Read Online The Woman Who Stopped Traffic by Daniel Pembrey - Free Book Online Page B

track online activities of partners in intimate relationships, usually to find evidence of infidelity. Monitoring a partner's online activities without his or her consent was usually illegal – and that had proved problematic for the authors of LoverSpy. But not always illegal, Natalie had managed to persuade herself, as she’d started to realize that a love triangle may be at play in her own workplace romance. Rather, it depended on local laws regarding marital/ communal property. A fawning programmer in her department had re-written the software so that it contained a rootkit, thereby becoming ‘LoverSpy, Deluxe’. Rootkits modified host operating systems, giving the hacker administrative or root access. After listening to her lover’s suspiciously fierce denials, Natalie directed the programmer to infiltrate her lover’s computer software not only to install and hide the spyware, but also to repel any attempts at removal.
    She no longer wanted to remember.
    How the spyware knew whenever a ghost-job was killed, how it would start a new copy of the slain program within milliseconds, how the only way to remove it was to slay both ghosts simultaneously (very difficult) or to crash the system altogether .
    For right there had been her undoing.
    Bringing herself back, she opened up the LoverSpy executable and re-parameterized it using a Boolean-style command: IF visitor accesses Natalie Chevalier profile page AND visitor first accessed login page, THEN scrape username, password. Next she copied the executable across to the open scripts of her profile page. From there, it would upload itself to the Clamor web servers in some hosting facility thousands of miles away, working its way in – then winging its way back.
    She leaned away from the Compaq, crossed her arms and waited. Waited. Waited …
    It still all felt so raw, so vivid.
    How, from his account of it, the Senior Vice President of Human Resources had gone in to bat for her at the last minute. She could imagine it all: him dropping by the CEO’s office at the end of a day, the CEO with his sleeves rolled up, his ball-shaped head reddened by the day’s exertions, but still listening intently. HR, in his clipped accent, acknowledging that Natalie Chevalier had been naive to get involved with a fellow executive, that there had been no defense for what she’d gone and done. And yet the company had long since tolerated workplace relationships, she was growing into a “world-class senior software executive” (the cost of recruiting and developing a replacement being significant), the provocation had been unusual – it was an aberration. “She didn’t have it easy earlier in life,” he’d apparently said on his way out of the CEO’s office.
    Natalie was left wondering what then went on behind closed doors. Perhaps that last remark to the CEO had proved her undoing. Perhaps it had been repeated to the Chairman, who could only have responded one way: “those are two mutually exclusive states: difficult childhood, total aberration – which?”
    Perhaps, perhaps.
    The CEO personally delivered the bullet. He told her that on a human level, he could empathize with what she’d been through. But business was about making the tough calls. She’d used the resources of her department to launch malware onto the personal computer of another serving executive. She would be given the chance to resign. She would receive twelve months’ severance provided that she signed a new non-disclosure and non-compete agreement covering that extended period. Both she and the other executive involved had reported into the senior leadership team. The circumstances of her departure would remain confidential to that small group.
    “What about him?” she asked.
    Her ex was not in a good place. His peers just didn’t care too much for his behavior. He’d been hit with improper use of corporate email or similar.
    “He’ll be dismissed for cause. Whatever he chooses to say, I very much