The one thing that troubled me most about my meeting with Rudy Levinski was that I had been unable to learn his secret. Why was he anxious to by-pass the police and approach Lisa directly? Why was he anxious to help her?
The answer seemed to lie with the garbled EFT's. His explanation of this strange event was not satisfying. I was convinced that those error messages lay at the heart of the problem. What did Mr. Levinski know and how could I draw it out of him?
I was certain that the transmissions were not corrupted by an electrical storm. Nor was the cause a faulty hardware component --- after all, the error messages got through properly, as did my replays moments afterwards.
Somebody tampered with those transmissions. This tampering occurred downstream of my wire-tap. Could there have been a second tap? Maybe. Or, another possibility was that the tampering occured closer to the end point, at the First Chicago computers. Indeed, maybe there was no tampering at all. Maybe the bank only claimed that the messages were scrambled. This would be consistent with Rudy's obvious effort to downplay the importance of the entire episode. Could it be that First Chicago was behind the forgeries and the rejections were somehow related to a cover-up? This seemed unlikely; by issuing systematic rejections, First Chicago was drawing greater attention to the forgeries. Such conspicuous action with no plausible justification would be inconsistent with a cover-up effort. So why would the bank deliberately stall transfers?
Slowing the flow of money between two banks would benefit the bank with the net decrease in assets. Thus, if somebody at First Chicago had examined the EFT's and determined that First Chicago stood to pay out a large amount of money, then there would be good financial reasons for slowing those payments. Perhaps the bank was low on reserves. By stalling for twenty-four hours, the bank can build up greater reserves without turning to the lendor of last resort, the Federal Reserve. The Fed charges interest for overnight loans. Admittedly, the rates charged by the Fed are generally below market-value, but for a large loan the amount can be significant. This might be the explanation I had been looking for! I raced over to my Alpha machine and quickly typed in my password to release the screen-lock. Using perl, I quickly wrote a script to sum the EFT's and print the net flow of dollars from Bendix to First Chicago. Sure enough, it was a negative number, meaning that more money was being paid by First Chicago to Bendix than the other way around. The net amount was $7 million. I had no idea if this was an unusually large amount, but I suspected it was. Certainly if my theory was right, then it would be. This would be the motivation I was looking for to explain why First Chicago would falsely claim that the transmissions were garbled and reject all EFT's until the next day.
Uh oh. If my theory was right then this also meant that the rejections were entirely unrelated to the forgeries. This meant my wire-tap had picked up two attacks on the United States banking infrastructure!
I pushed my chair away from the table. The card-table, already stressed from the weight of the Alpha, yielded to the presure of my arms and threatened to collapse. I scarcely noticed. The apartment was silent and gloomy.
Plick, plick, plick,...
The wall clock in the kitchen registered on my consciousness and took on an ominous quality with its incessant ticking. A shiver ran down my spine as I stood up and walked over to the window to draw the blind. The sky outside was overcast and the air was foggy. I kept the room light off. The paranoa that swept over me told me that it was better to let it appear that I was not home. I sat in an easy chair in the living room, across from the computer desk, and stared absently at the distant monitor screen glowing on the opposite side of the room.
The delay scam at First Chicago was clearly an inside job. The beneficiary of this crime was an institution. No longer was I chasing a two-bit crook or a prankster. If my prey was an institution, with the masterminds behind the crimes sitting on a corporate board, then there was no telling what extremes they might go to in order to escape capture. I stood up and checked the deadbolt on the door. Next I peeked through the blind and down to the street below. A week ago I had been disgusted by my fear; now I felt fully justified. I was certain that I had surmised the meaning of the rejections correctly. I was equally certain that Rudy Levinski was fully aware of the delaying tactic taken by his bank. Perhaps he had even been the one to carry it out.
Who might have been watching or even listening to my conversation with Rudy? I racked my brain trying to remember if I had said anything that might get me in trouble. Was the FBI aware of this second crime? My meeting with Rudy took on a whole new meaning in this new context. Did the FBI have Rudy under surveillance? Had I now met with two of the prime suspects? How long could I go on associating with suspects before I (rightfully) became suspect #1?
Scared, I sat alone in the room, thinking. I was in over my head. With evidence of institutional crime by a major United States bank, clearly my next course of action should be to call on the FBI. What was the name of the agent in the phone calls I had tapped between the FBI and First Chicago? Agent Carter. I should contact him.
Instead I called Lisa. I'm not sure why. When last we has spoken, she had been distant and somewhat cold with me. She did not seem to find me threatening... only repulsive. She viewed me as a hacker, with the full set of negative and unseemly connotations that the contemporary use of that term carries.
Still, it was Lisa that I phoned. Maybe it was because she was the only other person that knew of my involvement. There simply was nobody else to call. I needed to talk to somebody.
I used my meeting with Rudy Levinski as an excuse, telling Lisa that I needed to brief her and asking if she could come to my apartment immediately. Thankfully she did not ask any questions other than to ask for directions to my apartment. She sounded relieved that I had spoken with Rudy and that the meeting had been productive.
I did not have to wait long before Lisa arrived. In that time I turned up the lights and turned down my paranoa. Lisa walked in, cast a quick look around my living room without commenting, and asked about my meeting with Rudy. I explained the entire situation. After I finished my story, Lisa stood up, stretched, and asked, ``What do you have in the way of food Carl? I'm starving.''
Oops. It was almost 7:30 and I still had not had dinner. I was too embarrassed to let her look through the barren contents of my refrigerator in search of a reasonable dinner, so I suggested pizza delivery. She opted for Chinese carry-out instead. There is a small carry-out restaurant down the street from my apartment. There isn't anyplace to sit, but the food is good and it is within walking distance. It is a long enough walk that when I leave immediately after ordering, the food is ready just when I get there.
Lisa made the call and we prepared to leave the apartment. It had started to drizzle lightly shortly after Lisa arrived so I grabbed a jacket from the hall closet. Lisa hadn't worn a jacket when she came so I searched for something she could wear. All of the coats I had were either too warm for July or too big to fit Lisa. The best I could find was an old track-team jacket from my college days at Berkeley. It was a bit too big for her, but it was lightweight and water resistant. Given the stylishly casual manner in which Lisa dressed, it actually went quite well with the rest of her outfit.
As we exited the front door of the building I noticed a light-blue sedan parked immediately across the street. The only reason I noticed it was because it was parked in a spot that is always empty, due to the fire hydrant located there. A large burly man in a trench coat was sitting at the wheel but the engine wasn't running.
I didn't bother opening the umbrella I'd brought along with us, as the rain was little more than a mist. I turned right and headed down the sidewalk with Lisa falling in step beside me. The air had the smell of burnt ozone that it takes on after a light rain in a hot city. I've always found that smell to be a pleasant one and I breathed it in as we walked. Neither of us said anything for a time. We reached the corner still in silence and turned left. After we had gone about half a block a light-blue sedan passed us. There was a man in a trench coat at the wheel. Hmmm.
``See that car?'' I asked, as it reached the end of the block and turned right.
``Yeah''
``It was parked right outside my apartment. Looked as if the guy at the wheel had been sitting there for a while... maybe waiting for us to leave.''
``Maybe he was waiting to pick up a friend,'' she suggested.
``If he was then the friend didn't show up because he is still alone in the car,'' I replied.
``You think he was following us?''
``I'm not sure. I will confess that I'm becoming more and more nervous about this whole affair. It is starting to grow into something larger than I'm prepared to deal with.
``Let's see if the car continues to follow us to the restaurant. If we don't see him again then I will concede that I'm being crazy. But if he is just circling the block and passes us again then I think we may have cause to be worried.''
He wasn't circling the block; he was waiting for us instead. I hesitated for only an instant as we rounded the corner and saw the car parked there. Lisa didn't say anything but let out a soft whistle under her breath.
``Now what?'' she asked.
``Don't stop. Keep walking.''
I didn't want the driver to know that we had noticed him. Not that he seemed to be too concerned. He made no effort to feign some other purpose for being there other than to watch us. I tried my best to look him over as we went by without appearing to do just that. I had Lisa walk beside me, between the car and me, so that I could look beyond her and at the driver, all the while pretending to be involved in an animated conversation. For his part, the driver simply sat there and stared at us as we went by. Is this the way the FBI conducts surveillance? Or was it somebody other than the FBI? The CIA? NSA? I certainly didn't have any experience dealing with spooks and had no basis for even trying to determine which agency he might be from. But I had no doubt that he was a spook of some sort. The latest discovery of inside shenanigans meant I could no longer take any of this lightly. With such rampant corruption there would be plenty of blame to spread around and, innocent or not, I was bound to have some of that blame thrown my way. I was convinced that executives at First Chicago were already setting up Lisa to be a scapegoat.
As we neared the carry-out place at the end of the block the blue car passed us again. This time it slid into an empty parking spot along the curb in front of us. At the same time, a city bus pulled up to the bus-stop directly in front of the Chinese place. I turned to glance behind us. Uh oh. Two men in dark suits were following us, and walking faster than we were. I didn't like this. I grabbed Lisa's elbow and broke into a run. Lisa kept up with my pace easily, matching me stride for stride.
``Where are we going?'' she asked. ``Not the carry-out place.''
``See that bus stopped up ahead? Do you think we can get there before it leaves?''
``No problem,'' she said as she sped up.
I sprinted at full speed, leaving Lisa behind. Just so long as one of us got to the bus-stop in time, that person could hold the bus for the other. I pumped my arms and tried to control my breathing as I willed myself to move faster. I heard the doors on the bus close as I drew nearer. I was still fifty feet away. Thick black exhaust belched out of the back as the bus began to crawl away from the curb. Thirty feet away now. The bus shifted gears. Weather it was from first gear to second or second to third I don't know. Slowly, between belches and roars, it picked up speed. Very slowly; it wasn't moving fast yet. I ran up along side the filthy vehicle and beat on the glass doors with my fist. The driver turned with a startled look on her face and hit the brakes. Moments later the door opened and I stumbled up the steps.
``Thanks,'' I panted, ``there's another person on her way.''
``No problem,'' replied the driver. She was an overweight woman with curly blonde hair and weiging about 250 pounds. She had an amused smirk on her face; she probably doesn't get such over zealous passengers on her bus very often. Lisa trotted up the steps moments later.
Nervously I looked out the windows as the bus once again began to accelerate. We weren't out of trouble yet. Our pursuers were running toward the bus. It seemed an eternity as the bus labored to pick up speed, seemingly coming to a near stop each time the driver stepped on the clutch to shift up a gear. But we did eventually get away safely without incident.
Beside me Lisa was panting only lightly and, unlike me, was not sweating in the least. I tried to convince myself that this was only because I had been the one to run ahead, running hard.
We quickly revised our dinner plans. Lisa suggested we go to Sid's again. We changed buses three times before finally reaching what I now was convinced was Lisa's frequent watering hole. We were again shown a table by Maria. I found it hard to relax and when the waitress came to take our order a few moments later I realized that I'd been looking at the menu without actually reading it. To disguise my lack of concentration I quickly ordered the swordfish, the same dish I'd had last time. Apparently this wasn't good enough to fool Lisa.
``That car really got to you, huh?'' she asked.
Should I tell her of my worst fears? I was the one that had dragged her into all of this in the first place. I hadn't given her much opportunity to distance herself from the affair from the beginning and had given her every opportunity to become enmeshed further. Didn't I have a moral obligation to inform her of the risks as best as I could evaluate them? On the other hand I really didn't have any basis for making a firm evaluation myself. She had the same information I had. Wouldn't it be disrepectful and condescending to presume that she couldn't make her own determination of the personal risk involved. Still...
``Lisa, I think you should consider the possibility that there may be some very desperate people involved in this situation,'' I said.
``It does sound like the scope has broadened a bit,'' she agreed. ``Do you think the man in the car was on the side of law enforcement or on the other side?'' she asked.
This is exactly what had been troubling me the most. Now that we had evidence that EFT tampering was rampant, I couldn't discount the possibility that a large gang of thieves or even the Mafia, was in on the action. Given my choice, I would much rather be hounded by the FBI than the Mafia. The FBI operated under some legal restrictions; the Mafia had very few constraints. With bank executives involved in the delay scam, some very powerful people were operating on the wrong side of the law. Who might be working with them?
Our food arrived shortly thereafter. Once again the swordfish was excellent. Lisa had ordered the Fillet of Sole this time and reported that it too was very good. I had taken the liberty to order a bottle of wine with our meal. I felt more at ease now that I'd aired my concerns and Lisa accepted the situation. I poured the wine and was about to offer a toast to friendship and happenstance but Lisa interrupted me before I started and proposed a toast to our progress on the case and to petty thieves who interfere with the lives of innocent people. She chuckled softly as she sipped the wine. Then, as she set her glass back down, she asked me what I intended to do about the delay scam. I was still undecided. The safest and perhaps wisest approach would be to go straight to the FBI. However, I had hopes that by confronting Mr. Levinski I could learn whatever secrets he may have and enlist his help in tracking down the perpetrator. I was no longer eager to go it alone; I needed all the help I could get.
``How much money do you figure a bank could steal by delaying?'' asked Lisa. ``These are pretty serious charges you are making. Are you sure of yourself?''
``There is no way that those EFT's were corrupted by natural causes,'' I exclaimed. ``The TCP/IP headers made it through, yet each and every payload failed despite error correction in the modems and in the TCP/IP protocol.'' I made these comments to re-establish my own convictions as much as to convince Lisa. She was right; these were serious charges. I looked around the room uneasily. I wondered if we should be talking so openly about the case in public and suggested to Lisa that we switch to a more mundane topic.
``Carl,'' she said with some annoyance, ``look around. The closest people to us are thirty feet away and if they look like spies to you then you certainly have a great deal of respect for the creativity of the FBI in developing disguises.''
She was right. The party closest to us consisted of an elderly couple seated on the other side of the room. The man was very nearly entirely bald, with only a bit of grey hair near his ears. The women had powdered white hair tied in a bun. She was quite short and stocky whereas the man was tall and stocky. Both wore glasses. They had a small boy with them. My guess is that he was between four and seven years old. They appeared to be grandparents on an outing with their grandson. This impression was reinforced by the manner in which the older two listened patiently and attentively as the boy slowly and carefully recounted a long tale of some sort. I was too far away to make out the words, but I could hear well enough to know that there were frequent pauses and what sounded like revisions to the narrative.
Not only did the elderly couple look as wholesome and innocuous as can be, but it was hard to imagine that the FBI was recruiting young children for surveillance operations. OK, I was being paranoid.
``Still, if you'd rather talk about something else, that's fine by me,'' Lisa offered. ``I'd welcome the change. A girl can't live, eat, and breathe electronic banking crime. Or at least I can't.
``Tell me about your job at AT&T. Why did you leave?'' she asked. Then, when I didn't reply immediately she quickly apologized. ``I'm sorry. I didn't mean to pry. If you don't want to talk about that we can talk about something else. I was just making conversation.''
``No I don't mind,'' I re-assured her. ``I hesitated only because it's a long story and I wasn't sure where to begin.''
I told her about my move from AT&T to Multi-Media Telecommunications (MMT). That move came right after I earned my PhD in Computer Science from Princeton. As a small telecommunications company anxious to capitalize on the emerging markets in multi-media, MMT offered exciting positions in R&D. The company did quite well, with the stock surging in the first three years after I joined, but the work in cryptography within the company began to dry up. Ironically, the advances in authentication and information integrity that make cryptology applicable to business, are the same advances that caused MMT to lose interest. Unlike most computing applications in business, where information integrity is important, MMT was primarily interested in privacy. Things like digital signatures, MAC's, zero-knowledge proofs, and authentication were not on MMT's research agenda. Instead, MMT devoted the full research budget to communications hardware and multi-media technologies. I opted to go into the consulting business, and for nearly two years now I've been making a comfortable living working on protocol analysis. Admittedly, I've had to supplement that work with an occasional mundane programming assignment working on GUI's or firewalls, but for the most part the work has been interesting.
Lisa took exception to this last comment. It was then that I learned that she was a software developer working on Graphical User Interfaces (GUI's). I then had to sit through a long sermon that not all User Interface projects are mindless programming-by-example using wizards and other people's libraries. Before long I actually found myself quite interested as Lisa explained the GUI library that her company had developed in-house. She was not one of the original developers, but had joined the small company of about fifty employees threes ago. Her job was to help keep the aging GUI library current... no easy task given the rapid rate of advances in that industry.
``We produce MAC CD-ROM software for kids up to about age five --- mostly educational stuff. We are able to churn out new titles today that are cutting edge, and we are still using the same basic kernal the company was founded on. Sure, we've had to make lots of changes and enhancements, but the foundation remains strong. Don't belittle the Computer Science that goes into GUI's Carl.''
I was too pleased by her strong grasp of Computer Science to argue. I quickly retreated and confessed that the work she described was both interesting and challanging. We talked at length about Computer Science and about jobs. Generally, I have been pleased with the direction my career has gone... until now. Granted it is entirely my own doing, but chasing down a cunning EFT mastermind, with the FBI breathing down my neck, and with the threat of a jail sentence looming over my head, does not bode well for my career prospects.