MANI BLASKIL'S NEWSBRIEF - TECHNOMANCERS AT LARGE!
Good afternoon, I'm Mani Blaskil.
Today, I want to talk about Technomancers.
These so-called "Matrix Elite" are hiding among us and committing heinous crimes against humanity and god himself. They need to be rounded up and exterminated, for the good of all mankind.
In my opinion, the UCAS government needs to take drastic action immediately, before another god loving citizen of Seattle is killed or hacked, by one of these soulless monsters.
Let's take a call:
"Hi Mani! Long time listener, first time caller. I used to know a guy, that had his PAN hacked by a Technomancer. His bank account was wiped out and his reputation was ruined in an instant. Not sure where he's living now, but I'm sure he's squatting somewhere...
If the government won't take care of this problem, then it's time for us to take matters into our own hands."
Artwork by Mike Underhill
14 comments:
Hhhhmmmm... any of you chummers remember the "Night Of Rage" and the race riots that followed?
I almost didn't make it after the firebombs went off at Tacoma docks, Metahuman detention center.
I still have the fraggen barecode tattoo on the back of my neck from the last time people "took matters into their own hands".
I lost allot of chummers, and family to the "Hands of Five" lets use our heads on this one.
Unbelievable. Just unbelievable. Seriously, this is unbelievable.
Don't get me wrong, I still haven't met a Technomancer that I like. I really only know one and she's a mean @1%$>.
Seriously, though this kind of mass paranoia is ridiculous and it's also throwing off the scent from whatever's really going on.
Sure, a Technomancer could have been involved. But so could a shaman or a sammy. They're part of the shadows to. As far as the A-tech thing goes. I'm w/ the wetnoise/rope-a-dope theory and I'm still digging to see what's really going on. All my intel at this point seems to be pointing at some kind of a major data steal. The problem is that whatever they were stealing was so big that they had to get rid of everything so that no one would know what they stole
I was six when the Night of Rage happened, and I remember it like it was yesterday.
I remember several families from the neighborhood holed up in a local storefront, which we fortified. Many of the men had brought guns to defend ourselves with.
I remember waking up throughout the night, when somone would get too close to the store, and we'd fire off a few rounds to keep them back. I remember a few rounds that weren't really warnings, too.
Funny thing is, of the people doing the rioting, I don't remember seeing any metas.
They were humans, every one of them, and they were spewing the same kind of hate this fragger is.
Night of Rage? Too young, thank $Diety.
I do, however, know Technomancers. One I figured out when I "Rewarded" a "Hacker" with some fine (REAL) alcohol and she decided to hack the AROs of the bar we were in when it hit her brain right quick.
Learned two things that night:
One: Techies are Hackers that don't need fancy gear.
Two: Nautral Alcohol hits harder the Awakened faster than Synthahol.
First Money, your hacker is what we in the biz would call a lite weight.
Second, you just can't start rounding people up, because they don't fit the breeders mold.
Technomancers... I gotta say, they're a threat.
Calm down - I don't think they're a threat to metahumanity, and I'm not going to lynch anybody.
I just don't want them muscling in on my turf. If they're the super-hackers they're made out to be, then us normal cowboys might just be out of a job.
By the way - are they actually awakened, money? I've heard a few different takes.
I'd be prepared for a war. Not on the streets, but in the 'trix.
Aaaaahhhh, Kirby you old runt. I glad to see that someone hasn't put a bullet in you yet.
I want that pleasure for myself.
This is actually really clever signal management. And here I thought they were going to cover their tracks with a missile strike at Accelacorp followed by a torching of Adverteam - put up a little FM wet noise and get all investigating authorities to believe that they were at the start of a full-on drekstorm that was on fire - get huge security details thrown down on Aegis and Aformention.
But this is potentially better. It's called reverse piggybacking when you do it with your commlink, and when you're doing it with crime it's still called that. The idea is that if you have your own encrypted signal and you run it through with another less encrypted signal that many decryption attempts will stop as soon as they hit the first signal and edit out your real signal as additional noise (this works especially well when you are demonstrably throwing noise on the problem).
So here's how it goes: You pull a job and you throw some nice obvious AM wet noise on the problem. Then you also insert some evidence somewhere that the crime was done by some popular hated group (5 years ago it was Norse, 8 years ago it was Shedim, 12 years ago it was bugs, 15 years ago it was blood mages, and before that I was in middle school so I don't even know). Then as soon as someone "uncovers" the red herring they'll jump on it and start running off after some shadowy cabal that doesn't even exist.
:clap:
Nice signal management. From a purely professional standpoint it seems well orchestrated. It takes giant brass balls and some solid signal theory to really get a plain sight heist like this off the ground. But calling in a suspected technomancer involvement is genius. By the time four random technomancers are hanging from street lights, Lonestar won't even remember what they were investigating.
I don't see why people get all ooh'd and awe'd about the Techie's. There is no amount of "Mystic Matrix Mojo" that I've yet encountered that is a match for years of experience and a degree in advanced mathematics.
Are they all the whiz right now? Sure- and the few I've met seem to think they're pretty hot stuff (if you take my meaning) But what they believe and what I know to be true are two very very different things.
Well, she called herself Awakened, and was talking about "The Spirits of Technology", but she could have just been in a different spirit world. ;-)
As for her being a light-weight, well, I'll have to perform some scientific experiments to prove just that! Any people wish to be test subjects?
Ya made da world like dis fer ya own likins, now ya be bitchin like a ninny cuz of some fellavdakzi be betta at runnin it den you...
None of us made this world. The corps did.
And all I'm sayin' is that these technomancers better lay off my turf. Hackers will think they're a threat - I know I do.
As a long time Hacker I've got to say in my defense: the day I think "technomancers" are a threat to me or my skills is the day I buy and old rotary phone and figure out how wire it in to the power grid in my pad.
I've met one who was pretty good at mojo-hacking. She was pretty Good. I'm pretty much the best.
I almost lost my brother in the Night of Rage. This smells like the same thing all over again.
Don't let me catch these fools in my crosshairs or I may have to perform some pro bono work.
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