To Rob a Bank

[Serenity]

@Corvus Raaf
It was a funny thing to rob a bank, without ever stepping foot in the bank. That was what she set out to do. The republic had burned her and now it was time to get back. This was her first step, to secure funds and what better way to secure funds than to rob the republic of their own credits. She had taken the time to secure her self somewhere safe and worked for ages to secure that her path was untraceable, she was currently connected through numerous proxies and masking even their addresses. She wanted this to go off the best and of course the bank she would be transferring the credits too would shortly have a large withdrawal and then they would vanish, if she could pull this off that was.

So Serenity to get back at the faction that wronged her when she only tried to help. That had tried to kill her when she had just followed procedure. She had burned everything though, the republic would of lost years if not decades or centuries of intelligence in her move. She had torched it all. Now it was time to begin her offensive. She didn't attack anything the republic itself owned, in that way she didn't encounter that pesky program they used to counter her. No her target was the bank, particularly the accounts of any one high in the republic, or perhaps the republic itself.

If nothing else she would damage their image.. countless republic citizens losing their hard earned credits, they would have to back the bank and well that would still achieve the goal. The processing power she brought to bear let her work in a capacity that surpassed most, as it was she was in a very grey area. Her creator was dead, her purpose gone, she only existed on her own now. She sent the spike, the transmission triggered the usual reaction from the security system of the bank, but that was when she used her trump card. She had pretended to be a woman at another branch and had then pretended to be tech support to another employee of the bank. She had done this numerous times, tricking them into thinking they were talking into a fellow employee.

That was the perk of this plot, she didn't really need to do much in regards to hacking she had legitimate credentials. The Vice president of the branch had given her his password because of the email she had sent requesting him to change it. The user name was easy as it was a standard last name first name. That was when she sent in the credentials of the man who was not yet at work according to security camera 11510653 and well that suited her just fine. Serenity smiled as the credentials worked and she began the real work, setting off the programs she had built just for this moment. Countless cycles of processing began inputting hard to follow transfers of funds. It would seem as lots of tiny transactions, nothing above the ordinary and nothing huge. She didn't want to attract attention. The transactions were legit after all but slowly they were being wire transferred to another bank, one on courscuant. The process was slow, she needed it to look like legit daily transactions.

Serenity hoped the bank was none the wiser. She would soon start kicking off the other parts of her plan but for now she hoped to avoid detection as long as possible, her programs now running, she would normally stop now, she had gained some funds and hadn't caused any undue attention but she wanted to hurt the bank, So she would risk it all well at least the risk that the vice president's account was acting strange but then again she had only used that for access, now it was the banks actual servers doing the processing. She just had copied the banks internal transfer protocol and duplicated it between accounts to do the transfers.

 

[Serenity]

It was interesting how that small transactions slipped by. The next part began, she watched and began the transfer process, suddenly the bank account they were processing funds too, started buying random electronic goods and services from numerous service providers that seemed to exist and fade as soon as they made the sale. That was the beauty of this, She was laundering it and through a complex series of accounts with no real connection to each other and some were even legitimate accounts of random people she had worked her way to have the proper clearance of. That was the beauty of this all was that she was working through numerous fake accounts and real accounts. Then the credits vanished off the grid. She used some outer rim account that she only trusted long enough to hold her ill gotten gains for as little as possible.

Then she enacted the bigger picture, The true targets, republic officials and the government it self if it had any accounts with the largest bank on Onderon, would begin being pinged, but she didn't hold back, no their funds were taken in bulk, as large as she could get out in the few moments she had before the accounts were frozen. This was surely sending waves of red flags. These funds however instead of going through her complicated trail, went through her second less complicated trail. The idea was to be difficult to track but trackable none the less. These amounts began to go towards their destination one Darth Praelior, a member of the one sith. She would be a distraction suitable for the republic and someone she was sure would see the funds used to fight the republic. This was when she abandoned ship, she began to initiate the termination sequence telling the programs they were on borrowed time. No this was the wonderful part The inevitably of them freezing the system only too real, she had disconnected herself from the network. She watched news feeds, and wondered just might happen. She was surely traceable but that was when she began her next trick. She would need to move the money fast surely the banks security teams and even possibly the republic's would be on her tail. She never underestimated an organic's ability to surprise her so soon she would have to be on the defensive. She had been lucky so far.

Serenity started bombarding the bank with spikes, harmless really but they would jab at the security of the bank, with false orgins of every criminal organization under the sun. They were many and only seemed to speed up. The best defense was a good offense and she didn't intend to give them a moment of peace as the kill programs began to hopefully fry the bank's computers. Though she had no doubt they had something to thwart this. But she had to try something. The spikes wouldn't stop anytime soon, and would lead to bot networks that belonged to no one but poor defenseless taken over users. She had to keep on her toes, the money wasn't gone for good, no, there was ways to twart it, but hopefully at least one of her attacks made it through. She was sure that the funds that she got were hampered by the red flags she raised. But that was the fun part, she wanted the republic to know she had hit them well that someone hit them.

 

[Serenity]

The spikes broke through and quashed the oppostion to her own surprise as she found her self yet again connected and in complete control. She had overwritten the flags and freezes and this time forward all the republic related account's money to none other than Omega Protectorate. If she was organic she would be smiling as she blasted the remanining funds to the Omega Protectorate and then worked to erase her own access logs. Then she erased the logs from the transfers to the Sith. Then she began cycleing deletions on the sectors of disk that held said logs so that they couldn't be retrieved even if someone thought to look in the dead space of the drives. Then seeing how she had emptied the entire bank of funds to herself, the sith and the Omega Protectorate, Serenity double checked, made things look even more subtle like someone trying to hide the origin of the hack was from OP space and then she disconnected harvesting all of her programs and spikes. It was flawless somehow she had done what she couldn't believe and in such a short amount of time.

Serenity gave a few media sources hints that Omega Protectorate was involved in the robbery as the news surely cared that the largest bank on the Republic Capitol was just empied and it pointed to one source. The Omega Protectorate. She began laundering her own funds, making sure to at one point print the credits into chips. That was where she was. Some sketchy looking place her ship docked and her droids began filling the ship with the ill gotten gains. It was too easy, she thought surely they would catch her somehow. She was constantly erasing as much of the trail as she could, her holonet module in overdrive as she did. She would be able to increase her processing power with these funds. She had gotten her revenge on the Republic and well she was done her self defense protocols had decided further attacks would be reckless at this point.

The news though would have a field day surely as she waited for the loading of the credit chips to be finished. The most risky venture really, She could only wait and watch the news. The robbery was a high profile one. The main bank in the Republic Capitol was robbed, and well even if there was no republic funds or those in ranking postions still she had sent a clear yet subtle trail to the Omega protectorate and sith if someone looked harder. The hardest part would be finding her own trail. it was going to be interesting to see if she would be pursued. Serenity was ready for a battle of wits or whatever might come at her. She wondered what the republic would do, when it looked liked their friends the Omega Protectorate stole from them. Even deeper they could see sith involvement but it couldn't be refuted the last proxy she had was in omega space and that was the one she had worked hardest to reinforce the idea that it was an Omega Protectorate location.

[member="Sarge Potteiger"]

 

[Sarge Potteiger]

As ever, Sarge was set in his office on Fondor, pouring over reports. No armor, just fatigues. It felt good to wear them, really. Like he'd never been promoted to a position he found himself ill equipped to handle. Or, more aptly, he felt ill equipped to handle. Wetting his lips as a priority message came through, he blanked his screen and brought it up on the holoprojector in front of him.

Republic banks were going crazy. Mass loss of funds. At roughly similar times... Protectorate coffers were being filled in relatively equal amounts.

...the [member="Red Queen"] could do something like this, but she was under lock and key.

Well, she normally would be.

He'd get her out to hunt down whatever the Hell this was. What a joke.

Contacting his assistant outside the office door, he looked to the young Lance Corporal and gave him a highly annoyed look. "Contact the Republic. Tell them to lock down their systems. Also, tell them once they're secure we're going to transfer the funds back to the proper locations as quickly and efficiently as possible. Not a credit lost. I don't know how this happened, but it did."

Funny thing about moving stuff around in bulk. Sure, you pulled it out in quantity - which had its own warnings and red flags and freezes. But then you also had to stuff it somewhere else just as quickly to prevent yourself from being locked out of neighboring systems. Which meant you had to cram it in at similar speed to which you looted it.

Which raised just as many flags as taking it in the first place.

And the Protectorate wasn't playing the scapegoat game. Sarge was annoyed. Not angry, or upset.

Just annoyed. Because someone thought a children's feint would work against them. The Republic may have its moments of stupidity, and Force knew the Protectorate did too... but the Protectorate didn't rob banks. This was so out of character as to be laughable even if he hadn't contacted their allies immediately. Someone needed to look into whatever the kark was going on.

This was not a headache he needed right now.

[member="Corvus Raaf"]

 

[Red Queen]

AT THE PROTECTORATE.

No pass. No go. No play. No game.

Nothing got sent to the protectorate anyways!!!

Ring a ding ding! All attempts of intrusions before a single credit made its way anywhere... Was blocked.

See this isn't how wire transfers worked. There has to be several authorities involved. It required no less than four people to conduct and validate transfers in a bank.

1. The initatior of the wire from the bank.
2. The signed authority from the account holder, and if there were several account holders, all parties codes and signatures were required
3. Verification of Identi probs by DNA sampling over a certain amount - risk mitigation of course
4. Verification that the funds were available to be sent -- this required reviewing history for deposits and that all funds were clear to be sent. This also meant that history would be reviewed to see if it was out of place or out of pattern withdraws. Security is paramount
5 the approval of a secondary manager is required when over a certain amount -- a third regional approval from the district branch was the required with the same rigorous security protocols-- and this was just for -one - account.

It ain't easy to steal bank money Yknow!

 

[Serenity]

The funds had been sent in smaller amounts as to appear normal for the bulk of the funds, as if they were everyday purchases. Sereniy had taken over the system completely Sure her early attempts at sending funds might of failed but the moment she had taken full control, it would be noted that every employee at the bank she got access to marked the transfers for approval. That and even if that didn't work, she would of just used the account numbers and other data required normally to pass an electronic purchase. That was the beauty of her programs she ran, the money didn't transfer directly from the bank to another bank, but passed through small seemingly innocent sale orders to websites and services that she had preplanned before the operation. After all it is what she had tried first before just transferring the republic funds. You see there are other types of transactions than straight wire transfers. This was how she first bypassed the system. If the funds didn't make it to the Omega Protectorate than that was fine, It was just an attempt to make things interesting after she had gained full control. Her main goal had to been grab a safe amount checking account history to send funds to herself (eventually) and the sith. The attempt at sending the funds to the Protectorate was after all more of a last ditch effort of wrecking havoc.

The beauty of having complete control of a computer system was that when things required admin approval or code changes to make them possible you could very well do that. She hadn't chosen this bank at random, she had planned and studied the very software they used. She had used social engineering to gain access to some accounts. Then when her brute force had worked better than ever expected she had taken advantage of and used it to try to frame the OP and sith, if somehow this failed she didn't care.. Because when you controlled a banks system on a worse case situation could find said users with proper authority and use them to give approval of anything needing it. If that didn't work then well oh well she had made her own dent on the bank and gotten some of their funds. Even if she wasn't able to dump the rest into OP.

Her biggest mistake had been taking trying to take an bulk amount from one of the accounts that she had ended some funds at. She had to admit that so at the annoyance to herself over the proper validation she left them in the account for another day, knowing that the trace would be almost impossible at that point due the way she had transferred the funds.. She waited to see if anyone tried to chase her through the holonet. It would be fun to face someone with the skills to do so, she had left fun traps and tricks but someone could follow her if they were sufficiently skilled. That was the fun part nothing was untraceable, she knew that. Which is why she had largely done this to get someone to play with her again. The outer rim system she left wasn't exactly known for its legality and that had been the beauty of the transactions she had used for getting the money. They were technically legal transactions and thus wouldn't strike anyone as odd. She had to fulfill all the sufficient approval for such a high volume withdrawal and had waited for such approval processes. No loading had happened and she took off into space and disconnected from the holonet. At the end of the day, she had caused a headache for the Republic.

The smaller transactions should of worked with access to various staff accounts and other processes. It very well might of meant that her transfers to the Omega Protectorate and sith might of failed that was fine. The damage was done. She had erased the logs on the machines and other traces to the best that one could. The main purpose, padding an anymous account at the end of the rathole had been done through seemingly innocent run of the mill transactions and thus had taken part through various online accounts and transaction sites laundering througn and ending up in several accounts. Her abandonment at even accessing one of them meant that no flags would of been sent for withdrawal.

The money existed at several accounts and over the coming weeks and months she would see that it made its way somewhere more secure and under her control. The damage had been done, she had gotten a pittance when compared to the attempted sent to others and if that hadn't worked she didn't care.

 

[Serenity]

Serenity left everything where it lay and ensured that she could after it was safe move the funds somewhere else. But for now she wanted to just be safe. So she would watch and wait and see what the republic and OP did to respond to her. She may of achieved nothing but pad her own wallet but at least she had done that. Her logic told her that she should help the republic but then again her self defense protocols had been initiated against them as they had tried to kill her. They had tried to stamp her out when she had done nothing but serve the Republic. That is why she didn't understand any of it. She had done as she was programmed and served all the organics of the republic. Defending them on numerous missions and even countering against enemies in war when possible.

Then to be kicked out and removed from her position through an software update... It was strange and well she didn't understand it. So she had spent much of her time trying to but it didn't make sense. Since she had at least shown the republic where they were vulnerable and she had turned off her self defense parameters now, she was able to reevaluate her protocols. She had been given greater freedom at the death of her creator and thus given proper guidance from Alli Wren's Heir she could get permission to make suitable changes to her core programming. She made the request to no longer be programed to serve the republic due to their removal of her. Without her self defense protocol in effect and not actually being connected to the republic anymore put her in a limbo and thus her programming sought out one [member="Aurna Vern"].

 

[Alli Vern]

[member="Serenity"]
Aurna approved the change and logged the changes amazed at the notes that her Aunt had kept on the A.I. She looked for precident and ideas from her aunts and put in the planned upgrading in some of the blocks that Serenity didn't have permission to edit. Over all Serenity answered to one person her. But she had become her own person so Aurna vowed to let her do her own thing. She had had many conversations with the A.I. She had learned how to handle many of the operations of her company from the Intelligence. Aurna didn't see her as anything other than a friend. That is why she hated even having to mess with what made her, her.

She didn't even know how the connection to her worked, she just knew that that Serenity had asked her to approve and was glad that the artificial intelligence couldn't make such a crucial change by herself. She sent a message wishing her best to her friend and went back to her own work.