[Protocol of Blue Sun Division board meeting]
[New Angeles. 05-FEB-2216]
[Mr. Orange] Gentlemen… Welcome. As you know, the
last years have not been particularly glorious. Despite significant
improvements in our He-3 reactors efficiency, we had to accept significant
price decreases thanks to… uhm… some reputation problems. It is our duty to
restore our image and make our name shine as bright as the Wyldside’s neon
strip lights. Information was stolen from us and published on the net. This
must not happen again!
[Mr. Blonde] Sir, with all due respect, our
cybersecurity laboratory is doing all they can, but it seems that those hackers
tear in new holes in our defensive systems faster than we can…
[Mr. Orange] …plug the old ones. I know. Mr. Blonde,
describe your job to me.
[Mr. Blonde] Is this necessary?
[Mr. Orange] Yes.
[Mr. Blonde] I am in charge of developing our
intrusion countermeasure electronics. These are our first line of defence
against unauthorized accesses.
[Mr. Orange] And what exactly do those electronics do?
[Mr. Blonde] Well, they prevent hackers to infiltrate
our mainframe servers.
[Mr. Orange] Nothing else?
[Mr. Blonde] Isn’t that enough?
[Mr. Orange] Not anymore. Our progress in ICE design
has been marginal. Any kid can try to attack our servers with impunity. Our
servers are a playground for the worst scum. This must have an end!
[Mr. Pink] Sir, I might have an idea.
[Mr. Orange] Speak.
[Mr. Pink] I am frequently in contact with the
Haas-Bioroid production facility in Heinlein. They are one of the biggest
consumers of electricity from our Blue Sun reactor. Recently I got into a
conversation with one of their system operators – Ryon Knight. He told me about
a piece of ICE he is particularly fond of. It is called “Janus”.
[Mr. Orange] Go on…
[Mr. Pink] If I understood Mr. Knight correctly, any
unauthorized attempt to access data is not prevented by “Janus”…
[Mr. Orange] What?!
[Mr. Pink] …but some highly advanced brain mapping
algorithms implemented within the “Janus” ICE cause neural degeneration in the
attacker’s brain and more often than not some peripheral damage occurs as well,
leading to deletion of programs, attack scripts or even parts of the attacker’s
hardware.
[Mr. Orange] Mr. Pink, you had my curiosity, but now
you have my attention.
[Mr. Pink] The “Janus” ICE is usually very effective.
However, I have to admit that attackers can avoid some of the negative effects
by manually increasing their computing power. Still, a complete prevention of
the “Janus” subroutines is very unlikely, particularly when the attack on our
servers has been going on for some time before the hacker jacks into a system
protected by a “Janus”.
[Mr. Orange] So there is always at least some counter
attack on the hacker?
[Mr. Pink] Yes, unless they use special programs. But
those programs consume a lot of resources. So even if an attacker is able to
circumvent the complete “Janus”, chances are that other pieces of ICE do the
rest of the work and keep our servers save.
[Mr. Orange] You are saying that we use the “Janus” as
outer defence, force the attacker to take permanent neural damage or lose a lot
of resources while on the inside some of Mr. Blonde’s ICE keep the hacker out.
That is brilliant.
[Mr. Pink] But wait, there’s more. Studies found, that
attackers that took neural damage are less able to avoid discovery. Prior to
this meeting I talked to Mr. Blue. I am sure, he will be glad to inform you
about his progresses.
[Mr. Blue] I sure am. As you know, my job is to ensure
the supply chain of our He-3 from Heinlein to earth. The backbone is the
Beanstalk which is supervised by the Space Elevator Authority – SEA. The SEA
tracks and logs not only the passenger and cargo pods that go up and down the ‘Stalk,
but they also do a complete surveillance of the data that is transferred via
the Near-Earth Hub. As all our servers are connected via the Hub to the rest of
the Network, any attacker must establish his connection through this node as
well – and that makes him vulnerable to attempts of location disclosure…
[Mr. Orange] …and once we have gained knowledge of
the attackers’ location we send this information to Ms. Mills’ department, I
suppose?
[Mr. Blue] Precisely. To be frank, we have used the
SEA information frequently in the past. But hackers that attacked us began to
be particularly cautious. They started to wear specific protection gear or fled
into crowds of people, such that they could not be dealt with specifically. To
be honest, “specificity” is not one of Ms. Mills’ team’s particular strengths
either, but at least it is not as public.
[Mr. Pink] Right. And caused by those developments, we
have stopped making use of Ms. Mills as well as the SEA. But I am sure that the
implementation of “Janus” within our data protection protocols opens this door
again. I mentioned that an unprepared encounter with the “Janus” leads to
permanent neural damage. We can leverage this damage.
[Mr. Orange] Gentlemen, I am sold on the concept.
[Mr. Brown] I am sorry to interrupt, but you have not
yet mentioned the license cost of “Janus”.
[Mr. Pink] Let me quickly look up the figures. …
Alright here it is. If we max out on the implementation of “Janus”, we need to
spend 60% of our licensing budget. This might seem like a lot, but I think we
made clear earlier, that the usage of “Janus” increases the potential of Mr.
Blonde’s in-house ICE a lot - such that we are able to quit buying licenses for
other external ICE.
[Mr. Brown] And what about the SEA connection?
[Mr. Blue] Amounts to less than 15%.
[Mr. Brown] So the “Janus” and SEA take 75% together.
[Mr. Pink] Approximately, yes.
[Mr. White] Don’t forget our contract with Mr. Howard.
[Mr Brown] He takes 20% of our budget right now. That would
leave us with 5% remaining…
[Mr. Orange] I have an idea. In the long run, we need
own employees that are able to perform the tasks of Mr. Howard. Let’s initiate
an Executive Bootcamp in order to accelerate this progress. We should be able
to decrease the need of Mr. Howard if at least some of his tasks can be done by
our own recruits.
[Mr. White] We are currently in negotiations with Mr.
Stone, who is the head of human resources of the whole Weyland Consortium. If
we are lucky enough, he will put effort into our cause and create a position
for someone with Mr. Howard’s skillset in our company. One can dream.
[Mr. Orange] I like that. Mr. Blue, decrease Mr.
Howard’s contract by at third. This leaves how much license budget for other
tasks?
[Mr. Blue] Around 15%.
[Mr. Orange] Fair enough. What shall we use that on?
[Mr. White] You began the talk with our need to
increase our public reputation. I think I have found something that suits our
needs. There is a public project called the “Global Food Initiative”. If we
adopt it and use our remaining licensing budget to do so, we will certainly
improve our image. Another project we should fund is the renovation of Oaktown.
Not only will people see our good intentions, but actually we are able to
increase our profits. Win/Win, I’d say.
[Mr. Orange] Those suggestions are very good. But we need
to have more projects in order to satisfy the Consortium.
[Mr. White] True. But I have put some thought into the
topic. We are working on a secret agenda, “Project Atlas”. If we successfully
develop it, we are able to increase the effectiveness of our company
significantly. Lastly, we are still in a Corporate War with NBN over the extensive
use of Ms. Mills services which needs settling.
[Mr. Orange] I am impressed by the potential benefits
of “Project Atlas”. The overall amount of projects seems sufficient now. Let us
talk about the finances now. Mr. Blue, go ahead.
[Mr. Blue] With pleasure. Our in-house brokerage
division will continue to make money with their Hedge Fund trading. We also
expect our recent restructuring efforts to positively affect our results.
Lastly, our “Oversight AI” program accelerates the corporate development a lot
and leverages our reactor’s ability to dynamically adapt to our customers’
requirements. Overall, we can expect to continue contributing the majority of
profit to the Consortium.
[Mr. Orange] Excellent. Gentlemen, I am more than
pleased by today’s meeting. Please begin implementing the decided processes and
report back to me regularly. You are dismissed.
