Ask Nar Shaddaa Slicer's Paradise

[Vara Dramm]

In the slicer underworld, there is one thing that someone may recognize is a common trait among slicers of all ages and sizes, and that was the slicer's trademark curiosity. Often times, this showed itself as a slicer probing a government or cartel socket for information, not even in malicious intent. Other times, this may be the creation of challenges and games among the slicer and intelligence community.

Vara had always been interested in the latter. She had partaken in challenges before, but she wanted to see just how many people could pass these tests. This required a few days of planning, making sure that it would test the skills of any potential winners. She worked with a couple other slicers she was close to, making sure that these challenges couldn't easily be solved by some droid and a computer spike.

Now, the time had come for her to see who would pass this test. Perhaps even, they could collaborate on the next one, or an even more daring project. Vara transmitted the file across the planetary holonet. In order to access this file, one would need a specific rootkit, then be able to handle a simple decryption on a file in droidspeak. Once someone had gotten past this first task, they'd be greeted with a message; "Now the game begins. 01010011 01100101 01100011 01110010 01100101 01110100". Attached would be a dummy account on the holonet that they would contact to receive the next steps.

 

[Thweezo Vrazal]

It was a weekend night, nowhere to go and nothing to do, and as was so often the case in this scenario, Thweezo Vrazal found himself sitting at the kitchen table of his dingy, two-room apartment, hammering away at his keyboard in naught but his underwear. Something he liked to do in his off hours was show off to all the wannabe slicers lurking on the Holonet, using his deeper knowledge of computer systems to digitally smack them around. Granted he mainly did this to code-copying kids rather than the real, top-line slicers who might pose a threat, but still. Wins were wins.

So while scrolling through his third slicing forum that night, he found people chatting about some kind of slicing challenge that had just been posted and that nobody could crack. Challenge ac-farking-cepted, boys and girls. Thweezo cracked his knuckles and stretches his snout as he clicked on the link to the test.

He began with simply vulnerability and packet analysis, looking for the easy ways in that sometimes flew under the radar of more talented slicers. Sometimes the real security system is the other guy's stupidity. When nothing came up he realized this wasn't a loose document, whoever made this had covered their tracks and all the usual firewall gaps. The game was now afoot. Thweezo didn't want to reach for one of the proper worms he'd been concocting, he didn't want to know what one of those might do when loose on the Holonet. Not yet at least.

He tried the spoofers next, a small file of programs replicating some common interstellar electronic companies designed to open up backdoors in certain systems. Again, no response. The rootkits came next, a much longer list of procedures and processes and some very unpleasant files designed to subvert control of a system. After a few trials, one finally managed to click, opening up a file of seeming gibberish in Droidspeak. One quick decryption later Thweezo found himself staring at a particularly playful message and a dummy Holonet account.

Curosity? Piqued. He clicked, and waited to see where he went next.

 

[Vara Dramm]

It was late in the evening, even for Nar Shaddaa. The usual riff-raff of the Smugglers Moon had settled down for the evening as most of it's inhabitants were either going to sleep or passing out. Vara's night was wrapping up as well, she had been watching over Drakkett's Droids, a small droid shop in the lower levels while the titularly named owner, Drakkett, had the night off. It was the least she could do for him, after all he had done for her.

Working at the shop was a simple task, most of the time there was either spent skimming the holonet or answering menial questions for prospective buyers. The shop didn't have any droids that needed working on, and the inventory was done. This meant that Vara was free to do whatever she pleased, as long as she was on the clock. She opted to browse a few holonet forums, watching in real time the bickering between script-kids and genuine slicers. It passed the time, even if she never actually partook in the discussions.

The time had come for the shop to close and Vara made sure to lock up the shop securely. Both her and the owner knew the vulnerabilities of an electronic lock and opted instead on an old fashioned pad and key lock. Vara sighed as she lit a deathstick and put her hood up, making her way back to the small apartment she resided in. It had been a few days since she posted her challenge, but had yet to find a challenger who could crack it as of yet. With her free hand, she booted up her datapad again during the walk, accessing the virtual system she had running on it. She noticed there was a successful log-in attempt to the dummy account she had set up for her challenge and she nearly shouted out with glee.

Whomever had accessed the account would see very limited information on the account that signed up. "First Name: MYSTERIOUS, Last Name: STRANGER. Location: NULL." Any information used to sign up the account was used on with just as clearly bogus information.

However, there was a drafted holonet message, not sent out to anyone. If viewed, it read:

nO sCRIPT Kiddies :) Grats on step 1. R U a cop? nO More remOte Access. Level 72. Old 'WOMP RAT CANTINA'. Try UR hand at Socket Surfing

Vara knew it may be another day or two before she met this mystery slicer, but this was a test on technical prowess, not a riddle-filled scavenger hunt. The Womp Rat Cantina she found was not too far from her own residence, it had closed down and was shuttered over a decade ago, and no one ever bothered to move back in. She explored it one day in her youth, finding that it had a databank system that was not connected to the holonet and would require someone to slice in locally.Due to neglect or prior intrusion, the original data was corrupted and unusable, but she was still able to re-write a new message onto it, providing a perfect opportunity for her to leave a clue for this individual.

@The Captain