Not Dead Yet

56

Roy Grace sat behind his desk in his office and looked at the High Tech Crime Unit investigator Ray Packham, who took a seat opposite him. ‘So, tell me?’

Grace liked the guy a lot, but always felt, because he looked so much like a bank manager, that he should be asking him for a loan, rather than for the deeply sensitive information that Packham, who was a technology genius, seemed to be able to mine from the innards of any computer or phone.

‘Well, Roy, we found a suspicious code embedded within your BlackBerry’s software. It did not correspond to any of the apps you have downloaded. We reverse engineered it, and found it’s a sophisticated form of data logger. It encrypts all calls you make or receive, and texts – and sends them via email using your phone’s 3G.’

Grace felt a chill ripple through him. ‘All my calls?’

Packham nodded. ‘I’m afraid so. I’ve checked with Vodafone, who are very co-operative these days.’

‘Where’ve they been sent to?’

Packham smiled nervously. ‘I did warn you that you’re not going to like this.’

‘I’m not liking this.’

He gave him the number, and Roy Grace wrote it down on his desk pad. He looked at it, thinking hard. It looked familiar.

‘Recognize it?’

‘Yes, but I can’t immediately place it.’

‘Try entering it in your phone,’ Ray Packham said, with a wry smile.

Copying the numbers off the pad, Grace tapped them in. As he entered the last digit, a name appeared on the display of his BlackBerry.

Grace stared for some moments in disbelief. ‘That fucking little shit!’

‘I could not have put it more eloquently myself, chief!’