Julius Chance
Keys
“Well, what will you tell me this time? Do you want me to guess at first attempt? You have got no keys, have you?”
“No keys,” Tom admitted.
“And you also have no bonus anymore, by the way! Ha-ha! And soon there will be no more work for us!”
“I’m sorry, sir, but we are doing the best we can. We’ve been working twelve hour days a week for a month now,” Tom tried to justify himself.
Craig came close to him and asked with a hint of desperation in his voice:
“Tell me, what do you need the keys for? After all, the special secret insertions into microchip circuits are at your service. You can connect directly to the microphone of any smartphone and eavesdrop on the conversation before it is encrypted, can’t you? Or you are like those morons from K-interceptions who can do nothing at all in all?”
Ben picked up the headphones from the table and handed them to Craig:
“Please, listen for yourself. This is what we hear directly from the microphone even before the encryption.”
Craig put it on and heard what sounded like pterodactyl squeaks. Or like the sounds of dolphin communication, transposed into the audible range of the human ear. Yes, long ago he had heard similar sounds in an educational TV show about dolphins. Now one ‘dolphin’ on one smartphone screeched something – another, on another device, responded in the same manner. Craig’s anger subsided. He sat down in a chair and remained motionless and emotionless for long, until he tiredly said:
“We need to involve the CIA.”
Then he heavily god up and slowly trudged away to the chief’s waiting room. The secretary of the National Security Agency director told Craig that the boss was currently talking to the Secretary of State and therefore would probably not be available soon, likely in a few hours. Craig plopped down onto the waiting couch, leaned back, and said wearily:
“I’ll wait until morning. The matter is urgent. Would you make me some coffee, please?”
Antony returned from the Thai beach to his four-star hotel room, and was about to take a sweet nap on the couch when someone knocked the door. Wondering who it could be, Antony opened it. Four policemen entered the room, and the fifth remained outside.
“You’re under arrest! Here’s the warrant! Follow us! Leave all your personal belongings here. After the search, we will return them.”
A week later, an American Air Force plane landed onto the concrete strip of the airfield with some small service buildings scattered around it. Accompanied by a whole group of American intelligence officers, Antony descended from the ramp. After long, depressing days in a stuffy solitary confinement, that was somewhat of a relief for him. Antony looked around, guessing where he ended up. It couldn’t be Thailand, as they had been flying for too long. This could not be the Baltic States or Poland, as palm trees grew. And it did not seem to be US, because everything here was pervaded by the feeling that all on that place was about to vanish soon with disgrace. The group walked three hundred meters through the shrubbery along a flagged path and entered a two-story red brick building. The flag of the United States yet waved on its portal! An unmarked guard in a gray uniform respectfully parted on the porch. Several personnel were waiting for Antony inside.
“Welcome to Guantanamo!” Someone in a black uniform, presumably a CIA officer, extended a friendly hand to Antony.
“I demand to be formally charged and to make my advocate present,” Antony ignored the outstretched hand.
“You are accused of aiding and abetting terrorism. Lawyers in a military court, are not provided, sorry.”
“Then I demand to be given the opportunity to contact the Russian Embassy and substantiate the accusation with facts in front of them.”
“You’ll demand from your Russian mistress if you return back. There is no Russian embassy in Guantanamo. The formal indictment will be presented to you later.” irritated CIA officer informed.
“You are violating several international conventions at once!” Antony stated paying no attention to reaction around.
“Tone it down – no one knows you’re here. So far, you’ve just gone missing. You don’t exist at all. You may have disappeared, may be drowned, or may be died in a drunken fight in pub. And whether you show up again at all depends on your behavior here. Am I making myself clear?” CIA officer asked.
“What do you need?" Antony replied to question by question.
“Just a collaboration. Take the prisoner away!” officer ordered.
The cell was clean and austere. No windows. Just a bed, a nightstand, and a towel were inside. While he was being held in Thailand and transported, Antony held firm. Now the depression was looming upon him. He realized that he was completely at the mercy of these military captors. That neither Russia nor the rest of the world, including ordinary Americans, know that he has been captured. Even his very life might be at stake at this secret prison. Antony lay down and began to think. Aiding and abetting terrorism is less than terrorism itself. In normal court it would be not realistic to attach such a ridiculous accusation to a programmer of a company that even is not under sanctions lists. However, in Guantanamo, it might be possible, who knows. Most likely, he faces a prison term in a foreign country. Maybe even a life sentence, like Victor Bout. Sleep didn’t come. Antony closed his eyes and began to meditate.
A nymph in a white airy dress dances on the edge of a cliff. Antony has never seen such fabulous woman before. He calls to her, and lo and behold, she obeys and begins descending to him! Antony can’t believe his eyes. She steps to him, she approaches him, she smiles at him revealing her snow-white teeth with a bluish tint. Her arms wrap around his body, and he notices a mole in front of her right earlobe. The nymph slightly sways him from side to side… then, she suddenly starts shaking him… Stronger… With unladylike strength!.. With beasty force!!! Antony woke up in horror – the caretaker was bending over him:
“For interrogation!”
Antony was led through a maze of corridors to a brightly lit room with gray walls and no windows. A middle-aged interrogator was already waiting for him. To the left of the table stood a powerful goon in an unmarked black uniform that could have been used to frighten children at night. He offered a chair. Antony sat down.
“You are a programmer from the Russian company ‘Traceless Hero’, aren’t you?” the interrogator asked.
“Let’s say so.”
“Do you realize that cryptographic firms like yours are harming society?” the interrogator began from afar.
“It is strange to hear such affirmation from a representative of a country which since its birth has declared the secret of private life as one of the inviolable sacred human rights.”
“We don’t care about anyone’s personal secrets. We are only interested in communications between terrorists and state criminals.”
“There is a very fine line between those. Therefore private life is untouchable in its entirety as a whole in any of its parts and you know it. To fish out criminal facts you do listen to the whole planet, don’t you?”
“Do you seriously believe everything Snowden said? We never had such intentions!”
“Intentions? In one thousand nine hundred and seventy-six, at the insistence of the National Security Agency, the key length of the US state encryption standard was deliberately reduced from one hundred and twelve to fifty-six bits, which created vulnerabilities through which the special services became able to open electronic correspondence of private citizens. A little later, the NSA, for the same purpose, convinced IBM to reduce the strength of the cipher in its devices. In the 1980s, the NSA thwarted the spread of the strong encryption algorithm of Rivest, Shamir and Adleman. At the same time, the leadership of the US National Science Foundation was imputed with the obligation to send all work on cryptography for approval to the special services. In 1991, under a bill of two hundred and sixty-six, all manufacturers of communication equipment were de-facto obliged to leave ‘back doors’ in their devices, which would allow the government to read the correspondence unencrypted. In the ninety-third, the Clipper Chip project was put forward, with an aim to install a microcircuit on all phones with an encryption function, which would give special services access to the owner’s secret private key. Closer to the year 2000, the United States, both at home and in Europe, pushed the idea of forcibly depositing all private keys into a common storage available to them. Shall I continue?”
