kvmb Chapter 431: Is there a mole within the organization?
Chapter 431: Is there a mole within the organization?
The celebration was organized by Li Mo.
He booked three tables in the cafeteria downstairs at the Spark R&D Center, ordered barbecue delivery, and had two cases of beer brought over.
Ni Guangnan said he had a bad stomach and didn't drink any tea. He sat in the corner with his teacup, watching a group of young people making a fuss.
Li Mo took the bottle and toasted everyone in turn. When he got to Ling Yun, the bottle tilted and half a glass of beer spilled onto the table.
"Brother Ling, if our chip goes into mass production this year, you have to treat the whole team to a trip to Sanya."
Ling Yun took the cup and took a sip. "We'll talk about mass production later. Finish your cup first."
Li Mo tilted his head back, drank it all, wiped his mouth, and grinned widely.
It was almost eleven o'clock when the event ended. Ling Yun asked Zhao Hu to see Ni Guangnan off first, while he stayed behind to watch the cafeteria ladies clear the tables. Li Mo waited for him at the door, a half-eaten kebab stick dangling from his mouth.
"Aren't you leaving yet?" Ling Yun asked.
"I won't be able to sleep when I get back," Li Mo spat the stick into the trash can. "Go sit in the office for a while and run through the simulation data of the low-power solution."
"I'll run again tomorrow."
"It'll only be a short while. Let's get the test running and see the results tomorrow."
Ling Yun glanced at him but didn't stop him. The two left the cafeteria, and a night breeze made Li Mo shiver. He zipped his jacket up to his neck.
A few lights were still on in the R&D center building. Ling Yun went up to his office on the third floor, closed the door, and flipped through the pile of documents on his desk.
He picked out the monthly reports from the PC business, the expansion plan for Xinghuo Internet Cafe, and Xinvino's OLED yield report. He then made a few marks on the yield report.
The sound of Li Mo's footsteps came from the corridor outside, followed by the sound of the door of the next office opening and closing.
Ling Yun glanced at the clock on the wall; it was 11:40.
He put down the report, picked up his cup, and went to the tea room to get some water. The tea room window faced the parking lot, and one of the streetlights downstairs was broken, leaving a dark patch.
He turned on the tap, filled a cup, and as he turned to walk back, he heard the sound of a chair falling over in Li Mo's office.
Then Li Mo cursed, his voice low and muffled, coming through the door.
Ling Yun walked over and knocked on the door. "What is it?"
There was a two or three-second silence inside. "It's nothing, I just tripped."
Ling Yun pushed open the door. Li Mo was squatting on the floor, holding up a chair, his computer screen lit up with lines of code. He looked up at Ling Yun, his expression grim.
"Are you really alright?"
"Really." Li Mo straightened his chair and plopped down. "It crashed three times because it ran out of memory while running the simulation. This crappy machine, I'll have the IT department replace it tomorrow."
Ling Yun stood at the door without going in. "We'll deal with the memory shortage tomorrow. Go back to sleep."
Li Mo waved his hand. "You go first, I'll save this and then go back."
Ling Yun looked at his face. Li Mo's eyes were fixed on the screen, his fingers tapped the keyboard twice, then stopped.
"You saved your game five minutes ago."
"I'm saving it right now," Li Mo turned around and smiled. "Alright, alright, it's stressful having you watching me like this. You should go back now; the car's still waiting downstairs, right?"
Ling Yun didn't say anything more. He closed the door and heard the sound of keyboards clicking again inside, this time at a much faster pace.
Lingyun was woken up by a phone call at seven o'clock the next morning.
On the other end of the phone was Lao Zhou, the head of the security department. He spoke in a low voice, as if he were covering the microphone. "President Ling, the R&D center's server was hacked last night."
Ling Yun sat up. "When?"
"Around 11 p.m. The specifics are still under investigation, but several of Mr. Li's development machines were remotely accessed, and there are records of files being copied."
Which documents?
"The RTL design document for the StarCore chip, as well as some simulation data."
Ling Yun threw back the covers and stepped barefoot onto the floor. "Where are you now?"
"The server room. I asked two people to check the logs together, and they've been checking them since 3 a.m. until now."
"Don't make a sound. I'll be there in twenty minutes."
He hung up the phone, put on his clothes, and washed his face. He turned the tap on full blast, letting the cold water splash on his face. He stared at himself in the mirror for a few seconds, then picked up his phone and called Zhao Hu.
"Come pick me up, we're going to the R&D center."
When Zhao Hu's car stopped at the entrance of the R&D center, it was just dawn. Ling Yun got out of the car and went straight to the third-floor computer room.
Old Zhou was squatting next to the server rack, clutching a stack of printed log papers in his hand. When he saw Ling Yun come in, his knee cracked as he stood up.
"Mr. Ling, we've figured it out. The intruder used a former employee's account, and the permissions weren't revoked; they logged in directly from the external network."
Which departing employee?
"His name is Zhang Wei. He used to be an assistant engineer in General Manager Li's department. He left in March, saying he had family matters to attend to and went back to his hometown in Henan."
Ling Yun took the log and read it line by line. The paper was covered with IP addresses and timestamps: 1:17 AM, 1:23 AM, and 1:31 AM. There were three logins, each lasting no more than five minutes, and the file copy path pointed to an external cloud storage service.
"Tracing the IP address," Lingyun said, "I need to know where the other party logged in from."
Old Zhou nodded, then dragged a laptop out from behind the server rack. The screen displayed a network topology diagram. He swiped his finger across the touchpad a dozen times, bringing up a table. "We traced it this morning; the IP went through at least four hops, the final destination—"
He paused.
"Where is the final destination?"
"In Wuhan," Lao Zhou said, "a network information center under the China Electronics Technology Group Corporation."
The only sound in the server room was the hum of the server fans.
Ling Yun folded the diary paper twice and stuffed it into his pocket. "Who else knows about this?"
"It was just me and two people who did log analysis. I told them to keep their mouths shut."
"Keep investigating," Ling Yun said. "Check every single account that has access to the StarCore project. Make a list of all accounts that have left the company but haven't been deactivated, those whose passwords haven't been changed in a long time, and those that have logged in from different locations."
"clear."
Ling Yun walked out of the server room. The fluorescent lights in the corridor weren't all on yet, and some sections were dark. He walked to Li Mo's office door, which was locked. He peeked through the crack in the door; the computer screen was black, and a coat was draped over the back of the chair.
Zhao Hu walked over from the stairwell. "President Ling, I checked the parking lot surveillance footage. Around midnight last night, a black sedan without license plates was parked outside the wall for over an hour."
"Will you be able to get a picture of people?"
"It's too far away, I can't see clearly. But," Zhao Hu took out his phone and showed a screenshot, "around 1:30 a.m., someone walked from that direction to the roadside and got into this car."
Standing in the empty corridor, Ling Yun suddenly remembered Li Mo's curse in the office last night, and how he didn't dare look at him when he squatted down to hold up a chair.
"Don't notify Li Mo yet," Ling Yun said. "Hold a company-wide safety training meeting this morning and inform all department heads that they must attend. Use the excuse of 'annual routine safety review'."
Zhao Hu nodded, turned to leave, then turned back. "President Ling, Li Mo, he..."
I know what I'm doing.
Outside the window at the end of the corridor, the parking lot was getting busier. The R&D center was starting to get lively; the elevators jingled, and people were chatting and laughing in the lobby downstairs. Ling Yun stood in front of Li Mo's office door, staring at the closed door for a long time.
Around eight o'clock, he took out his phone and dialed a number.
"Wang Degui, help me investigate someone. Zhang Wei from Zhoukou, Henan, left Xinghuo in March."
The sound of flipping through a notebook came from the other end of the phone. "What are you looking for?"
"Find out if something happened to his family, find out where he is now, and what he's doing."
"Okay. I'll give you the result as early as tomorrow."
Ling Yun hung up the phone and put it in his pocket. He turned and walked towards his office. As he passed the break room, he saw the light on through the half-open door. Someone had just made tea; the cup was still steaming, but the person had already left.
He stopped and glanced at the cup. It was a white porcelain cup with the Xinghuo logo printed on it, and a thin crack ran along the side of the cup from the rim to the bottom.