PRIME MINISTER: Can these selected people access this sensitive data?
DR PORTER: If they wish to, yes. But they will be trained not to. The DNA will be stored inside a plastic bead and injected into lesser used sections of their brains where the contents will disperse and can only be retrieved in a laboratory procedure where they are encouraged to migrate back to the bead. The bead cannot be transferred from one person to another or survive outside the body beyond our specialist laboratories. It is also biodegradable and after a period of five years, will dissolve and be absorbed into their system. All they’ve have learned will disappear with it.
EDWARD KARCZEWSKI: But by then, our nation’s security will be permanently unhackable.
PRIME MINISTER: If this bead is so small, why not just store it somewhere else? Anywhere else? Somewhere completely off-grid. Not in a human … perhaps an animal?
EDWARD KARCZEWSKI: It’s an option that’s been thoroughly investigated but only human brains have proved suitable. Besides, if it’s stored anywhere else, a record of it would always exist somewhere, placing it at risk of being hacked and held to ransom.
DR PORTER: However, a person cannot be hacked. And who would think to look inside a human being?
PRIME MINISTER: But humans are fallible. They can be compromised.
EDWARD KARCZEWSKI: Not if they’re of the correct mindset. We’ve calculated the risk potential of candidates turning rogue after we have rebuilt them and it’s negligible. Each will be eager to start their lives afresh under a new identity and will have access to funds to make this happen. But first, over several intensive months of training, their consciousness will be stripped and rebuilt according to the criteria required for a successful deployment.They will be taught to assess all risks and react accordingly, to trust no one, and to die or to kill for their country if necessary. Keeping themselves and what they know safe will be their only priority. Once their five years are complete, we will help them to relocate anywhere in the world they desire and they will be financially compensated.
PRIME MINISTER: And if they are, for example, discovered and tortured for what they know?
EDWARD KARCZEWSKI: We have developed a medical procedure to ensure the somatosensory cortex and thalamus do not recognise pain. So, our candidates could break a leg and feel nothing. Please read the attached contract of employment for further details.
PRIME MINISTER: And if they choose to sell or give our secrets away? I assume there to be consequences?
MI5: The candidates will sign the Official Secrets Act and will be reminded of the severe ramifications to any friends or families if they put the programme at any risk. We are prepared to punish not only them but anyone they have been close to by and if necessary, . They will be deemed an enemy of the state.
PRIME MINISTER: How do you propose to find these candidates?
DR SADIE MANN: Mass media and targeted online advertising. Those who complete the puzzle in the fastest time will demonstrate a defined ability to retain and process data. Under anti-terrorism laws, we have access to every recorded online click a British citizen makes. Our analysts will gather a candidate’s personal datafrom hundreds of private and public sources, including their phones, work and home Wi-Fi to make estimates about their personalities and how they might fare in different scenarios. Entrants will be filtered until we have the most suitable candidates and they will be invited for an interview. Inside this document you will find in detail everything they will undergo in the programme.
** EDWARD KARCZEWSKI has offered printed documents to each person in the room **
PRIME MINISTER: Where will you hide them once their training is complete?
, MI5: They are free to travel to wherever they please within the confines of the British Isles.
PRIME MINISTER: And how do we follow them? Do we implant tracking devices in their wrists like we do with our children?
EDWARD KARCZEWSKI: There will be no way to follow them either by GPS or by satellite. If we can’t find them, our enemies can’t either. I am the only person who will know their identities and roughly, their whereabouts.
MI5: Other members of this programme will be aware of how to communicate with them. The public message board ReadWell is the largest online book club in the world with twenty million subscribers. Our ‘Minders’ will regularly log on for updates and only if their mission is at risk will we send them a recall notice to pre-assigned safe houses.
PRIME MINISTER: William, if it came to it, have you calculated the cost of giving in to the Hacking Collective’s demands?
WILLIAM HARRIS: As our economy has grown and we are now one of the world’s fifteen wealthiest countries, we estimate the one- to two-trillion-pounds mark.
PRIME MINISTER: I need time to consider this.
EDWARD KARCZEWSKI: Unfortunately, we don’t have that luxury. After the attack on the lorry, our data is once again vulnerable.
PRIME MINISTER: You must all appreciate that if this crackpot scheme of yours backfires, it’s my name that will for ever be associated with bankrupting our economy. That is a legacy worse than taking us to war with no proof of weapons of mass destruction, the Brexit referendum or the response to Covid-19.
EDWARD KARCZEWSKI: I understand that, Prime Minister. But we need to give our programmers and engineers time to find a way of stopping the Hacking Collective, securing critical infrastructures, and creating deterrence tools and an infallible, unhackable system. And we estimate it will take at least four to five years to create it from scratch. The Minders will give us the peace of mind and breathing space to do just that.
PRIME MINISTER: And when will your programme be ready to roll out?
EDWARD KARCZEWSKI: Very soon, once we iron out some teething issues.
DR PORTER: They are very minor and I am confident it can happen within the next couple of months.
EDWARD KARCZEWSKI: Are you sure of that …
