One of the men in the blue suits leaned over to the other and spoke quietly in his ear. "Who is that guy asking all those ques- tions?" "Isn't that the reporter the Director was talking about?" "Yeah. He said we should keep an eye on him." * * * * * Thursday, November 5 Tokyo, Japan <<<<<<AUTOCRYPT MODE>>>>>> MR. SHAH Ahmed heard his computer announce that Homosoto was calling. He pushed the joystick on the arm of his electric wheelchair and proceeded over to the portable computer that was outfitted with an untraceable cellular modem. Even if the number was traced through four interstate call forwards and the original overseas link, finding him was an entirely different matter. Ahmed entered the time base PRG code from the ID card he kept strapped to his wheelchair. yes. CONGRATULATIONS ON THE STOCK EXCHANGE. yes. we were well served by martyrs. they are to be honored. CAN YOU HAVE MORE READY? 8 more. WHEN? 1 month. GOOD. PUT THEM HERE. SOCIAL SECURITY ADMINISTRATION, IMMIGRA- TION AND NATURALIZATION, AMERICAN EXPRESS, NEW YORK FEDERAL RESERVE, STATE FARM INSURANCE, FANNY MAE, CITIBANK AND FEDERAL EXPRESS. done. DO IT AS SOON AS POSSIBLE. THEN MAKE MORE. <<<<<<CONNECTION TERMINATED>>>>>> * * * * * Friday, November 6 New York City The Stock Exchange didn't open Friday either. Scott Mason had made enough of a stink about the erased tapes that they could no longer hide under the cover of computer mal- functions. It was finally admitted that yes, the tapes were needed to verify all transactions, especially the computer trans- actions, and they had been destroyed along with the entire con- tents of the computer's memory and hard disks. Wiped out. Totally. The Exchange didn't tell the press that the National Security Agency had been quietly called in to assist. The NSA specializes in information gathering, and over the years with tens of bil- lions of dollars in secret appropriations, they have developed extraordinary methods to extract usable information where there is apparently none. The Exchange couriered a carton of computer tapes to NSA's Fort Meade where the most sophisticated listening and analysis tools in the world live in acres upon acres of underground laboratories and data processing centers. What they found did not make the NSA happy. The tapes had in fact been totally erased. A total unidirectional magnetic pattern. Many 'erased' tapes and disks can be recovered. One of the preferred recovery methods is to use NMR Nuclear Magnetic Reso- nance, to detect the faintest of organized magnetic orientations. Even tapes or disks with secret information that have been erased many times can be 'read' after an MNR scan.