and Freedom situations if Scott would make sure that his articles clearly spelled out the difference between the white-hat and black-hat hackers.
Journalistic responsibility demanded fair treatment of all sides and their respective opinions, and Scott attempted to bring objectivity to his analyses. He did this well, quite well, and still was able to include his own views and biases, as long as they were properly qualified and disclaimed.
Additionally, Kirk wanted assurances of total anonymity and that Scott would not attempt to identify his location or name. Scott also had to agree to keep his Federal friends at a distance and announce if they were privy to the conversations.
In exchange for fair portrayals in the press, privacy and no government intervention, Kirk promised Scott that the resources of Nemo would be focussed on finding defenses to the virus at-tacks in dGraph and Freedom software. If Kirk and Homosoto were right, millions of computers would experience the electronic equivalent of sudden cardiac arrest in less than two weeks.
The Times, Higgins and Doug agreed to the relationship but added their own working caveats. In order to treat Kirk as a protected source, they pretended he was a personal contact. Instead of reporter’s notes, Scott maintained an open file which recorded the entirety of their computer conversations. There were no precedents for real-time electronic note taking, but Higgins felt confident that the records would protect the paper in any event. Besides, Supreme Court rulings now permit the recording of con-versations by hidden devices, as long as the person taping is actually present. Again, Higgins felt he had solid position, but he did ask Scott to ask Kirk’s permission to save the conversa-tions on disk. Kirk always agreed.
At midnight, Scott’s computer beeped the anticipated beep.
Wtfo
I heard a good one.
Joke?
Yeah, do they work over computer?
Try Me
Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs were in Europe and got to meet the Pope. Dopey really wanted to asked the Pope a few questions. “Mr. Pope, Mr. Pope. Do you have pretty nuns?” “Of course we do, Dopey.” “Mr. Pope, do you have fat ugly nuns?” “Why, yes, Dopey, we do.” “And I bet, Mr. Pope, that you have some tall skinny nuns, too.” “Yes, Dopey we do.” “Mr. Pope? Do you have nuns in Chicago?” “Yes, Dopey, we have nuns in Chicago?” “And in San Francisco and New York?” “Yes, Dopey.” “And do you have nuns in Africa and Australia and in France?” “Yes, Dopey. We have nuns everywhere.” Dopey took a second to think and finally asked, “Mr. Pope? Do you have nuns in Antarc-tica?” “No, Dopey, I’m sorry, we don’t have any nuns in Antarc-tica.” The other six dwarfs immediately broke out into a laugh-ing song: “Dopey fucked a penguin. Dopey fucked a penguin.”
Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha!!! Love It. Real Ice Breaker. Ha Ha
Facetious?
No, That’s Great. Is Your Recorder on?
You bet. No plagiarism. What have you got?
More Than I Wish I DID. DGRAPH FIRST. WE HAVE IDENTIFIED 54 SEPARATE DGRAPH VIRUSES. I HAVE A FILE FOR YOU. IT LISTS THE VIRUS BY DETONATION DATE AND TYPE, SYMPTOMS AND THE SIGNATURES NEEDED FOR REMOVAL. ARE YOU REALLY GOING TO PRINT IT ALL?
Daily. Our science section has been expanded to every day from just Tuesday. I have all the room I need.
You Might Make Me Reconsider My Opinion of the Media
Just the facts, ma’am. Just the facts.
HA HA. WE’VE JUST TOUCHED THE SURFACE ON FREEDOM, BUT THE WORD’S OUT. FREEDOM WILL BE AS GOOD AS DEAD IN DAYS. THE NUMBER OF VIRUSES MUST NUMBER IN THE HUNDREDS. IT’S INCREDIBLE. I’VE SEEN A LOT OF VIRUSES, BUT NONE LIKE THIS. IT’S ALMOST AS THOUGH THEY WERE BUILT ON AN ASSEMBLY LINE. SOME ARE REAL CLOSE TO EACH OTHER, EVEN DO THE SAME THINGS, BUT THEIR SIGNATURES ARE DIFFER-ENT MAKING IT EXTRA HARD TO DETECT THEM. EACH ONE WILL HAVE TO BE DONE INDIVIDUALLY.
I suggest we start with the dGraph viruses. You said 54, right?
So Far
Send me the file and I still may have time to get it into tomor-row’s paper. They usually leave a little room.