Breaking and Entering

by Jeremy N. Smith

  “Six-foot metal side fence,” Richard said, pointing out each security feature and its placement. “There’s a camera. There’s a camera. And there’s a blind spot by the corner—see the angle?”

  Alien nodded. “Got it.” She jotted down the observations in a softcover five-by-eight-and-a-half-inch tan Moleskine notebook. “Castle,” Elite Defense had code-named the client, referring to the financial institution’s logo, a red castle with two symmetrical turrets.

  Richard drove around the block to the rear of the building, which they studied through a small hole in a blue mesh screen covering the employee parking lot fencing.

  “Notice the UPS guy,” he said, pointing out a brown-clad figure leaving from a side door. “That must be the delivery entrance.” The door was propped open with a small wooden block. “I bet they have a freight elevator,” Richard continued. “And that looks like an unmanned storage room with an unlocked window.”

  Alien followed his gaze and then added the details to her notebook, to be integrated later with her own remote reconnaissance notes—information gathered online or via public records, such as the names and positions of local Castle employees and the floor plans of areas for lease. As with hacking computers, a single security flaw was unlikely to give them everything they wanted. But the more they knew and could combine, the more likely it was that they could get in—and then out again with sensitive goods or information.

  “Not much movement,” Alien said when they were back out front. “Could be tricky to tailgate”—that is, to gain entry by following someone with authorized access.

  “Just wait for the smokers’ breaks,” said Richard. “Or”—a clock outside struck the hour—“lunch.”

  Alien counted twelve chimes: noon. Employees started streaming out of the building lobby.

  “See you tomorrow,” she whispered to them.

  Ted Roberts, Castle’s head of security, requested a private booth at the hotel restaurant. A friendly blond forty-year-old man in a business suit, he leaned across the table after dinner and passed both Richard and Alien his business card and a signed one-page note.

  Alien skimmed the document, which she had written and sent to Ted, asking him to fill in the blanks and bring it to their meeting tonight. “[Castle] has hired Elite Defense to perform physical security penetration tests and assessments of nine sites in three states,” it said. Specific addresses followed, starting here, with the bank’s regional headquarters and four branches she and Richard had driven by today, doing local reconnaissance. For the rest of the week, Ted’s note authorized, they were to probe the facilities, one by one, to determine if an uninvited visitor could enter, explore, remove equipment or data, or rob the banks. The letter closed with instructions on how to contact Ted if they got caught.

  “Your ‘Get Out of Jail Free’ letter,” he said.

  Richard harrumphed, but Alien gave her best smile, folding the letter and placing it in her coat pocket. “Thanks,” she said, patting the pocket afterward. “I hope we won’t need it.”

  Ted signaled to a waiter for the check. “Good luck—but not too much luck,” he said.

  Tuesday noon, the clock tolled and office workers exited the twenty-story building again. Everyone was bundled up and breathing out steam on their way to lunch. Moving in the opposite direction, Richard entered the lobby to check it out.

  Alien watched from the front passenger seat of the car, clutching an empty black laptop case. No—not completely empty. While she waited, Alien reached her fingers into the zippered pocket and checked.

  There they were. Beside her “Get Out of Jail Free” letter. Fake business cards she’d printed after dinner with Ted last night.

  “Elizabeth Tessman/Enterprise Technology Specialist,” they said, to the right of the red Castle logo, above her real cell phone number, a fake Castle corporate email address, and the address of this building, each element copied from Ted’s business card.

  Alien sighed, shifting impatiently. Then she sat up quickly, seeing Richard approach the car.

  “Did you get in?” Alien asked after he had taken his seat and shut the door.

  Richard responded scornfully. “There’s no way,” he reported.

  “What do you mean?” she said. All he’d done was try the lobby. What about the freight elevator? Or the storage room with the open window? “What happened?”

  “Forget it.” Richard turned up the heater and made to shift the car into drive. “It’s fucking freezing,” he said. “Let’s move.”

  “We can totally do this.” Alien unbuckled her seat belt. “Let me try,” she said.

  Richard shook his head. “You won’t get in,” he insisted. “There are turnstiles and a security guard watching everything. You’ll just blow our cover.” He continued gruffly, “Let’s try the bank branches first. If there’s time, we’ll come back here. We found plenty already.”

  “We’re here now,” said Alien. “And I won’t blow our cover.”

  Richard could spot a narrow opening in a fence at fifty yards and recite security camera specs from memory. Forthright, credible, and confident, he was, like all the Jedis, terrific at presentations. It was clear, however, that he had neither the patience nor the aptitude for what those in the InfoSec community called social engineering.

  Bluntly put, the term meant manipulating people. You might call it charming or, in some cases, scaring them, but it was always about getting them to do what you wanted. Whoever you were, the trick was to assess the other person and figure out how you might talk him or her into something. Perhaps the best name for it might be “human hacking.”

  Freshman year, for example, getting Alex and Vlad to “help” Alien with her calculus homework had been social engineering. More recently, she had turned her dinner out with Bruce, Jules, and their client into a kind of job interview.

  Consciously or not, every child or parent, teacher or military leader, politician or “player” on the dating scene used social engineering. For pentesters or their criminal counterparts, like those who sent phishing emails or persuaded victims to empty their bank accounts, the appeal was obvious. Why bother breaking into anything when you could get individuals to open their doors for you? And because people, especially men, were generally less suspicious of women in this kind of situation, being female could be an advantage.

  “It’ll be fine.” Alien smiled sweetly. “I’ll be quick and come right back if there’s any problem.”

  Before Richard could say another word, she was out the door with her laptop case.

  Alien crossed the gray slate floor of the spacious lobby. Four hip-high stainless steel gateways stood between her and the elevators. Each was equipped with a wedge-shaped black barrier that receded when you placed your badge on a scanner. Then, as soon as anyone passed the gateway, the barrier closed immediately, preventing tailgating.

  Next to the gates was a wide marble counter, also gray, behind which stood a white-haired guard in a crisp black uniform, including a matching tie on which were printed diagonal rows of the red castle logo.

  She walked toward the badge reader systems, as though expecting to go through. When the barriers stopped her, Alien acted startled, purposefully trying to catch the guard’s eye. Then she approached him.

  “Hi,” she said. “I’m with IT. We have a computer emergency on the seventh floor. I need to get up there.” She would be happy to get in anywhere, but knew from remote reconnaissance that this was the floor with the most day-to-day office workers.

  Up close, the man looked even older than she had originally estimated—at least sixty-five, Alien guessed, with thin gold-framed bifocals and permanent creases in his forehead. Still, he looked in excellent shape, erect and alert.

  “You have to use your badge,” the guard said. “Or are you on the list?” he asked, pointing toward a black hardcover binder on the table.

  “No—I’m in IT,” Alien told him, reassuming an old role. “I’m new—I just started yesterday.”


  The guard frowned. “Where’s your badge?” he asked.

  “I don’t have a badge yet,” said Alien smoothly. “But my name is Elizabeth Tessman. And my boss is Ted Roberts. T-E-D. R-O-B-E-R-T-S. Here’s his card.”

  Alien lifted her laptop case and placed it squarely on the counter between them. She tugged the zipper and took out and slid him one of her new cards as well as Ted’s.

  The guard entered both names in his computer system. “He’s in here,” he acknowledged. “You’ll need to call him to get added to the list.”

  Alien opened her phone, pretending to call Ted and leave a message. As she did so, holding the phone against her ear with her shoulder, she undid the buttons of her trench coat.

  “Hi, Mr. Roberts,” she said. “This is Elizabeth. I’m leaving you a voice mail. I’m really sorry to bother you. They won’t let me up to the seventh floor. I know it’s an emergency. Can you call me back, please? I’m really sorry. Thanks.”

  She stood awkwardly in front of the desk, checking her phone and looking fleetingly at the elevators. The guard cringed.

  “I can try him again,” she said to him. “I’m really sorry to keep you waiting. I know there was a big server crash right before I left and he might be in the data center. I just can’t leave without fixing this—I promised.”

  The guard was clearly conflicted. He looked down, giving her card only a second’s glance. Then, though, he waved her forward.

  “Look, I know it’s important,” he said. “I’ll make an exception. Just be quick.”

  “Thanks—I will!” she told him—just as she had assured Richard.

  Alien grabbed her laptop bag and stepped forward to the closest gateway.

  The guard pushed a button under the counter. The barriers parted with a whoosh.

  Alien was surprised to feel her heart pounding as she stepped out of the elevator. She’d taken much greater physical risks in college. But she’d never tried to steal something.

  For now, at least, there was nobody else on this floor.

  Alien moved quickly. Most workspaces, she saw, were cubicles containing white desks, separated by six-foot freestanding gray walls. At the perimeter of the floor were the larger individual offices of middle-level managers, with glass walls and doors.

  Occupants of the cubicles personalized their space with photos and trinkets—a blue-and-white coffee mug with Chinese characters on it, a squeezable yellow “stress reliever” ball, a Mickey Mouse figurine. On every desk was a black phone and a Dell laptop connected to an external keyboard and monitor.

  Alien hefted a few laptops. All were secured with cables.

  She decided to try the managers’ spaces, starting with a corner office with an unimpeded view of the downtown. It had the same computer setup, though on a larger dark gray desk. She lifted the laptop.

  No cable.

  Alien heard the elevator ding, announcing the return of the first of the employees from lunch. Two men chatted as they went to their desks, not noticing her. She slipped out of the corner office with the laptop and walked past two more employees. Alien was positive she looked as guilty as she felt, but these employees ignored her too. She ducked into the nearby women’s restroom, where she hid inside the stall farthest from the door.

  Her heart was beating harder than ever. To a bank, nothing meant more than its reputation for trustworthiness. The machine might have confidential customer files on it, Castle business plans, corporate personnel records, or all of the above. An identity theft ring exploiting that information could make millions. So could shady stock market traders or any of Castle’s national and international competitors. And the fines and settlement fees once a big breach was disclosed could run to eight figures. ChoicePoint, the commercial data broker, had paid $15 million the previous year for giving up information on 163,000 people.

  In the stall, Alien unzipped her satchel and stuffed the laptop in her case, between the business cards and “Get Out of Jail Free” letter. The laptop was a little too big for the case, and she was very nervous. She told herself to calm down and succeeded in stretching the case over the laptop and zipping it closed.

  As Alien was about to exit the stall, she heard two women enter the restroom. One took the stall next to hers. The other tapped her toes, waiting for Alien or her colleague to finish.

  Alien was anxious to leave, but she decided to wait it out. She was afraid that with everyone coming back from lunch, she’d be trapped here for a while. But both women were gone mercifully soon, and she followed immediately.

  Alien walked to the elevator as confidently as she could, smiling professionally at others as their paths crossed. Everyone else wore a rigid badge with their name, headshot, and the Castle logo clipped to their shirt or waistband, so she shielded those areas with the laptop case.

  The elevator opened back in the lobby. “Did you get it taken care of?” the security guard asked.

  “Yes. Thanks so much!” said Alien, giving him a thumbs-up. She crossed the street, opened the car door, and slipped back inside the Taurus.

  “Nada,” Richard said in a told-you-so tone.

  “I did it,” Alien said. She zipped open the case. “I got a laptop.”

  “What?” Richard’s eyebrows rose as he beheld her prize.

  “Holy shit,” he said.

  At Ted’s request, they rendezvoused immediately afterward for Alien to walk him through the heist. They met outside and went back in together, gathering after the walk-through in a second-floor conference room to talk. Then Ted brought in the guard.

  The man looked stricken. He was still in uniform. Without the reception counter to stand behind, however, he seemed older and frailer—shrunken somehow.

  “This is Elizabeth. You’ve met her before,” Ted said. “She’s a professional penetration tester. You let her into the facility. Why?”

  The guard lowered his head. “Looking back, I know it was the wrong thing to do,” he said. “But I just . . . trusted her.” He looked up at Alien. Their eyes met. His were dark brown. He wasn’t angry. More ashamed.

  Then the guard looked away.

  “We’re on your side,” Alien said to him. Struggling over what to say next, she explained, “Like a doctor—they have to hit your knee to test your reaction. It hurts for a minute. But in the long run it makes you stronger.”

  The man nodded woodenly.

  Alien continued. “Let’s talk about your visitor verification procedures,” she said.

  Another wooden nod. No eye contact.

  He was forty years older than she was, Alien considered. In a normal world, he’d be giving her advice, not the other way around. Of course he was embarrassed. So was she.

  Having to face the security guard she’d just fooled was awful, but checking email before bed, Alien found congratulatory messages from Bruce, Jules, and the other Jedis and Agents, patting her on the back. And in her suitcase, she uncovered a present from Tanner.

  Alien smiled as she tore off the wrapping paper: a pocket edition of The Art of War. In neat black cursive Tanner had inscribed: “I thought it was ‘The War of Art.’ Maybe ‘The Love of War’ or ‘The War of Love.’ How about ‘Art Warriors from Outer Space’?

  “May our campaigns always be fully committed,” he concluded, adding a doodled heart and his initial—“T.”

  “Thanks, honey! You’re the best boyfriend ever!” Alien emailed him. “Guess what? Today I stole my first computer,” she told him. “Tomorrow I rob my first bank branch.”

  Late morning the next day, Richard circled the icy strip mall parking lot, head shaking as he and Alien passed the Kinko’s where she had made their fake business cards, a Blockbuster Video, a fitness center, a party supply store, and a gyro shop before circling back to the long, low-slung redbrick Castle bank building—the first of the branches in town to be assessed. Again, he didn’t see how they could crack it.

  “A big office building like yesterday, okay—strangers come and go there all the time,” Richard
said. “Here, a little bank branch, everybody knows everybody else. They can all see everything that’s happening. They’re not going to let you just carry out a computer.”

  “I want to get into the vault,” said Alien. “Circle again. Let’s check the back of the building. Maybe there’s a vent we can climb in.”

  Richard scoffed. “It’s going to be locked down,” he said.

  “We’ll figure it out,” Alien said. Like yesterday. “What would be a good ploy?”

  Richard looked at his phone, squinting at an incoming text. He shrugged and said, “My daughter’s choir has a concert tomorrow night. I’m going to switch my flight and head home early. Just give it a shot yourself in the morning.”

  Concert or no concert, Alien was surprised that he was giving up so easily. But she couldn’t say that.

  “Okay, no worries,” said Alien. “Do you want a ride to the airport?”

  Richard checked his watch. “Nah, I’ll take a cab.” He added, “Good luck, but yesterday was a fluke. You’re not gonna get into this place.”

  Alien peered across the frost-fringed asphalt, new hope dawning only when her gaze reached the rows of self-service copiers inside the glass-walled Kinko’s.

  Time to live off the land.

  When Richard had left, Alien strode inside the Kinko’s, grabbing her driver’s license and hotel room keycard from her purse. She made a color photocopy of the headshot from the license, cut it out, and pasted it carefully to the keycard. Then she rented computer time, printed out her name and the Castle logo, and added both to the prop.