American Detective: Starting as a Rookie Cop in an American TV Show

Chapter 1299 Finch's Story

Harold Finch's high school grades were not ideal, but he was admitted to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) after all.
Well, that's because he showed an extraordinary mind in mathematics and programming, especially computer science, since he was a child.

According to Finch himself, from the time he graduated from college to before 911/, his life had been devoted to accumulating wealth and he dreamed of becoming the second Bill Gates.

This was not difficult for him at that time. He used probability theory to obtain the first gold from Las Vegas, wrote a small program, and exploited small loopholes in the Wall Street securities trading system to conduct high-frequency short-term trading.

But after the disaster that affected the perceptions of most Americans, Finch had an epiphany: money didn’t seem to be that important.

Of course, in Jack's view, this might be because money was just a number to him at that time.

When the need for wealth is met, some people will turn to the pursuit of power, fame, fortune and even some intangible things such as immortality, such as some wealthy people whose names contain the character "horse".

The remaining small part begins to think about the meaning of life.

911 may have been just an opportunity for Finch, but in any case, everything changed when he received a call from a friend in the Pentagon.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was established the following year, and at the same time, a series of federal departments related to defending against terrorist attacks, including the FBI and NSA, were given broad powers by the Patriot Act.

As we all know, if you want to get some fresh air in an airtight room, it is best to declare at the beginning that you want to tear off the entire roof. Then someone will compromise and suggest, why don’t we open a door?
After lengthy discussions, the final result may just be to open a window, but this has achieved the purpose of breathing, which is the art of political compromise.

But the shock of 911/ seemed a little too great for the entire federation. When someone actually suggested opening a window, everyone simply smashed through all the walls of the house.

In short, when it comes to the actual implementation stage, as long as the NSA puts on the hat of preventing terrorism, it actually has the power to check every email and monitor every phone call.

Putting aside the issue of abuse of power, the sheer volume of this information makes it almost impossible to analyze and categorize it solely by human effort.

Besides, this is not just a matter of manpower, but also a matter of timeliness.

To prevent terrorist attacks from happening, the most important thing is to be able to identify terrorists from ordinary people in advance.

Hearing this, several FBI agents present, especially Jubal, a veteran agent who has been in the bureau for nearly 20 years, could not help but nod their heads slightly.

"Potential Danger Plan", "Spinnacle Plan" and "TIA Plan" were all proposed during that period.

Some plans were implemented but the results were not good. Some plans were boycotted because they made some "people" feel that their privacy rights were violated, triggering some unpleasant associations similar to the Watergate Scandal, and ultimately had to be abruptly ended.

Others, such as the "TIA Project", remain merely concepts due to excessive complexity and technical limitations.

This plan proposed by DARPA (Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency) is more of a concept than a plan.

It aims to identify and predict terrorist activities by collecting and analyzing large amounts of information, with the ultimate goal of establishing a comprehensive information perception system to better protect national security. It involves the collection, storage, management, and analysis of large amounts of data, including but not limited to social media information, communication records, financial transaction records, etc.

The "TIA Project" attempts to rely on advanced technical means and algorithms to process and analyze these massive data, build complex algorithm models, and automatically identify potential danger signals.

Even going a step further, some have proposed identifying and analyzing individual and group behavior patterns, including analyzing individuals' social networks, travel trajectories, purchasing behaviors, etc., and conducting risk level detection and early warning for group gatherings and organized activities.

After hearing this, all the FBI agents who were listening, including Reese from the CIA, understood what the "machine" Jack was talking about was.

Aubrey took out his phone and took a look at it, his face full of disbelief. "No wonder Jack asked Alice to take away all of our FBI phones this morning, and asked us to turn off our own phones."

Finch looked at Jack meaningfully, "It's not the 'TIA Plan', because some people have discovered that while the public wants to be protected, they don't really want to understand how they are being protected.

So when the NSA finally found a system that did what they wanted, they kept it secret rather than releasing it to the public.”

Reese asked in a hoarse voice, "This system, isn't it the 'machine' that you two have been playing charades about before? Are you its creator?"

Jack really wanted to reveal something more, such as the reason why Reese was killed by the CIA before was also related to the core program of the "machine", but after thinking about it, he decided not to.

He had finally managed to guide the two of them through their thinking and get himself out of the situation. There was no need to do that again at this point.

Finch nodded, seemingly modest but actually a little proud, "Yes, I'm good at computers."

Seeing that everyone present had different thoughts and was immersed in their own thoughts for a while, Jack coughed lightly and reminded, "Please continue."

There was a barely perceptible sadness in Finch's tone, as if he was recalling some painful past events. "But there is a problem with the 'machine'. I built it in the first place to avoid another '911'.

But it 'sees' all kinds of crimes at the same time, so I had to teach it to sort the things it perceives into two different lists, 'relevant information' and 'irrelevant information.'"

"What do you mean?" Jubal, who was absorbed in listening, couldn't help but move forward.

Finch went on to explain, "The 'relevant information' that will cause significant casualties will be compiled into a list and handed over to the NSA, and then the relevant departments of the NSA will decide whether to forward it to the DHS or directly notify you, the FBI."

Jiejie then recalled the question that Jack had asked Finch before, which had left him speechless. "Then can I understand 'irrelevant information' as cases that will not cause major casualties, such as ordinary murders?

But as Jack said before, your 'machine' didn't seem to predict the 'Central Park bombing', which was an attack that could have caused thousands of casualties. Could it be that this incident was mistakenly classified as 'irrelevant information'?"

(End of this chapter)