Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
I am writing a thriller book, that centers around a villain who commits cybercrimes. The villain wouldn't commit those crimes from his own traceable computer at home though, logically. He would use a laptop, or external computer source, the police would not know about.
If the police were tailing the man for example, and saw him on a laptop from far away, can the police hack into his computer to find out what crimes he is committing at the time, as long as they know the GPS coordinates of where the villain's computer signal is coming from, that he is sending out while on his laptop?
Location: God's Gift to Mankind for flying anything
5,921 posts, read 13,856,642 times
Reputation: 5229
They could, with a *fictional* hacking programme ...
Realistically, there are many ways to use a computer that are not reallly publically known !
Yet ...
Some *Spy* entertainment programmes, on TV now can watch anybody with a view that can only come from a drone ! You know darn well there are not that many drones around all over the country ... , or they can *tap* into any CCTV that *might* see him ?
Since your story is *fictional*, why not *invent* a new hacking prorgamme that *in reality* would scare the dickens out of everyone ?
Yes, provided they already know who he is and are tailing him. If he's using public wifi, that's an inherent risk. They could simply hack the public wifi router and packet sniff to see what he's doing. It's difficult and illegal but not impossible. The issue is they'd need to already know he is. If they trace back through zombie computers, VPN/proxy, and get back to Starbucks store number 18536, that takes time. By the time they do, he's long gone. Even tracing back through VPN/proxy is an issue as most people would use services that don't cooperate with US law enforcement.
Well basically in my story, the villain has videos, that he has uploaded into cyberspace which have other criminals on committing murder and other crimes. The videos were shot with a zoom lens, and are close up to the killers' faces, so they can clearly be identified, evidence wise.
The villain is keeping these videos as leverage to blackmail the killers into doing what he wants. The cops who are tailing the villain, know that if they can get their hands on these videos, they can use them to arrest the killers on the videos. Those killers will then cut a deal and turn evidence on the main villain.
So the cop's goal is to get the videos. So if a crook were hiding such videos in cyberspace, that he did not want anyone to know where they are, how would he hide them? Since I am not computer or cyberspace savvy, I am not sure how he would do this. I kind of need an expert's opinion, on how the villain would logically do this... and how the cops would be able to track him to the blackmail videos as he goes to extract one of them from cyberspace, if that makes sense?
I am not sure what network he would be using. What network would a crook logically use, if he was hiding leverage videos in cyberspace, that he has on others?
Even though Tor is good at what is does, the feds have infiltrated it and caught people doing stuff on it, usually by pretending to be someone else and friending the culprits. 21 Arrested In Online Drug Bust | Silk Road Drugs
That's true. It took a long time for the feds to find silk road though, where as in my case, if the police track him through cyberspace, they probably have five minutes, tops, to find where he is keeping the leverage the videos, since all the villain has to do is log in, and download one of them. The rest he is leaving in cyberspace, and that is when the police will seize the rest, when he is not looking.
I originally wrote it so that he keeps it on a flashdrive, but a few readers didn't buy it and said he would logically keep the videos in cyberspace, since it's safer from the police that way. But you think he would keep it on a flashdrive?
If he were to keep it in cyberspace, he has no reason to do it on his computer, since the police already searched that computer earlier. He would logically use a device the police would not know about. What if the police were able to find the website, in which he was keeping the leverage videos, but they needed him to access them with his password. If the police are already there, on the site, in cyberspace, can they wait for him to show up in cyberspace, ready to access them, and then follow him into where the videos are being kept, once he has entered the password?
OK, well first of all: please stop calling it cyberspace. That term fell out of favor years ago.
I'm just telling you what I would do in his shoes. There's no way I would keep them on the internet. What if I need to get to one and have no internet access? That seems illogical to me. I would want to have unfettered access to those at all time. How does he show these other villains he has them? Send them a link to a file on the internet? Upload them to YouTube?
I would have maybe a deactivated cell phone with no Sim card in it. Store the videos on that with a copy tucked safely away somewhere. I could show the videos to people on the phone. I could connect to wifi and upload them that way if I needed to.
"If the police are already there, on the site, in cyberspace, can they wait for him to show up in cyberspace, ready to access them, and then follow him into where the videos are being kept, once he has entered the password?"
No. It simply doesn't work that way. For the police to "be there, on the site" doesn't make sense. You can't "follow someone" into a site from another location.
It's your fiction story. You can invent any technology you want.
The "factual level" depends on how serious you want your fiction story to be taken by your targeted readers - Tom Clancy or Michael Crichton or Castle / NCIS level?
If Castle/NCIS level, then you can come up with the most ridiculous, non-realistic technology story you want.
Remember that movie "Disclosure", based on the book by Michael Crichton? My geek/techie/gamer friends thought it was not technologically realistic at that time. But my non-techie friends were pretty entertained by the VR technology portrayed in it. Remember when Michael Douglas' avatar actually saw Demi Moore's avatar walking in and deleting files? So sure, you can have the cops sitting and waiting on a site to nab the criminal in the act. Because it's fiction! Depends on how you support that piece of fiction. Is it believable? Well, that depends - how serious do you want your story to be taken?
As for the videos, if you keep it on a flash drive, it better not be on your villain. Otherwise, it's evidence against him if he gets nabbed. If I had incriminating evidence like that, it would be split up in packets, stored in various torrents, and retrievable from anywhere the villain is. Again, its fiction. But based on current technological reality.
For example, pirated movies. If I had pirated movies on my PC or on a flash drive in my possession, and I get busted, that's evidence against me right there. But if I had a program, that given a password and some commands that only I knew, would download all these thousands of torrents from thousands of servers on the net, assemble them in order, even if the cops busted in my door at that moment and seized my computer, ... they wouldn't have anything to charge me with if my program is not executed.
Heck, I could even booby-trap my computer to explode/melt/disintegrate (or just trash all data) if the cops tried to login or remove the drive. (i.e. anyone other than my eyeball or fingerprint check). Again, it's fiction. But based on some facts. You can even invent laws to charge the criminal with intent only! Like that movie, "Minority Report".
But I'm not going to get caught.
My flash drive is encrypted, as well, so it's pretty uncrackable even if I do get nabbed.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
