Chapter 8 - The Assignment at Moscow (Continued)
Raul studied each photos which was sent to him, zooming on them. He wanted those photos to talk to him.
He seem to recognize the gray building in the picture. "Was it the 'ONE TEASPOON CAFE?'"- He asked to himself. The brick walls, the green thicket on the right, the steel gray painted lower wall, everything looked very familiar to him. He zoomed in on the yellow number plate, of a car in the picture. The code 777 on the right hand corner of the number plate confirmed that these photos were indeed taken in Moscow.
The picture sent to him seemed very recent. Raul smiled at the thought that, Mr. Wilson already has spotters at Moscow keeping an eye on the clients.
Raul decided to do some Digital Recon on these six individuals he was about to meet in another days time.
Digital Reconnaissance and Surveillance was something that Raul mastered over the years, it was one of his other skill that made him valuable.
Today, the world operates on a digital landscape. Wearable technology is the latest buzz word and everyone seems to be connected via their phones, pads, and laptops. Virtually everyone everywhere is becoming more and more interconnected and sharing data and socializing. Using this medium has become the norm. While the world continues to grow digitally, so does the risk of exposure.
Almost everyone who ritually use the social media platforms left a specific signature according to their behavior. These were a wealth of information, for the social engineering scouts.
Reconnaissance and surveillance have been practiced for centuries, primarily as a way for militaries to conduct observation of enemy activities and monitor targets to gain strategic advantage. Reconnaissance and surveillance teams would go out to gather information about enemy activities in hopes to find out location information, size, and strength of their targets and/or to place targeting information for incoming strikes.
Today, Digital reconnaissance (or digital recon for short) is the “digital” form of what these teams or individuals do, except primarily in a computer-based world. The experts perform many of these same basic functions of their military counterparts and the target could be strategic advantage, financial gain, leverage, or to place targeting information for more attacks in a corporate or private landscape.
Raul does these tasks very specifically, barely escalating it into severe methods like hacking.
He didn't approve of hacking into any device. He understood the security architecture much better. He knew the corporates, especially the mammoth ones like his own must have already deployed enough resources to thwart any such hacking attempt. Most of the companies have their own digital deception framework or simply called "honey pots" to attract hackers and keep them on a network to be watched.
If the targeted office understood the nature of attack and the point of origin, it was a matter of simple guess for them to figure out who would be in need for such an information. They could plant false information and business data for the hackers. These information is cruft for the company who is trying to acquire these by hacking.
Most of the tactics employed by Raul were custom tailored for the day's need based on a targeted individual.He made a rule as not to get carried away with the information that he acquired during the recons on his targets, or his skill set in penetrating their digital devices. Raul made the data acquisition for Mr.Wilson in such a way that he barely come in contact with any data that Mr.Wilson has requested for;a bug is employed with an automated process which collects the data and routes it to Mr.Wilson for his eyes only. He never intended to change the status quo in his line of work.
Data is the oil which runs all the businesses today. For the data, business houses collect information about the market and the adversaries. The intention is simply to survive, to make informed decisions and not run into a lure that is set by a competitor. It's hard to differentiate between friend and foe in the transient landscape of the business world. Every one tries to guard their interests with extreme jealousy.
In a fortnight's time, Mr.Wilson has to call the director board and the stake holders of the company and brief them on his decision of a large investment on a new project with facts and figures. The project envisages an alliance with another company Headquartered in St.Petersberg.
Raul was tasked to fetch what Mr.Wilson wanted, in pure data.
Raul started scouting for information on social media about his targets. Ivan and Grigory has their Facebook albums open for every one to see. They seem very nocturnal with hundreds of pictures of them partying at various clubs, getting drunk, flaunting their tattoos.
Raul looked at their interests and subscriptions, which displayed icons of various clubs, rock bands, pubs, DJs.
The lawyer Egor, seemed a bit more sensible in using Social Media. Except for some posts that was 'public' which shared news articles of political in nature. His FB account was more secure and most information kept private.
Raul couldn't find Alexie and Fyodor on the FB. He tried many search combinations, but was unable to find them on the search results.
With whatever information that was exposed in their FB profiles, Raul learned a few things about the party that he was going to meet in Moscow.
As a rule, Raul never used social media, at least with a genuine profile. He created some profiles to gather information, which he discarded as soon as he got the information he was looking for. Social media is a useful tool for everyone to have a digital life, but the "Habituation" part of it was the side effect, which was detrimental to concept of this new age digital life.
Raul found this constant projection and perception war on FB, as some kind of mass hysteria. He never wanted to subscribe for it.
He remembered from an era of simple chat applications like Yahoo and Gtalk, the digital landscape has grown more complex into an extension of people's every day life, which the society seemed to have enforced it on them.
Raul, knew that Mr.Wilson will give him more updated information on the clients in Moscow from the spotters. He expected, another couple of mails from Mr.Wilson in the coming hours.
He hoped to have enough pieces to put the puzzle together in Moscow.
He disabled the Hotspot on his iPhone and switched off the laptop.When he opened the backpack to keep his laptop a whiff of lemongrass scent filled the cabin. The scent was pleasnt like the memories he has with it. It was as if he opens a bag of memories everytime he open his backpack.
He seem to recognize the gray building in the picture. "Was it the 'ONE TEASPOON CAFE?'"- He asked to himself. The brick walls, the green thicket on the right, the steel gray painted lower wall, everything looked very familiar to him. He zoomed in on the yellow number plate, of a car in the picture. The code 777 on the right hand corner of the number plate confirmed that these photos were indeed taken in Moscow.
The picture sent to him seemed very recent. Raul smiled at the thought that, Mr. Wilson already has spotters at Moscow keeping an eye on the clients.
Raul decided to do some Digital Recon on these six individuals he was about to meet in another days time.
Digital Reconnaissance and Surveillance was something that Raul mastered over the years, it was one of his other skill that made him valuable.
Today, the world operates on a digital landscape. Wearable technology is the latest buzz word and everyone seems to be connected via their phones, pads, and laptops. Virtually everyone everywhere is becoming more and more interconnected and sharing data and socializing. Using this medium has become the norm. While the world continues to grow digitally, so does the risk of exposure.
Almost everyone who ritually use the social media platforms left a specific signature according to their behavior. These were a wealth of information, for the social engineering scouts.
Reconnaissance and surveillance have been practiced for centuries, primarily as a way for militaries to conduct observation of enemy activities and monitor targets to gain strategic advantage. Reconnaissance and surveillance teams would go out to gather information about enemy activities in hopes to find out location information, size, and strength of their targets and/or to place targeting information for incoming strikes.
Today, Digital reconnaissance (or digital recon for short) is the “digital” form of what these teams or individuals do, except primarily in a computer-based world. The experts perform many of these same basic functions of their military counterparts and the target could be strategic advantage, financial gain, leverage, or to place targeting information for more attacks in a corporate or private landscape.
Raul does these tasks very specifically, barely escalating it into severe methods like hacking.
He didn't approve of hacking into any device. He understood the security architecture much better. He knew the corporates, especially the mammoth ones like his own must have already deployed enough resources to thwart any such hacking attempt. Most of the companies have their own digital deception framework or simply called "honey pots" to attract hackers and keep them on a network to be watched.
If the targeted office understood the nature of attack and the point of origin, it was a matter of simple guess for them to figure out who would be in need for such an information. They could plant false information and business data for the hackers. These information is cruft for the company who is trying to acquire these by hacking.
Most of the tactics employed by Raul were custom tailored for the day's need based on a targeted individual.He made a rule as not to get carried away with the information that he acquired during the recons on his targets, or his skill set in penetrating their digital devices. Raul made the data acquisition for Mr.Wilson in such a way that he barely come in contact with any data that Mr.Wilson has requested for;a bug is employed with an automated process which collects the data and routes it to Mr.Wilson for his eyes only. He never intended to change the status quo in his line of work.
Data is the oil which runs all the businesses today. For the data, business houses collect information about the market and the adversaries. The intention is simply to survive, to make informed decisions and not run into a lure that is set by a competitor. It's hard to differentiate between friend and foe in the transient landscape of the business world. Every one tries to guard their interests with extreme jealousy.
In a fortnight's time, Mr.Wilson has to call the director board and the stake holders of the company and brief them on his decision of a large investment on a new project with facts and figures. The project envisages an alliance with another company Headquartered in St.Petersberg.
Raul was tasked to fetch what Mr.Wilson wanted, in pure data.
Raul started scouting for information on social media about his targets. Ivan and Grigory has their Facebook albums open for every one to see. They seem very nocturnal with hundreds of pictures of them partying at various clubs, getting drunk, flaunting their tattoos.
Raul looked at their interests and subscriptions, which displayed icons of various clubs, rock bands, pubs, DJs.
The lawyer Egor, seemed a bit more sensible in using Social Media. Except for some posts that was 'public' which shared news articles of political in nature. His FB account was more secure and most information kept private.
Raul couldn't find Alexie and Fyodor on the FB. He tried many search combinations, but was unable to find them on the search results.
With whatever information that was exposed in their FB profiles, Raul learned a few things about the party that he was going to meet in Moscow.
As a rule, Raul never used social media, at least with a genuine profile. He created some profiles to gather information, which he discarded as soon as he got the information he was looking for. Social media is a useful tool for everyone to have a digital life, but the "Habituation" part of it was the side effect, which was detrimental to concept of this new age digital life.
Raul found this constant projection and perception war on FB, as some kind of mass hysteria. He never wanted to subscribe for it.
He remembered from an era of simple chat applications like Yahoo and Gtalk, the digital landscape has grown more complex into an extension of people's every day life, which the society seemed to have enforced it on them.
Raul, knew that Mr.Wilson will give him more updated information on the clients in Moscow from the spotters. He expected, another couple of mails from Mr.Wilson in the coming hours.
He hoped to have enough pieces to put the puzzle together in Moscow.
He disabled the Hotspot on his iPhone and switched off the laptop.When he opened the backpack to keep his laptop a whiff of lemongrass scent filled the cabin. The scent was pleasnt like the memories he has with it. It was as if he opens a bag of memories everytime he open his backpack.
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