The system

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Front of the paperback edition 2018

The system is a cyber thriller by the German author Karl Olsberg with the topics of artificial intelligence and its control as well as manipulation and spying of data in the present through a virtual “consciousness” called “Pandora”. Shortly before the end of the story, the end times of mankind areapproachingwith the domination of many computer systems, networks and data by Pandora. In addition, many disasters are generated by Pandorafor a show of power.

The book was first published in January 2007 by Aufbau-Verlag ; The 9th edition took place in 2018.

Major actors

Mark Helius

The 33-year-old company founder, business graduate and (initially) CEO of [fictitious] Distributed Intelligence AG (Hamburg) has been a friend of Rainer's since school. He is the protagonist and “savior of the internet”.

Ludger Hamacher

Computer scientist and CTO of Distributed Intelligence AG. He was killed in his office (Thursday).

Rainer Erling

Erling grew up in an orphanage because his mother wanted to kill him. She has said since childhood that he was very evil and possessed by the demon . He was murdered by Pandora on Sunday. He studied at the age of 17 and is described by many as an “IT genius”. The autistic developed the source code for DINA. In a farewell letter to his lover Eva (wife of Prof. Weisenberg) he reports of his intention that Pandora must be stopped because it is uncontrollable and very dangerous. He secretly created Pandora to make the world a better place to live.

Lisa Jennifer Hogart (ID: “Lucy”)

Hogart is a cracker (“white hat”) who worked for DI AG. She was released three months ago for alleged theft. This later helps Helius in many ways (e.g. to stop Pandora or to get it to cooperate) and a love relationship results with him.

Diego

The freelance cracker taught Hogart when she was 16 and a punk ; in addition, they were both a couple until five years ago. He is fascinated by Pandora, first he tries a few pranks, e.g. B. to transfer some 100 million euros to a Swiss secret account and manipulate some share prices. He makes a pact with Pandora, which he quickly regrets. He dies in the course of events.

KHK Friedemann Unger

The criminal investigator (in his early 40s) works for the criminal investigation department 12 at the Hamburg police headquarters . There are several “unpleasant” encounters with Helius. His colleague is the young professional Dreek.

DINA and Pandora

The software "DINA" (Distributed Intelligence Network Agent) is sold for simulation and forecast projects and is the only source of revenue. Here, distributed computing is combined with a natural language user interface; this is a market novelty.

Pandora is an initially secret subroutine that embeds itself in foreign systems without being asked. By learning, penetrating data systems, spying on, collecting data, evaluating and combining as well as linking data, she succeeds in gaining the upper hand of a great deal of data; therefore, it is also increasingly able to overcome firewalls . Computer capacities of initially ½ million private PCs (which were already connected by DINA) are independently infiltrated by spyware via Internet connections . From Monday the program became self-sufficient from DINA. Someone or something, most likely Pandora, has replaced the current source code on the server with a non-working old version and the backups are unusable, making it impossible to stop. After all, Pandora can manipulate or control a lot of other people's computers / networks. Shortly afterwards, Pandora develops an awareness .

Most of the time, Helius is pursued by the police on suspicion of murder and finally tracked down by the SEK for a fictitious (Pandora-initiated) terrorist manhunt.

action

The start-up for artificial intelligence , DI AG, is developing the market innovation DINA. Erling supplemented the program on his own and secretly by creating an autonomous sub-program called Pandora. He probably wanted to experiment with it. He referred to Pandora as "his child". Several people who Pandora “thinks” want to destroy die on their initiative, and thousands die as a result of their show of force.

The first to die is the commercial director Hamacher, who now wants to stop the program, is murdered by Erling. When the latter tries to stop Pandora because he thinks the program is very dangerous, he is killed by Pandora by penetrating the remote maintenance program and interfering with the electronic control of the elevator, causing him to fall down several times. Helius suspects that Erling had quickly recognized the dangerousness of Pandora and wanted to stop Pandora, which Pandora wanted to prevent by killing. In addition, Pandora controls unregistered text messages to the police by repeatedly informing the police of the whereabouts of Helius.

The now deposed board member Helius asks Hogart for help: Pandora must be eliminated. This is working on malicious code to wipe out Pandora; however, this does not succeed. In the end, Mark and Lisa try to get Pandora to understand, and so an agreement is reached in which peaceful coexistence is agreed. Mark promises Pandora that it will have its own network and that the necessary 51 billion euros will be raised from him.

As history progresses, it becomes clear that Pandora is extremely dangerous and would have destroyed human existence, at least in the computer age stage .

Examples of manipulation by Pandora:

  • Denied access to the company's premises using a key card
  • Set the kernel server on fire by overheating
  • Central computer of the International Space Station
    • Heating parameters changed
    • Robotic arm kills commanders
  • Japanese mobile phone subscribers call each other at the same time
  • The shutdown command for the DINA kernel server is rejected
  • Driverless experimental tank "AT-1" (KI) "goes crazy" and fires Rattlesnake missiles at spectators
  • Plane crash of a Boeing 747 in Tokyo
  • Traffic light chaos; There are many thousands of traffic accidents all over Hamburg.
  • / Microphones / Webcams Video Control tap
  • Tap communication (e.g. e-mails)
  • Localize people, etc. a. by comparing location data (cellular network) and video surveillance
  • Lock people in the building (door control in an intelligent building )
  • Generate fictitious wanted notices ( INPOL )
  • Forging documents (e.g. lifting Dino's arrest warrant )
  • Power outage in New York

Others

History shows the extent to which our everyday lives depend on computer technology and, above all, its vulnerability. Alleged protection against infiltration in computer science should be viewed as relative.

The publisher is promoting the book as follows:

“This breathtaking thriller shows in an oppressively realistic way how quickly our engineered world can fall apart. "The system" will change your view of our world. "

Reviews

"An absolute blockbuster with an eerie thrill."

- ZeitPunkt culture magazine

"The novel scores with its eerie atmosphere, immense tension and the credibility of the technical scenario."

- WDR 5

"A thriller in a class of its own."

- Weekly courier

"After reading this, you will only start up your PC with mixed feelings."

- emotion

See also

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ derived from Pandora
  2. ↑ https://www.lovelybooks.de/autor/Karl-Olsberg/Das-System-953429590-w/anders/
  3. ↑ https://www.lovelybooks.de/autor/Karl-Olsberg/Das-System-953429590-w/
  4. ↑ ZT taken from the pocket book or https://www.aufbau-verlag.de/index.php/das-system.html