Chasm Waxing: A Startup, Cyber-Thriller (9 page)

The two
person, Gamification Systems’
board
was a
bit
non-standard.
However, there had only been
a Series A round of investment. The board would grow in subsequent
funding
rounds,
as investors typically requested a board
seat.

Samantha had pitched
Gamification to numerous other VCs. There was a
high level of interest
, but
investors had yet to offer a term sheet. Samantha was not
comfortable relying entirely on the Accelerator for the Series B
round.

Defense Innovations
was not committed
to
providing
any further funding to Gamification. Locating
investment capital would be much easier if Gamification just had
one referenceable client. Samantha hoped that a successful demo to
Gecko Insurance would lead to this outcome. But that was a long
shot. Samantha
perceived
that Gecko was just kicking the tires. She didn’t
feel there was any urgency on their part. They weren’t in a hurry
to close a deal. She needed money quickly.

Samantha ran her fingers through her
hair and smoothed her skirt.

6:30 p.m. (EDT), Monday, July 27, 2020
- Columbia, MD

Suite 601, General
Shields’ Office, Defense Innovations Accelerator

Samantha Powers and
General Shields sat close to each other at
a cozy
side table. In the middle
of the table was a new, Universal Secure Phone. A bottle of
Macallan 1928 single malt scotch rested next to the
phone.

Samantha raised her glass to toast the
General and declared: “I officially commence this board meeting.”
The two snickered.

“
Oh, this is good,” said
Samantha, elatedly.

The General cackled. “It
should be. That’s a $50,000 bottle of scotch. I get all sorts of
gifts
in
this job.” A devious smile swept across his face.

“
Josh Adler emailed me
today and said that you told us to meet?” asked Samantha,
nonchalantly. “I forwarded the email on to Becca.
I knew you wanted us to talk. I just
didn’t realize it was so urgent.”

“
After his demo, it jumped
up in priority. I know you’re still a little apprehensive.
Don’t
be. You
want Gamification to be about
gamifying
and monetizing
standard
enterprise functions—
cybersecurity
is just one of them,
right? I remember from your earliest presentations the idea that
you wanted to expand to other business opportunities; like, human
resources, call centers, and physical security?”

“
Yes, General.”

“
CyberAI is better than
you at recognizing sophisticated attacks. I think if you replace
your current AI with CyberAI, you can quit devoting resources to
developing software to identify cyber-threats. So if the
conversation goes well with Becca, I’d like you to consider
licensing his technology.”

Samantha took a sip of her
scotch to mask her frown. “I see. We’re going to review the
financials later, but you know that with nine people on the
payroll
,
we’re
burning
through our cash quickly. Unless I lay people off, there won’t be
any money for licensing.”

“
I
know. I’m
going to help you
land Gecko Insurance as your first source of revenue. I think that
deal can provide close to $1.2M. From that money, you can take
about $250,000 to pay CyberAI for licensing.”

Samantha’s frown
transformed quickly. “Landing our first paying customer would be so
exciting!
We’re
scheduled to conduct a demo and presentation to
Gecko in two weeks.
I just don’t
think they’re
ready to buy that
fast.”

“
I
believe I can
get them to
move
quickly,
if everything goes well on your end.
Especially, if you can recognize spear phishing.
Tim and I go way
back. And, I have some inside information. Recently, hackers
viciously attacked Gecko. The cyber-thieves
sent spear phishing emails, with bogus .pdf insurance
attachments, to Gecko customer service agents.

“
When the Gecko agents
clicked on the .pdf files, malware was downloaded to their system
and spread everywhere. Then, the thieves snuck into Gecko databases
and stole personal financial information, including credit card
data and lists of insured assets.
This hasn’t
been announced to the
public yet. The FBI called
us.
It
appears the hackers have some ties to
the Caliphate. The whole situation gives me some leverage with
Tim.”

Samantha could barely contain herself.
Landing the first paying client for an enterprise software firm was
like scaling Mount Everest. Samantha batted her eyes at the
General. “You’re my hero,” she said, using her cheesiest
voice.

The
General
smiled broadly.
“
Of course
I am.
Now,
let’s make sure your hero
isn’t called
to testify
before
Congress.”

“
Alright, the law firm is
expecting our call on their
secure
line.” Loreal & Hammer was a
boutique law firm located 10 minutes away, in Annapolis Junction,
Maryland. The General recommended the
firm
to all members of the
Accelerator because Jim Loreal was a former NSA
attorney.

Jim answered the secure
phone.
A secure
phone ensured that voice communications over
the
regular
public telephone network were encrypted, and not subject to
eavesdropping. Voice and email were not the only forms of
communication that could be encrypted. All types of
communications—voice, satellite, radio, web, text, chat, and the
like—could be encrypted. When
‘https:’ was
visible in a browser, it signified that encrypted IP messages
were
being sent
from the browser to the web server, and vice
versa.
Encryption made
online
shopping and banking
safe.

Numerous algorithms
existed to perform encryption. Over the years, N
SA cryptographers developed many of these
algorithms.
In fact, with their chief
mission to steal foreign SIGINT, and protect US military SIGINT;
the NSA’s staff consisted of the best collection of mathematicians
and cryptographers in the world. The NSA was the lead DoD
agency
on
encryption. It told the DoD what encryption algorithms were
suitable
for
various levels of information exchange, including SECRET and TOP
SECRET.

Due to leaks of classified
information from Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden, SIGNIT
gathered from all over the world was increasingly encrypted. To
read this
information
, the NSA had to break the
codes, bypass the encryption, or persuade enterprises to
volunteer
their
encryption keys. Or, they could steal the encryption
keys.

Samantha greeted
Loreal
and told
him that General Shields was present. She pushed the
Hands-Free
button. Shields and Loreal exchanged pleasantries.

Loreal asked,
“I
f it’s ok with
you guys, I’d like to have our resident Bitcoin-Blockchain expert
join our call? I’ve gone over our earlier conversations. He’s got
some recommendations.”

The General and Samantha
concurred. Loreal introduced Larry Watkins. Watkins
possessed
broad
experience with Bitcoin and Blockchain startups.
“As I understand it, you want to make sure that your Gamers can’t
claim they’re Gamification employees?”

“
Affirmative,
Larry,”
said the
General. “We want to maintain a clear line of separation between
the Gamers and Gamification Systems. We don’t want there to be any
ties whatsoever. Gamers need to play games and earn rewards,
without knowing anything about the gamified environment, or knowing
that
Gamification Systems’
software is handling the game
.”

Samantha added,
“Currently, we’re paying the Gamers in Bitcoin. Our concern is that
Gamers could be considered employees by the IRS and state
employment agencies.
Of
course,
that would mean we’d need to
withhold and match payroll taxes.”

“
Right,” said Watkins.
“First, I’ll give you some background on your employment
issue;
then, I
want to review Bitcoin and the Blockchain. After
that,
I’ll
detail what I think is your best option. Ok?”

“
Yes, that sounds
good
,” replied
Samantha.

“
In our connected
age,
the
boundaries between employer and employee gets fuzzier every
day.
” Watkins
spoke
with
a distinctive New York accent. “This issue has
really
come to
the forefront, with the dawn of the sharing economy—the Ubers,
the
Lyfts
, the Airbnbs of the world.

“
Every state has different
laws regarding drivers that receive payment for ride-sharing—and
it’s a big headache.
Of
course,
that’s why Uber and Lyft are
aggressively moving towards self-driving cars, as
are
others. I
think Nucleus Corporation’s, A-Car, comes out
late
this year.

“
You can make the argument
that Gamers are independent contractors and are therefore
responsible for their payroll taxes. And
at first,
that’s what the
ride-hailing companies did. But
many lawsuits were filed to challenge this argument.
Given
the high profile nature of the NSA’s
investment in Gamification; I don’t recommend this
route.”

“
Good,
we agree with you so far,” said the General, with
a chuckle.

Watkins laughed. “Anytime
I talk about Bitcoin and
Blockchain; I
do a level-set. I know
you have experience with Bitcoin as a digital currency, but are you
familiar with the underlying concept of the Blockchain?”

The General replied, “I think we are,
but go ahead and give us your spiel.”

“
Act like you’re talking
to your grandma,” Samantha said. She smiled at the General like a
school girl.

“
Ok…so, the core idea that
makes Bitcoin
disruptive
is that it doesn’t require its users to
trust
one another,”
Watkins said, emphasizing the word, ‘
trust
.’

“
Let’s say I run a dry
cleaner. You come to pick up your
clothes,
and I charge you $75. You pull
out your credit
card,
or the pay-app on your phone.
This connects you to
your
payment
processor
, like Visa or Apple
Pay.
Now,
what’s
important
about
this
transaction is that
I, as
the dry cleaner, don’t trust you to pay
me.

“
I
trust
your payment
processor—the Visa, or MasterCard, or PayPal, or Apple Pay—whatever
payment processor you use. Once they allow the transaction, I don’t
worry if you’re going to pay your bill. And you don’t have to trust
me with your financial details. You
trust
the payment processor and
authorize the transaction.

“
Bitcoin gives you the
ability to ditch the payment processor. You can cut
out—completely
disintermediate—
the
middle man. This is
possible
because the Blockchain allows for decentralized trust.

“
The Blockchain is a
shared ledger—think of a spreadsheet—that everyone in the world can
simultaneously view. The Blockchain contains all the records, of
all the transactions, ever conducted with Bitcoin. It’s completely
transparent.

“
Everyone can see the
record of the transactions—two Bitcoins went to this address, 1000
Bitcoins went to that address. It’s important to understand that
the addresses are not personally identifiable. Once the
transactions
are agreed
upon,
and
entered onto the Blockchain, they can’t
be changed
. Everyone owns the
Blockchain;
no one controls
it
.