I thought a lighter story with some satire and a spy background could be fun. Set in the near future - or perhaps it already is happening?
I always appreciate feedback.
*****
One Friday afternoon at Vauxhall Bridge, London, a meeting took place.
"Minister, welcome, may I congratulate you on your new role. Let's go directly to the briefing room."
"Harriet, long time no see. How are you?"
Perhaps I let my surprise show that he remembered me for it had been a long time. Not very professional when you're in my role. William (never 'Bill') continued, "I always remember a woman's name and her..hrmph ... face. Now, Harry, why are you dragging me down here old girl? We could have met at my club with dinner and a nice bottle of '94 claret while you gave me all this super secret briefing nonsense and whatever else?"
He was staring at my tits! I suppose he thinks I sucked and fucked my way to be head of Security Services and will get down on my knees for him. Good God! I thought the PM was a clever woman. Even if this old Etonian boy wowed the older female voters needed for the government majority did she really have to put this imbecile in charge of national security? He'd probably repeat the briefing to the first busty blonde that offered him a blow job. The surveillance footage showed just how much he liked big boobs - the other details about the women did not seem to matter. Now we had to brief him on the most important security project in the western world. Maybe someone here could get a #metoo campaign started featuring him and get him kicked out of office? Better hold that thought for now. Perhaps this was a clever act and he was not really that stupid, even if he had never had to work for a living? You could not call spending a big inheritance followed by hosting some celebrity TV show really working! He did not seem to work that hard in parliament either. Big breath - smile now - keep it all friendly and light hearted I reminded myself.
"May I still call you William, Minister? Thank you. I am sorry to have dragged you down here but we have rules in this spy business. We have to check all the rooms are scanned for bugs and all that other spy shit. One other thing, we will need your phone before we go into the room."
"Harry, your guys sent me this phone only a few weeks ago and I've just got used to it so you don't have to give me a new one."
"No, William, I'm not giving you a new phone. It's just that whilst this phone is the most secure in the business we can never know that any phone is 100% safe, so we don't take them into class 1 meetings."
William handed his phone over glumly. If only he knew what intelligence we got from phones! Luckily they had reached the conference room by then and Harriet ushered him in and introduced him to James, her deputy, and the man who would conduct the briefing. Just as James was introducing the subject William interrupted.
"What, No spy satellite images, or holograms? I thought you boys were into all into that stuff. James Bond and all that."
At which point his laughing at his own joke turned into a coughing fit.
James covered his face with his hand for a moment then said "gesundheit".
James started the presentation with the history to date. The twin forces of austerity and technology development had led to an exponential increase in those attempting terrorist acts. The media was outraged because for too many weeks in the year there was some terrorist act committed. They had no idea we intervened successfully to stop 20 times that number from happening. The rise in terrorism in the last decade had led to many responses in different countries. Security services throughout the world tried to find ways to identify threats better. It was two British scientists combined with American money and single mindedness that developed a radical Artificial Intelligence named ISAR, 'Intelligent Surveillance And Response'. An offshoot of GCHQ, called Communications Command, ran UK operations and NSA the US operations.
William was clearly bored and had the attention span of a fruit fly. I signalled James to speed up. He acknowledged and continued.
"I am sure you have already guessed the first part of what ISAR does, minister, the name kind of gives it away. It is our AI surveilling all forms of electronic communication: internet, web, social media, radio, TV, phones, camera streams and more. "
"Quite so, old boy, jolly good show. No privacy anymore. TV cameras in the toilets now. Not quite cricket is it? "
James then got to the heart of the matter. "It is obvious that the best result is when we intervene before the terrorist act happens. Supposing though, we were able to intervene even before the terrorist act was planned? This is where the last part of the ISAR name becomes important, the 'And Response' bit."
Though James had sped through some of the earlier parts because William would most likely not comprehend the facts he was now going slow here, to try and get it to sink into William's small brain and minimal attention span.
James continued, "That response comes in 3 levels. The lowest level is level 3 and..."
At this point a puzzled look went across William's face and he interrupted. "But hang on there. Surely 3 is bigger than 1 so how can the lowest be level 3?"
Oh for goodness sake! Harriet jumped in. "William think about your days at Cambridge. Was it better to have a First degree or a Second? We work the same way as Cambridge. First is the highest. "
James picked up the presentation missing out more detail wisely. "Most people who come to our attention stay at level 3. Given the governments budget cuts - wise I'm sure - level 3s are dealt with automatically by the AI. This is the bit absolutely top secret and covered by the Official Secrets Act, known only to a handful of people. The clever part is that we use the same weapon as has often played a key part in leading them towards terrorism - Social Media and the Internet. "
William looked confused again but James wisely quickly continued. "Given your professionalism in media you know of course that social media is often considered to be an amplified echo chamber. Where similar views to your own get repeatedly fed back to you by others. That's because you 'Friend' or subscribe to others with similar views and they to you. It's easy then to believe that most sensible people thinks the same as you and so anyone or organisation saying different must be bad and wrong. A small step from there is to seek to do something about those who are 'bad' or 'wrong'. That's what terrorism is."
William who had managed to be silent for two minutes then contributed, "But James, my Twitter account followers do not all agree with me. They post disgraceful cartoons of me and say hurtful things. Constantly people say I'd say and do anything to be PM. Can this ISAR thing stop them from doing this?"
James used all his training to stay composed and avoided answering the question. If we did interfere it might be to do the opposite and try and make him see the world for what it is.
"I suppose minister the skills of a top politician are sometimes beyond the ordinary person's comprehension. Anyway, as I was saying, what the AI does is filter some of those messages that might reinforce more extreme views, some of which may even have been sent by others deliberately for that reason. At the same time selecting messages the person would not normally have seen reflecting other points of view and ideas. Sometimes the messages display tolerance and understanding and others encourage the joining of constructive groups or make the target feel more a part of the community around them."