Mango Key

by Bill H Myers

  I tapped the file list again. “Tell me about the files on this list. Are they important?”

  Boris shook his head. “No, not really. I'd rather they not be made public, but there is nothing there that will hurt me. That's not the point. Someone was able to break into my computer, get my files and take private photos of me. They may even have photos of my wife and daughter. That can't be allowed.”

  I nodded. “I understand. When someone breaks into your network, it can be a big problem. Once they get in, they can take control of your computers, security cameras, house alarm, even your phones.

  “You mentioned you have other computers. Anything important on them?”

  “No. We use the one in the house mostly to buy things from Amazon and watch YouTube videos. We don't keep any of our important records on computer.”

  “Good. So let me ask you this. You want me to lock down your network, clean up your computers, and keep hackers from getting in. Is that what you want me to do?”

  Boris shook his head. “No. What I want you to do is find out who did this. I want to know their name. Then I want you to delete all traces of my files from their computer. Then I want you to make it so that no one else can ever do this to me again. Think you can do that?”

  Before I answered, I thought about what Kat had said. She had warned me not to disappoint this man. She said he didn't take disappointment well. I didn't want to find out what she meant by that, so I thought carefully before I answered.

  Clearly it was illegal for someone to tap into Boris' computer network. It was also illegal for that person to take files from him and hold the files for ransom. These were serious crimes and if Boris wanted to, he could get Homeland Security or the FBI involved.

  But I doubted he wanted to do that. I didn't know what kind of business he was in, but I got the feeling it was something he would rather keep private. That was why he had sought out someone like me. A private contractor who could get things done without involving the authorities.

  Legally, I could lock down Boris' network to keep hackers out. I could also legally try to figure out who they were. If I could tap into their computer, there were ways I could remove Boris' files from them. It might not be totally legal but it could be done.

  I was still thinking about this when Boris said, “So Walker, can you do it? Can you find out who did this and get my files back?”

  I nodded. “I can try.”

  “Good. Tell me what you need to get started.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  I'd agreed to help Boris with his computer problem. He'd asked what I needed to get started.

  “I'll need to see your laptop computer. I want to examine the email you got, see if I can figure out who sent it. Then I need to check the settings on your wireless router. Then I'll check your security camera controller. Those things will help me figure out what I'll need to do next.

  “But first I need to see your laptop and I need a quiet place to work.”

  Boris stood. “You can work here at my desk. But before you start, I want to make sure you understand that anything you see or find on my computer stays private. Nothing leaves here. You can't talk to anyone about what you see. Is that understood?”

  I nodded. “Yes.”

  “Good. Buck says I can trust you. He says you're a standup guy. He says I have nothing to worry about with you. As long as that's the case, we'll get along just fine.”

  He reached under his desk and pulled out his laptop. “The password is mangokey171.”

  I pointed to the security camera behind me. “Until we get this resolved, be careful about what you say around the cameras. Someone could be listening in. Let's unplug the one in here while I'm working. Don't want the bad guys to see what I'm doing.”

  He said, “Go ahead. Do it.”

  I pulled a chair close to the camera and pulled the power cord. After a few seconds, the little red light on the camera went dark. With the camera out of service, I told Boris I needed to go to the car to get my laptop and I needed to check the incoming internet connection in the main house.

  He smiled. “You need to go the house? Good. I'll go with you. You can meet Katrina’s mother. Buck, you coming with us?”

  He shook his head. “No, I think I'll stay here. Walker said something about a problem at the hot dog stand. I want to hear about it when he gets back.”

  Boris and I left the boathouse and headed up the walk to where the Prius was parked. I reached inside and grabbed my laptop and phone. From there we went over to the main house. As impressive as it was from the outside, it didn't hold a candle to what was within.

  The furnishings were sparse, but high end. The artwork on the walls looked expensive as did the rugs on the floor. There was a two-story wall of glass overlooking the blue-green waters of the gulf. An infinity pool just outside the glass gave the illusion that dolphins would have no problem swimming up to the house.

  As I was taking all this in, Kat walked into the room with an older woman. Both smiled when they saw me.

  Kat introduced us. “Walker, this is my mother, Marissa.”

  The woman's resemblance to Kat was striking; so much so that it would be easy to think they were sisters.

  I smiled and took her hand. “Very pleased to meet you. I'm sure you've heard this before, but you and Katrina could pass for sisters.”

  Marissa smiled and turned to Kat. “I like him. Try not to run this one off.”

  I started to ask what she meant, but Kat shook her head. She was signaling me not to ask questions. So I didn't.

  Marissa asked if I would like to stay for dinner, but Katrina said we had other plans. Her mother smiled approvingly.

  After the introductions were over, I set about checking the incoming internet and the wireless router settings. It took me less than ten minutes to discover the problem. The router still used the default passwords set by the cable company.

  This meant that anyone who intercepted the wireless signal could use the default passwords to add themselves to the network. Once on the network, it would be easy to gain access to all the computers and files.

  I showed Boris what I'd found.

  “See this password? It's the default one for this router. Every hacker knows it. The person who installed this is supposed to change it. But they didn't, making it easy to break into your network. With just a laptop and a signal amplifier, a person could pull up to your gate, tap your wireless signal and log in.”

  Boris nodded. He seemed to understand what I was saying. “So the problem is with the passwords? You're going to change them, right?”

  “I am. But not yet. If we change the password, the hacker will know we're on to him. We don't want that. We want him to think he can still get in and do some damage.

  “As long as he continues to log in, we have a chance of finding out who he is. To increase those chances, I'll create a little surprise for him. Something so interesting he won't be able to resist downloading it. Once he does, we'll be able to find out who he is.”

  “You can do that? You can put something on his computer from here?”

  I shook my head. “No. I can't do that. That would be illegal and we don't want to break any laws. But what we can do is let him take something from us. A little program I create. If he takes it from us, we haven't done anything wrong. It's not our fault if what he steals from us gives us control of his computer. We didn't make him take it.”

  Boris smiled. “I like it. How soon can you do this?”

  “I can start right now. I need to go back to the boathouse and set things up. It'll take me about an hour to get everything ready. I'll put the bait out and we'll wait for the guy to take it.”

  “What happens then? What happens if he takes it?”

  “That's when the fun starts. Our bait file will launch a small program on his computer that'll snap a photo using his webcam. Every thirty seconds it'll capture a new image and route it to my laptop. The photos should show who the hacker is.

 
“But if they don't, we can use my program to turn on his computer microphone. That'll let us monitor his conversations.

  “As long as he's connected to the web, whether he's connected to your network or not, my program will continue to send us photos and let us hear what he's saying.

  “To keep us out of trouble, my program has a kill switch. If we have to, we can tell it to delete itself from his computer. We can also tell it to delete other files as well.”

  Boris seemed impressed. “You can really do all this? Without him knowing about it?”

  I nodded. “I can. It'll take me about an hour to get it done.”

  “Good. Go do it. And Walker, when this is over, you and I need to spend some time together. I want to find out what else you can do.”

  I said goodbye to Kat's mom, got my laptop and returned to the boathouse. Buck was waiting there for me.

  As soon as I walked in, he said, “Tell me what happened with Lori. You said there was a problem.”

  He knew Lori had wanted me to come to Key West to talk to the guy hassling her sister. But he didn't know I'd found him and already talked to him. He also didn't know that overnight someone had killed a chicken and left a message in blood on the hot dog stand's back door.

  I filled him in.

  “You're telling me that someone left a message in blood on the hot dog cart last night? And you left the two girls there alone today? What were you thinking?”

  “Buck, calm down. Lori's got pepper spray. She said they'd be okay. She said she'd call me if they ran into any problems.”

  Buck shook his head. “Call her now. I want to talk to her.”

  I picked up my phone and punched in her number. When she answered, I said, “Lori, is everything okay?”

  “Yeah Walker, no problems. How's it going with you?”

  “Fine. I'm here with Buck. He wants to talk to you.”

  I handed him the phone.

  He took it and said, “Lori, tell me about the chicken.”

  I couldn't hear what she was telling him, but I could see the concerned look on his face. When she finished talking, he said, “Be careful. If anything comes up, call Walker. As soon as he's done here we'll be coming over there to see if we can straighten things out.”

  Buck ended the call and looked at me. “This Wiener Girl thing has gotten out of hand. We need to find out who's behind it and get it taken care of.”

  I nodded. “You're right. As soon as I get done here, we'll go over there and start chasing it down.”

  Buck headed for the door. “I'll be back in a few minutes.”

  I watched as he walked to the main house then I started working on Boris' computer problem.

  The first thing I did was to power up his laptop and open his email program. I clicked on the last message received, the one shown in the printout Boris had given me.

  The “to” and “from” addresses were the same. Both showed Boris' email address. It was standard hacker stuff. Spoof the “from” and “to” address so it looked like you were getting email from yourself.

  I dug a little further and checked the hidden headers. They would provide information about the path the email followed before it reached its final destination.

  The headers on Boris' message showed the email was sent and received from the same originating server. This meant the hacker either spoofed the headers or the message was sent from within Boris' home network. That would be possible if the hacker had been able to log into Boris' network. As far as hacking went, it was pretty easy to do. Just get in range of the Wi-Fi signal and enter the right password and you'd be in.

  Assuming the hacker had gotten in that way, they probably had everything they needed to get back in any time they wanted. With that in mind, I wanted to create something they couldn't resist downloading the next time they got in.

  Back when I was working cyber security in the corporate world, I'd often create programs to show management how easy it was to infiltrate their supposedly secure networks.

  After I got approval to run a demonstration, I'd send an email to one of their corporate employees. It would have a subject line like “past due” or “interested in buying” or “help needed” and it would have a PDF or JPG file attachment.

  When the email was read and the attachment opened, the email would install a small program that would give me access to all the computers on the network. I'd use the program to snoop though the network and print out files I'd find.

  I'd take them to corporate management to show what I had been able to accomplish. In most cases, after seeing how easy for me to gain access to their private files, they'd hire me to improve their network security.

  I planned to do the reverse with Boris' hacker. Because I didn't know his email address I couldn't send him my hidden program. But I could embed the program in a file on Boris' computer and give it a name that would make it irresistible to the hacker.

  I created a dummy file, added in my program and saved it under several file names including “masterpass.txt”, “bankinfo.dat”, “contacts.txt”, and “private.pdf”.

  After putting the files on Boris' laptop, I connected it to the internet. I changed the sleep mode to 'never' so the laptop would stay powered up and online until I turned it off.

  The next time the hacker logged onto Boris' computer, he would find new files with the kind of file names that hackers looked for. If he downloaded the files and opened any of them, my hidden program would launch and start sending me photos from his webcam. My cell phone would notify me immediately when my program launched.

  Until then, all we could do was sit back and wait for the hacker to take the bait.

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  I was still in the boathouse packing up my laptop when Buck returned. He had a serious look on his face. “Walker, you ready to go?”

  “Yeah, but I don't have a car. Kat drove me. We'll have to get her to drive us back.”

  He shook his head. “No, we won't. She gave me the keys to the spare Prius. She said to remind you about tonight. Said she'd be at your place around seven.

  “You and her have something going on?”

  “Just dinner. That's all.”

  Buck shook his head. “Be careful around her. Her daddy is very protective. Treat her nice and don't make her mad.”

  I laughed. “Buck, you keep telling me not to make her mad. I think that's the way it works with all women. Treat them nice and don't make them mad. Wouldn't you agree?”

  He didn't answer. He just shook his head and headed for the door. I grabbed my laptop and followed him up to the garage. There were two Prii parked in front of it. Both were white. “Which one we taking?” I asked.

  Buck pressed the remote in his hand and the Prius closest to us beeped.

  “That one. You're driving.”

  He didn't say much on the way back to Key West. But after we went over the Stock Island Bridge, he said, “So tell me about this Eugene guy you talked to. You think he's dangerous?”

  I shook my head. “No, Buck. I don't. What I think is he fell in with the wrong crowd and is in over his head. I think he wants out.”

  “Good to know. Was it Eugene who painted the message?”

  Again I shook my head. “No, I don't think it was him. He left me a note saying he didn't do it. I think he knows who did do it though. That's why we need to find him.”

  Buck nodded. “I'm with you there. We start by finding Eugene. Where do we look?”

  I thought for a moment. “We'll start at Wiener Girl. Maybe he'll show up. If he does, we'll grab him. But if he doesn't, we can hang around the homeless shelter tonight. He was there last night and might come back tonight.”

  Buck nodded. “Sounds good, but there's a problem.”

  “What kind of problem?”

  “A Katrina problem. Your date tonight. You can't be at the homeless shelter when Katrina expects you to be waiting for her at your motorhome. You don't want to stand her up. That'd be real bad.”

 
; Buck was right. “I guess I need to call her and cancel.”

  “No, don't do that. That's the last thing you want to do. You don't want to make her mad.

  “You keep your date. I'll go to the shelter and look for Eugene. But that creates another problem. I've never seen him. How will I recognize him if he shows up?”

  He was right again. Only Summer and I knew what Eugene looked like. “Let me think about it.”

  We had reached the parking lot across from Wiener Girl and I pulled into the same space I'd parked in before. Buck pointed across the street at the line of people standing in front of the hot dog stand. “Looks like they're staying busy. That's good.”

  “Yeah, it is. You going over there?”

  “I think I will. Maybe I'll try one of their hot dogs. How about you?”

  “No, I'm not hungry. I think I'll check the neighborhood. See if I can find Eugene. If he shows up at the hot dog stand, give me a call. I'll be back in thirty minutes.”

  I took off down the sidewalk, heading toward Duval Street. My plan was to check places where a homeless person like Eugene might hang out during the day.

  After a hundred steps I realized my plan wasn't going to work. The sidewalks and benches were full of tourists. Most of them were dressed down for their Key West adventure, baggy shorts, sleeveless tees and flip-flops. It was going to be hard to tell by the way people were dressed whether they were homeless or not.

  I decided that rather than stay on the main streets, I should concentrate my search in the alleys behind the buildings. I started on Caroline Street and ducked into every alley looking for Eugene.

  I quickly found several cats, none of whom seemed lost, two drunks, and a man and a woman having what looked like sex, but no Eugene. At the end of Caroline Street where it met the Truman White House Annex, I turned back and took the sidewalk to Front Street. Along the way, I checked the benches and cubby holes where a homeless person might hang out. It became quite clear there was no shortage of people that looked homeless in Key West, but I hadn't had any luck in finding Eugene.