NOVPUBChapter 127: Chapter 126 Aftermath
Chapter 127 -126 Aftermath
Two days after the Twin Towers Bridge car crash, the related news reached an unprecedented level of viewership.
Especially the video of a car speeding up towards the top of the rising bridge surface became a hot search in various countries. Netizens discussed it with various opinions, some believing that the Twin Towers Bridge was more about style than substance, favoring aesthetics over practicality; some argued that autonomous driving should be banned; others believed that the government of City L should bear full responsibility. The fact that the victim was a wealthy individual significantly increased the interest in the incident.
However, Britannia’s official response was very clear.
The police declared that this was a premeditated malicious incident, and after preliminary investigations, they had ruled out the possibility of operator error and equipment malfunction. The gang responsible not only remotely controlled the bridge’s lifting system but also tampered with the driver’s vehicle. They were already working on salvaging the car and expressed their determination not to let the culprits get away.
Who murdered the outstanding entrepreneur Jason Tyler also became the media’s favorite topic to speculate on.
At the same time, another matter came to light, though it didn’t have as much impact as the Twin Towers Bridge car crash.
That was the entire file dump of the Sunflower Project on the internet.
Since the Prism scandal, incidents of leaks due to personal factors have emerged one after another, including both genuine confidential intelligence and false information created to muddy the waters; people were basically no longer surprised.
Therefore, only a few niche forums paid attention to this matter.
Alex was one of them.
As a hacker, his focus wasn’t on the leaked files themselves, but on the method of the leak. Every time there was a new discovery, he would share his views in the hacker club “The Wall of Silence,” used for private communication within the small circle.
This time, Alex tagged the topic with “Shocking.”
Considering the origin and classification of the Sunflower Project, it should belong to MI6’s top secrets. Insiders all knew that MI6 had an isolated server room for storing these secret documents, which theoretically was impossible to be breached by an online intrusion. Therefore, the source of these documents was very likely from an employee with a burst of conscience, who directly stole the files from the server room.
However, Alex proposed a completely different view.
He believed that to steal MI6’s top secrets in reality, one must use a specially made device to connect to the system, rather than simply copying the data with a USB stick or data cable—this was also the method adopted by many enterprises with physically isolated server rooms, not to mention intelligence agencies living off secrecy.
This kind of reading device could only access specific data, which, after being translated, became comprehensible text and images for humans. It had no commercial output ports, and stealing the information required manual reproduction, such as taking photos or typing records.
This was also the reason why most leaks were released in the form of photos.
However, the Sunflower Project that was dumped online was different; it looked like the original files had been packaged and leaked, and Alex could even read the original file creation and modification dates in the file data during his analysis. This was something that normal stealing methods could never accomplish.
Therefore, he boldly speculated that someone had managed to hack into MI6’s isolated server room over the internet and had obtained this information almost as if they had scraped the hard drive.
It wasn’t long after the topic was posted that fellow professionals started to chime in.
‘Bell’: If I said you could use solar power without the sun, would you think I’m an idiot? The question then is, how do you hack into a device that is not connected to any network?
‘Cobra’: Buddy, consider microwave programming, it can remotely alter the way a program operates.
“Bell”: Has anyone succeeded in reality? If the target device can convert specific microwaves into telecom signals, we call that a mobile phone. It’s 2023, surely everyone has a mobile phone, right?
“The Emperor of Dark”: Actually, there’s another way to achieve the same effect, which is to physically enter MI6’s isolated server room and carry out the entire host machine. I think this method is far more feasible than the one Alex suggested.
“Frey”: Don’t mention it, I just saw someone chatting that two days ago they saw an ambulance and a fire engine parked in front of the Walker’s Cross Building, and there was black smoke coming out of the building.
Seeing everyone drifting off-topic, Alex added with dissatisfaction: I’d rather we discussed this topic from a technical perspective. As hackers, you should be curious about the unknown, not stubbornly deny it.
“Frey”: Speaking of which, I can relate… Just a month ago, our leader actually claimed to be… ah, if I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, some things beyond imagination are indeed hard to accept.
“Bell”: Was it a rainbow?
Alex typed on the keyboard rapidly: Please take private conversations to other chat rooms, thank you.
“Avalon”: But did you guys notice that the car crash on the Twin Towers Bridge and the leak of this document seem to have happened on the same day? That evening, I was near the bridge and when I found there was an accident, I immediately dived into the surveillance system, and then I found something interesting. Of course… I accessed it through a live connection port, not much technical content, unlike hacking into MI6 as this godlevel person did. 𝓷ℴ𝓿𝓅𝓊𝒷.𝓬𝓸𝓂
“The Emperor of Dark”: Wait, are you agreeing with what Alex said? Someone in a world without the sun successfully used solar power?
Seeing someone supporting him, Alex suddenly became excited: Never mind him. What did you find? Share with everyone.
Soon, a video was posted.
Alex opened the video and immediately realized it was footage from a surveillance camera on the Twin Towers Bridge. However, unlike the usual static shots, this time the frame almost completely locked onto the out-of-control vehicle, rotating almost 150 degrees as the car appeared and disappeared.
Was someone operating the camera?
The video was only a short eight seconds, but Alex opened his video analysis software, replayed the clip, and maximized the size.
This time he saw it clearly.
It seemed the person inside the car was struggling with the vehicle… In just eight seconds, the individual tried to cut the safety belt, reach into the glove compartment, and break the window. In the final second, it looked like he made a fatal mistake by letting his screwdriver fly out of the window. However, upon frame-by-frame examination, Alex was shocked to see that the window moved down a step faster than his action—as if it anticipated the move, rapidly closing right after, catching him completely off guard!
“The Emperor of Dark”: Man, AI’s gone rogue and killed someone! The question is… do these two incidents have any connection? And are you selling this video? Any price.
“Bell”: Stop joking, an onboard chip couldn’t support a strong AI! Was someone remotely controlling the car?
Alex, excited, continued: You see, the essence of the two incidents is exactly the same! The car’s logic center is all inside the car computer; it receives radar information and road navigation, but the analysis and decision-making are done inside the vehicle, which, in a way, is also a physically isolated host device.
“Bell”: It’s not strict, because the external world can send wrong navigation information leading the car to misjudge, or it can forge radar signals.
“Cobra”: Can the outside world also remotely control the windows to raise and lower them at high speeds? That’s clearly not the speed that windows normally close at. The motor’s program has been rewritten.
“Avalon”: Exactly, so I don’t understand—if someone really is controlling all of this, how did they invade the car and take control? The car computer doesn’t have the relevant network ports and theoretically, it couldn’t be done. That’s why when I saw the topic raised by Alex, I thought this might be possible after all.
