by Ran Weber
“Tell me something I don’t know,” said Rami, rubbing his forehead.
“Ehud saw someone else at the trade show, in the hackers’ area.”
30
Schriever Air Force Base, Colorado
“Commander, the challenge has been cracked.”
“Very well,” said Major McDowell. “Anyone familiar?”
The soldier approached the screen. “I don’t think so.” He ran a number of queries on the computer and shook his head. “No, someone new.”
“Really?” The Major approached the screen. “We haven’t had someone new cracking the challenge for a long time. Do you have a name?”
“Not yet. He has to go through the usual procedures; forms and the like.”
The Major nodded and muttered to himself, “the challenge has been cracked, at any rate.”
“I gather this year the challenge was more complex than usual.”
“Yes,” sighed Major McDowell. “We wanted to explore another couple of variables this year.” He stopped for a moment and thought. “Did you relay the information to the Feds and the NSA?”
“Actually, I got the information from them. They asked me to pass the information to you, they said you would know...”
McDowell nodded and turned away. “Now it’s only a matter of time.”
“What, sir?”
“It doesn’t matter,” said the major. “How about Pillar of Fire?”
“All the systems are perfectly operational, sir,” replied the soldier. “There was something... I can see in the system records that there was something.”
“What?” McDowell came closer to the screen again.
“But it isn’t possible.”
“What isn’t possible?”
“Looks like somebody was trying to mess with the system, to break in. But that’s impossible, isn’t it, sir?”
“It’s improbable. I wouldn’t say impossible. The hacker challenge too was very difficult.”
“Yes, but in the hacker challenge there is a terminal that connects to the system. Pillar of Fire doesn’t have remote access.”
“Right,” said the major.
The soldier looked at him.
“Let’s put it this way, sometimes breaking into a system is done using code, via a screen and sometimes the system itself seeks the code.”
“The system seeks the code, sir?”
“Yes,” smiled the major. “You really can’t access the system. No one can access the system, but the system itself goes to all sorts of places on the net, seeking.”
The soldier looked at him in amazement. “What?”
“It doesn’t matter right now,” the major stopped him. “Update me about the challenge winner as soon as there are details, yes?”
31
The Hacker Challenge, San Diego, California
The other hackers applauded me. There was a pleasant feeling of solidarity. I recognized some of them. To my left was Yoshi Terakami, the Japanese hacker who had won the challenge for two consecutive years three years ago. I remembered him from a video I had seen on the web. There were two members of the White Hats, a group of hackers in the name of good causes whose members signed an agreement not to use their methods to disrupt systems or perform hacks that might jeopardize security.
A representative of the exhibition approached me with forms. She congratulated me heartily, and said that when I finished filling out the forms, I was invited to go into the office. I thanked her in few words and examined the first form. “What is your name and where are you from?” she asked with a smile, pointing to the corresponding boxes on the form.
Filling out my details wasn’t such a good idea – the information trickles on. “Umm,” I said after a few seconds of thought, “Yossi Bergman.”
She nodded as if waiting for more information. “From Tel Aviv, Israel,” I added impatiently. She got the message and went. Yossi Bergman. See, Yossi? Alive or dead, in the end you took the challenge. I sighed. I would have given anything for Yossi to be with me at the hacker challenge.
While filling out the forms, I saw from the corner of my eye two men waiting patiently. I assumed they weren’t hackers but hacker hunters. Turns out everything they say is true, I thought. They’re waiting for me to fill out the forms, following which they’ll swoop down with lavish employment contracts. I prepared myself for polite refusal – I had more pressing matters to attend to.
I finished filling out the forms and got up. The two men wished to talk about something, we moved away from the center of the pyramid.
“Congratulations!” said one of them. “You did it, huh?”
“Yes,” I replied.
He surveyed me quickly. “Israeli?” He asked in Hebrew.
“Yes,” I answered, surprised. He didn’t look Israeli.
“Ben, Ben Davidi,” he said, shaking my hand.
The second man, the older one, was the last person I expected to meet there.
“And this is my boss, Avi Schetritt.”
32
“Well?” Binyamin asked. “Any new karate games you’ve never before seen?”
“I don’t think so,” I replied with a smile.
“Three-dimensional soccer, perhaps?”
“No,” I said, my smile expanding. “Say, have you been sitting here the whole time?”
“No,” he replied. “I practiced hitbodedut and then I went into the trade show to see if there’s anything interesting in your digital world. When I went in, ten Japanese midgets tried to get me to stand on a rotating musical platform, playing a new game. I had to flee them. In the end, I got stuck in the war games and simulators area. They’ve even got a new simulator of the Merkava tank, did you see that?”
“I didn’t get to see the new simulators. I’ve seen quite enough tanks in my life. It’s good to hear that you enjoyed yourself.”
“Yes,” Binyamin said, starting the engine. “More or less. The truth is I’m not a fan of computer games, it distances the person from the truth. Instant experiences. Do you understand what I mean? Imaginary, synthetic emotions.”
“You can be a poet, Binyamin.”
“I was,” he said, sighing, “a long time ago. Now I don’t have the patience needed for writing, I used to be optimistic.”
We started making our way to Los Angeles. The way back felt shorter.
“Say, Binyamin, what is hitbodedut?”
“Hitbodedut is to talk to HaShem.”
“As in prayer?”
“Yes, a kind of prayer. Rabbi Nachman said that one should take at least an hour a day to talk to HaShem.”
“An hour?! That really seems over the top.”
“Anyone who can’t do an hour, but only five or ten minutes, well, a little is good too, to step out of the crazy race of life. To meet yourself, your desires and longing, knowing where you’re at. A sort of soul-searching -- just you and yourself.” He paused for a moment and then added, “Just you and the Creator. To talk, share, confess. Whatever you’re going through. It’s amazing and truly life-changing.”
An hour with myself? Sure. And the Creator? What’s he going on about, doesn’t he realize I’m not into it at all?
Binyamin smiled. “Yes, you too, Yoav, no matter how you perceive yourself. In the Divine perspective, we are all His children and He has infinite room, for each of us. Try it one time, what have you got to lose? If there’s nothing in it, there nothing in it. And if...” he paused. “What I’m saying might not speak to you just now, but maybe it’ll mean something one day. One of the concepts of hitbodedut is to talk about things, not just to think about them but also speak them out loud. Thought is something internal, theoretical, it’s force. Action is the external matter, the actual application. Speech is the connection between thought and action. When you talk about your wishes, your dreams -- a con
nection is made between the force and the action. Of course, everything is with the help of God and nothing can be done without His help, but this is our part; to dream, to want, to choose good, and then to speak it, to ask for it.”
“ I just can’t believe that talking to the air about my problems would achieve anything.”
“And if it’s someone else you’re talking to? Do you talk to close friends about your problems?”
I didn’t answer.
“That’s what I thought,” he said. “Rabbi Nachman instructed to speak to HaShem as you would with a good friend. Someone who doesn’t find time to talk to Hashem is usually someone who doesn’t share his pain and troubles with a good friend either.”
“I just don’t believe in these things,” I tried to explain. “Do you really think that prayer can change reality? It sounds like science fiction to me.”
“You’d be surprised,” he said. “The Tzadikim say that prayer changes nature, that prayer can tear away all the heavens. Everything that is said in the world is also said in man himself.”
“What is meant by that?”
“If prayer can change nature, it can also change the nature of man. And if it can tear apart the screens that separate us from HaShem, it can also tear the screens between man and himself, between himself and his heart.”
“Are you being a poet again?” I asked.
He didn’t answer and appeared to be lost in thought.
“Look,” he said finally, “let’s put it this way, the miracle oftentimes lies within nature because everything is Godliness, everything is good at the root.” When he saw the look on my face, he continued, “I’ll explain. At our potential we are perfect, everything is within us. If a person prays for something and asks for it, if he really wants to change and he continues to practice hitbodedut and ask for it, it can change in an instant. Do you understand? If this is something that is already within you, prayer can only tear the membrane that separates you from this thing. Imagine someone who has a treasure of millions in the yard, hidden under his lawn. All he needs to do is dig a few inches and reach the treasure.”
I didn’t answer, I thought about what he had said. It was difficult for me to accept this business of prayer changing reality. If it’s all so simple, I thought, why doesn’t he change? Why can’t he forget what he went through in Hebron? I didn’t feel like entering a confrontation with him, so I remained silent. He didn’t speak either.
“I talked too much,” he said at last.
“Say, Binyamin,” I tried to change the subject, “do you know a guy named Schetritt?”
“Schetritt?!” He asked in amazement. “Avi?” and he nearly drove into the guardrail.
“Yes, yes. Do you know him?”
“A petty merchant who has risen to greatness, the man’s garbage, I’m telling you.”
“Binyamin, is that any way to talk about somebody else? Doesn’t Judaism speak against saying bad things about people?”
“Listen, there’s a thing called lashon hara for constructive purposes. You would need to learn the halachot themselves, but in general in this case the slander is constructive. If you’re going to do business with him or something, then you are getting into deep trouble. And I know everything from first-hand experience, not gossip or hearsay, I know his operation from the inside.”
“I thought he prayed in your minyan.”
“So you thought,” Binyamin said, looking straight ahead onto the road. “He used to pray. He would come to minyan and try to take over. When the rabbi tried to talk to him, he turned around and said that no one understood anything and that he wanted to change things in the synagogue. Yoav, one thing I can tell you, is that some things you can’t buy with money.”
33
Federal Bureau of Investigations, Los Angeles
Nash sat in his office and looked through the mail. “Hey, honey,” he whispered to the cellphone propped between his shoulder and his tilted head. With his free hands, he opened envelopes. He scanned the contents quickly and sorted them into three piles. “Yes, yes, I remember Sandy’s birthday, of course I’ll be there, believe me. It’s Thursday and I’m already seeing myself with you and the kids at home this weekend. I’m counting the minutes... yeah... what am I doing? Nothing, just going through the mail, pretty dull... Yes, I think I’ll be out early today, a few small things and I’ll split home... yes, darling, me too, bye.” He swiveled his chair towards the computer and scanned the articles on the screen. He found nothing meaningful in most of the articles. One of them caught his attention - an autonomous car stolen in San Francisco.
The door to his office opened, Jim was at the door. “What’s going on?” he ask Nash impatiently.
Nash looked at the screen. “Ha!” he snorted, “these dimwits had it coming. You heard that Google had an autonomous car stolen?”
“No,” said Jim, approaching Nash. They studied the computer monitor together. On the screen appeared a news report that read: “Google autonomous vehicle stolen in San Francisco. The vehicle was part of the company’s fleet of autonomous vehicles used for photographing and mapping streets.”
“That’s it?” Jim asked.
“There aren’t a lot of details in the article,” Nash said, connecting to an internal database. “Wait. Yes, the car was stolen in front of a sports retailer between Bryant and 15th Street. One of the sales staff, 26-year-old Melanie, reported that a strange person had been in there just before the theft and that the sound of an explosion drew her running out of the store just to see the car driving away.”
“A Google autonomous vehicle?” asked Jim.
“Yes,” said Nash, “an autonomous vehicle. It’s a driver-less car that maps the streets.”
“A car without a driver!” Jim interrupted Nash. “Schetritt had said: There’s not much need to worry about the driver in this explosion.”
Nash’s eyes opened wide.
Jim hurried to his desk and picked up the phone. “Joan, get me Andrew Kelly of the San Francisco Police Department and two plane tickets over there.”
34
The Valley, Los Angeles, California
The week went by quickly. I hadn’t gotten much done since I got back from the trade show. I arranged to meet Schetritt and his guy next week. They were eager to meet before, but we agreed on Monday early morning. I rented a car for getting to the meeting, I didn’t want to bother Binyamin again, certainly not when I knew what he thought about working for Schetritt. It was Shabbat, at last. Who would have thought that I’d ever say something like that. Binyamin reminded me that there would be a Shabbat meal at his house and that I was invited.
We sat down at the table, Aharon, Binyamin and myself. Binyamin was about to do Kiddush when there was a knock at the door. I was closest to the door so I got up to open. Binyamin tried to say something, but I said that I felt right at home.
I hurried to the door and opened it wide. Ehud stood before me. That’s all I needed.
“Good evening,” said Ehud, looking at the set table, “and Shabbat Shalom.”
“Shabbat Shalom,” I said, and whispered, “what are you doing here? Have you lost your mind?”
He drew nearer to me and whispered, “I have something for you.”
“Get out of here,” I whispered back.
“Have you forgotten what you’re here for?” he gave me a piercing look.
I had enough guilt without his preaching. I wanted just a little peace, on Shabbat at least, but I couldn’t get rid of him.
“I remember, I remember, Ehud. Let’s talk on Sunday?” I wanted to close the door.
“Hello, Shabbat Shalom!” Binyamin said, and turned to Ehud. “Please, come in. Are you a friend of Yoav’s?”
“Something like that,” Ehud said with a broad smile.
“Get out,” I hissed.
Binyamin came up to Ehud. �
�Come in, we’d be very pleased to have guests.”
Ehud looked at me for a second. “I’m sorry, first I have to give something to Yoav.”
I asked Binyamin to pardon me, saying that he didn’t have to wait for me and I went out with Ehud. We went over to the housing unit. I opened the door and we went inside.
“Are you all right, Yoav?”
“Ehud, what do you want?”
“You’re all over the place! Rami is unbelievably furious with you. What was the deal with the trade show?”
“Do I need to report to you? You knew I was going to the trade show. What is it you told him?”
He ignored what I said, took a brown paper bag out of his bag and put it down on the table.
“What is this?” I asked.
“A gun and another small gadget.”
I pulled the gun out of the bag. “A mini Beretta?” I asked, holding the gun between two fingers. “What am I, a little kid?”
“That’s what they asked me to get you,” Ehud smiled. “I thought it was your choice.”
“Right,” I said, and continued digging through the bag. I found an object that looked like a remote control. The gadget, as Ehud called it, had 4-inch-long plastic cylindrical body, with a diameter of two inches. It seemed to consist of two parts, one of which could be rotated. There was also a dark green button and a display panel. I wanted to test the rotation and Ehud grabbed the remote from my hand.
“What does it do?” I asked.
“It gives you five minutes to flee the area and during these five minutes a driverless autonomous car bearing an explosive device, speeds to your location and detonates. It is recommended that you don’t press the button for no reason.”
I took the remote control from him and examined it. It said “15 minutes”. “You said five, didn’t you?” I asked Ehud and pointed to the small display.
“Yes, it isn’t turned on yet. You have to engage it by turning it. You see the two parts? It’s a hinge. You’re meant to turn it when you want to engage the remote control and the car will go. It’s currently parked fifteen minutes away so as not to arouse suspicion and also to spare it the need to tail you all over the United States.”