My very first work experience as a cybersecurity expert is full of a lot of what ifs. If I should be honest with myself, I did mess up a lot of things because I was learning from scratch while on the job. But then, giving this a second thought, I was only doing what I was asked to do and nothing more. My boss wanted a Lamborghini that cost nothing more than $2,500 and he got me so all I can say at this point is; “It serves him right”. God damn it, now I feel horrible for saying this out loud, I feel like an actual reaper, I feel like a thief on paper. Why does my conscience keep tormenting me for something that wasn't my fault? In my defense I was doing as I was asked, saying I couldn't would make me unreliable, now I feel like I can't be relied on for anything. If only I could turn back the hands of time and make different decisions and critical moments, perhaps I will feel less horrible.
I mean I was on my own, enjoying life as a digital marketer. When my boss called me to ask if I could create a website from scratch, I thought about it and decided to be as sincere as possible. I have never built one professionally so I can't say I have what it takes because there are a lot of things I don't know. This I clearly stated, but I guess he was a man on a mission to get high quality for little or nothing. I never felt settled accepting to take on such responsibility and even when I told Victor who I knew could very well help, it was not the same as doing what I know and love. I always found myself in tough situations, the hackers attacks were always coming and I did not have much up my sleeve to really fight them other than relying on my friend all the time. Such a great guy he is, never got angry at the pressures I put on him when my job was on the line.
I decided it was high time I looked into things myself, that was when I discovered I was capable of finding a permanent solution by myself. I had initiated the perfect plan in my head, with full assurance of it working, I had made weeks of research and finally came to a suitable conclusion. Just to be sure I was on the right path, I shared my ideas with professionals which they found to be a possible cheap solution to a long existing problem. The server I was building on was so corrupt that it made my job look bad, not that I was that good to begin with, but I wasn't that bad either. I decided to take the second obvious step presented before me, with all the tingling optimistic sensations I get when I'm about making a big move. I made a full proposal to my company that we migrate from the server we currently are into a new server of our own. We were in a dedicated server with a lot of other people only God knows how many, and when a virus infects one, what are the chances of the rest not getting infested.
My MD, hearing my all brilliant idea, commended me for the effort, but did nothing about it. I spoke to all the managers at my disposal to let them know it was best we migrate when we just got some antivirus softwares because the hackers already had a loophole in the server to always attack us from, but because my MD saw I was able to deal with the threat, not knowing I had lots of help doing so and might not be able to handle another one, decided to let it wait. His attitude to this whole situation made me feel like running away, as though my incompetency would be exposed sooner if he does nothing, and after two months of dragging, my fears finally became a reality as the hackers didn't just infiltrate our system, but also accessed our client database and emails intercepting ongoing transactions we already had with them.
This was what made my boss take action, but then it was already too late. When he asked me what could be done, in my justifiable anger I raised up the price for the migration because I knew I could not do it on my own, and seeking advice won't be able to get the job done. I charged him in dollars and when he paid, I felt like I took advantage of the situation and reaped him viciously. But then even after the migration, we started facing spam at a very large rate due to the fact that the hackers had gotten into our database. At this point I charged my company for a number of softwares which I only got few and collected the rest from my cybersecurity friends, keeping the rest for myself. At this point I wanted to feel guilty, but then it's been nearly six months of building the website, and I wasn't paid for it, truly speaking I don't know how to feel about it.
THIS IS MY ENTRY INTO THE INKWELL CREATIVE NONFICTION PROMPT #119
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