Hooper checked the portable trace against the Judiciary system logs of the comms. The portable system clearly showed that there was a digital echo on the line, it had to mean someone was taking a copy of the call. The internal system did not show a trace, however there was a slight pause after the comms had disconnected. It was nothing more than a microsecond where the call didn’t end. In any normal circumstance it could indicate that there was a system running or it could be an artefact in the wires. Hooper now knew it to be a breach.
The situation was simple, someone inside Judiciary was monitoring Hooper’s work. The officers at Judiciary regularly shared workstations and offices, there were few who had permanent positions. Space on the station was at a premium so no area was wasted if it could be avoided. Workstations were a waste of resources if they were individually assigned, there would be large portions of a day when they were empty. The logical stance was shared areas for almost every activity.
This meant that an officer could log on at any station, on any level. They were not restricted and so tracing the calls of one specific person would need a sophisticated and targeted assault. It would not be as easy as attaching a physical device to a terminal at the right desk.
Hooper would have said this made the task almost too difficult for a single organic to undertake. They would need to know where Hooper was logging in to the system so they could attack that section of the network, breach it and then operate a clone or echo program. It was an awfully large deal of effort. It would also require some proficient slicer skills.
Hooper supposed they could monitor his progress using the Judiciary security systems but that would mean that there was a simultaneous, or long term, breach of the security systems which was even more effort. This was starting to imply multiple organics or compatible intelligences in a mass number of systems working in unison. That surely implied a conspiracy. Hooper hated the idea of a conspiracy almost as much as the nutjobs who claimed that very item in their lives that couldn’t be explained was one.
Conspiracies rarely existed. It was just too much effort. It was far more likely to be one or two intelligences working than a massive hidden cabal in Hooper’s long experience.
So it brought Hooper back to the original issue. How were they being targeted? Once Hooper worked out the how then they could work back along the method to find out whom. If you know what’s being done and where you can run a standard boots and laces process of suspect and motive elimination. Means, method and opportunity was still the holy trinity of almost all investigative work. Work out the means and the method and you have a set of criteria to determine who has the opportunity.
