BXBX NOVEL Chapter 151 Stuxnet
30 Rockefeller Skyscraper AV Pad, September 6, 2013.
After meeting many people during the runway event and the afterparty, Vince\'s entourage grew to more than a dozen people, so he dispatched two more corporate AVs from the local branch to accommodate his guests.
The young CEO invited his FT Investments executive director, Richard Hanks, and the Alibaba Group members to fly with him privately and discuss sensitive information regarding the recent threats posed by Jamie Dimon.
As the CAV flew over the glittering Manhattan skyline towards the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, Vince stated, "Jack, I\'m sure you\'re not in New York just to attend Future Couture\'s fundraiser. I assume Alibaba is here for financial purposes like entertaining venture capitalists for your initial public offering on the stock exchange."
Vince remembered the highly monumental Alibaba IPO in his previous life that occurred in April 2014, which resulted in the most extensive initial public offering in the New York Stock Exchange\'s history, valued at $22 billion.
Jack Ma\'s company had experienced recent success due to its partnership with Future Tech in the e-commerce industry, which allowed him to pursue an IPO a few months earlier in Vince\'s current life.
The Chinese CEO confirmed the assumption by replying, "Alibaba had been fortunate for the past two years growing our user base in Asia and expanding corporate network infrastructure with Future Tech\'s assistance. Considering our growth, we\'ve decided to raise venture capital to develop Alibaba\'s goods and services further."
Their most significant competitor, Amazon, shared the same fortune by facilitating Bitcash transactions on its online market and diversifying its logistics capabilities after purchasing cargo vessels from Future Tech\'s new manufacturing port in Houston.
It was only a matter of time until the Eastern and Western consumer market giants battled for supremacy, so it was natural for Jack Ma to branch out and accept foreign investments.
Vince respectfully explained, "Jack, I don\'t want to overstep, but as your business partner, I advise postponing Alibaba\'s IPO for a few months."
Jack and his executives were confused with the young CEO\'s suggestion until Richard amicably interjected by asking, "Is the trouble with JP Morgan Chase that serious?"
Vince spent a few minutes explaining the discussion with Jamie Dimon with his companions before Richard said, "I\'ve worked in Wall Street for 15 years since graduating from Harvard, and I can assure you these bank executives are a vindictive bunch. They tear at each other\'s throats daily but aren\'t afraid to cooperate with one another if there\'s a threat to their mutual interests."
Vince agreed and replied, "I\'m already assuming all the local banks will target Future Tech in the coming days, which is why I brought up the topic of creating our own bank with Jack earlier. Richard, your department should stop trading stocks and focus on valuable commodity futures like gold, copper, and aluminum until our conflict with the banks subsides. There will be a reckoning, but I\'m not sure how it\'ll end."
Jack felt relieved to speak with Vince before he began the IPO process, or else he would need to contend with a volatile market affected by a secret war between Future Tech and Wall Street.
The Chinese CEO calmly inquired, "Other than his threat of regulating Bitcash as a currency, what else could the banks do to disrupt our operations?"
Vince honestly replied, "Many different ways, unfortunately. But we do have a few tricks up our sleeve to at least defend ourselves when the time comes. I\'m glad you\'ll visit Austin with us so that you can share our good intentions more effectively with Xi Jinping\'s administration."
Their AVs arrived at the hotel before Paris Hilton graciously provided the best suites for free to her new acquaintances and potential business partners.
While his friends explored the classically exquisite hotel, Vince was outside bidding farewell to Richard and reminding him of the corporate meeting he shouldn\'t miss the following day before entering the lobby.
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Only a few miles away from the hotel in Manhattan, JP Morgan Chase\'s lead security officer, Nicholas Lowe, spent the night reaching out to his contacts via a secure line commonly accessed by former intelligence officers from the CIA and NSA.Â
Nicholas was assigned a complex operation by his CEO and considered the options based on his extensive experience as a career spy and intel analyst.
He couldn\'t expect an offensive against NetServ\'s communication systems, such as its regional data access nodes and internet satellites, to be a walk in the park, but he had an idea in mind.
Nicholas messaged an NSA network infrastructure analyst, or what many would call a hacker, that supported him during one of his last assignments for the CIA.
The mission in 2010 was highly successful and involved him bribing an Iranian nuclear facility employee to plug a seemingly normal USB drive that contained a modified version of the \'Stuxnet\' virus into a random computer that eventually infected every machine in the remote military installation\'s local network to ultimately gain access to programmable logic controllers produced by the German company, Siemens.
The PLCs controlled the underground centrifuges removing unwanted isotopes and enriching uranium to supply nuclear power generators, based on Iran\'s public statements denying allegations of producing warheads. Still, the US government assumed the worst-case scenario and funded operations to hinder Iran\'s research progress.
Neither he nor his NSA colleague knew the exact origins of the highly malicious and effective virus that crippled the Iranian Nuclear Program, which cost $250 billion in lost oil revenues.
But both of them only needed to find the classified documents related to the operation and pay off friendly filing clerks to uncover the virus\' source.
Jamie Dimon provided him with a generous budget, so he was confident in contracting the mystery defense company for the cyber warfare mission against Future Tech.
The Department of Defense didn\'t purchase the virus from the typical companies you\'d see in Washington DC but was sourced from a random antivirus software firm based in Luxembourg.
The CIA and NSA required a precise cyber attack and paid a premium of $8 billion to develop the boutique virus but unknowingly funded and legitimized one of Digital Anarchy\'s businesses in Europe.
Anarchy employed a network of the best hackers in almost every nation on Earth under the guise of criminal and legal companies, allowing it to monopolize the highest tier of cyber-warfare services. At the same time, Enigma and his cronies profited even further by taking advantage of insider information.
During the chaos that occurred in the aftermath of \'Stuxnet\', one of Anarchy\'s cyber defense companies in Iran earned the respect of its government by containing the virus, which resulted in more defense contracts, and more money.
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Vince woke up next to Hailee the following morning, then he walked up to his hotel room window and admired the New York metropolis under sunshine.
It was old-school compared to Austin, but he still appreciated the industrial history of the Big Apple.
An hour after eating breakfast, three CAVs landed next to a private hangar at the John F. Kennedy International Airport, where a Luxury 787 was waiting for its passengers.
There were almost 20 guests, but the plane could easily fit them with plenty of space in excess.
The young junior executives were accustomed to flying on the modified corporate jets since Vince began expanding Future Tech\'s fleet to accommodate its increasing number of upper-echelon staff and foreign branch offices.
It wasn\'t too common for most people to fly in such a lavish and advanced aircraft, even for celebrity personalities like Kanye West and Paris Hilton.
The guests boarded the plane while the elegant flight attendants welcomed and assisted them by explaining the amenities available during the three-hour journey, such as the bar lounge and gaming center.
The young ones like Princess Olympia and the Jenner sisters were familiar with the plane\'s interior because of Instagram posts from BTS and the Future Tech junior executives.
Kylie garnered Kyle\'s attention, then curiously asked, "How often do you and your friends travel using this plane?"
Kyle chuckled before honestly replying, "We fly in this 787 when we accompany Vince out of town but use the corporate ones when we\'re on vacation during Christmas and between projects with our families. This one is his private jet, after all."
The other guests overheard their conversation before Kanye asked in surprise, "What?! How many of these does Future Tech own?"
Kyle answered, "Including this one, around five, but I\'m not quite sure. Though Elon uses one primarily as a taxi for SpaceX and Tesla engineers traveling between local and foreign offices."
Their new acquaintances were dumbfounded to learn how willingly Future Tech provided the best quality transportation for its executives to the tune of more than $1 billion worth of private jets.
Kanye jokingly declared, "Damn, I\'m in the wrong business!"
The rise of Vince\'s corporation looked easy from the outside. Still, its success was the culmination of his knowledge of the future and the strategy he employed in holistically capitalizing on technologies yet to be extensively explored, such as cryptocurrency and systematic AI manufacturing.
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