Social Network (9)
An emergency meeting was called at Facenote headquarters.
CEO Goldenberg asked in an angry voice, “What the hell is going on?”
The situation was already chaotic enough because of Enple’s tightened privacy measures.
And then, before anyone had even managed to get a grip on the crisis, WST dropped its article.
The report itself was, honestly, nothing earthshaking. But this was investigative journalism. The real revelations would begin with the follow-up pieces.
“Who’s the whistleblower?”
The head of human resources answered carefully, “We believe it’s Emily Heisen. She resigned two months ago as the Product Manager for Misinformation. It looks like she gathered a massive amount of material from the internal social media system over the months leading up to her departure.”
CEO Goldenberg thought of Emily Heisen.
She had argued repeatedly that the algorithm needed to be improved. But her warnings had been ignored.
So she chose to blow the whistle in the end?
With her level of skill and experience, she could have chosen any company she wanted. But once she became a whistleblower, the equation changed.
Everyone said they wanted whistleblowers in the abstract, but no company actually welcomed one through its doors.
And yet she had taken the risk, knowing full well she might destroy her career.
Why?
At that moment, the image of the young Asian man who had once visited the company came back to Goldenberg.
Could he have engineered this?
Continue Capital had poured into heavy short positions before anything happened.
Given that they stood to profit if Facenote’s stock fell, there was certainly a chance he was involved. WST had also maintained a close relationship with Continue Capital for quite some time.
Mike Goldenberg knew how many investments Continue Capital had turned into successes, and how many companies it had brought to its knees.
But Facenote was the fifth-largest big tech company in America by market cap.
Even if you added together every company Continue Capital had ever gone after, the total still wouldn’t come close to Facenote’s scale.
That was why he hadn’t taken the news that they were shorting it too seriously.
But to attack us like this? Was what he said that day a declaration of war?
Just how much damage would the article do?
There had always been controversy around the algorithm, but until now it had never amounted to much.
This time, though, the mood was different.
If they responded poorly, the backlash could be enormous.
“Who on the inside is close to Emily Heisen? Get someone to contact her right away.”
“Understood.”
It didn’t matter whether they tried to exploit a personal connection, bribe her with money, or threaten a lawsuit.
They had to keep her from appearing in interviews or anywhere else in the media.
CEO Goldenberg said firmly, “Stop her by any means necessary. I don’t care how much it costs.”
Mark Phillips, a United States senator from Georgia, was in the middle of a packed schedule when his aide brought him a report.
“You’ve received a call from someone named Han Miru.”
At that, he was genuinely startled.
“Is that really true?”
The senator remembered what had happened the previous year.
He had taken leave and boarded a flight to Orlando with his family for a vacation. But right before takeoff, a young Korean man on the runway had caused a commotion, insisting that there was something wrong with the engine, and the plane had been forced to return to the gate.
At the time, Phillips had only thought some lunatic had ruined a family trip.
But the engine really had exploded!
If that had happened after takeoff, the plane could have gone down.
That young man had saved him, his family, and everyone else on board!
No amount of gratitude would have been enough.
And yet he had left without asking for anything in return. He had never requested a favor, and he had never once made contact afterward.
Then, by sheer coincidence, Phillips had heard the name again.
It was the name of one of Continue Capital’s co-CEOs.
Han Miru? Could that be the same young man?
From what he had heard through his daughter Elena, the man had exposed a fund fraud in Korea before coming to the United States to invest.
He wasn’t sure how common the name Han Miru was in Korea, but this couldn’t have been a coincidence.
The senator recalled the face of the Asian young man he had seen that day.
A steady, unwavering gaze full of certainty. A confident expression.
He had thought then that the young man would surely succeed, but even so, he had succeeded too quickly, and too spectacularly.
Co-CEO of Continue Capital!
Each and every investment Continue Capital made shook American society.
Starting with the collapse of Thomas Motors, then the acquisition of Snow Crash, then the ransomware disaster at Blackwood International, and more besides.
No wonder the man’s name had reached the political world as well.
After finishing the memory, Senator Phillips called the number that had reached him.
“This is Mark Phillips. I’m told you called.”
Nice to hear your voice, Senator. This is Han Miru.
Hearing that voice brought the memory back with such force that Phillips felt unexpectedly glad.
“How have you been?”
Well. I’ve been working back and forth between Korea and the United States. Right now I’m in America.
“So you really are the head of Continue Capital?”
Oh! You knew about that?
“My daughter told me you said you were going to become the world’s greatest investor. Seems you’ve come pretty close.”
Haha! Not at all. I still have a long way to go.
Just how high does he intend to climb?
In any case, the fact that he was reaching out meant there had to be a reason.
“Do you have something you wanted to tell me?”
Yes.
“What is it?”
I’d like you to meet a reporter.
Phillips could guess why.
“Is this about Facenote?”
Yes. If you meet her and hear what she has to say, I think it’ll help you.
No matter how much he owed the man for saving his life and his family, he had no intention of indulging an improper request that abused power.
But meeting a reporter was hardly a huge favor.
“That’s all?”
Yes. Ah—and everything she tells you is true, so you can trust her.
If I personally asked him to hold a congressional hearing, that would amount to a request for influence.
But asking him to meet one reporter wasn’t a problem. It would be his decision what to make of Trish O’Connor’s story.
I thought back to the first life.
Back then, Senator Phillips had pushed for a congressional hearing.
But with no whistleblower coming forward, and with fierce resistance inside the Democratic Party as well, the effort had eventually collapsed.
What would happen this time?
I met with Trish and told her the situation.
“I’ve arranged an appointment, so you should go to Washington D.C.”
She looked surprised at my words.
“By myself?”
“I’d like to go with you, but if I show up with you now, it won’t look great.”
Since I was shorting the stock, I was already a party with a direct financial interest.
I could make the introduction, but if I pushed beyond that, it could create problems.
“Try to win over Senator Phillips.”
Trish looked completely flustered.
“M-me? A senator? I d-don’t even know what you’re ta… talk…”
“……”
Why was she so shocked?
Then again, her counterpart was a political heavyweight often mentioned as a future president.
Just getting the interview would be pressure enough. Asking her to persuade him as well must have multiplied the pressure a hundredfold.
“You’ll do fine, Trish.”
“You really think so?”
“Of course.”
“Ah, okay. I’ll do my best!”
Thankfully, she looked like she’d found her footing again.
Once you short a company, you have to push its stock down as far as possible.
Unlike in Korea, in the United States it was legal to publish a short-seller report after entering a short position, as long as there was no falsehood in it.
Unlike in the first life, I already had a whistleblower lined up, and a congressional hearing was about to be held as well.
I thought back to my conversation with CEO Goldenberg.
No matter what happened, he intended to acquire LinkLapse. Could this be enough to break that resolve?
Since I was already doing it, I might as well do it properly.
I made a call to somewhere.
“Hello, this is Han Miru. I hope you’ve been well.”
A woman’s voice answered.
Hello. What can I do for you?
Her name was Eleanor Reed.
She was an FBI cybercrime investigator.
“I hear your case numbers have been excellent lately. Partnering with Snow Crash was the right move after all, wasn’t it?”
At that, she laughed out loud.
Yes. We’ve been getting a lot of help.
During the Blackwood International ransomware incident, Snow Crash had become a cloud client of both the FBI and the NSA while helping resolve the case.
The two agencies had used the cloud to gather information and analyze data.
After that, the FBI and NSA’s case-closure rates had shot upward.
Snow Crash and the agencies had presented it as the result of cloud efficiency, but the real reason was different.
Mona App was essential for criminals.
Just as Americans used WhatsApp and Koreans used TTalk, criminals used Mona App.
But not just anyone could use it.
You had to buy a specialized phone on the black market, then pay a $5,000 sign-up fee and a $5,000 annual subscription, along with recommendations from three existing members.
Petty crooks couldn’t even get in the door, which was why Mona App had come to function almost like a status badge among criminals.
Just using Mona App meant you were a serious offender of a certain tier. To criminals, a smartphone with Mona App installed was like a supercar or a luxury watch.
The biggest reason criminals preferred Mona App was its formidable security.
It was said to be impossible to hack, even with a supercomputer.
…Unless the developer had built a backdoor into it, that was.
Syd had provided law enforcement with a program that could peer into Mona App conversations.
Inside Mona App, criminals discussed everything from small-scale drug deals to full-blown terrorist plots.
The FBI and NSA used that information carefully in their investigations so as not to expose the source.
They even let some things slip on purpose, worried that catching too many cases too neatly would make people suspicious.
She asked me,
What can I do for you?
“I have something I’d like to report.”
Report?
“Yes. It’s material CEO Lucas found on the dark web. I think the FBI ought to take a look.”
WST’s investigative report on Facenote shook American society to its core.
Using a wide range of internal documents as evidence, reporter O’Connor followed up with pieces that laid out Facenote’s problems one by one, analyzing what those problems had caused and how they had affected society.
WST announced that it would share the internal documents with other media outlets as well, and fifteen American news organizations—including the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, and CNN—formed a consortium to publish a series of articles exposing Facenote’s misconduct.
- What? Is this real?
- What do they mean, it’s addicting teenagers and causing depression?
- They don’t stop the spread of hateful content just to keep users online longer? Are they insane?
- Come on, no way. This sounds like a conspiracy theory.
- Is this why they say social media is a waste of life?
- What exactly is Continue Capital? Did they short it after hearing from the whistleblower first?
- Isn’t this illegal short selling?
- The SEC needs to step in right now and investigate!
- From what they just released, it sounds like they had already written an internal report and shorted the stock before the whistleblower came forward.
- Their own analysis matches what the whistleblower said. But Continue Capital used it first.
- These guys are unreal with their timing, lol.
- Damn it, now that Continue Capital shorted it, all the other hedge funds are rushing in and shorting too.
- I wish all the short sellers would just die T_T
As the situation snowballed, the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Federal Trade Commission finally announced that they would begin investigating the leaked Facenote internal documents, the so-called Facenote Papers.
In the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, Democrats and Republicans agreed to hold a hearing, and a subpoena was issued to CEO Mike Goldenberg.