‘A thousand dollars,’ he read aloud from his computer screen.
‘Not bad for a simple job,’ he thought, leaning back in his chair. ‘This client must be desperate. At least they know stuff like this is paid for in dollars.’
He clicked open a chat window to begin an encrypted response.
Can do. 50 per cent in advance.
A minute passed. There was no reply.
He tapped his fingers nervously on the heavy engineering college textbook on his table that was doubling up as a mousepad.
Another minute. Still nothing. He began typing again.
Are you on for this or n—
A ping interrupted him.
OK.
The confirmation was in.
‘Easy-peasy,’ he said to himself, swiftly responding with instructions to complete the transaction securely.
Use this payment link. And send me the material to work on right here.
Five minutes later, he received a notification from his offshore account confirming the expected dollar credit. Soon after, the material arrived.
‘Just a few hours of work tonight. Better than cramming pointless chapters on hardware architecture.’ He laughed.
He took a large swig of his cold coffee. Caffeine and sugar were his only allies for the night in his bare hostel room.
He wondered, as he had done on previous jobs, what his work would be used for. But for a part-time cracker like him, it didn’t matter, he reminded himself. It didn’t matter who the client was. It didn’t matter why they did what they did. It didn’t matter what they were going to do next. All that mattered was that he was getting a good stash of cash for straightforward work. Besides, on the dark web, nothing could ever be traced back to him.
Even if his client botched it all up …