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mostlysignssomeportents · 3 years

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Experian doxes the world (again)

The nonconsensually compiled dossiers of personal information that Experian assembled on the entire population of the USA may currently be exposed via dozens, perhaps hundreds, of sites, thanks to a grossly negligent security defect in Experian's API.

The breach was detected by Bill Demirkapi, a security researcher and RIT sophomore, and reported on by Brian Krebs, the excellent independent security reporter.

https://krebsonsecurity.com/2021/04/experian-api-exposed-credit-scores-of-most-americans/

Experian, like Equifax, has unilaterally arrogated to itself the right to collect, store and disseminate our personal information, and, like Equifax, it faces little regulation, including obligations not to harm us or penalties when it does.

Experian's API allows criminals to retrieve your credit info by supplying your name and address, information that is typically easy to find, especially in the wake of multiple other breaches, such as Doordash's 5m-person 2019 breach and Drizzly's 2.5m-person 2020 breach.

Demirkapi explains that the API is implemented by many, many sites across the internet, and while Experian assured Krebs that this bug only affected a single site, it did not explain how it came to that conclusion.

Demirkapi discovered the defect while he was searching for a student loan vendor. There is a way to defend yourself against this attack: freeze your credit report. Credit freezes were made free (but opt-in only) in 2018, after the Equifax breach.

https://krebsonsecurity.com/2018/09/credit-freezes-are-free-let-the-ice-age-begin/

Indeed, you may have already been thinking about the Equifax breach as you read this. In many ways, that breach was a wasted opportunity to seriously re-examine the indefensible practices of the credit-reporting industry, which had not been seriously scrutinized since 1976.

1976 was the year that Congress amended the Equal Credit Opportunity Act after hearing testimony about the abuses of the Retail Credit Company - a company that swiftly changed its name to "Equifax" to distance itself from the damning facts those hearings brought to light.

Retail Credit/Equifax invented credit reporting when it was founded in Atlanta in 1899. For more than half a century, it served as a free market Stasi to whom neighbors could quietly report each other for violating social norms.

Retail Credit's permanent, secret files recorded who was suspected of being gay, a "race-mixer" or a political dissident so that banks and insurance companies could discriminate against them.

https://www.jacobinmag.com/2017/09/equifax-retail-credit-company-discrimination-loans

This practice was only curbed when a coalition of white, straight conservative men discovered that they'd been misidentified as queers and commies and demanded action, whereupon Congress gave Americans limited rights to see and contest their secret files.

But these controls were never more than symbolic. Congress couldn't truly blunt the power of these private-sector spooks, because the US government depends on them to determine eligibility for Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

It's a public-private partnership from hell. Credit reporting bureaux collect data the government is not legally allowed to collect on its own, then sells that data to the government (Equifax makes $200m/year doing this).

https://web.archive.org/web/20171004200823/http://www.cetusnews.com/business/Equifax-Work-for-Government-Shows-Company%E2%80%99s-Broad-Reach.HkexS6JAq-.html

These millions are recycled into lobbying efforts to ensure that the credit reporting bureaux can continue to spy on us, smear us, and recklessly endanger us by failing to safeguard the files they assemble on us.

This is bad for America, but it's great for the credit reporting industry. The Big Three bureaux (Equifax, Experian and Transunion) have been on a decade-long buying spree, gobbling up hundreds of smaller companies.

These acquisitions lead directly to breaches: a Big Three company that buys a startup inherits its baling-wire-and-spit IT system, built in haste while the company pursued growth and acquisition.

These IT systems have to be tied into the giant acquiring company's own databases, adding to the dozens of other systems that have been cobbled together from previous acquisitions.

This became painfully apparent after the Equifax breach, so much so that even GOP Congressional Committee chairs called the breach "entirely preventable" and the result of "aggressive growth." But they refused to put any curbs on future acquisitions.

https://thehill.com/policy/technology/420582-house-panel-issues-scathing-report-on-entirely-preventable-equifax-data

A lot has happened since Equifax, so you may have forgotten just how fucked up that situation was. Equifax's IT was so chaotic that they couldn't even encrypt the data they'd installed. Two months later, they "weren't sure" if it had been encrypted.

https://searchsecurity.techtarget.com/news/450429891/Following-Equifax-breach-CEO-doesnt-know-if-data-is-encrypted

*Six months* before the breach, outside experts began warning Equifax that they were exposing our data:

https://www.vice.com/en/article/ne3bv7/equifax-breach-social-security-numbers-researcher-warning

The *only* action Equifax execs took? They sold off a shit-ton of stock:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-14/sec-says-former-equifax-executive-engaged-in-insider-trading

The Equifax breach exposed the arrogance and impunity of the Big Three. Afterward, Equifax offered "free" credit monitoring to the people they'd harmed. One catch: it was free for a year; after that, they'd automatically bill you, annually, forever.

https://web.archive.org/web/20170911025943/https://therealnews.com/t2/story:19960:Equifax-Data-Breach-is-a-10-out-of-10-Scandal

And you'd pay in another way if you signed up for that "free" service: the fine print took away your right to sue Equifax, forever, no matter how they harmed you:

https://www.ibtimes.com/political-capital/equifax-lobbied-kill-rule-protecting-victims-data-breaches-2587929

The credit bureaux bill themselves as arbiters of the public's ability to take responsibility for their choices, but after the breach, the CEO blamed the entire affair on a single "forgetful" flunky:

https://www.engadget.com/2017-10-03-former-equifax-ceo-blames-breach-on-one-it-employee.html

Then he stepped down and pocketed a $90m salary that his board voted in favor of:

https://fortune.com/2017/09/26/equifax-ceo-richard-smith-net-worth/

Of course they did! His actions made the company so big that even after the breach, the IRS picked it to run its anti-fraud. Equifax got $7.5m from Uncle Sucker, and would have kept it except that its anti-fraud site was *serving malware*:

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/equifax-irs-data-breach-malware-discovered/

Equifax eventually settled all the claims against it for $700m in 2019:

https://nypost.com/2019/07/19/equifax-agrees-to-pay-700m-after-massive-data-breach/

But it continued to average five errors per credit report:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/02/11/rep-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-takes-aim-equifax-credit-scoring/

And it continued to store sensitive user-data in an unencrypted database whose login and password were "admin" and "admin":

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/equifax-password-username-admin-lawsuit-201118316.html

Congress introduced multiple bills to force Equifax, Experian and Transunion to clean up their act.

None of those bills passed.

https://www.axios.com/after-equifaxs-mega-breach-nothing-changed-1536241622-baf8e0cf-d727-43db-b4d4-77c7599fff1e.html

The IRS shrugged its shoulders at America, telling the victims of Equifax's breach that their information had probably already leaked before Equifax doxed them, so no biggie:

https://thehill.com/policy/cybersecurity/355862-irs-significant-number-of-equifax-victims-already-had-info-accessed-by

Since then there have been other mass breaches, most recently the Facebook breach that exposed 500m people's sensitive data. That data can be merged with data from other breaches and even from "anonymized" data-sets that were deliberately released:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/21/re-identification/#pseudonymity

And while you can theoretically prevent your data from being stolen using the current Experian vulnerability by freezing your account, that's not as secure as it sounds.

Back in 2017, Brian Krebs reported that Experian's services were so insecure that anyone could retreive the PIN to unlock a frozen credit report by ticking a box on a website:

https://krebsonsecurity.com/2017/09/experian-site-can-give-anyone-your-credit-freeze-pin/

That was just table-stakes - it turned out that ALL the credit bureaux had an arrangement with AT&T's telecoms credit agency that was so insecure that *anyone* could unlock your locked credit report:

https://krebsonsecurity.com/2018/05/another-credit-freeze-target-nctue-com/

These companies came into existence to spy on Americans in order to facilitate mass-scale, racist, ideological and sexual discrimination. They gather data of enormous import and sensitivity - data no one should be gathering, much less retaining and sharing.

They handle this data in cavalier ways, secure in the knowledge that their integration with the US government wins them powerful stakeholders who will ensure that the penalties for the harm they inflict add up to less than profits those harms generate for their shareholders.

This is why America needs a federal privacy law with a "private right of action" - the ability to sue companies that harm you, rather than hoping that federal prosecutors or regulators will decide to enforce the law.

https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/16/where-it-hurts/#sue-facebook

Experian promises that this breach only affects one company that mis-implemented its API. We would be suckers to take it at its word. It didn't know about this breach until a college sophomore sent in a bug report - how would it know if there were others?

Image: KC Green (modified) https://kcgreendotcom.com/

#pluralistic

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koreaunderground · 3 years

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(2021/04/02) LexisNexis to Provide Giant Database of Personal Information to ICE

[theintercept.com][1]

[1]: <https://theintercept.com/2021/04/02/ice-database-surveillance-lexisnexis/>

# LexisNexis to Provide Giant Database of Personal Information to ICE

Sam Biddle[email protected]theintercept.com@samfbiddle

10-13 minutes

* * *

_The popular legal research_ and data brokerage firm LexisNexis signed a $16.8 million contract to sell information to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to documents shared with The Intercept. The deal is already drawing fire from critics and comes less than two years after the company downplayed its ties to ICE, claiming it was “not working with them to build data infrastructure to assist their efforts.”

Though LexisNexis is perhaps best known for its role as a powerful scholarly and legal research tool, the company also caters to the immensely lucrative “risk” industry, providing, it says, 10,000 different data points on hundreds of millions of people to companies like financial institutions and insurance companies who want to, say, flag individuals with a history of fraud. LexisNexis Risk Solutions is also [marketed to law enforcement agencies][2], offering “advanced analytics to generate quality investigative leads, produce actionable intelligence and drive informed decisions” — in other words, to find and arrest people.

[2]: <https://risk.lexisnexis.com/law-enforcement-and-public-safety/crime-and-criminal-investigations>

The LexisNexis ICE deal appears to be providing a replacement for CLEAR, a risk industry service operated by Thomson Reuters that [has been crucial][3] to ICE’s deportation efforts. In February, the Washington Post [noted][4] that the CLEAR contract was expiring and that it was “unclear whether the Biden administration will renew the deal or award a new contract.”

[3]: <https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/02/magazine/ice-surveillance-deportation.html?login=email&auth=login-email> [4]: <https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/02/26/ice-private-utility-data/>

LexisNexis’s February 25 ICE contract was shared with The Intercept by Mijente, a Latinx advocacy organization that has [criticized links between ICE and tech companies][5] it says are profiting from human rights abuses, including LexisNexis and Thomson Reuters. The contract shows LexisNexis will provide Homeland Security investigators access to billions of different records containing personal data aggregated from a wide array of public and private sources, including credit history, bankruptcy records, license plate images, and cellular subscriber information. The company will also provide analytical tools that can help police connect these vast stores of data to the right person.

[5]: <https://theintercept.com/2019/11/14/ice-lexisnexis-thomson-reuters-database/>

Though the contract is light on details, other ICE documents suggest how the LexisNexis database will be put to use. A [notice][6] posted before the contract was awarded asked for a database that could “assist the ICE mission of conducting criminal investigations” and come with “a robust analytical research tool for … in-depth exploration of persons of interest and vehicles,” including what it called a “License Plate Reader Subscription.”

[6]: <https://beta.sam.gov/opp/dd2901df29274e49921fdc232bb18d8d/view#general>

LexisNexis Risk Solutions spokesperson Jennifer Richman declined to say exactly what categories of data the company would provide ICE under the new contract, or what policies, if any, will govern how agency agency uses it, but said, “Our tool contains data primarily from public government records. The principal non-public data is authorized by Congress for such uses in the Drivers Privacy Protection Act and Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act statutes.”

ICE did not return a request for comment.

The listing indicated the database would be used by ICE’s Homeland Security Investigations agency. While HSI is tasked with investigating border-related criminal activities beyond immigration violations, the office frequently works to raid and arrest undocumented people alongside ICE’s deportation office, Enforcement and Removal Operations, or ERO. A[ 2019 report ][7]from the Brennan Center for Justice described HSI as having “quietly become the backbone of the White House’s immigration enforcement apparatus. Its operations increasingly focus on investigating civil immigration violations, facilitating deportations carried out by ERO, and conducting surveillance of First Amendment-protected expression.” In 2018, The Intercept reported on an [HSI raid][8] of a Tennessee meatpacking plant that left scores of undocumented workers detained and hundreds of local children too scared to attend school the following day.

[7]: <https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/social-media-surveillance-homeland-security-investigations-threat> [8]: <https://theintercept.com/2018/04/10/ice-raids-tennessee-meatpacking-plant/>

Department of Homeland Security[ budget documents][9] show that ICE has used LexisNexis databases since at least 2016 through the National Criminal Analysis and Targeting Center, a division of ERO that[ assists][10] in “locating aliens convicted of criminal offenses and other aliens who are amenable to removal,” including “those who are unlawfully present in the United States.”

[9]: <https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/u.s._immigration_and_customs_enforcement.pdf> [10]: <https://www.dhs.gov/sites/default/files/publications/privacy-pia-ice-das-september2017.pdf>

> It’s exceedingly difficult to participate in modern society without generating computerized records of the sort that LexisNexis obtains and packages for resale.

It’s hard to wrap one’s head around the enormity of the dossiers LexisNexis creates about citizens and undocumented persons alike. While you can at least attempt to use countermeasures against surveillance technologies like facial recognition or phone tracking, it’s exceedingly difficult to participate in modern society without generating computerized records of the sort that LexisNexis obtains and packages for resale. The company’s databases offer an oceanic computerized view of a person’s existence; by consolidating records of where you’ve lived, where you’ve worked, what you’ve purchased, your debts, run-ins with the law, family members, driving history, and thousands of other types of breadcrumbs, even people particularly diligent about their privacy can be identified and tracked through this sort of digital mosaic. LexisNexis has gone even further than merely aggregating all this data: The company [claims][11] it holds 283 million distinct individual dossiers of 99.99% accuracy tied to “LexIDs,” unique identification codes that make pulling all the material collected about a person that much easier. For an undocumented immigrant in the United States, the hazard of such a database is clear.

[11]: <https://www.lexisnexis.com/en-us/products/public-records/powerful-public-records-search.page>

For those seeking to surveil large populations, the scope of the data sold by LexisNexis and Thomson Reuters is equally clear and explains why both firms are[ listed as official data “partners” of Palantir][12], a software company whose catalog includes products designed to [track down individuals][13] by feasting on enormous datasets. This partnership lets law enforcement investigators ingest material from the companies’ databases directly into Palantir data-mining software, allowing agencies to more seamlessly spy on migrants or round them up for deportation. “I compare what they provide to the blood that flows through the circulation system,” explained City University of New York law professor and scholar of government data access systems Sarah Lamdan. “What would Palantir be able to do without these data flows? Nothing. Without all their data, the software is worthless.” Asked for specifics of the company’s relationship with Palantir, the LexisNexis spokesperson told The Intercept only that its parent company RELX was an early investor in Palantir and that “LexisNexis Risk Solutions does not have an operational relationship with Palantir.”

[12]: <https://www.palantir.com/partnerships/data-providers/> [13]: <https://theintercept.com/2019/05/02/peter-thiels-palantir-was-used-to-bust-hundreds-of-relatives-of-migrant-children-new-documents-show/>

And yet compared with Palantir, which eagerly sells its powerful software to clients like ICE and the [National Security Agency][14], Thomson Reuters and LexisNexis have managed to largely avoid an ugly public association with controversial government surveillance and immigration practices. They have protected their reputations in part by claiming that even though LexisNexis may contract with ICE, it’s not enabling the crackdowns and arrests that have made the agency infamous but actually helping ICE’s detainees defend their legal rights. In 2019, after [hundreds of law professors, students, and librarians signed a petition][15] calling for Thomson Reuters and LexisNexis to cease contracting with ICE, LexisNexis sent a mass email to law school faculty defending their record and seeming to deny that their service helps put people in jail. Describing this claim as “misinformation,” the LexisNexis email, which was shared with The Intercept, stated: “ **We are not providing jail-booking data to ICE and are not working with them to build data infrastructure to assist their efforts.** … LexisNexis and RELX **does not** play a key ‘role in fueling the surveillance, imprisonment, and deportation of hundreds of thousands of migrants a year.” (Emphasis in the original.) The email stated that “one of our competitors” was responsible for how “ICE supports its core data needs.” It went on to argue that, far from harming immigrants, LexisNexis is actually in the business of empowering them: Through its existing relationship with ICE, “detainees are provided access to an extensive electronic library of legal materials … that enable detainees to better understand their rights and prepare their immigration cases.”

[14]: <https://theintercept.com/2017/02/22/how-peter-thiels-palantir-helped-the-nsa-spy-on-the-whole-world/> [15]: <https://theintercept.com/2019/11/14/ice-lexisnexis-thomson-reuters-database/>

> “Your state might be down to give you a driver’s license, but that information might get into the hands of a data broker.”

The notion that LexisNexis is somehow more meaningfully in the business of keeping immigrants free rather than detained has little purchase with the company’s critics. Jacinta Gonzalez, field director of Mijente, told The Intercept that LexisNexis’s ICE contract fills the same purpose as CLEAR. Like CLEAR, LexisNexis provides an agency widely accused of systemic human rights abuses with the data it needs to locate people with little if any oversight, a system that’s at once invisible, difficult to comprehend, and near impossible to avoid. Even in locales where so-called sanctuary laws aim to protect undocumented immigrants, these vast privatized databases create a computerized climate of intense fear and paranoia for undocumented people, Gonzalez said. “You might be in a city where your local politician is trying to tell you, ‘Don’t worry, you’re welcome here,’ but then ICE can get your address from a data broker and go directly to your house and try to deport you,” Gonzalez explained. “Your state might be down to give you a driver’s license, but that information might get into the hands of a data broker. You might feel like you’re in a life or death situation and have to go to the hospital, but you’re concerned that if you can’t pay your bill a collection agency is going to share that information with ICE.”

Richman, the LexisNexis spokesperson, told The Intercept that “the contract complies with the new policies set out in President Biden’s Executive Order [13993][16] of January 21, which revised Civil Immigration Enforcement Policies and Priorities and the corresponding DHS interim guidelines” and that “these policies, effective immediately, emphasize a respect for human rights, and focus on threats to national security, public safety, and security at the border.” But Gonzalez says it would be naive to think ICE is somehow a lesser menace to undocumented communities with Donald Trump out of power. “At the end of the day, ICE is still made up by the same agents, by the same field office directors, by the same administrators. … I think that it is really important for people to understand that, as long as ICE continues to have so many agents and so many resources, that they’re going to have to have someone to terrorize.”

[16]: <https://public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2021-01768.pdf>

#https://theintercept.com/2021/04/02/ice-database-surveillance-lexisnexis/#usa

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allthebrazilianpolitics · 4 years

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Meet Cortex, a Brazil government surveillance system that integrates even employment data

Without fanfare, Brazil’s Ministry of Justice is expanding one of the greatest surveillance and control tools known in the country. This is Cortex, an artificial intelligence technology that uses the reading of car license plates by thousands of road cameras spread over highways, bridges, tunnels, streets, and avenues across the country to track moving targets in real time. The Cortex also has access in a few seconds to several databases with sensitive and sensitive information from citizens and companies, such as Rais, the Annual List of Social Information, from the Ministry of Economy. With just a few clicks, officers can have access to registration and labor data that all companies have on their employees, including ID, CPF (Brazil’s individual taxpayer registry identification), address, dependents, salary, and job. In theory, it is a powerful tool to fight crime. In practice, the system can be used for monitoring and surveillance of citizens, civil society organizations, social movements, political leaders and protesters, on an unprecedented scale. The Ministry of Justice officially denies that the system is integrated into the Ministry of Economy database. But that's not what a video sent to The Intercept from an anonymous source shows.

In the recording, made in April of this year, the captain of the Military Police of São Paulo Eduardo Fernandes Gonçalves explains how to use the tool. Since 2018 ceded by the São Paulo government to Seopi, the Integrated Operations Secretariat of the National Public Security Secretariat of the Ministry of Justice, Fernandes demonstrates the ease of crossing information from a license plate record. Rais is among the demonstration databases. “What's interesting here? That, based on the CNPJ (Brazil’s identification number issued to companies), I recover the list of all employees who work at the company today.”, says Fernandes in the presentation. "Crossing this information here with the CPF bases, which you will also have at your disposal, you can have a very quick list of where that person lives." The agents get from the license plate to know all your movements around the city, who you met, who accompanied you on the trips, and who visited you. They can also cross-check this history with personal information and employment and salary data, including police reports and passages by the police. In the video, what you see is a powerful tool that is available to thousands of people from the security forces and intelligence sectors of the federal, state, and even municipal governments, all without clear criteria of control over its use. The source who sent the video to The Intercept, who did not identify themself for fear of retaliation, estimates that about 10,000 servers have access to the system.

Seopi, which developed the Cortex, was a sector of the Ministry of Justice virtually unknown until July, when the existence of an intelligence dossier against police and teachers linked to anti-fascist movements produced there was made public. Seopi's Director of Intelligence, Gilson Libório, one of those directly responsible for both the Cortex and the secret dossier, was exonerated after the case became a scandal and began to be investigated by the Federal Public Ministry. In a plenary decision, Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court ministers decided to order the ministry to suspend the production of dossiers for political reasons. But the Cortex continues to expand.

The system was used by Seopi in the five host cities of the Copa America last year, in the elections and in the Enem of 2018. Today it has at least 6,000 cameras, according to statements by former Minister of Justice, Sergio Moro, in whose management the technology was implemented.

Who, when, and where in two seconds In the system, when a “moving target” is registered and passes a camera with the ability to read license plates, it takes two seconds for interested intelligence agents or police to be warned by even pushing notifications on the mobile app. From there, it is possible to perform a series of tasks: continue to monitor the target, send the nearest police officer to try to approach them, or cross check the information of the vehicle and its owner with several others available to the federal government. In the video sent to The Intercept, Fernandes, the military police officer scheduled for training, makes it clear how easy it is to operate the system and cross data. Everything can be done directly by the agents, before any judicial authorization. The video shows that accessible with the Cortex are the databases of Denatran's (the National Traffic Department), Sinesp (National Public Security Information System), Depen (National Penitentiary Department), the national CPF register, the national register of fugitives, police reports, the national bank of genetic profiles, Alert Brazil of the Federal Highway Police, and Sinivem (the National Integrated System for Identifying Vehicles in Motion).

Questioned, the Ministry of Justice denied that Cortex had access to Rais, the database of the Ministry of Economy. That’s not what’s shown in the video for an hour, a minute, and 48 seconds. There, Fernandes even gives an example: with the help of Cortex, he accesses all the information of the employees of the concessionaire at Viracopos airport, in Campinas, says how many employees the company has, and begins to scrutinize some names. In the recording, he opens a spreadsheet with all the company's employees - with data with CPFs and dates of birth -, and states that it is possible to know which of them traveled through the city of Guarulhos on January 10th. Public servant of the government of São Paulo assigned to the Ministry of Justice, Fernandes has worked since at least 2018 in the government's intelligence area. There, he works at the technology directorate, where he receives more than R$ 3,000 (~US$ 540) added to his police salary to participate in a “working group responsible for developing proposals for technological solutions”. In the federal government's accounts, he is a “mobilized” server. On social media, he is an unconditional fan of President Bolsonaro.

“Searching here, there's a license plate here, it belongs to an employee of the company that manages the airport, and he moved to Guarulhos that day.”, says the cop in the video, showing details of the employee's displacement, which includes avenues, direction, and time. “At 8 pm he was going towards the neighborhood-center, so he was coming back.”, says Fernandes. “There goes the creativity. Put the license plate in the system, and it will put together an itinerary, whoever was with him. Or rather, take the license plate, go to the CPF of the owner, go to Rais, see where he worked, see who worked with him.”, he said. The target data is stored for ten years and the success rate in the readings is 92%, according to the video demonstration of the technology. According to the anonymous source who sent the material to Intercept, around 10,000 people from Abin, the Brazilian Information Agency, Ministry of Justice, PRF, PF, state PMs, Civil Police and even municipal guards have access to the system. Questioned, the Ministry of Justice did not confirm or deny it. In the tutorial, Fernandes states that all movements within the cortex are recorded and auditable. "If there is any kind of deviation in this use, the professional who did this will suffer the consequences of improper registration.", warns the agent in the video. Despite this, he does not explain what the consequences would be and who oversees the use of the system by thousands of users with simultaneous access. In practice, the operation of the Cortex and Seopi's own work do not have clear rules and are surrounded by secrecy.

National integration

The embryo of what was to become Cortex also emerged in the Dilma Rousseff government, with the creation of Sinesp, the National Public Security, Prison and Drug Information System. The initiative aimed to unite information from state databases such as police reports, vehicles with theft and robbery alerts, prisoners, and fugitives into a single system. Shortly before the 2014 World Cup, the federal government launched the Integrated Center for National Command and Control, which gathered representatives and information from the public security secretariats of the event's host cities and real-time images from scattered road and security cameras. through these cities. The government's main concern was the possible action of terrorist groups, organized crime, and demonstrations that put the event at risk like the ones that happened in the previous year. In 2015, a decree by the president systematized, expanded and made official the use of the Alert Brazil - created by the Federal Road Police in 2013, also amid investments in public security for the FIFA soccer world cup. In 2018, already under President Michel Temer, the law that created the Susp was approved. From then on, it was established to share with the Public Security Secretariat of the Ministry of Justice a series of databases hitherto separate from the state public security secretariats. Those who do not comply lose the right to the transfer of federal resources to the area of public security. By the end of last year, according to information from the Road Police, at least 12 states shared their cameras with the Cortex: Santa Catarina, Paraná, Rio de Janeiro, Mato Grosso do Sul, Mato Grosso, Goiás, Distrito Federal, Rondônia, Acre , Amazonas, Roraima ,and Amapá. Of these, the public security departments of Rio de Janeiro, Santa Catarina, Amapá, Acre, Goiás, Mato Grosso, Roraima, and Federal District were connected with the Cortex. In addition to state governments, there are partnerships - and access to cameras - directly with the municipalities. At the end of 2017, for example, the City of Atibaia, in São Paulo, announced that its road sign readers would become part of the Alert Brazil, a sign monitoring system created by the Federal Highway Police in 2013.

The surveillance arm of the Ministry of Justice Alert Brazil was one of the precursor technologies of the Cortex. In September last year, the then Minister of Justice, Sergio Moro, said on Twitter that the two systems were completely integrated. "The unification of the road monitoring systems Alerta Brasil 3.0 by the Road Police and Cortex by SEOPI, both from Ministry of Justice and Public Security, will lead to cost reduction and the creation of an integrated system with six thousand monitoring points in the country." said Moro. "Sometimes, integration requires just looking at who is on your side." Today, countless cities are part of the system, which also receives images from state highway, urban, and federal highway concessionaires. Questioned, the Ministry of Justice did not inform the exact number of partnerships with state and municipal governments for the use of the tool. About this, they said only that "it is important to emphasize that the system is being developed with the work of technicians from the Ministry of Justice and Public Security, in addition to the contributions of users from the states that are gradually inserted into the context of the system." And that the monthly cost of the infrastructure needed to support the Cortex is R$ 30 thousand (~US$ 5,400). Seopi, the intelligence arm of the Ministry of Justice today responsible for the system, was created at the beginning of Sergio Moro's tenure at the Ministry of Justice. Decree number 9,662, issued by President Jair Bolsonaro on his first day in office, attributes to the secretariat the production of intelligence services. Thus, Seopi acts in a similar way to other intelligence agencies such as Abin, the Brazilian Intelligence Agency; the GSI, Institutional Security Office; and the Army Intelligence Center, the CIE. And, like them, they are not obliged to undergo external control by the Public Prosecutor's Office, congress or any instance of justice. The agency's mission is to produce intelligence to fight organized crime. An example of this type of action was the transfer of the main leaders of the criminal gang First Command of the Capital from São Paulo prisons to federal penitentiaries, at the beginning of last year. Furthermore, as the dossier on anti-fascists reveals, Seopi has also been used for political purposes. Through the secretariat, the ministry secretly produced a kind of list this year with names, addresses on social networks and photographs of 579 public servants in the area of public security and three university professors, all critical of the Bolsonaro government, linked to anti-fascist movements. The material circulated in the Federal Police and Presidential Palace. After the dossier went public, Moro said that monitoring government opponents did not happen when he was a minister. "Seopi produces intelligence and operations, in my day focused on combating organized crime, cyber crime, and violent crime.", said the former minister. "These reports that are now controversial are not from my period." At the infamous ministerial meeting on April 22, Bolsonaro complains a lot about the intelligence information he was officially receiving. “Our information service, all of them, are a shame, a shame!”, shouted the president at the meeting. “I am not informed! And you can't work like that, it's difficult. So I will interfere! Period.” In total, Seopi is composed of four directorship boards and ten coordination boards. When Minister André Mendonça took over the portfolio of Justice after Moro left, he changed 9 of the 13 people who headed these bodies. Mendonça's nominees were responsible for the dossier against anti-fascists - and also look after the Cortex.

Technoauthoritarianism There is no law, decree, ordinance, or any official public regulation that regulates the use of the Cortex within Seopi. I asked the Ministry of Justice which were legal regulations and control devices, and who supervises their use. The government limited itself to saying that the Cortex operates in accordance with the Single Public Security System, which determines the exchange of information between agencies, but does not establish limits and protection of privacy. "You can't say that the current use of the Cortex is illegal today in legal terms, but it can be said that it is deeply problematic and potentially illegal.", said Rafael Zanatta, lawyer and researcher at Lavits, the Latin American Network of Surveillance Studies, Technology, and Society. “I also don't know, as a researcher, what they do. There is a fundamental problem with lack of transparency. This is already a very problematic starting point.” The General Data Protection Law, which came into force in August 2018, provides for the use of citizens' personal data for public security, national security, and criminal investigation activities - but not indiscriminately. “The LGPD took an important step, which was to separate this into points. Public security is one thing, national security is another, investigative activities are another. Having that clarity and separation of powers is very important.” The data protection law provides that the use of data for security purposes must have its own regulation, which does not yet exist. For the researcher, the free sharing of confidential databases of different government entities is outside the principle of purpose and is part of a global discussion on “techno-authoritarianism”. “It is a new term for an old problem. This concern with surveillance capabilities and the use of technologies for security and surveillance is a classic theme.”, he says. "There is a very broad process of contesting this worldwide." In Europe and the USA, he exemplifies, the adoption of new surveillance technologies is publicly discussed, and there is jurisdictional separation between information under the custody of different government entities. The Ministry says that Seopi used the Cortex in the security operations of the elections in 2018, Operations Luz na Infância 5 and 6 (which resulted in the arrest of more than 90 people accused of sexual crimes against children and adolescents), as well as in “monitoring national impact of Covid-19 on public security”. And that "the integration of information from urban monitoring allows the detection of vehicles with registered criminal code, such as theft and robbery for exclusive employment in public security activities for the repression of organized crime and violent crime."

Source, translated by the blogger.

#brazil #brazilian politics #politics #democracy #technology #privacy rights #mod nise da silveira

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sablelab · 5 years

Text

Covert Operations - Chapter 85

DISCLAIMER: This is a modern AU crossover story with Outlander and La Femme Nikita. LFN and its characters do not belong to me nor do those from Outlander.

COVERT OPERATIONS …. THE STORY THUS FAR

James Fraser informs Operations that Claire Beauchamp has been kidnapped, however, Dougal Mackenzie is unsympathetic and tells Jamie to forget about going after her. When Operations refuses any help, Jamie calls in a marker owed to him of fifteen days. He will use this time to cut ties with Section and his superiors to go on Mandatory Refusal. Meanwhile Murtagh and Fergus both offer their assistance to search for Claire.

In the meantime, Claire is just beginning to realise who her captors are when she meets one in particular. Jamie’s search for her comes up empty handed until he looks at surveillance tape from Claire’s apartment building. He asks Fergus to help him trace the number plate of the car in the car park and they find the name of one of the kidnappers and a possible location. On leaving Section Jamie picks up a bag of tricks from Murtagh which he will put to good use in his pursuit of his Claire.

And so, the story continues …

SYNOPSIS: James Fraser goes on Mandatory Refusal until he discovers Claire’s whereabouts and he returns to Hong Kong to track down one of the kidnappers. However, when this William Ransom is not at the address Fergus gave him, Jamie checks with the university he is a student at for a current address. During this time Sun Yee Lok hears Intel about Claire Beauchamp and when Fergus Claudel is called into Madeline’s office, he is wary of why.

Previous chapters can be found at … https://sablelab.tumblr.com/covertoperations

CHAPTER 85

It was very late; in fact, Fergus was really not sure if it was morning or still night. He was tired and was ready for the comfort of his bed safe in the knowledge that he had done something good. He'd left Jamie's office not so long ago well pleased with himself that he had finally been able to help him with a name and his possible location from where to start looking for Claire. Although it wasn't much to go on, at least Jamie had something concrete to build on now that he'd left Section One. Also knowing the determination of the man, Fergus knew it wouldn't be too long until he found her. However, as he was returning to his quarters Fergus was unexpectedly summoned to Madeline's office. The sound of her voice sent a shiver down his spine and sent a myriad of thoughts through his mind. Why would she be asking for him at this late hour? They'd been careful not to arouse suspicion and the perch had been dark so there was no reason that he could think of that might incriminate him in Jamie's quest to find Claire.

Although his ever over active mind rationalised that Madeline must need something else, Fergus was still in trepidation of what Section's second in command really wanted and he couldn't help but think the worst. Nevertheless he made his way to her office and on arrival knocked and waited for her affirmation to enter. It was not long before his superior’s voice echoed the command.

"Come in Mr. Claudel."

"You wanted to see me?" he asked as he walked over to where Madeline was sitting at her desk. Looking at him with a expression he'd seen many times before, Fergus knew Madeline was well aware of what he had done for Jamie and her words only confirmed his suspicions. "You utilized Section's facilities and manpower to assist an off-profile operation." "I can explain ... Jamie needed some information ..." Fergus stammered while trying to think of a plausible reason to give Madeline as to why he'd done what he'd done. "You know very well what I mean Mr Claudel." "All right, so I helped him out. It only took 10 minutes." "Why did you do it?" Madeline's steely gaze sent shivers down Fergus Claudel's spine with her question. There was no way to avoid her scrutiny. His only course of reply was the truth. "Claire's been kidnapped. Jamie's trying to find a location on her. All he's doing is helping out someone he cares for. I don't really see the harm in that." "And despite the rules you believe it all comes down to how you see it?" She replied with a countenance that cut him to the quick. "It just seems strange. Claire Beauchamp is one of ours and we need to protect her," he replied boldly standing his ground in front of his superior. Madeline's look made him nervous as she continued. "Jamie was told he had to do it on his own and not use any of Section's resources." "I get the point. So, what now? You're not going to cancel me about that are you?" "No ... I'm actually quite pleased that you helped him." Suddenly looking up Fergus couldn't believe what he had just heard. "You ... are?" he asked incredulous that Madeline would go against Operations' wishes. 'Yes ... If Jamie is able to locate Claire, then the quicker we can get back on track for the Rising Dragons' mission. Section has used enough man hours and Claire is crucial to its success." Fergus stammered not knowing what to say or how to reply. "Ahhh ... yes." "I know Jamie has been granted his fifteen days and won't report in. I want you to keep me informed on his progress ... if by chance he does."

The stare Madeline gave him made Fergus jumpy, as her eyes held his waiting for his reply. Having heard her request, he was in two minds about what to tell her about the Intel they had found on one of the alleged kidnappers that could lead to Claire's whereabouts. Deciding it was in his best interests to come clean, Fergus took a panel from his pocket and handed it to Madeline. She immediately loaded it onto her computer.

"Where did you get this?" she enquired studying the Intel on the disk. "From the DMV database I did of the number plate of the car seen on the surveillance tape that Jamie had of Claire's underground car park." Madeline looked Section's Techie in the eye before demanding, "Tell me what you know." Meanwhile ...

Sun Yee Lok sat in his office waiting for confirmation from one of his personal bodyguards Wang Yu or Karen on the success of the kidnapping of Claire Beauchamp. It had been a long time coming but her incarceration had finally been arranged and it was all thanks to brother Jiang Ng. Karen and Andy had befriended Claire as ordered and now they would be able to extract the information from her that they knew she had on the Rising Dragons. Systematically they had been keeping a dossier on her and had it not been for Jiang Ng's intervention they may not have been able to have her in their midst as soon as they had. His suspicions had set in motion the events that had occurred, but it was with great sadness that he would not be able to partake in the interrogation of this woman. Jiang's sad demise from a heart attack was so unexpected that it had caught them unawares. Not only had the Rising Dragons lost a fine brother, but they had now lost their hold over the police at the Organised Crime and Triad Bureau. His loss would be great and a replacement hard to find. Had it not been for Jiang's quick thinking, the kidnapping of Claire Beauchamp may have been postponed. There had been far too many coincidences surrounding her time in Hong Kong. The Inspector's investigations had been leaving far too many questions unanswered and it was this that had raised his suspicions about the coincidence of her movements and the disappearance of Tony Wong and Madame Cheung in particular. Miss Beauchamp would certainly be an interesting study and the triad leader looked forward to getting to the bottom of her knowledge about the Rising Dragons. The sound of his private line ringing was the signal that things had obviously been put in motion. This was the call he had been waiting for as he'd been expecting an update on their prisoner's detention. Reaching for the telephone's handset he placed it to his ear but showed no surprise when Karen's and not Wang Yu's voice was heard. "I have news ..." "Ah Kai-lin ... has it been done?" "Yes." "Good," Sun Yee Lok answered waiting for her to elaborate further on the state of affairs thus far. "It went very smoothly." "Excellent … Did our recruits William Ransom and his accomplice Steven Bonnet, have any complications in the kidnapping?" "No … They served the triad well." "This was an initiation test for them both that Wang Yu organized, which by your own admission they have passed with flying colours. We may use their services again then." "Wang advised them to lay low for a while though just in case." "Wang's a good man, I trust his judgement." "So, do I ... There is also no way that Andy or I can be implicated in her kidnapping if questioned because of him and ... my alibi is watertight thanks to Jiang." "Yes … How fortuitous that Jiang had called you in to the OCTB for questioning by his detectives. It is certainly the perfect alibi." Regrettably, Sun Yee Lok remembered the last conversation he'd had with the head of the Organised Crime and Triad Bureau when he had cut him off in mid conversation in regard to the nightclub incident. Jiang had wanted to tell him something and he wouldn't let him. Thankfully Wang had informed him personally of Jiang's recommendations about Claire Beauchamp's kidnapping. Little did he know but it was the last thing he had organized for the triad. It was unusual for the leader of the Rising Dragons to show any emotion but Karen heard sadness in his voice at his next words. "Our brother Jiang's death is a great loss to us and one we will find hard to replace." "That is true … That's why there is something I need to discuss with you." Sun Yee Lok was intrigued, "I'm listening." "I fear that we are not safe here. I would suggest that we transfer Claire Beauchamp to a more secure location. It is too close to Hong Kong." He too had anticipated this very thing and was glad that she had brought it up. "Where do you suggest?" "Somewhere more remote and less accessible ... perhaps one of the outlying islands?" "Hmmm … yes … I understand. Wang will see to it." "We will need to move quickly. Her male companion, James Fraser, will be making inquiries about her whereabouts shortly." "We will take care of him … you take care of the woman." "I will." "Is that all?" "I do have some other concerns." His voice softened, "What is troubling you Kai-lin?" "Claire will be a difficult target ... I feel that we may need to use some force if we are to extract the information we need." "Wang Yu, will provide everything that you need there. Knowing of his close association to me, Jiang Ng chose him personally to arrange the kidnapping of the woman and that went well. Now he will be your "Hung Kwan". Whatever you need ... just say the word and it will be done." "That is good …" "I will also contact Jonathon … I'm sure he can be of use too." "Yes … We may need his services soon when we have a new location." "You have done well my daughter … very well. I am proud of you." "Thank you, father." Heading back to Hong Kong ...

James Fraser had one thought on his mind as he made swift headway back towards Hong Kong ... he would complete his mission to find Claire before reporting back in to Section One. He had automatically gone into mandatory refusal for this left him with few options other than to go dark for a while until he found her. He’d been given no choice in the matter as Operations had refused to allow him to use any of Section's facilities or time to search for Claire. Then when he had called in his favour, his superior had reluctantly given him the fifteen days owing to him when backed into a corner.

Although he'd been completely cut off from Section One by orders from Operations, there were always ways and means around his directive. Jamie knew Section back the front and could easily make his way in and out if needs be. If by some strange miracle Section heard anything from the kidnappers about Claire, Jamie knew Murtagh and Fergus would try and contact him someway or other on an undetected channel. Regardless of what Operations had ordered Jamie knew they would be there if needed for assistance. The two men would certainly make sure that Section's leader didn't find out if they were helping him in any way. Madeline and Operations would not be happy if they found out he was using Section One's resources or personnel. Although he was a master at deviation from protocol, Jamie didn't want to implicate the two friends. Fergus and Murtagh had already helped him with a possible location but he didn't want to put them in jeopardy any more than necessary. He would locate Claire no matter what. With a steely determination and his normal methods of persuasion, he would make sure, one way or the other that William Ransom had no choice but to give him the information he wanted on his Claire's whereabouts. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ Jamie accelerated the SUV wishing that it had wings to fly. Although he made steady progress, the time spent in travelling was an anathema to him. Expediency was a necessity at the moment and the quicker he could find Claire, the better it would be for all. Armed with the address of one of the kidnappers he made his way to the beginning of Route 1. His destination was in Waterloo Road north of Kowloon Tong and towards the Lion Rock Tunnel. Turning at the intersection with Lai Cheung Road and Ferry Street, he drove east past Nathan Road then proceeded on to a northeast-southwest alignment through the eastern part of Yau Ma Tei. Passing by the wholesale Fruit Market, the abandoned Yaumati Theatre and the Yau Ma Tei Station of MTR, Jamie then proceeded on to Mong Kok. When he reached the intersection with Princess Margaret Road, Waterloo Road turned in a northward direction. This was the route Jamie took as it was close to the address he was seeking. He cruised along the road and soon arrived at the proposed destination of the kidnapper. Parking the SUV a short distance from the house, James Fraser surveyed the perimeter for movement along the street. Although there was a car parked in the driveway, the house looked deserted. He watched for several minutes before approaching the door. Jamie knocked once ... but there was no answer. He knocked again and waited. Yet again there was no answer so he peered in the window. What he saw was of some concern. It didn't look like William had been at his house for some time as there seemed to be no presence of it being occupied. Jamie's spirits were somewhat dashed. That could mean one of two things ... his Claire was not here ... this was not the kidnap site or William Ransom had done a runner. Either way he needed to find something in the house that would help him find where William and ultimately Claire could be found. This was a quiet neighbourhood and few people passed by. Casting a glance up and down the street Jamie made his way around to the back of the house. Breaking the glass of the back door with his clenched, gloved fist, he leaned in and opened the door. He entered with his gun drawn. There were two plates on the table and signs that someone had eaten a meal recently. There were pots on the stove that had clearly bubbled over and the stove top was still warm. Jamie went to the living room and quickly made his way through the house but it was unoccupied. He made his way up the stairs and searched all the rooms but alas, no one was there either. It was obvious that whoever was here recently had left in a hurry. Clothes were scattered and the bedrooms were unkempt. Regrettably the location Fergus had given him was cold, for the house was now abandoned. It looked like Jamie had just missed whoever was here but he knew he couldn't be far behind them. What now? he thought. Precious time was slipping away and the longer it took to locate William Ransom the longer Claire was in captivity and the longer she was at the mercy of the Rising Dragons. Making his way downstairs Jamie checked for any Intel that may help in locating William. He entered a small study where he found a desk littered with papers, a diary and a notice board that contained a series of papers and clippings. Rifling through them he came across an assignment paper with the insignia motto "Sapientia et Virtus" … "wisdom and virtue" … the Latin motto from the prestigious City University of Hong Kong the oldest tertiary institution in Hong Kong. It was apparent that he was a university student at HKU. Jamie declared that these words would come back to haunt William Ransom for he had neither wisdom nor virtue. This student had become involved in the dirty work of the Rising Dragons by kidnapping his Claire. He would pay the price for his association with the triad. If her kidnapping was some form of initiation into the triad, there may be other students who were involved as well. University student bodies provided opportunities for students to participate in extracurricular activities but were more renowned to be the main driving force behind the student activist movement. William Ransom, if involved in such a group, would be ripe for the picking by recruitment personnel for the Rising Dragons' triad. His kidnapping of Claire was probably just the first step to his acceptance into the brotherhood. William had made his bed and would have to lie in it for there would be no going back if he'd been recruited by the triad. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ He knew what it was like to become involved in student organisations only too well. Along with some other extremist students of London University, he'd formed the radical activist group called "The Bloody Hour.” Like his fellow student activists, he was so filled with the anger of youth that they had gone too far. There was a bombing during the student protest.

Jamie could remember vividly the video of the protest and the British announcer describing the action. The protest didn't start until everyone had had lunch. But then, the niceties were over ... Students, and their teachers, hit London in waves, the largest in the month-long series of demonstrations ... Officially, nearly 3,000 extra riot police turned out to meet them, but some said the number was double. At any rate, they and the students have played this game before. They both knew the rules ... It was the biggest so far of the recent student demonstrations, a national one called to protest against government plans to reform the universities. But the government has handled it so clumsily that, although the plans are deliberately vague, everyone - left and right - feels threatened. It was mostly the right who turned out today ... He'd been arrested during those student protests and had ‘died’ in prison ... then his life had changed forever in Section One. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ Breaking from thoughts of his youth, Jamie systematically sought another plan of action. Perhaps William Ransom had come back to collect an assignment that was due in for assessment today to make things appear as normal as possible. The university wasn't that far away and although it was a long shot it was something he could check out. At the moment he had few leads to go on, hence it was at the City University of Hong Kong that Jamie decided to begin his search once again. Someone would surely know William on campus and where to find him. Somebody, somewhere, knew something. And ... if he were to find William Ransom, he would surely find his accomplice too. ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ James Fraser drove past luxurious residential houses on LaSalle and Oxford Road as he made his way to the university in Kowloon Tong. Eventually he came to the university's main campus on Bonham Road and Pok Fu Lam Road. He drove his car along the driveway past red brick British Colonial architecture and pulled the SUV into the parking lot out the front of the administration block. Getting out of the car, he quickly climbed the stairs and entered the university offices. One of the clerical staff saw the imposing man enter and came to the front desk. "Oh hello ... Can I help you sir?" "Hi ... I am hoping that ye can help me. I'm looking for my nephew William Ransom. He's a student here. I was wondering if ye could give me his current address." The woman gave Jamie a cursory glance before replying officiously. "I'm sorry sir, but I can't give out any personal details about our students ... confidentially you know." Showering the woman with one of his irresistible smiles Jamie asked, "Could ye make an exception this one time lass?" Taken aback she retorted, "Excuse me?" His eyes held hers as he wove a spell around the woman with his tale. "Ye ken... this is a family matter ... My sister ... his mother has just died in Scotland, and I have come to Hong Kong to tell him in person, but he didn't know I was coming." "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that,” the woman responded in sympathy on hearing his tale. “I'll see what I can do but I'll have to check with my supervisor. Could you wait a moment please?" "Certainly ..." James Fraser watched as the woman singled out another person and spoke rapidly to them while looking in his direction once or twice. Finally the supervisor came to the front desk. "I believe you are looking for William Ransom?" "Aye, that's correct." "He's a fine student ... I only just saw him today." "Ye did?" "Yes ... He handed in a due assignment and asked for a leave of absence from his studies for personal reasons." "Do ye ken where I can locate him? ... ‘Tis most important. I've already checked his current address but he was nae longer there. Did he say where he could be located?" "Under the circumstances I would refuse ... but he was obviously in an agitated, distressed state. He needs his family around him at this sad time. One moment please. I'll check if he left a forwarding address ... it's a mandatory requirement of this university." Nevertheless, the supervisor checked his student database and gave Jamie the address where he could be found. "Ah ... there you are." "Thank ye." Jamie replied taking the address from the supervisor. "My sincere condolences. I hope you find your nephew soon." "Aye ... so do I." "Something was really bothering him today. Perhaps someone has already told him about his mother's death." "Perhaps ... thank ye kindly for yer assistance." With a determined gait James Fraser quickly strode from the office hoping that the address wasn't a bogus one and that he wasn’t chasing a red herring. He desperately needed to locate this William Ransom for his Claire's life was at stake and the sooner he found her the better.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ to be continued next week

#jamie x claire fanfic #outlander fanfiction #claire x jamie #jamie x claire crossoverau outlander lfn covertoperations #covert operations #james fraser #claire beauchamp

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quinnybee-writes · 4 years

Text

Title: Fire Meet Gasoline

Fandom: Boku no Hero Academia/My Hero Academia

Rating: T+

Part: 3/?

Story Summary: A chance encounter between a villain and vigilante leads to an unwise deal made between unlikely allies; an unwise deal made between unlikely allies ends in a final stand neither would have ever dared to take on alone. Together, though, they just might have a fighting chance.

Part 3 Summary: Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, and thrice is just a big headache for everyone involved.

Part 1 on Tumblr / AO3

Part 2 on Tumblr / AO3

Part 3 on AO3

Hizashi gave the IT intern a tight but friendly smile as she waved to him before going to check on the status of the server migration. He hated having to do delicate research like this at work; every time one of his coworkers needed something in the room he shared with the server banks he couldn’t help jumping to attention, his hand poised on the lid of his laptop to snap it shut if they wandered too close. The cover it provided him was mostly worth the anxiety, however. A single IP using a VPN in the middle of an apartment block full of unsecured cable company wifi signals was suspicious; another VPN added to the tangle of secure signals emanating from a tech-heavy operation like a radio station was just another Tuesday. Hizashi waited for the intern to finish her checks before going back to what he’d been looking at before he was interrupted.

As far as he was able to find in the HR filings for Solo-Falcon Deliveries they only had one employee named Aizawa, first name Shouta. The photo that accompanied the digitized CV was younger-looking but the man was recognizable nonetheless; same perpetual look of knowing what a hairbrush was in concept but no evidence of him owning one, same dour, “are we done yet?” expression in his dark eyes. Said CV was as barebones as Hizashi had ever seen: eight years at Solo-Falcon Deliveries preceded by a plethora of short term post-middle school jobs; school transcripts from a dozen different private tutors that came to a sudden stop at the end of middle school. His permanent residence had been the same for as long as Aizawa had been working, cosigned by an adult family member with the stipulation that the lease would pass to Aizawa when he turned eighteen. As far as Hizashi could tell Shouta Aizawa had popped out of nothingness as a poe-faced fifteen-year-old looking for a job.

Trying to get any answers out of social media was equally fruitless. Retracing Aizawa’s online steps revealed a ghost town of abandoned accounts in his wake, all following the same pattern of non-use. He would sign up for a new platform, friend or follow one or two other accounts, make half a dozen posts over the course of about a year, then drop it completely without bothering to deactivate or delete. The posts were all the kind of non-entities one could expect out of someone who wasn’t expecting to stick around for very long. Even on the accounts he’d used the most they mostly consisted of inoffensive comments about the weather or work and slightly blurry cell phone pictures of cats.

Even the government seemed to have no luck in catching ahold of Aizawa longer than the time it took to confirm his address, collect his taxes, and send him back on his way. According to his Quirk registration, Aizawa had been something of an early bloomer, developing his nullification power before he even hit kindergarten and being switched from public schooling to private education soon afterwards for reasons of “health concerns”. Elementary and middle school records matched the near-yearly swapping of home tutors from his CV, but Hizashi noticed with interest that there was one massive omission between the two. Several records back in the Quirk registry’s access history was a request from the registrar of UA High School to confirm Aizawa’s personal and Quirk information. Raising an eyebrow Hizashi flipped back to Aizawa’s schooling history and found a perfunctory footnote at the bottom of the file: UA High School registration Apr 2004-Nov 2004; file sealed per subject request. Nothing else was said, just that short “by the way” on a digital post-it note before going on to document the work history and financial filings Hizashi already knew about.

Either Aizawa was some kind of subterfuge wunderkind or he really was just this disconnected. Hizashi sighed and leaned back in his chair, turning that over in his mind. A sealed UA record was as tantalizing a morsel of intrigue as you could ask for, but he wasn’t arrogant enough to think he could go up against a security system as ironclad as theirs with nothing but a masked IP and an undeniable curiosity. There were favors he could call in, Hizashi supposed, people he could ask. Said people would want something equally backbreaking in return as insurance on their investments but that could be relegated to a date far in the future where he had the information in hand and could gauge its actual worth for himself.

Before he had time to start flipping through his mental address book, however, he was interrupted by a buzzing from his cell phone. The display showed an unlisted number being forwarded through his “business line”, a landline he’d had installed in a condemned fast food restaurant on the far edge of the city. Hizashi glanced at his door to make sure it was fully shut before swiping to accept the call.

“Mmn,” he muttered by way of greeting. There was a click, and an automated voice on the other end began to speak in choppy, text-to-speech sentences.

“Bird. Seguchi. Your backdoor into the Hero Registry failed.” Hizashi rolled his eyes. Of course he was the problem, it couldn’t possibly be that Seguchi's client was incompetant. “You owe me a workable solution, do it right this time. Meet tonight at nine sharp, no later. Directions to follow.” The message barked out the address and Hizashi scribbled it disinterestedly onto the back of an envelope. It looked like his pet project would have to take a backseat for something more pressing but way less interesting, he thought with a disappointed sigh.

Biting back a curse, Shouta stared daggers at the bland error box telling him he didn’t have the proper access clearance for the files he needed. He’d spent most of the morning trying to fake the new set of credentials the police database was requiring to view the updated version of the Mockingbird dossier. The security had never been what you could call lax, but the newest version required both the highest clearance level Shouta had ever seen as well as a password that from what he’d been able to glean was just a long randomly-generated string of characters that maxed out the number of available spaces. He gritted his teeth and decided the building headache at the back of his skull was telling him he needed to switch to something a little less frustrating, though such things felt thin on the ground at the moment.

Trying to reconcile the comings and goings of Hizashi Yamada with the known Mockingbird incidents was proving to be an exercise in futility. Yamada didn’t necessarily have an alibi for every time Mockingbird had been sighted in the act, but there was also no real reason for anyone to suspect him of needing one. Mockingbird was a serial offender with a list of potential charges that took up several single-spaced pages in his police file; Hizashi Yamada was the well-known and well-loved operations manager and late night host for a radio station that while not the biggest or wealthiest was far from needing any kind of criminal boost. The only link between the two was Yamada’s oft-abused Quirk, but even that information was a double-edged sword at best. The police had been smart enough to keep the press away from the more sensitive details of the Mockingbird case to avoid copycats and false reports but no one knowing the connection was possible left Shouta shouting into the void. If he went as a civilian witness to the police, he would have to think of a very good lie for how he knew Mockingbird’s M.O. but hadn’t gone to them before now; if he went to them as an admitted vigilante, they might take his report more seriously but he’d end up in handcuffs right next to Yamada. As with most things he’d have to go into this on his own, something that would be a much simpler undertaking if he wasn’t being actively locked out of the information he needed to do so.

“Computer trouble?” a voice above him asked. Shouta jumped, causing the large ginger cat in his lap to grumble and dig its claws into his thighs in retaliation. He gave the cat an apologetic pat on the head and looked up to see one of the cat cafe’s servers standing next to his table.

“Uh, no. It’s just old. Doesn’t like to load,” Shouta lied, swapping screens as casually as he could. The server nodded with a sympathetic smile.

“I getcha,” she said. “It’s such a pain when they still work but they’re too old to really do the work. Our whole register system is older than I am but we can’t get the old workhorse to give up the ghost and let us replace her.” She chuckled, shrugging. “Did you want a refill on that coffee?” she added, pointing to Shouta’s half-full cup that had gone cold long ago.

“Sure, thanks. One sugar, no milk,” Shouta said. He scratched the cat in his lap behind the ears until the server was safely back behind the counter putting his order in before switching back to his other window.

The page had blacked out, the error message now telling him that his session had expired and would not be renewed. He tried closing his browser and restarting it, but the window instantly dimmed and let him know that his session was well and truly dead for today. Shouta wondered if this was a new protocol being rolled out across the board or if he wasn’t the only one they were having to lock out. If the same gap in the digital fence was being used by someone with less scrupulous intents, Shouta supposed he couldn’t entirely begrudge the police for fixing the fault and adding a less easily manipulated system. Trying to channel his frustration into a more helpful direction, Shouta opened the spreadsheet he’d been using to build a Mockingbird timeline and added what scraps of new information he’d been able to screenshot. He highlighted the long periods of silence and typed each time period and Yamada’s name into individual browser tabs.

Hizashi Yamada was as easy to track as Mockingbird was impossible to pin down. Yamada put a lot of effort into propagating his breezy, unbothered persona, but seemed to put just as much into being a diligent employee; the gaps Shouta had found in Mockingbird’s movements didn’t generate so much as a sick day for Yamada. Shouta supposed if you weren’t actively looking for irregularities the lack of them wouldn’t have sparked interest, but to him it was both unnatural and damning. There had to be a weak spot somewhere, Shouta thought. Absurdly careful was one thing, but perfect was something else entirely. He had a suspicion that there was information in the locked sections of Mockingbird’s dossier that would mean nothing to the police without knowing Yamada’s civilian movements but would be the key to getting the upper hand on him for Shouta. But getting in there for a better look around would take time, and with his afternoon delivery shift fast approaching time was not something he had in excess. Another day with better luck, Shouta thought, saving what little progress he’d made and shutting his laptop.

Hebiko, Seguchi’s second in command and high-ranking candidate for Hizashi’s least favorite person on the planet, was waiting for him under the awning of the burned-out corner shop they were supposed to meet at. Hizashi groaned internally at the sight of her, fighting the urge to turn on his heel and cut his losses. Instead he raised a hand in greeting.

“Nice weather for it,” he said.

Hebiko fixed him with an unblinking stare and an emotionless smile. “It’s been a while, Bird,” she said, extending a hand to him like she expected him to shake it. Vivid memories of falling for the ploy and being subjected to the tetanus-like paralysis of her Snakebite Quirk the first time they’d met made Hizashi’s hands reflexively clench into fists. He meaningfully tucked his hands into his jeans pockets and looked around.

“Is your boss planning on joining us, or did he decide the B-team could handle this one on their own?” he asked.

“He had a more important appointment to keep,” Hebiko replied. Her smile widened without gaining so much as a scrap of good will. Hizashi was tempted to point out that Seguchi had thought this was important enough to call him out in the middle of a weekday evening, but his desire to get this over with before all of the good takeout places closed won out.

“His prerogative,” Hizashi said instead, shrugging. “Shall we, then?”

“After you,” Hebiko said, gesturing down the narrow alley between this building and the next. “We’re parked a street up from here,” Hebiko added when Hizashi didn’t move. “It’ll be easier to just cut through here.”

Hizashi scraped together the waning scraps of his patience, reminding himself that there was a takeaway curry and a quiet night at home with his cat on the other end of this nonsense, and headed up the alley where she was pointing.

“Good work today!” Shouta’s manager called over his shoulder as he left the employee changing room. Shouta’s two remaining coworkers called it back to him over the clang of closing lockers. Shouta muttered a vague reply a little too late, his mind already turning to what he had planned for after work.

With a last-minute change in the schedule he had somehow escaped an early shift tomorrow morning after tonight’s late shift, which meant he had until tomorrow afternoon to sleep and eat and all of the other things he usually had to cram into the few hours between clocking out and clocking back in. His heart ached to get out and stretch his legs on a long patrol, missing the routine in the wake of his recent garbage schedule. His head knew better, though. The late hour would mean fewer personnel working at police central intelligence, which would mean fewer eyes on what files were being accessed and by whom, and his newly-opened timetable would mean plenty of time to figure out what he was supposed to do about the lock on the Mockingbird dossier.

Shouta threw his bag over his shoulders, bidding his coworkers a hasty good night and walking quickly out the door before anything had time to interrupt his plans for the evening.

Hebiko followed at a distance that felt both too close and uncomfortably distant, her footsteps almost purposefully off-beat from his own. Hizashi opened his mouth to invite her to stop being such a stalker and just walk next to him, but instead found himself being slammed sideways into the alley wall by something that exploded out of a garbage bag next to a nearby dumpster. Hizashi staggered, breath catching short and sharp in his throat from the hit. Hebiko’s foot shot out from behind him, dead-legging him into an awkward half-crouch on the pavement. Hizashi looked up to see Takeshiro, one of Hebiko’s favorite minions, hopping out of the dumpster. The garbage bag that had assaulted him rustled and squirmed as a thick tangle of dessicated vegetable cuttings slithered out and stood ready by Takeshiro’s side. Hizashi choked back a gag at the smell of it, working to keep his face unconcerned.

“I feel like you might have taken that B-team comment from earlier a little too personally,” he said, the words coming out in a pained wheeze. For the first time Hebiko’s smile held actual mirth and Hizashi deeply regretted the development.

“You’ve been pissing a lot of people off lately, Bird,” Hebiko said.

“Including your boss, apparently,” Hizashi agreed. He pivoted on his toes and tried to keep his eyes on both of them as he straightened up. “He must be pretty irritated to send his pets to do his wet work without coming along to gloat.”

Takeshiro’s plant weapon struck out at him again, sending Hizashi skittering sideways to avoid it. Hizashi gritted his teeth. Hebiko and Takeshiro were each blocking an open end of the alley, closing ranks around him along with Takeshiro’s plant. The only other potential exit he had was a fire escape above the dumpster Takeshiro had crawled out of. If he could keep them distracted long enough to dart through and scramble up the escape there was a chance he could make it out of this in one fresh-scented fully mobile piece. He thought of the extendable police baton hidden in the holster sewn into the back of his jacket but decided it was better to keep it as a last resort. There was no point in escalating a situation already at the snapping point if he could find another way out of it.

“The boss doesn’t know you’re here,” Hebiko said coolly. “The cops caught him trying to get through the Hero Registry’s security net last week using the instructions he got from you. He’s been in custody ever since.”

“Sounds like user error to me,” Hizashi replied, “since the information wasn’t for him in the first place. Does he go through other people’s mail too?”

“That’s really cute coming from someone who makes a living out of digging in digital garbage looking for things to sell,” Hebiko snapped.

“Ooh, really hitting me where it hurts,” Hizashi said. He put on the biggest, fakest grin he could muster, putting a hand to his chest in mock offense. Hebiko’s eyes narrowed, her hands flexing at her sides like she was trying to resist the urge to throttle him. Takeshiro’s plant weapon was starting to twitch and writhe at Takeshiro’s side, belying the man’s outward straightfaced patience. His strategy was panning out for the moment, and hopefully a moment was all he would need.

“We’re about to find a few more places for it to hurt,” Hebiko said, lips curling back from her teeth in a cold smirk.

“Thanks but no thanks.”

Seizing his chance, Hizashi caught Hebiko hard in the jaw with a surprise right hook. She stumbled back a step before coming towards him with an open-palmed strike of her own, ready to freeze him where he stood. Hizashi managed to avoid it just in time, hooking his foot around the back of her knee and sweeping it out from under her. He felt a hand grab him by the back of the jacket and yank him back several steps, nearly taking him off his feet as well. Hizashi twisted sharply towards Takeshiro, forcing the man to loosen his grip just long enough for Hizashi to duck away. He made it all the way up onto the lip of the dumpster and felt his fingers brush the ladder to the fire escape before something grabbed him around the waist and pulled him hard down onto hands and knees on the pavement. Hizashi yelped as pain crackled through his shins and forearms. Before he had time to recover he felt a hand snatch his sweatshirt’s hood off of his head, followed by Hebiko’s sharp fingers digging into the back of his neck. Instantly his body went rigid, joints locking painfully together against his will.

“This is why I hate birds,” Hebiko said, her voice mockingly conversational in Hizashi’s ear. “Whenever things get a little intense, they try to flit away before you get to have any fun with them.”

Without any warning Hebiko grabbed him by the hair and jerked his head forward, slamming it with all her strength into the steel side of the dumpster. Hizashi went limp, the fading paralysis replaced by a dazed ringing in his ears and an unstrung feeling throughout his limbs. He struggled to keep himself awake as black static overtook his vision. Distantly Hizashi could feel hands turning him over and working to pick him up. He heard a second metallic clang, followed by Hebiko snapping something to Takeshiro at the far end of the sludge his brain was sinking into. Before he could make any sense out of any of it, he’d drifted too deep and everything was dark buzzing silence in his head.

Shouta had been trying his best to keep his head down and his eyes on the goal of getting home, but the instant he’d seen the two of them he knew there was going to be trouble. The street was mostly empty and the few people who were out were in motion, leaving jobs or late-night restaurants and heading to wherever they were going after that. The two under the awning, however, were just standing there, carefully keeping to the little bit of shadow the scraps of ripped canvas still cast over the sidewalk. Shouta slowed, pulling his hood up to make it slightly less obvious that he was watching them. One of the figures was tall and skinny with a sharp silhouette, the other at least a foot shorter with unnaturally stiff posture. They talked for a moment before the shorter one waved the taller into the nearby alleyway. Shouta’s eyes narrowed. Never a good sign. He unsnapped the pocket he’d sewn into the shoulder strap of his bag, pulling out one of the bolases he’d stowed there for emergencies. Tucking it tightly into his palm he approached the mouth of the alley. A quick check of the sidewalk confirmed no one else seemed to have noticed him or the two he was following, so Shouta edged up on the corner of the building and peered down the alley.

A third, stockier figured had joined the group from somewhere in the time it took him to approach; they and the short one had closed ranks around the tall one to prevent any potential escape. Shouta dropped into a crouch as he rounded the corner, scuffing his feet over the ground to keep his steps quiet. The group was too far away for Shouta to tell what they were saying, but the conversation seemed to turn sour very quickly. Shouta only managed a few steps towards them before whatever was said triggered a short, dirty fight and the attempt at a quick exit by the tall one via a nearby fire escape. Something fast and tentacle-like caught them around the waist before they made it and dragged them back down. A moment later the short one had them by the back of them neck and slammed them head-first into the side of the dumpster with a sickening clang of skull on metal that echoed out in the otherwise muted night. The tall figure lolled sidewise, dropping senseless onto the ground and for a moment Shouta thought the other two were just going to leave them there. Worse plans were being made, it seemed, as instead the two still standing worked together to roll the unconscious third over and the stocky one made to throw them over their shoulder.

As quickly as he could, Shouta spun the bolas in his hand and threw it at the stocky figure as they bent over. Just shy of wrapping around them, however, the tentacle thing reared up again and slapped the bolas aside. It wrapped uselessly around the bottom of the fire escape ladder with a metallic snap and both of the standing figures turned to see Shouta where he had broken his cover. He pulled another spare bolas out and started it spinning as he rushed them.

“Forget it, get to the car!” the shorter figure commanded the stocky one as they made a move to grab the unconscious figure again. Sprinting away, they made a cursory attempt at tripping Shouta with the tentacle thing, but the swipe swung wide and the tentacle melted into a glob of rotting vegetables as he darted past. The second bolas flew straight, but the two of them had a big enough head start on their side that it dropped and skidded along the ground at their heels without making contact. They had already ducked into a nondescript black sedan and were pulling into traffic by the time Shouta reached the other end of the alley. Shouta pulled his phone out of his pocket and just managed to get a photo of the back of their car. He realized too late that the car didn’t have any plates. Muttering a sharp curse under his breath, Shouta turned and walked back to where they had abandoned the body.

A cold, dawning recognition began to spread in the pit of his stomach as he approached. The figure lay face-down on the concrete where it had been dropped, a spill of long blond hair falling over the collar of a familiar feathered leather jacket. Gently turning the body over confirmed his worst suspicion. Mockingbird’s mask now sported a jagged crack along the top and was streaked with blood from where it had cut into his forehead when his head slammed into the dumpster. Under the blood he looked unpleasantly pale in the dim alley light. His eyelids flickered and he let out a small moaning breath as Shouta put two fingers to his neck to confirm there was a pulse. Not dead, Shouta confirmed with a tight grimace, just knocked out.

Shouta sat back on his heels, brain speeding off in opposite directions at the same time. He knew he was duty-bound to find the nearest patrolling officer or hero and turn Mockingbird in; it was the only good ending for the situation, even if his accomplices had managed to get away. Then again, those “accomplices” had knocked Mockingbird out and for all intents and purposes left him for dead. Whatever had gone south between them, Mockingbird had ended up a victim of it in the end. It seemed unfair somehow for him to get turned over to law enforcement when what he needed was help, like adding insult to injury. A police siren rang out on the street Shouta had followed Mockingbird and the others off of, making Shouta jump. He didn’t have time to debate it. Before better instincts could kick in, he shuffled off his bag and opened the farthest-back compression pocket.

“Sorry about this,” Shouta muttered. Working quickly, he stripped off Mockingbird’s mask and jacket, stuffing them into his bag. Mockingbird was wearing a piece of homemade gear around his neck, partially hidden by the neckline of his hoodie. It looked like a series of spare audio parts wired into a tight collar; long wires stretched down under his sleeves to controls strapped to the palms of his hands under his gloves. The sirens were getting uncomfortably close as Shouta tried to find a way to get it off of him. Finally he just took each side of a join in one hand and yanked, pulling all of the wires free and and shoving the whole contraption in his bag as well. He managed to get everything strapped flat and his bag back over his shoulders as blue and red lights announced the approach of the police. Taking a deep breath and turning his gut-level panic into an expression of concern, Shouta half-jogged out of the alley to meet them.

“Hey! Hey over here, I think he needs help!” Shouta shouted, waving his arms to flag the car down.

The next hour was a hazy blur of trying to keep his story straight for every cop he had to repeat it to, from the scene to the ambulance to a private conference room at the hospital. He had been on his way home from work, he said in increasing tones of weariness, and he heard what he thought was a fight in the alley as he passed by. He tried to step in after the muggers threw Yamada against the dumpster, but they ran off before he could get a good look at them. No, he didn’t really know Yamada, he just recognized him from a delivery he’d made. No, he wasn’t the one who made the initial call to the police, he had been trying to check if Yamada was dead or just unconscious. No, he didn’t have any additional information, he had honestly just been in the right place at the right time. Each time the police seemed to get a little less interested in him, turning their attention to questioning Yamada when the doctors were done running tests. Finally they thanked him for his time and Shouta was allowed to sit by himself in the waiting room and catch his breath.

Every single part of him felt like it was trying to fistfight every other part, but his head was winning the pain battle by a longshot. Hizashi opened his eyes and immediately shut them again with a sharp grunt of pain as white fluorescent lights burned into his skull. He tried again more slowly, squinting his eyes open in slow shifts to let them adjust. A hospital room came into focus bit by bit.. His jacket and gear were gone and his feet were bare. He could see a doctor and nurse standing a few feet away, talking to a uniformed officer. All of them seemed relatively relaxed, considering where they were. There was an uneasy feeling of Wrongness about the situation, but before he had time to dwell on it, the three of them noticed he was awake and came to stand around his bed.

“‘M I under arrest?” Hizashi mumbled. It wasn’t the best opener, but putting thoughts into words and having them stay in the right order was proving to be a challenge right now.

“Nothing so drastic, Mr. Yamada,” the doctor said, smiling at the perceived joke. “Officer Fujiwara is just here to take a statement about what happened to you tonight after we run a few tests to make sure everything’s shipshape up here,” she added, tapping her own temple with an index finger.

“Okay,” Hizashi said slowly. The time delay between ears and brain was slowly shortening, but somehow that wasn’t helping things make sense. He wasn’t being detained (yet), and they’d called him Yamada, which seemed to imply better things than he had expected. How that better outcome had happened was still up for debate but he was more than willing to let it ride for the moment.

The doctor introduced herself as Dr. Watanabe before going through the usual battery of post-concussion memory and comprehension tests that a childhood spent roughhousing with four siblings had turned into second nature for Hizashi. Slowly but surely as they spoke Hizashi’s brain clicked up through the gears until he was mostly running on all cylinders. He kept the conversation going as they wheeled him out of the room for a quick brain scan and then back in once it was done. Too soon, however, came the moment when he had to explain himself to the police.

“I understand things may be a little bit confused at the moment,” Officer Fujiwara began, cutting off Hizashi’s excuse before he could even make it. “We can fill in the more minor details at a later date as they come back to you. For right now, just tell me what you remember.”

Hizashi hesitated, trying to come up with a story that was both plausible and matched enough of the details that it wouldn’t come back to bite him later. “Uh. I was out walking,” he started, trying to get his feet under himself as he spoke. “There’s a takeout place I like, but it’s on the other side of town from my apartment so I don’t go there much unless I’m working late.”

“Understandable. Where is it that you work, Mr. Yamada?” Officer Fujiwara asked.

“Asahi Radio. I manage operations and fill in when our hosts are out. I had some paperwork to finish up, so I stayed late tonight.” Nice, neat, normal little life, Hizashi thought, willing her to buy the excuse. Officer Fujiwara made no indication that she did or didn’t believe it. Instead she just nodded and scribbled down shorthand on her notepad, motioning for him to go on. “I was trying to get home before it got too late, so I took a shortcut to the restaurant, but…” Hizashi trailed off, stiffly shaking his head. “I don’t know. It gets kind of jumbled after that.”

“I see. Do you remember seeing or hearing anything out of the ordinary while you were walking? Anyone suspicious, anyone seeming like they were following you?” Officer Fujiwara asked. Hizashi shook his head.

“No, but I wasn’t really looking I guess. Too distracted by my stomach,” Hizashi replied, cracking a smile at his own joke. Officer Fujiwara gave him a thin smile.

“Anything else you can remember?” she asked. Hizashi pretended to think. Trying to remember things in the order that they had happened after Hebiko had hit him with her Snakebite was genuinely difficult and added a touch of realism to his stymied expression.

“Sorry, no,” he said.

“Not a problem, Mr. Yamada. Here’s my card, and one for my immediate superior,” Officer Fujiwara said, handing him a pair of business cards. “If anything comes to mind later, please feel free to give us a call and let us know.”

Hizashi thanked her and accepted the cards, giving her his number at the station in return in case they needed to call him back instead. Officer Fujiwara bid him a good evening and left. Hizashi allowed himself to breathe a long sigh of relief as Dr. Watanabe returned.

“Well, the good news is your scans came back looking clear as can be hoped for,” she said brightly. “We can go ahead and keep you overnight for observation if you would like, but you should be all right to go ahead home if you’d rather do that. I believe your friend’s still out in the waiting room if the two of you need to talk it over.”

A cold jolt sank into the pit of Hizashi’s stomach, but he tried to keep it off his face. “Uh, yeah,” he agreed. “That might be best.”

Dr. Watanabe nodded and left to go get said “friend”. Hizashi sat up, sliding his legs over to sit on the side of the bed. He wasn’t really feeling up to running for his life after the rest of what happened tonight, but if Hebiko had followed him all the way to the hospital it seemed like he wasn’t going to have much choice. Maybe the cops would still be down in the lobby when he got there and he could have a miraculous return of memory that the stringy, suspicious-looking woman who had said she was here to get him was actually here to get him.

The frantic train of thought had a massive derail, however, as Dr. Watanabe returned to the room with a tall, shuffling figure in tow. Hizashi blinked, sure he had to be seeing things as Aizawa awkwardly nodded in greeting.

“Hey,” Aizawa muttered. “Erm. How’re you feeling?”

“A little confused,” Hizashi said. He tried to raise his eyebrow, but relented when the motion pulled too hard at the stitches in his forehead. “But, uh. Okay, I guess. Are you my escort home?”

Aizawa gave him a slightly sour look at the question but nodded. “I guess so,” he said.

In a renewed haze of bewilderment Hizashi reclaimed what of his belongings hadn’t been thrown out as a biohazard and signed himself out of the hospital while Aizawa called them a taxi. A very stiff, silent cab ride followed, neither of them knowing how to break the silence without making this worse than it already was.

“How’d you know where I was?” Hizashi asked finally, eyes locked forward out the front windshield of the taxi. “Decide to follow me?”

“No,” Aizawa replied flatly. “Just bad luck I guess.”

“Yours or mine?”

“Both.”

Hizashi snorted. “For once we agree on something,” he said.

The cab pulled to a stop in front of Hizashi’s building and his door creaked open to let him out. Aizawa cleared his throat as Hizashi shambled up off the seat.

“Do you...want me to come with you?” Aizawa asked, with a note in his voice that sounded like genuine concern. Hizashi paused, amused in spite of himself.

“Not even a little bit,” Hizashi replied with a cheerful, insincere smile. He shut the door and waited until the cab had pulled back into traffic and rounded the corner before going inside.

#boku no hero academia #my hero academia #aizawa shouta #yamada hizashi #villain!mic #vigilante!aizawa #hizashi yamada #shouta aizawa #Fire Meet Gasoline AU #Quinny thinks she's a writer

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giancarlonicoli · 4 years

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In what looks like one of the biggest leaks of private banking records since the Panama Papers, Buzzfeed News has published a lengthy investigation into how the world's biggest banks allow dirty money from organized criminals, drug cartels, and terror groups like Al Qaeda and the Taliban to flow through their networks.

The "FinCEN Files", as Buzzfeed calls them, offer "a never-before-seen picture of corruption and complicity." A lengthy investigation by Buzzfeed and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists - the same group that handled the Mossack Fonseca leaks -

Instead of combating financial crime, the current system of requiring banks to report all suspicious transactions to FinCen simply allows money laundering to flourish, while ensuring that any enforcement will be of the 'whack-a-mole' variety.

These documents, compiled by banks, shared with the government, but kept from public view, expose the hollowness of banking safeguards, and the ease with which criminals have exploited them. Profits from deadly drug wars, fortunes embezzled from developing countries, and hard-earned savings stolen in a Ponzi scheme were all allowed to flow into and out of these financial institutions, despite warnings from the banks’ own employees.

Money laundering is a crime that makes other crimes possible. It can accelerate economic inequality, drain public funds, undermine democracy, and destabilize nations — and the banks play a key role. “Some of these people in those crisp white shirts in their sharp suits are feeding off the tragedy of people dying all over the world,” said Martin Woods, a former suspicious transactions investigator for Wachovia.

Laws that were meant to stop financial crime have instead allowed it to flourish. So long as a bank files a notice that it may be facilitating criminal activity, it all but immunizes itself and its executives from criminal prosecution. The suspicious activity alert effectively gives them a free pass to keep moving the money and collecting the fees.

The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN, is the agency within the Treasury Department charged with combating money laundering, terrorist financing, and other financial crimes. It collects millions of these suspicious activity reports, known as SARs. It makes them available to US law enforcement agencies and other nations’ financial intelligence operations. It even compiles a report called “Kleptocracy Weekly” that summarizes the dealings of foreign leaders such as Russian President Vladimir Putin.

What it does not do is force the banks to shut the money laundering down.

In response to Buzzfeed's questions about the leaked trove of SARs, the Treasury Department warned that the company's decision to publish information gleaned from the leaked SARs could make banks more hesitant to file them, because inevitably hundreds of thousands of reports are filed every year involving transactions that are legitimate. The program was first created in 1992, but it has changed substantially over the last 20 years.

Congress created the current SAR program in 1992 making banks the frontline in the fight against money laundering. But Michael German, a former FBI special agent who is a national security and privacy expert, said that after 9/11, "the SAR program became more about mass surveillance than identifying discrete transactions to disrupt money launderers.” Today, he said, "the data is used like the data from other mass surveillance programs. Find someone you want to get for whatever reason then sift through the vast troves of data collected to find anything you can hang them with."

It also warned that leaking SARs is illegal, and that the Treasury Department's inspector general would be looking into the leaks.

Since we must give credit where credit is due, Buzzfeed does point out that in addition to being a powerful law-enforcement tool, the SAR system is a "nightmare" of surveillance overreach. Particularly after 9/11, the system evolved into a tool of mass surveillance, creating a massive trove of data that could be weaponized against anybody, according to a former FBI special agent who spoke to Buzzfeed.

Today, he said, "the data is used like the data from other mass surveillance programs. Find someone you want to get for whatever reason then sift through the vast troves of data collected to find anything you can hang them with."

When it came time for Robert Mueller to investigate the Trump Campaign's ties to Russia, and whether the president knowingly colluded with a foreign government - a narrative, we later learned, with zero basis in fact - Mueller was able to access reams of SARS filed on Manafort, Michael Cohen and other members of Trump's circle.

What did any of this have to do with Russia? Nothing, apparently.

They requested SARs on Deutsche Bank, which had loaned Trump money; Christopher Steele, the former MI6 agent who wrote the so-called Trump dossier; an array of Russian oligarchs; Trump’s former campaign chairperson Paul Manafort; and even a small casino in the Pacific run by a former Trump employee. All told, they were looking for information on more than 200 entities.

Many of the 1,000-plus SARS received by Buzzfeed were apparently requested by the Mueller team. However, none of the SARS included any direct information on Trump or the Trump Organization.

FinCEN unearthed tens of thousands of pages of documents. Those documents, along with a few additional SARs requested by federal law enforcement authorities, make up the majority of the FinCEN Files. Some were never turned over to the committees that requested them.

A person familiar with the matter blew the whistle to multiple members of Congress. The collection does not include any SARs about Trump’s finances. (A source familiar with the matter told BuzzFeed News that FinCEN’s database did not contain SARs on either Trump or the Trump Organization.) And though the documents show suspicious payments to people in Trump’s orbit before and after key moments in the 2016 presidential campaign, they do not provide direct information on any election interference.

When banks settle AML violations with regulators, typically, they're asked to improve their controls - and in most cases, that means filing more SARs. The way the system is set up, banks are required to detail transactions, but have no say in prosecuting them, and staff cuts at FinCEN mean only a very small percentage of notices every get read.

However, since all of this data is stored, prosecutors can bring it to bear whenever a particular person or organization catches their interest.

Buzzfeed saved the banks' statements on their investigation for a separate article (one that most of its readers will probably never see). But in a series of statements, the banks explain that its not their place to investigate these types of crimes. Buzzfeed reports that banks' compliance workers are often shunted away in backwater offices in places like Jacksonville Florida (where many of Deutsche Bank's compliance employees are situated).

More than 2 million SARs were filed over the past year, a massive increase over the past decade, according to Buzzfeed. That's because, as banks have been filing more reports to cover their own backsides, regulators have endured staff cuts that left far fewer people there to examine them.

But some of the most egregious financial frauds in recent memory never generated a single SAR, including Bernie Madoff's Ponzi scheme. When the reckoning with authorities came, JPM got off with a slap on the wrist.

PMorgan Chase got a deferred prosecution deal of its own. For years, it was the primary bank of the world’s biggest Ponzi schemer, Bernie Madoff. Despite multiple warnings from its own employees, the bank never filed a suspicious activity report on him and allegedly collected $500 million in fees. For punishment, the bank was required to pay a $1.7 billion fine and promise to improve its money laundering defenses. But after it settled the Madoff case, the bank’s own investigators said they suspected it had opened its accounts to an alleged Russian organized crime figure who is known for drug trafficking and contract murders, as well as businesses tied to the repressive North Korean regime, which the US has placed off-limits.

Buzzfeed's sources argue that the only way to fix the problem is to arrest the executives of banks that break laws.

"The bankers will never learn until you start putting silver bracelets on people...Think of the message you're sending to repeat offenders."

[...]

"These guys know what they're doing," said Thomas Nollner, a former regulator with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. “You break the law, you should go to jail, period."

Of course, the report also pointed out why this hasn't yet happened - and why it probably never will. Because thanks to the Fed and the Treasury, 'too big to fail' also means 'too big to prosecute'.

In 2012, Standard Chartered and HSBC were facing criminal prosecution. George Osborne, at that time the UK’s chancellor of the exchequer, wrote to the chairperson of the US Federal Reserve, Ben Bernanke, and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner to discuss his “concerns” that a heavy-handed response could have “unintended consequences.” He warned of a “contagion.” The implication: Close one bank and the whole economy could suffer.

Because while money might come from unsavory places - Russian organized criminals, the Taliban, etc - it still contributes to economic growth, and puts dollars into the banking system.

One ex-federal agent told Buzzfeed there's a "mosaic" of reasons why banks are rarely prosecuted for AML violations: “Even if it's bad wealth, it buys buildings,” he said. “It puts money into bank accounts. It enriches the nation.”

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fnewstoday · 5 years

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kryptoncloned-a-blog · 6 years

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INSTRUCTIONS : fill out the questions about your muse. repost, don’t reblog. tag as many people as you want.

1 ) WHAT DOES YOUR MUSE SMELL LIKE ? his hair usually smells like argan oil, clothes almost always smell like laundry detergent ( sometimes like m’gann’s perfume or shampoo ). conner himself has a natural musk, sometimes accompanied by the smell of his shaving cream / after shave but to anyone with an enhanced sense of smell they will catch an almost chemical type scent beneath it all.

2 ) HOW OFTEN DOES YOUR MUSE BATHE / SHOWER ? regularly. he’ll shower after sparring matches, more often because his sparring partners sweat all over him as opposed to himself considering it takes a lot for conner to work up a sweat. he’ll also shower after missions ( and any time he comes into contact with lex luthor. guy makes him feel dirty ).

3 ) DOES YOUR MUSE HAVE ANY TATTOO’S OR PIERCINGS ? conner has neither, however on a molecular level his dna has been patented by cadmus.

4 ) ANY BODY MOVEMENT QUIRKS ( eg. TAPPING HEEL, SHAKING KNEE ) ? conner usually stands at ease or with his arms folded across his chest, one of the most notable movement quirks is that he doesn’t have any. conner stands and sits very still, rarely moving unconsciously or without purpose.

5 ) WHAT DO THEY SLEEP IN ? he used to sleep fully clothed minus his boots. he has since taken to sleeping in a pair of boxer - briefs.

6 ) WHAT’S THEIR FAVOURITE PIECE OF CLOTHING ? most would assume it’s his black shirts with the red emblem of house el, but it’s actually his leather jacket. he doesn’t wear it often because he worries about it getting destroyed because trouble always seems to find him.

7 ) WHAT DO THEY DO WHEN THEY WAKE UP ? when he does sleep conner will usually become fully awake pretty quickly. he’ll wash his face, dress and go to the training room or check out the sunrise if he’s feeling a certain kind of way.

8 ) HOW DO THEY SLEEP ? POSITION ? he used to sleep standing up in a closet so it’s a good thing he’s evolved. he’ll sleep on his right side facing his bedroom door, one arm tucked under his pillow and head.

9 ) WHAT DO THEIR HANDS FEEL LIKE ? the inside of his hands / fingers are smooth and soft, conner burns a little hotter than the average person so they’re always warm but his knuckles are calloused from use and punishment.

TAGGED BY : @emeraldhellfire TAGGING : @zoomenir, @vespertiilian, @hopesymbols, @nightspride, @birburger

#⧰ –– accessing secure database. 「 dossier. 」

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doorsclosingslowly · 7 years

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The Opening Act of Spring

Maul’s teacher has always been violence, and it’s never done him any harm. He should have no qualms about treating his apprentice the same way.

3.6k | pt. 3 of Runaways ‘verse | content warning for abuse | read on AO3

“What are you writing about, brother?”

“Mission dossier,” Maul replies. Not that their target deserves it, frankly. Ms Chykynn is a businesswoman from Corellia who sought fortune in an entanglement with the Banking Clan, and also a far-removed and minor former beneficiary and ally of Maul’s old Master. Somehow, she managed to bankrupt a rival family, possibly as a side effect of one of Lord Sidious’ myriad schemes, driving the parents to ruin and their daughter to suicide. Two days ago, the daughter’s widow set an astronomical bounty on the businesswoman’s head—detached only—but this information is unlikely to have filtered through to the target yet. She won’t even have hired security. Despite her tangled ties to Lord Sidious, she should be easy prey.

Maul had set their course for Corellia immediately, and they’ve been in hyperspace for two days now. They’ll drop out in eight hours to change lanes. They’ve slept and consumed their morning protein bars, they’ve meditated and sparred, and when there was nothing of any importance left to do, Maul had decided to begin preparing an in-depth dossier. He hasn’t done so in two years now, and he wants to keep his researching skills sharp.

It’s good that Savage’s brought Maul’s attention to what he’s doing, though. Chykynn is plainly ill-protected and weak. He has already read about Corellia, and even her city. This is superfluous busy-work.

Maul stretches his shoulders, and with the press of a button he saves his dossier attempt on the datapad he’s balancing on his knees, and then he closes the file. In its stead, he calls up the blueprints and notes for the DRK-1 Dark Eye redesign that he found in an office on Castell. Much more stimulating.

“What did you write?” Savage asks, not five minutes later. Currently, he’s sitting cross-legged on his bed, his posture almost a mirror of Maul’s. Almost. He doesn’t have the discipline, even now, to force his feet onto his knees. Also, silent work and rest does not become him. He’s fidgeting periodically. He is much too interested in Maul’s activities.

“Three colon null-seven colon two-five dash dash esk krill usk vev dash leth underscore one,” Maul says.

His apprentice’s face remains blank.

“The file name. Look it up yourself. There is a box of datapads by the door—” a box that hadn’t been there when Savage first abducted him; shockingly there hadn’t even been a single datapad on the Sheathipede then— “and all the Versafunction Eight-Eights are patched into the ship’s comm system, take one of those.”

“It is quicker if you just tell me.”

“Not for me,” Maul replies, and then, with over-exaggerated care, he holds up his datapad so that it blocks out the center of his field of vision. No more annoying brother. Methodically, he skips through the redesign notes: pressure sensors, photo-sensors, auditory sensors, a concept for olfactory sensors—a typically useless v2 idea—balancing software… There. The antennas of the current DRK-1 have an inconvenient tendency to break off at sub-zero temperatures, and Maul is curious how Sienar are planning to address the issue.

He can’t quite concentrate on the diagrams, though.

Out of the corner of his eye, he watches Savage instead. Maul’s brother untangles his legs and then flops down on his bed, evidently bored of fidgeting. Five seconds later, he rolls over, braces himself on his arms and one knee—the bed is too short—and starts doing lazy push-ups. The bed creaks. Despite Maul’s orders and his obvious restlessness and the fact that he asked for the information, the apprentice never even considered getting up and fetching a datapad.

This petty obstreperousness shall not be tolerated.

“Savage, read the dossier,” Maul says.

Another push-up, and Savage pretends not to have heard him.

“Apprentice.”

Creak, creak, creak.

“By now, you would have finished your reading, if you’d retrieved the datapad.”

“By now, you would have finished telling me about whatever it is you wrote,” Savage replies mulishly. “It would have been much more efficient.”

True. Irrelevant.

“I am the Master,” Maul says, because it must be said occasionally. He’s almost certain that Savage has forgotten that fact again, and more than a little worried that he himself might have, too. “You, Savage, are the apprentice. I have been lenient—” He doesn’t want to, can’t, imagine Lord Sidious’ retribution, should Maul ever have wasted his time like this. It would have involved force lightning, possibly, or skinning, if… if not worse. Master might have just left, might have simply discarded him for his lack of respect. Maul shudders. “I have been incredibly lenient, but when I tell you to read the mission dossier, I expect you to obey. With haste and diligence and eagerness. Without question. Being a Sith is a privilege. You are training to become the most powerful being in the galaxy, apprentice, and when your Master gives you an order, you will obey.”

Lord Sidious—his former Master, Maul thinks bitterly, it wasn’t because of his non-existent disobedience but nevertheless he was discarded—he would have laughed at this pitiful attempt at discipline. The obviously unfit and shy approach to training his apprentice.

(Maul had suspected, in small moments he never managed to eradicate entirely from his days, that He viewed his as little more than an attack dog, an assassin and errand-boy but not a successor, and here is the proof that He was right. He discarded Maul, didn’t need him for the Naboo mission or the grand millennial plan after all, and he was right.)

Maul is no Master. This is not training, this is…

This is a lazy, relaxed day.

This is wrong.

Some threat in Maul’s posture—he would be unduly flattering Savage’s mental capacity or commitment if he attributed it to the words—something that Savage can see in him now makes him stand up, quickly, and walk over to the datapad box.

DRK-1 schematics completely forgotten and trying to quench the anger at his own failure, Maul watches his unwieldy apprentice pick up the uppermost pad. It’s an Eight-Eight—pure luck, he’ll realize later—held together by spacer’s tape and chance ever since an unfortunate incident with a hilt prototype.

Savage shuffles back to his bed and then, with his back buckled and avid concentration, he stares down at the pad, but he’s pressing too many buttons. He’s pressing them seemingly at random. His left leg is beating against the blanket below it, thoughtlessly, restlessly.

“Apprentice, read the first sentence out loud.”

More fidgeting.

“You can’t read,” Maul says.

“I—”

“You can’t read. You should have alerted me, apprentice.” First the utter naïveté with money and the superfluous religious offerings and the propensity towards making unpalatable raw food, and now this. Maul will not fail, and he will not tolerate an uncivilised apprentice. “You should have told me that you can’t read. You used voice commands and holomaps to steer the ship, to hide your deficiencies from me, didn’t you, but we,” Maul snarls, feeling his patience fray, “are Sith. We are not barbarous outer rim yokels.” Or shall soon cease to be ones, at least, in Savage’s case. “We may be zabraks, but that will not limit us. There are certain standards I expect you to abide by, apprentice, and this is one of them. Everything important has been written down, and a true Sith shall not remain ignorant. You will become literate. You will start now.”

Savage is still sitting on the bed, clutching the datapad. He’s looking at Maul, eyes wide, but apart from that, his hurt—hovering in the aura around them, tingling at the borders of Maul’s mind—is hidden well in his posture. He’s learned something from Maul’s customary disapproving frown at emotional displays, at least. From the training sessions that are always harsher if he cries out at an injury. He can be taught.

(The reason had been minor, and that was the worst of it. Loneliness, maybe, since his nanny droid had just been decommissioned, or a broken finger or mockery, he couldn’t even remember why he’d started crying in the first place. He couldn’t remember anything through the pain. There was only one fact left in the world: Maul had started crying and his Master had seen, and the punishment wouldn’t stop until the tears did. Knowing this did not make stopping easier. It was a very long day.)

“Kneel down on the floor.”

The apprentice obeys quickly.

“Switch on your datapad. Search Sheathipede’s database for the Little Aurebesh.” Maul doesn’t know why he still remembers that title or that it was apparently often used as a test datafile and therefore might be accessible. He shouldn’t remember. It was so long ago, and he hadn’t even enjoyed Dirk forcing him to read it over and over and over because it was the only children’s book installed on his memory chips.

Savage is slower this time, pressing a button and then looking up at Maul and then pressing it again, and…

Alright, Maul can see the issue now. “Give it to me.”

The holobook isn’t there, only then he remembers to use reg expressions and change the directory and—Puddle Aurek-Besh by Kel-Shuuura. That’s it. Sheathipede is obviously ancient and yet, she has never been data-scrubbed and her memory banks still contain test files. The passphrases are probably still factory-set. An amateur oversight on Maul’s part, after the complete mechanical overhaul—he should take care of that security nightmare—but nevertheless serendipitous.

Lord Sidious never taught Maul how to read, that was Dirk the trusty rewired (or not) spy droid, and he adopts the methods he remembers the machine had used. It’s probably better this way. It’s easier to look at datapads when you’re not being thrown across the floor. (His Master laughs at his pitiful justification. Maul is unfit to train an apprentice.)

Kneeling next to Savage, he gives back the datapad and points at the scrawly illustration on the screen, the heads of two akk dogs meeting snout-first with thick red lines around their mouths forming the general shape of the letter aurek. “Look at those creatures. What do you see? What are they?”

“Maul, I am… forgive me.”

“Those are akk dogs.” Maul stretches out the sound. A necessary clue, perhaps, since his brother’s probably never even been to their wretched native planet. He stretches out the sound, and the seconds until he’ll have to… “That is the principle behind this book: there will be a well-known creature, and its visible body will be in the shape of the first letter of its name. If you know the animal’s name, you can deduce the letter. If you know the order of the letters, you can gain clues regarding its species. Two akk dogs. From Anoat. In the shape of an…”

Savage hums, low and anxious.

“Aurek,” Maul snaps. “See those slanting semi-circles. Aurek. You will try again and answer me promptly, apprentice.”

He is no droid and there is no electric prod, and Maul has never learnt Sith lightning, so he’ll conduct the lesson with what he has. His apprentice is not obeying fast enough, is not taking this seriously. With the flick of his wrist he calls his lightsaber close, and he tries not to feel cold. He knows what’s coming—whatever being will appear, Savage won’t know it. Savage will fail his order. He will be punished. This is the way lessons work: the desire to obey your Master, a harsh task, and the pain, the wish for survival, driving you to succeed. Savage will fail, at first, and he will suffer. It’s almost unfair.

It’s inevitable. Maul is Master, Savage his apprentice. Their roles were cut into stone and whispered and handed down long before either of them existed. Savage has—more or less voluntarily, if not intentionally—entrusted Maul with the sacred responsibility of teaching the ways of the Sith, of shaping him into the most powerful version of himself. He does not deserve Maul’s clammy hands; he deserves resolution. Help. He deserves to be taught. (Master looks down and laughs and laughs.)

With a deep breath and the press of a button, the next picture appears.

“Bruth!” Savage exclaims.

Something unwraps from around Maul’s hearts. He’s too happy to correct his brother for the fact that he should have recognized letter, not species. “Very good, apprentice. Now, the next one.”

Their luck runs out.

“Veeka-bird?” Savage guesses.

Maul’s fumbling hand only finds the lightsaber’s ignition button on the third try, but it does. In the space between them, the blade burns read.

“Palm-bird? No, please, brother… Give me more time. The Great Blind One? Moon-driver? No, just wait. Maul, you don’t have to do this, you don’t—Maul, no, wait, please…” Savage begs, but there is nowhere for him to go once he’s scrambled backwards against his bed. Nothing but Maul and Savage, Master and apprentice, and the ship and the saberstaff and the inevitable stream of wrong answers. There is nothing either of them can do to end this.

“The correct answer is cresh,” Maul says, and it tastes stale and empty inside his mouth.

Slowly, carefully, he brings the blade down.

(“Your timing has improved,” the droid said, and still it gave Maul a harsh shock that he couldn’t yet dodge. Not a disabling shock, although the exertion alone was enough to make him lie down for days. He stood up again and launched himself against the wall and backflipped. Another improvement. Another shock.)

The blade stops, still more than a decimeter above Savage’s arm.

“That’s good, Maul,” Savage says. There’s a tremor in his voice, and his eyes are fixed on the weapon that should, by now, have burned him. He’s very still. “That’s good. You don’t want to do this.”

And Maul doesn’t. He should, Master would, but—the ‘saber is so heavy in his hand.

“Let’s just… try this again, with the next letter? Can you do that?” Savage asks. “I promise I will get it right next time, brother.”

Maul can’t think of a better option—the blade will not move—and so he acquiesces.

Despite his promise, Savage doesn’t manage to name the next letter or animal, either, even though he talks for minutes and runs through a bewildering array of strange animal names, animals that Maul has never heard of, as if he could stop the lightsaber by inventing creatures, only interrupting the fantastical names to occasionally say Maul’s name.

It’s… whatever it is that Savage’s doing to defend himself, it’s working. The lightsaber is wavering too badly, now, and Maul switches the blade off. He is supposed to punish his apprentice, not accidentally decapitate him.

“That’s good, Maul,” Savage says, interrupting his litany for a moment to run his fingers across the scars on Maul’s hand, the hand that still clutches the saberstaff, and pulling it down towards the floor. Then he launches back into it, growing more erratic in his answers, not even bothering to match the type of animal—insect, bird, fish—to the clues in the illustration anymore.

It’s rhythmic. Meaningless. Soothing.

It’s utterly alien. The threats aren’t a motivation for self-improvement, the way Maul remembers them being, and Savage is just moving further and further away from any viable answers. It doesn’t make any sense: Maul had often loved his teacher and wished for his approval, and Savage does, too. Maul had wished to end his pain, and Savage is terrified. The situations are equivalent. There should be no reason why punishment doesn’t work now.

Savage should be learning.

There is no difference between now and all those times when it worked for Lord Sidous. No difference but two.

Savage.

Maul.

Master and apprentice, but not. Brothers. The lesson of lesson of strangulation, of near-death and terror, of dipping into the dark side to ensure your survival if there is nothing else left but your body and the hand of your Master cutting off your air supply—that lesson, just weeks ago, had been aborted as well because of Maul’s weakness. His inability to teach the way Lord Sidious does. He’d been terrified at the idea of accidentally ending his brother’s life, of losing whatever this new life is, and he had cried. He’d allowed himself to be held. Maul had been too weak to teach in the old ways then, and he is still too weak now. Will always be too weak. He doesn’t want to hurt Savage.

This failure, in hindsight, is entirely predictable. He took an apprentice too early, left and chose to challenge his own Master years before he was ready, and now he cannot even instruct Savage in the aurebesh, let alone the dark side of the force. He’d had no choice in leaving, at first, because Savage had abducted him, but—he chose to stay with Savage. Maul chose to make that mistake.

Naïveté and youth and the deep heavy knowledge that if Maul had returned to his Master, Savage would be dead now. It was the wrong choice, but it’s too late to go back now. It was wrong, but still, it feels…

He can hear Master laughing somewhere deep inside his mind (Maul is no Master—) and it only makes him grateful that his brother is still holding down his ‘saber hand.

Maul is no—

Abruptly, Savage’s voice cuts through the revelation. “Brother. I’ve taught before, showed children how to walk, how to sew and make weapons and fight. I know how to do it. Teaching’s not that difficult, really, if you care.” Something flashes across his force presence, unflinching white hatred, and then it’s swallowed again by love and anxiety and regret. “If you feel it is important that I learn how to read, I can show you how.”

If his would-be Sith Master can’t even execute a simple lesson, he may as well try. Maul is tired. He nods.

“Let go of the lightsaber, brother.”

A slow shuddering breath, and then Maul obeys.

“It’s alright to ask me for help when you don’t know what you’re doing, brother.”

This is—

Savage keeps his warm right hand wrapped around Maul’s, but he pulls it up slightly, away from the weapon, and Maul acquiesces. With his other hand, Savage gently rolls away the saberstaff, and then he instructs, “Show me the shape of the letter. The first one. Aurek? Trace it on the floor.”

Maul does, hesitantly and then over and over, pulling Savage’s hand along. This isn’t teaching, he thinks. It shouldn’t be this easy. This is wrong, but he doesn’t let go, even when he feels the ghost of electricity lashing across his skin.

(Maul misunderstood the point of lessons, in fact. Of punishment. Even though Lord Sidious wasn’t as invested in developing Maul’s mind himself and left the task to his servants, he wasn’t in the habit of him to do something as flat-out impossible as naming animals that Maul had never seen. He wanted his weapon to progress, after all. Moreover, the desperation for approval was usually enough.

He asked for things that could be accomplished, at least most of the time, unless he wanted to punish Maul.

It’s just that the pain doesn’t feel any different.)

“What do your datapads say of Wrath, brother?” Savage asks, later. The lights inside the cargo hold where they always sleep and where, mere hours ago, Maul almost hurt… Where Maul received yet another proof of his own failure. The lights are shut off and dark, now, except for the one lamp that always flashes its comforting green through the open door.

Maul’s wrapped up and warm inside the blanket that Savage insists he use, and he’s almost asleep. Blearily and angry and still uncertain, he blinks open his eyes again, and finds Savage’s irises shining at him through the gloom. “What,” he grumbles.

“Wrath. The first nightbrother. What do they say?”

“Learn to read and look it up yourself.” Maul pulls the blanket over his head. Slowly, the air grows damp and hot and stale around him, and it’s a sufficient rejection to make the room blissfully quiet.

It’s enough, for almost a minute.

“They say nothing, don’t they.”

Savage is entirely correct. Maul had looked for information, years ago when he was small and his droid caretaker had revealed Maul’s birth species. When, for a few hours, he’d failed to understand that the answer as to what he was was Sith, and that was sufficient. He’d read what little research there had been about the nightbrothers, but nothing had ever mentioned this ‘Wrath’ or anything else that Savage likes telling Maul about, not even the strange animals he spoke of today. (Nothing had ever mentioned that someone like Savage was waiting for Maul.)

“Nobody ever wrote about him,” Maul agrees. “I said that everything important has been written down, I never talked about this ‘Wrath’. I do not care about your backwater myths. It’s night. Shut up.”

Blessed silence.

Five minutes later—

“Who was Wrath, brother?” Maul whispers. It’s not quite an apology for today and as close as he’ll ever manage. Entirely by accident, those are also the words that are always used, the child’s call for the Elder’s recital.

Maul doesn’t understand why there’s a hitch in his brother’s heartbeats. He’ll never find out, but still he falls asleep with the soft age-worn cadences of strength and worship and ownership, of terror, of a man and a witch and a child and the long journey to bring that child back home entering his ears for the first time—for the thousandth time—for the first time he can remember.

Tonight, despite everything, he will not dream.

#a day in the life of two people who are only partially competent at being people #darth maul #savage opress #runaways 'verse #dimtraces makes things

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paranoidsbible · 7 years

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Quickie: The Paranoid’s Bible

Quickie: The Paranoid’s Bible A Quick Guide to Prevent and Remove Dox Before it’s too Late Written by the Paranoid’s Bible Team

1. Compartmentalize yourself -- compartmentalization is the act of limiting access to information through a need-to-know basis (E.G: Keeping your accounts separated from each other and telling no one that doesn't need to know). 2. Online life should be completely separate from offline life. 3. Keep your profiles limited, set security and privacy settings as high as possible – less information out there, less information people can find. 4. Always have an escape plan and a contingency plan – keep things short and quick, if your account is suddenly too popular too fast, find a way to remove it without anyone cataloging. 5. Grab this dossier from here (https://pastebin.com/MRWPBWwE) and make two dossiers – one for the information you can remember, the other for information you’ve found. 6. Self-dox by doing the following (Note: Self dox is not doxing yourself but finding your information and working to expunge it, never posting it for others to see). To find usernames: https://namechk.com/ | http://knowem.com/ General information search sites: https://www.spokeo.com/ | https://www.pipl.com/ | https://www.linkedin.com/ | http://www.whitepages.com/ | Social Networks to search: https://www.twitter.com/ | https://www.facebook.com/ | https://www.deviantart.com | https://www.tumblr.com/ | https://www.reddit.com/ Image reversals: https://www.tineye.com/ | https://www.saucenao.com/ | https://www.photobucket.com/ | https://www.revimg.net/ | https://www.iqdb.org/ Whois: https://www.networksolutions.com/whois/index.jsp Archives: https://www.archive.is | https://www.archive.org/ Besides the above, vanity-search hard – search on Google and Bing with the below search queries and add it to the dossier you’re making. +Full name (First, Middle, Last and/or marks JR/SR/2nd/ 3rd…etc) +First + last name +First name +Last name/home address +Name combinations + birth-date +Name combinations + home/street address +Name combinations + school +Name combinations + work + Name combinations + vote, voted or voting +Street address +Relatives names + name combinations +Usernames + name combinations +Usernames +E-mail addresses +E-mail addresses + usernames +Websites or accounts + usernames +Websites or accounts + e-mail addresses +Usernames + city or state +Name combinations + city or state +The above + IP addresses or ISP +The above + known leak or dump searches (E.G: Have I Been PWNED) 7. Look at what information you’ve found, compare each dossier to each other to see what you’ve missed and found. 8. Never delete old email accounts, switch any accounts linked to them to another email address and let the email sit for a year. After a year, delete. 9. Delete your information once you crosscheck the dossiers with each other and ensure you’ve found all your information (Remember: Don’t post any of this publicly, this is only for you to go through).- Remember the 1 month rule A. Wait a month before deleting an account. B. Within that month, hide and/or delete all comments that you can that aren’t yours. C. Modify and change everything that you can. D. Any editable text should be randomized (E.G: wodegnoi2n402) E. Images should be changed to a blank or solid color image. F. Videos should be changed to a solid color or static video. G. All CSS and HTML, that’s editable, should be wiped out. H. Change the e-mail address used to register the account with something else. I. Check your e-mail addresses against Have I Been PWNED to ensure nothing has been compromised. J. Repeat the above steps for each account and e-mail address to be deleted. 10. Before deleting an account, check your accounts against the internet archive @ archive.org. 11. If archives exist, send an email to [email protected] and request you’d wish your archives would be removed for privacy reasons. To ensure they know you’re the account holder, take a screen cap while logged into your account(s). This is to show them you are the owner and have access to the account. 12. Blur out your house on online maps. ---For Bing:--- * https://www.bing.com/maps/ * Type home address * Get to street view * Center squarely on house * Look for (?) question mark near bottom right. Be careful as it can be hidden sometimes. * Click it * Select "Report an image concern" * You'll get a pop-up or new tab with a panoramic image * Select your house, a little red square will appear then * Voice your privacy concern, stating vandalism and potential break-ins by criminal elements. * Fill out the rest of the form + Captcha, wait * Save ticket (#) Number ---For Google:--- * Go to Google Maps and type in your address * Bring up the street view of your property * Look to the bottom right hand corner of the screen you should see an Icon Labeled: “report a problem.” * Click on “report a problem.” * You will get a page labeled “report inappropriate street view.” * Look for the words “Privacy Concerns” and click on them. * If you want your house blurred, click on “my house.” Then choose the option: “I have a picture of my house and would like it blurred.” * Adjust the image and show Google which part of the photo needs blurred. * Type the verification code at the bottom of the page into the box provided and click submit. * Check back in a few days to see if the image has been blurred. ---For Yahoo: Special thanks to /r/n0esc from Reddit!--- * Visit https://www.Yahoo.com/maps * Drag the gray icon that resembles a person (top-right) to your street. (If it won’t drag, then your street has not been photographed for Yahoo.) * Click on “report image” at the bottom-left of the screen. It will take you to a different website. * Click on “request blurring,” and follow the directions. 13. Opt-out of commonly used databases and people search engines. https://www.beenverified.com/f/optout/search • Go to opt-out link • Enter first & last name + state • Find your profile(s) • Click on the one you wish to remove • Follow instructions • Repeat for each individual in household https://www.familytreenow.com/optout • Follow instructions on the opt-out link https://www.intelius.com/optout • Follow directions on page. https://www.locatefamily.com/contact.html • Search for your name on the left side of the site. • You’ll find a page or pages containing Names, addresses and phone numbers. • Find yours; take note of the number next to it. • Go to the contact page. • Scroll down for the opt-out\removal form. • Follow the directions. • Make sure to provide the information you want deleted in the ‘Comments’ box. • Repeat for each individual in household. https://radaris.com/ https://radaris.com/page/how-to-remove • Search for a name. • On the search results page, select the name that is most appropriate. • On the profile page, click the down-arrow to the right of the name and select ‘Control Information’. • From the information control page, choose ‘Remove information’. • Here you can choose to remove all information, or to delete specific records. • Confirm your real name matches your account and profile name. • Enter your cellular phone to receive a verification code. • Once the code has been entered, the profile will be private. • Repeat for each individual in household. https://secure.whitepages.com https://secure.whitepages.com/suppression_requests • Find your information VIA search • click view free details • Copy the profile link to the second link • Click/select opt-out and remove me • Select your reason • Enter your phone number to confirm, https://www.Spokeo.com https://www.spokeo.com/optout • Go to Spokeo. • Search your First, middle and last name. • Find your profile/listing by go to the bottom of the page and select ‘open advance filter’. • Fill out your information. • Find your profile/listing, copy the link (note: Right click + copy link to have a ‘Clean link’ copied). • Go to the Opt out link. • Follow instructions to opt-out. • Repeat for each individual in house. • Hint: You’ll need a different e-mail address after so many removals. • Hint: You may have multiple profiles/links due to previous addresses. • Hint: Make sure HTTPs is not at the start of the link, if it is just remove the 'S'. The above is just the bare basics of the Paranoid’s Bible Anti-Dox Guide. For a better understanding, we do request that you visit the main guide at: https://paranoidsbible.tumblr.com/post/160173700334/the-paranoids-bible-20

#how to remove dox #how to prevent dox #what to do if doxed #privacy #security

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go-redgirl · 5 years

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Mueller Report: Special Counsel Didn’t Examine DNC Servers — Based on FBI Investigation that Didn’t Examine DNC Servers

WASHINGTON — In his extensive report, Special Counsel Robert S. Mueller notes that his investigative team did not “obtain or examine” the servers of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in determining whether those servers were hacked by Russia.

Instead, Mueller’s assessment of the DNC’s allegedly hacked servers relied upon the investigations conducted by the FBI and other agencies. “The Office understands that the FBI, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and the states have separately investigated that activity,” reads Mueller’s report.

However, the DNC famously refused to allow the FBI to access its servers to verify the allegation that Russia carried out a hack during the 2016 presidential campaign. Instead, the DNC reached an arrangement with the FBI in which a third party company, CrowdStrike, conducted forensics on the server and shared details with the FBI.

As this reporter previously documented, CrowdStrike was financed to the tune of $100 million from a funding drive by Google Capital.

Google Capital, which now goes by the name of CapitalG, is an arm of Alphabet Inc., Google’s parent company. Eric Schmidt, the chairman of Alphabet, has been a staunch and active supporter of Hillary Clinton and is a longtime donor to the Democratic Party.

It was previously reported that Perkins Coie, the law firm that represented the DNC and Clinton’s campaign, helped draft CrowdStrike to aid with the DNC’s allegedly hacked server.

On behalf of the DNC and Clinton’s campaign, Perkins Coie also paid the controversial Fusion GPS firm to produce the infamous, largely-discredited anti-Trump dossier compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele.

Mueller’s report states that the GRU, the Main Directorate of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, “stole approximately 300 gigabytes of data from the DNC cloud-based account.”

The GRU also targeted “individuals and entities involved in the administration” of the presidential election, the report documents. “Victims included U.S. state and local entities, such as state boards of elections (SBOEs), secretaries of state, and county governments, as well as individuals who worked for those entities,” the report states.

Yet the Special Counsel’s office “did not investigate further” the evidence it said it found showing that Russia’s GRU targeted the DNC and the other entities. Mueller’s team did not examine or obtain the DNC’s servers.

The report states:

While the investigation identified evidence that the GRU targeted these individuals and entities, the Office did not investigate further. The Office did not, for instance, obtain or examine servers or other relevant items belonging to these victims. The Office understands that the FBI, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, and the states have separately investigated that activity.

In June 2016, The Washington Post reported on the Perkins Coie law firm’s involvement in bringing in CrowdStrike to investigate the DNC’s allegedly hacked server.

The Washington Post documented how Michael Sussmann, a partner with Perkins Coie who also represented the DNC, contacted CrowdStrike after the DNC suspected its server had been hacked. CrowdStrike then identified hacker groups allegedly tied to Russia.

The Post reported that Sussman called in Shawn Henry, president of CrowdStrike.

The Post reported:

DNC leaders were tipped to the hack in late April. Chief executive Amy Dacey got a call from her operations chief saying that their information technology team had noticed some unusual network activity. “It’s never a call any executive wants to get, but the IT team knew something was awry,” Dacey said. And they knew it was serious enough that they wanted experts to investigate.

That evening, she spoke with Michael Sussmann, a DNC lawyer who is a partner with Perkins Coie in Washington. Soon after, Sussmann, a former federal prosecutor who handled computer crime cases, called Henry, whom he has known for many years.

Within 24 hours, CrowdStrike had installed software on the DNC’s computers so that it could analyze data that could indicate who had gained access, when and how.

According to The Post, citing DNC officials, the “hackers” had “gained access to the entire database of opposition research on GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump.”

In testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee in January 2017, then-FBI Director James Comey confirmed that the FBI registered “multiple requests at different levels,” to review the DNC’s hacked servers. Ultimately, the DNC and FBI came to an agreement in which a “highly respected private company”—a reference to CrowdStrike—would carry out forensics on the servers and share any information that it discovered with the FBI, Comey testified.

A senior law enforcement official stressed the importance of the FBI gaining direct access to the servers, a request that was denied by the DNC.

“The FBI repeatedly stressed to DNC officials the necessity of obtaining direct access to servers and data, only to be rebuffed until well after the initial compromise had been mitigated,” the official was quoted by the news media as saying.

“This left the FBI no choice but to rely upon a third party for information. These actions caused significant delays and inhibited the FBI from addressing the intrusion earlier,” the official continued.

CrowdStrike is a California-based cybersecurity technology company co-founded by experts George Kurtz and Dmitri Alperovitch.

Alperovitch is a nonresident senior fellow of the Cyber Statecraft Initiative at the Atlantic Council. The Council takes a hawkish approach toward Russia and has released numerous reports and briefs about Russian aggression.

The Council is funded by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Inc., the U.S. State Department, and NATO ACT.

Another Council funder is the Ploughshares Fund, which in turn has received financing from billionaire George Soros’ Open Society Foundations.

As this reporter previously documented, CrowdStrike was financed to the tune of $100 million from a funding drive by Google Capital.

It was previously reported that Perkins Coie, the law firm that represented the DNC and Clinton’s campaign, helped draft CrowdStrike to aid with the DNC’s allegedly hacked server.

The report states:

In June 2016, The Washington Post reported on the Perkins Coie law firm’s involvement in bringing in CrowdStrike to investigate the DNC’s allegedly hacked server.

The Post reported that Sussman called in Shawn Henry, president of CrowdStrike.

The Post reported:

Within 24 hours, CrowdStrike had installed software on the DNC’s computers so that it could analyze data that could indicate who had gained access, when and how.

According to The Post, citing DNC officials, the “hackers” had “gained access to the entire database of opposition research on GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump.”

A senior law enforcement official stressed the importance of the FBI gaining direct access to the servers, a request that was denied by the DNC.

CrowdStrike is a California-based cybersecurity technology company co-founded by experts George Kurtz and Dmitri Alperovitch.

The Council is funded by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Inc., the U.S. State Department, and NATO ACT.

Another Council funder is the Ploughshares Fund, which in turn has received financing from billionaire George Soros’ Open Society Foundations.

Aaron Klein is Breitbart’s Jerusalem bureau chief and senior investigative reporter. He is a New York Times bestselling author and hosts the popular weekend talk radio program, “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio.” Follow him on Twitter @AaronKleinShow.