A Mac User Group? That could be interesting. She pulled a notepad from her purse and copied down the information.
“Don’t waste your time with that MUG.”
Startled, Alison looked up from her notepad. A young guy in a wheelchair parked in front of the magazines next to her. With long limbs, the gangly guy had a rubber-banded ponytail tucked into the collar of his army combat jacket. Stickers with skulls and lightning bolts plastered his chair.
“Waste time with what?” Alison asked.
“That user group. Don’t bother. A bunch of fresh-off-the-plane types whining about the bad internet connections from Tokyo. Newbies who don’t know shit.” He continued reading his magazine.
“So you’re a Mac hotshot, huh?”
“Wouldn’t touch anything else.”
“Maybe you can help me.”
The guy whirled his wheelchair around, looked at Alison and grinned. A dimple appeared in his right cheek. “I’m here to help,” he said.
Alison smiled back. “I’m shopping for a Mac. On a budget. I’m not looking for anything fancy. I just need something to get online. Do you know a place where I can get a good price?”
“Hey, you’re asking the right guy. Would you be interested in an experienced machine?”
“Experienced?”
“Yeah, used. I can help you get a good deal on a gently used Mac. No problem.” The guy smiled at Alison and looked genuinely interested in trying to be of assistance.
“I just started getting online — I guess that makes me a newbie, right?”
The guy made a face. “No offense,” he said.
“None taken. Anyway, I’ve been borrowing my friend’s Mac to get on World NetLink. Do you know it?”
The guy clicked his tongue in disdain. “NutLink? Of course I know it. Do I use it? Hell the fuck no. A rip-off, it holds your hand if you’re nervous on the net.”
“You’re looking at Nervous Nellie.”
The guy’s face lit up with his lopsided dimpled grin. He might be kind of cute. If he combed his hair, shaved, got some new clothes. Some clean clothes. The Sixties are over, man.
“I’ll tell you what I got,” the displaced hippie guy began. “She’s a rebuilt laptop, got an OK hard drive, but she’s loaded with RAM. Plus, and here’s the beauty part, she’s got a built-in modem.”
“Meaning…”
“You plug in your cable and get online.”
Lots of RAM was good, Alison had learned from her reading. But what would she do with a built-in modem, whatever that meant? “Sounds OK, but how much are you asking?” Alison braced herself.
“Go man.”
Alison counted to herself in Japanese. “That’s fifty thousand yen, right?”
Jed nodded. “A steal.”
Alison mentally calculated the dollar conversion. “Sounds too cheap to be true. This didn’t fall off the back of a truck, or anything …”
The guy snorted. “I can have her here in half an hour, show her to you, put her through her paces. You don’t like, you don’t buy.”
“Yeah, but—”
“Meet me in the kissaten downstairs in half an hour, have the money in case you’re interested, and we can go from there.”
The guy looked honest enough. And he was letting her test drive the computer before she had to part with her precious cash. What did she have to lose?
“By the way, I’m Alison. I didn’t catch your name.”
“Just call me Jed. Short for Jedi. That’s my handle,” he explained.
“All right then. Jed,” Alison laughed, going along with it. Whatever.
“See you in thirty,” Jed said and rolled to the elevator.
Alison paid for the basketful of texts and magazines and waited while the store clerk wrapped each book with a Kinokuniya-branded paper cover. Was the additional cover meant to protect the book or to keep out prying eyes? Maybe both.
She rode down to the first basement and ordered an American coffee at the kissaten coffee shop. Alison found it amusing that the Japanese called “American coffee” the watered-down version of the caffeinated battery acid they considered a regular cup o’ joe. She found an empty table relatively far away from a pack of teenage girls fouling the air with their cigarette smoke.
Two cups of American coffee later, Jed appeared. He pulled a PowerBook computer out of the Maruzen bookstore bag in his lap. The computer’s plastic case bore a skull sticker. “Jimi Lives!” Jed booted up the Mac. “Check out this speed. She really rips.”
The computer booted up and icons marched across the bottom of the screen.
“What’s that?” Alison pointed to the lineup of the logos.
“Software. She’s fully loaded. Latest versions, too. There’s FileMaker, Photoshop, SimCity. Check it out.” Jed showed off the Mac’s bells and whistles, most of which Alison didn’t grasp. But she clearly understood the computer’s most important feature. 50,000 yen and it was all hers.
“How much for the software?”
“Huh?”
“You said fifty thousand for the Mac, but how much for the software?”
“Why don’t you pay me what I paid for it.”
“So how much total?”
“Fifty thousand.”
“But then—”
“Like I said, you pay what I paid.”
Alison decided to drop it. She didn’t want to know the details. She ran her hand over the laptop’s sleek gray glossiness. “Hello, my little friend. I think we’re going to get along just fine.”
“So it’s a deal,” Jed asked.
“Yes, indeed.” Alison counted out five 10,000 yen notes from her wallet. She’d have to raid her Green Space stash again soon, but this computer was a steal. Maybe a literal steal… Alison tried not to dwell on it. “Can I get a receipt?” she asked. “For taxes.”
“A receipt?” Jed shifted in his chair. “Sure, I guess. What do you want it to say?”
“Here, I’ll write it.” Alison pulled a notepad from her bag and jotted down something she hoped would satisfy the IRS. She handed the receipt over to Jed and he signed it. “J. Knight.” Alison hoped the document wouldn’t have to withstand an IRS audit. She put the receipt in her wallet.
“Thanks, Jed. There’s one other thing you might be able to help me with.”
“Shoot.”
“I’ve been getting all these obnoxious messages sent to me online. Anonymous messages. It’s really a pain, and the network administrators say there’s nothing I can do since I don’t know who the sender is.”
Jed smirked. “Network admins aren’t for shit.”
“I downloaded some encryption software, but the guy still lobs these messages at me. Sometimes it makes my computer crash.”
“That’s so fucked. But there’s lots you can do to protect yourself. Depends on how far you want to go.”
“What do you mean?”
Jed cracked each knuckle of each hand, pulling his fingers so far backward it was obvious that he was double-jointed. “There’s a guy who sends you messages over the net, and you don’t know who he is.”
“Right, but somehow he seems to know things about me.”
“Okay, so let’s say this guy has access to some equipment. When he sends messages, are there any tags on them?”
“Tags?”
“You know, routing info about how it got to you?”
“No, there’s nothing. Just the message.”
“Shit.” Jed started knuckle-cracking again. “Okay, we can go at it another way. Have you done a trace on your phone system? This guy might be accessing from NutLink, but he could be jacking in from another net altogether. Or even be doing a live feed if he’s close enough.”
The thought of some person taking such pains to pry into her personal life sent a shiver through Alison. Not so much a shiver of fear as of anger.
“Please translate that into English, OK,” she said. “Assume I know nothing, and you’d be pretty close to right.”
&n
bsp; Jed laughed. “Okay, no problem. It’s like this: A lot of computer networks are connected together. And even if they aren’t exactly connected, people who know how — the real bitheads — can get into one system from another.”
“Like the hackers, right?”
“Yeah,” Jed nodded. “That’s one way your buddy could be talking to you without leaving a trail. But here’s another way. He might be busting into your modem communications. Kind of like a phone tap.”
“You mean he could bug my computer line?” asked Alison.
“Kind of like that. And, if he’s really good, he could even send messages undetected.”
“Wow. How could he do that?”
Jed shrugged. “Listen in on the noise — the electromagnetic noise — from the monitor. Patch in that way. But he’d have to be real close to do it. I mean, close to your computer.”
“How close are we talking about?” Alison sat back. It had never occurred to her that her internet stalker could be physically close to her. Her lip curled with distaste.
“Depends, but they’d have to be within, say, about a hundred meters of your computer.”
“So you mean the guy harassing me might be one of my neighbors?”
“Might be. Or he could have a portable remote location. You know, transmitting from a car, a cell phone. Wouldn’t matter so long as he was close to your computer.”
Her stalker could be right next door? Too creepy. “Does this guy know where I live?”
Jed’s head was lowered in thought. “You don’t have to sit there and take it,” he said. “There are countermoves you can make.” The way Jed was abusing his digits, Alison predicted arthritis in his future.
“Countermoves?” The idea of empowerment, of not being a defenseless target, excited her. “What would I have to do?”
“You’ll need to invest in some hardware. First, you can get a little box called a Tracer. It’ll tell you if anyone is listening in on your modem line.”
“How’s that?”
“If the guy is doing a near-range feed, a light will go on. You’ll know someone’s busting your EM noise.”
“I have no clue what you’re talking about, but OK. What else?”
“With the Tracer, you’ll know if someone’s listening in. But what you really want to know is who’s calling you, where they’re calling from, right?”
“Right.”
“So you can run some software that’ll tell you the access point for any message sent to you.”
“And that means—”
“That means you could tell how the phreak — spelled with a ‘ph’ — was cutting into the network. You’d know where he was calling from.”
Blankness registered on Alison’s face. She shook her head and shrugged with palms up. Jed kept at it. “You’ve heard of Caller ID, right?”
“Sure. If you have Caller ID on your phone, it tells you what phone number is calling you.” Alison was glad to be back on terra firma.
“This software works on the same principle. It can give you a handshake ID of the computer calling you. Just like Caller ID. Problem is, for the software to be able to analyze the handshake data, you have to be receiving a direct message from the caller, not just email. You with me?”
“Yeah, I think so.” Alison was somewhere, but not “with him,” that was for damn sure.
“With the software running, you’ll be able to know the phreak’s phone number if he’s calling in directly, or at least the IP address of his computer network. Now your guy sounds a little bit sophisticated, your basic wirehead. So I’m guessing he’s calling in from another network, not direct from his own phone number or from NutLink.”
“And so—”
“If he’s calling from another system, that system computer would have a node user log of who was online and which number they’d called into at any time of day or night. So you’d know where the guy had called from and what time. Then if you get the system node user logs, you know what the guy’s phone number or IP address is. Then, all—”
Alison raised her hand to ask a question. “Hold on, Jed. I need to write all this down.” She pulled the notepad and pen from her purse. “You said something about logs?”
“Yeah, the node user logs. If the guy is calling from outside.”
Alison jotted in her notebook. “Got it. But what if he’s not calling from outside?”
“If he’s calling direct from NutLink, even better. The software will tell you his phone number, and you could get an ID that way. Assuming you want to play it out that way.” Jed’s fingers twitched.
“I don’t understand this completely, but at least it looks like there’s a glimmer of hope,” Alison said. “So what should I do first? What’s my next move?”
“You gotta gear up. The Tracer hardware you can get in Akihabara. Lots of places. Just plug it into your computer and the wall. When the red light goes on, you’ve got company.”
Alison took notes. “Sounds straightforward enough,” said Alison. “What about the software?”
“I’d go with PeepHole.”
“PeepHole? That’s software?”
“Yeah.”
“Great. Where do I get it?”
Jed pulled at his goatee. “Now that’s a little harder.”
“Why’s that?”
“Let’s just say that certain interests don’t want to see it freely distributed.” Jed wiggled his eyebrows.
Alison set down her notepad. “You mean it’s hacker software?”
“You might say that.”
Alison shook her head and laughed. “I can’t picture myself as a hacker. Not this newbie. I’ll find some solution, something this side of the law. But thanks a lot, Jed. You saved me a bundle.”
“No problem. Always ready to help out a fellow gaijin.” He pulled a card out of his jacket. “Here’s my meishi. Email me, let me know how it goes.”
Alison returned home, happily toting her new purchase. A better bargain couldn’t be had. She hoped she hadn’t been had, either.
With her user’s guide open, Alison plugged in her laptop computer and read how to copy the FYEO file from Charles’ computer hard drive onto her new laptop. She dragged the FYEO icon on Charles’ computer desktop to the trash. Gone without a trace.
Alison loaded the disk containing the FYEO software onto her computer. She’d be ready to take off as soon as she found a phone jack. She searched for a suitable work space and found a jack right by the dining room table. It would do perfectly. She cleared a space on the table and set up shop.
Alison booted up her network communication software and punched in the access number for World NetLink. The computer’s modem sounded a dial tone, then emitted a series of beeps. Music to her ears.
Her little PowerBook lit up with the NetLink welcome screen. She entered her user name and password, and was greeted as a recognized member. She was one of the cool kids.
Next was uploading the FYEO encryption software. She navigated over to the software area of the network, and read the online instructions for sending software to another user by email. Sending the encryption file to Kiyoshi, she attached a little note:
Hi, Kiyoshi: This software should solve our problems with the Peeping Tom. I made a key for our messages and uploaded it for you. If you run the software and use the key, no one will be able to read our messages. See you at 5.
Alison caressed her PowerBook in her lap. Things were going to work out all right.
21
“Are you a complete fucking idiot? You short it, you buy it, you transfer it. Leave the rest to me. Make sure to use the goddamn street name. Got it? The Hang Sen is closed on Tuesday, so run it through SIMEX. Check the Singapore calendar.”
Charles slammed down the phone. “Damned fool,” he muttered.
Charles’ shouting had awakened Alison. She looked at the clock: 5:15 a.m. It must be New York. She couldn’t imagine what was going on to get Charles so worked up, but it certainly wasn’t the first time.
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“Sorry I was late today.”
“No problem. How’ve you been?”
“Busy researching environmental organizations in Asia.”
“Are there a lot of them?”
“Yeah, I was surprised. The other day I visited a group right here in Tokyo. Green Space. Have you heard of them?”
“I don’t know very much about the group, but I know the founder’s family.”
“Yamada-san? I had lunch with her.”
“Yamada Yuko and I were at high school together. The international school in Kobe.”
“No kidding? Small world.”
“Kobe is a big port city. Taisho is the Yamada family business. They build ships. And other things.”
“Yuko Yamada asked me to help with their website. She’s impressive.”
“Please go slow before getting involved with them. There is more to the Yamada organization than you might realize.”
“You’re sounding very mysterious, Kiyoshi. What’s the deal?”
“They are not popular with everyone.”
Alison thought of the guards posted outside the entrance to Green Space. All kinds of groups doing the right thing needed security. Planned Parenthood, Greenpeace, NAACP, for starters.
“What do you mean, Kiyoshi?”
“Just don’t move too quickly with them.”
Why was Kiyoshi so put off by Yamada’s group? Maybe Yuko had broken his poor little high school heart when they were kids in Kobe.
“I FOUND YOU! THERE’S NO HIDING FROM ME!!!!!”
“Alison, did you see that?”
“Yes. He’s back.”
“It looks that way.”
“But you know, I don’t think he can read our messages since they’re encrypted. He probably can only tell that we’re online, but he can’t read what we’re saying.”
“You think so?”
“Hello, you weirdo creep. Can you read this? Is our encryption software working? Are you there? I don’t think he can read this, Kiyoshi.”
“Let’s hope you’re right, Alison.”
Tokyo Firewall: a novel of international suspense Page 10
