Crisis- 2038

by Gerald Huff

  “Senator Lathrop and I have met with the President and with the Chairmen of the Intelligence and Homeland Security Committees,” said Scott. “We have agreed to fast-track new legislation to make our country safe again. We have not always agreed on these kinds of measures, but we are facing a crisis of historic dimensions. So, on a temporary basis, we will be banning all use of personal privacy clothing. And disabling or tampering with medplants will result in detention and investigation.”

  “There are other measures,” continued Lathrop, “that will give new powers to the Domestic Terrorism Task Force to increase surveillance in our cities, access critical corporate information, and intercept communications as necessary to track down these killers. There is no more important job for your government than keeping you, the American people, safe. We stand here, side by side, and pledge to you to do everything in our power to honor that obligation. Thank you.”

  The journalists shouted questions all at once. Walter pointed to a well-known anchor. “Keon Evans, CNN. Senator Scott, you said these were temporary measures. How long will they last? Is there a time limit in the legislation?”

  “They will last as long as necessary to safeguard our country,” said Scott.

  “So is there an actual time limit in the bill?”

  “Next question. Yes?”

  “Yasmin Kasan, AP. The Supreme Court has held similar measures unconstitutional in the past. Why do you think these will pass muster?”

  “This is a national emergency, Ms. Kasan. If the legislative and executive branches think this is what is necessary to protect the Homeland, I doubt the judiciary will get in the way.” There was an audible, rolling buzzing sound as PNAs throughout the room started alerting the journalists to breaking news.

  “Senator Scott!” yelled a reporter. “There’s been a massive dump of hacked personal information. Do you have any comment?”

  “That’s horrendous. Even more reason for this legislation, clearly. We need to do everything possible to find these terrorists and bring them to justice.”

  “Actually, there is no connection to LKC yet, Senator, no claim of responsibility.” The reporter stared at his PNA. “It appears that personal, financial, and medical information on members of Congress, the President and her Cabinet, as well as Fortune 500 top executives and major celebrities around the globe has been dumped.” The two senators at the podium froze.

  A different reporter shouted out, “Can you confirm, Senator Scott, that you have been diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s?”

  Another shouted “Senator Lathrop, your husband’s transportation and medplant records indicate he might be having an affair with a staffer in your office. Any comment?”

  Walter Scott, shaken, managed to reply. “We obviously need to get back to our offices and confer with National Security staff. This press conference is over.”

  “I want options, now,” said President Teasley. Her voice made it clear her anger was reaching a breaking point. “How do we contain this? Kara?”

  Kara Morrigan, the country’s Chief Technology Officer, looked up from her tablet. “It’s not going to be easy, Madame President. The content has been uploaded to hundreds of mirror sites outside the U.S. It’s being downloaded over secure connections so there’s no way to do packet inspection and block it at the border. Major news organizations already have the whole archive. Most of them are responsible, but anything they deem newsworthy is going to get reported. Then you’ve got all the fringe outlets and the sensationalists, they’re going to go after the most salacious and embarrassing stuff.”

  “What about blocking access?” asked William Jeffries, Director of Homeland Security.

  “Like I said, it’s offshore and the downloads are encrypted.”

  “No, what about inside?” Jeffries asked. “Blocking news organizations and the omnipresence channels that publish the content.”

  “Uh, excuse me,” said Attorney General Emma Wilcox. “Perhaps you’ve heard of the first amendment?”

  “Not helpful, Emma,” said the President. “Can we order them not to publish any of this information?”

  “No, that would certainly run into first amendment issues. But you could certainly appeal to their better nature.” Half-hearted laughter around the room did little to defuse the tension.

  “Could we block this material from being published for national security reasons?” asked Jeffries. “What if we got a war declaration from Congress against LKC?”

  “LKC is a domestic terrorist organization,” answered Attorney General Wilcox. “You can’t declare war on them. In any case, this material does not appear to be a national security threat. It’s damned embarrassing to the people involved, but there is apparently no classified information in this dump.”

  “Feels like a national security issue if the whole damned government is consumed by scandal,” said Jeffries.

  “Madame President,” interrupted her Chief of Staff, Alex Turner. “We’re getting lots of questions about how this hack was pulled off. The organizations that were hacked have no indications whatsoever of breaches. There are rumors flying that only the government could have accessed this much information. I’ve already tried to squash that by pointing out the need for warrants, and obviously no court would have issued warrants for this group of individuals en masse.”

  The President looked at Mark Geiger, Director of the Domestic Terrorism Task Force. He and Attorney General Wilcox were the only ones who knew about the secret Executive Order giving DTTF free rein to access exactly this kind of information without warrants.

  She quickly changed the subject. “Mark, do you have any leads?” she asked Geiger.

  “Madame President, I have no information at this time.”

  “Is it LKC?” she asked.

  “We don’t know,” said Geiger. “Every other attack they have claimed responsibility, but no word from them on this one.”

  Teasley turned to Alex. “Assure the press that the government is doing everything in its power to determine the source of this information and track down the people responsible.”

  To the rest of her cabinet she delivered an ultimatum. “I know there is nothing classified in this data dump. But it has the potential to tear this country apart. I want this information sequestered and destroyed. Get me options for how to do that. If we run into constitutional issues, fine. We’ll go to court for emergency orders. But we can’t just sit here and do nothing. Get on it!”

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  NEW YORK/SAN FRANCISCO - JANUARY 14

  NEW YORK

  “Good morning, everyone! I’m Megyn Robbins and welcome to Morning Fresh. With me, as always, are my co-hosts Steve Brattle and Victor Langston.”

  “Good morning, Megyn!”

  “Today, the entire country is in chaos as more and more information from the LKC hack is revealed,” Megyn began.

  “That’s right, Megyn,” said Steve. “And what we’re learning about key Democrats is shocking, just shocking.”

  “I’d say horrifying,” said Victor. “Democrats and their celebrity friends have been revealed as a bunch of hypocritical jerks who claim to be all about helping the poor but really behind the scenes they laugh at them. And it turns out they really just envy successful businessmen and want to tax them as punishment.”

  “Yeah, except not their rich celebrity friends,” said Steve. “Did you see how much they seem to spend on synthetic neurotropic drugs? Outrageous!”

  “We have document after document,” said Megyn. “Private messages between Democrats in Congress and between key leaders in the so-called activist community. They all paint the same picture. A bunch of entitled elites trying to shove their anti-gun, multicultural, multi-gender, multi-religious agenda down our throats.”

  “And did you see the secret donations? Blockchain verified, unreported money from anonymous sources into so many Democrat campaign accounts!” said Steve.

  “Eve
ry Democrat in Congress should resign!” said Victor. “The people should be marching by the millions. We have got to get rid of these hypocrites once and for all!”

  “For another perspective,” said Megyn, “we bring in Richard Masterson, an expert on omnipresence psychology. Richard, how are these hacked documents playing out in OP?”

  “Well, Megyn, there’s a lot of outrage from all sides about what they reveal. But there is also a big backlash brewing against corporations holding all this data.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Steve. “It wasn’t their fault LKC hacked them. They are blameless here.”

  “People have been uncomfortable for decades having the most personal intimate details about their entire lives in the hands of these corporations. But now that they see they aren’t safe they’re getting angry.”

  “Well, yes, but that’s what enables the incredible standard of living we enjoy,” argued Victor.

  “That may be so, Victor,” said Richard. “But the release of this kind of information brings very uncomfortable truths to light, things people kind of knew but didn’t want to think about. People wanted to believe they have some privacy left, even if they really don’t.”

  “Yeah, well that’s just a fact of life,” said Megyn. “I mean, look at all the good this will do, in terms of revealing the disgusting things Democrats have been doing behind our backs this whole time.”

  Richard looked at her, puzzled. “Megyn, I would have thought you would be a little more upset about personal privacy.”

  “Well, sure, but these are public figures. We have a right to know what those Democrat hypocrites are really saying and doing.”

  “Megyn, I’m surprised—wait, oh my, did you not hear there was a dump on journalists this morning?”

  “What? No, what, wait, what do you mean?”

  “I’m so sorry, Megyn, I guess you’ve been off OP. Hundreds of journalists’ hacked personal info was dumped this morning. There are reports about you having an affair with a certain married Democratic congressman, based on travel and medplant traces.”

  “I, uh, well, no, that’s not true, not true!” she insisted. There was silence in the studio. Victor and Steve were just staring at her. The remote director got a dead air alert from the studio AI and broke into commercial. The three hosts whipped out their PNAs and began furiously dealing with their own personal privacy disasters.

  SAN FRANCISCO

  “Good morning, Bay Area! You’re back with Calista Quinn-Jones, here on the early shift. We’re still talking about the absolutely shocking revelations from this LKC hack. Did you know that most of the Republicans in Congress got secret donations from the carbon pollution industry actively working to destroy our planet?

  “Did you know that they secretly planned to rescind the environmental standards waiver here in California if they win the election this fall, even though every Republican candidate has sworn they wouldn’t do it? Liars, liars, liars. We’ve known it forever, but now we have the truth, in all its ugliness, right on our screens. Every Republican in Congress should resign! Rashid, you’re on the show.”

  “Hey Calista. I think you’re missing the point here. Why are you focusing on Republicans instead of what this hack really represents?”

  “Say more, Rashid.”

  “I’m talking about the end of personal privacy in the corporate state. Financial records, medical records, transportation, purchases, life streams, everything about us is stored by corporate systems. They use it to manipulate us and now this hack has revealed just how dangerous this information is. Personally, it makes me want to dig my medplant right out of my arm and go totally off grid. I’m starting to see what LKC was talking about.”

  “Whoa there, Rashid. LKC is going around killing people, that’s not cool. But I understand where you’re coming from. This medplant thing has got me freaking out too. I mean, I have to say, mine detected a breast cancer at stage one and probably saved my life. But did you hear about Senator Lathrop’s husband? Dude called up self-drive rides to go to his lover’s apartment and they correlated that with medplant pulse, breathing, and body temperature readings to know exactly when they were having sex! Talk about invading personal privacy, holy shit!”

  “Exactly, but it’s not just Congress and celebrities, Calista. That information is stored on everyone, every one of us! And now they’re talking about making it a crime to remove your own medplant!”

  “You’re right, Rashid. Even Walter Scott for some reason is backing that, arm in arm with Lathrop. I never thought he’d be pushing the surveillance state. It’s like the whole world is upside down.”

  “Calista, we need to take this whole damn system down. We need a revolution on the streets, millions marching holding their bloody medplants in the air. Humans are not machines! We can’t let them treat us as data sources!”

  “I hear, you, brother,” said Calista. “So, what about it, listeners? A revolution against corporate dehumanization? Tell me what you’re thinking!”

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

  WASHINGTON - JANUARY 16

  Senator Harry Paxton organized the first in-person meeting of the “Six Lost Souls” since their ALPHA bill had flamed out in every committee where it had been raised. He was joined by fellow Democrats Dylan Cipriani and Emily McCutcheon. His fellow Ohio Senator Esteban Hernandez brought Rebecca Matheson and Zach Keller along. Even though the bill had failed spectacularly, the long hours of working out dozens of important compromises had created among them a long-lost senatorial collegiality.

  “Thank you all for coming,” said Harry after they had all settled down in comfortable chairs in the back room of one of Washington’s off-the-beaten-track bars. The wood panel walls around them were covered with faded photos of long-gone politicians. “I know some of you have been particularly busy.” He didn’t need to look at the Senators who had been caught up in the data leak—everyone knew who had been fighting embarrassing personal stories for the last few days.

  “I wanted to start with a tribute to poor Sara. I can’t believe she was taken from us at such a young age. She had so much to offer the world, she was such an inspiration.” His voice broke.

  “Yes,” said Emily McCutcheon. “It’s a terrible tragedy. And I feel like we haven’t even had a chance to mourn her properly with this data leak overwhelming everything. I know they didn’t take credit, but it’s hard to believe LKC didn’t make this leak happen to cover up this crime against humanity.”

  Harry waited for each of his remaining colleagues to say a few words, then called for a moment of silence.

  “Thank you all,” Harry said after a minute. “Today I was also hoping we could strategize about what we can do, together, to build on the great work we put into ALPHA.”

  “Harry,” said Rebecca. “I hope you’re not suggesting that we make another run with that bill?”

  “No,” said Harry. “No, of course not. Now’s not the time for ALPHA, that’s clear.”

  “So, what then?” asked Dylan.

  “I was hoping we could take some actions together that were in the spirit of ALPHA, to advance the cause, lay some groundwork,” explained Harry.

  “What did you have in mind?” asked Emily.

  “What about this Scott-Lathrop security bill? Where do we stand on that?” asked Esteban. His colleagues looked at each other, trying to read the tea leaves. “Well, I’m against it,” he continued. “A massive increase in government surveillance power, using technology against our own people to combat a group that is complaining about abusive technology. It makes no sense!”

  “I’m not so sure,” said Zach. “LKC is a highly technical terrorist group. We’re going to need to use every technological means at our disposal to fight them.”

  “But using people’s medplants to invade their privacy?” said Emily incredulously. “Not only does that go against all of the founding legislation that enabled the technology and safeguarded privacy, it’s ma
king people feel like we are forcing them to keep something inside their body that is spying on them.”

  “I agree with Emily and Esteban,” said Harry. “We can’t trample on the Fourth Amendment. And we can’t feed public perception that technology is an evil force being used against them. That’s exactly what LKC wants. Remember, we believe in a positive future enabled by investments in the right kinds of technology. We should be doubling down on technologies that can help people, not shoving funds into domestic surveillance to make them afraid.”

  “Well I believe in that,” said Rebecca, “but we cannot ignore the threat of LKC and their ability to disrupt our economy and kill or injure more people. We have to take some measures to defeat them.”

  “Yes, but what we have here is the classic counter-insurgency paradox,” said Zach, who had been an officer in the Army. “It’s an asymmetric situation with a small enemy living amongst the people. To try to ferret them out you often use tactics that end up hurting innocent people and generating outrage that brings more people to their cause.”

  “So how do you get them?” asked Rebecca.

  “History has shown that you can’t. You can’t fight insurgents with force. You have to take away their support systems within the population. You have to make what they are doing unacceptable to the people, and not give them excuses to join up with the insurgents.”

  “So how does that apply here, with LKC?” asked Dylan.

  “I’m not sure,” replied Zach truthfully. “This technology angle is making my head hurt. They have so much more power than the typical insurgency group.”

  “It sounds for sure like you don’t think making people fearful and angry at technology is going to help our cause. It may even help LKC with recruiting,” said Dylan.