History Literature / Daemon

This 2009 book is unusual for the standard technothriller in that Daniel Suarez is JustForFun/OneOfUs. It becomes clear from the very beginning of the book that he is ''very'' familiar with computer systems, networking and security. (He is, in fact, a successful systems & networking security consultant.) It starts off a little jargon-heavy -- clearly to set up the book as tech-heavy for the uninitiated, and to indicate to those of us on the inside that ''[[ShownTheirWork he actually knows this stuff]].'' He never skimps on the explanations for those who don't already know these things, while not going overboard for those of us who do.

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->Good luck to you all. And don’t be afraid of change. It’s the only thing that can save us.\\
--'''Matthew Sobol'''

Among its first actions are to kill two of Sobol's coworkers. When they try to forcibly enter his mansion after connecting Sobol with the aforementioned murders, a number of police and FBI agents are maimed or killed by an impressive set of boobytraps, including an autonomous, murderous Humvee that is NighInvulnerable to everything they can throw at it. The Daemon then frames its actions on a handful of people to cast doubt on its very existence and withdraws from the public eye. It quietly offers certain people in key positions fame and success if they make a deal with the devil, or more accurately, the Daemon. Then, ominously, it goes silent. When it resurfaces, things go downhill. Fast.

The 2010 sequel, ''Freedom™'' (yes, the trademark symbol is part of the title), picks up shortly after where ''Daemon'' leaves off and focuses further on the motives and goals of the Daemon's actions. Through the main viewpoint character, whose identity is a spoiler for the previous book, we learn that the Daemon has moved beyond merely attacking the old system to building a new one and making itself more appealing to the masses, who it needs in order to truly upset the status quo. We also get multiple looks through the viewpoints of the powerful parties both corporate and governmental who oppose it for their own reasons and are slowly but surely putting together plans to get rid of it for good. A storm is coming, and only one of the sides will be walking away after it erupts.

Among its first actions are to kill two of Sobol's coworkers. When they try to forcibly enter his mansion after connecting Sobol with the aforementioned murders, a number of police and FBI agents are maimed or killed by an impressive set of boobytraps, including an autonomous, murderous Humvee that is nearly impervious to everything they can throw at it. The Daemon then frames its actions on a handful of people to cast doubt on its very existence and withdraws from the public eye. It quietly offers certain people in key positions fame and success if they make a deal with the devil, or more accurately, the Daemon. Then, ominously, it goes silent. When it resurfaces, things go downhill. Fast.

*** This is first [[JustForPun daemonstrated]] in the FBI's early siege of Sobol's mansion: while the preparations for an assault are rather crude, the actual goal is manipulation of attention. Sobol is very aware of his limitations and as such, an integral part of the Daemon's lifetime cycle is the recruitment of human agents which can adapt to the details of a situation while the Daemon sets broader goals and handles automated tasks.

* AugmentedReality: Members of the Daemon's "darknet" use CoolShades as a HeadsUpDisplay and haptic gloves. The shades are keyed to their retinas, and the gloves to their fingerprints. These turn RealLife into an {{AbsurdlyHighStakes|Game}} {{MassivelyMultiplayer|OnlineRolePlayingGame}} AlternateRealityGame, initially in a figurative sense and eventually ''[[TheGameComeToLife literally]]'' -- by carrying out "quests" to increase the Daemon's influence on the world, operatives are awarded with "{{Character Level}}s" that grant them access to increasingly powerful devices and abilities such as remote controlled weapons like [=AutoM8s=] and Razorbacks, ShockAndAwe gloves and {{Invisibility|Cloak}}(at least to cameras) rings, "curses" that ruin people's credit ratings, etc. As "quests" are completed, the devices and abilities the Daemon awards become more numerous and powerful. [[spoiler:Eventually, the darknet becomes an entire ''civilization'' that is InvisibleToNormals -- one superior to the current one]].

* AugmentedReality: Members of the Daemon's "darknet" use CoolShades as a HeadsUpDisplay and haptic gloves. The shades are keyed to their retinas, and the gloves to their fingerprints. These turn RealLife into an [[AbsurdlyHighStakesGame Absurdly High Stakes]] [[MassivelyMultiplayerOnlineRolePlayingGame Massively Multiplayer]] AlternateRealityGame, initially in a figurative sense and eventually ''[[TheGameComeToLife literally]]'' -- by carrying out "quests" to increase the Daemon's influence on the world, operatives are awarded with "{{Character Level}}s" that grant them access to increasingly powerful devices and abilities such as remote controlled weapons like [=AutoM8s=] and Razorbacks, ShockAndAwe gloves and {{Invisibility|Cloak}}(at least to cameras) rings, "curses" that ruin people's credit ratings, etc. As "quests" are completed, the devices and abilities the Daemon awards become more numerous and powerful. [[spoiler:Eventually, the darknet becomes an entire ''civilization'' that is InvisibleToNormals -- one superior to the current one]].

* [[spoiler:BorrowedBiometricBypass]]: A favored technique of the anti-Daemon forces in general, and the Major in particular; he regularly [[spoiler:"rescues" teenage girls from brothels so that he can get them darknet accounts and then behead them to steal their darknet identities, keeping their heads chemically alive to spoof the biometrics. He actually has Loki's [[AndIMustScream eyes torn out and his fingertips and tongue chopped off]], but needs to keep him alive to pass the [=fMRI=] scans... and all of this is is insufficient to fool the Oberstleutnant Boerner bot, who not only rescues him and has him fitted with cybernetics, but kills the Major when he attempts to assume Loki's identity with the borrowed biometrics]].

[[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt There are many potential biological, geological and astrophysical events]] ([[ThePlague a theoretical Level 4+ pathogen such as an airborne, multispecies variant of Ebola or Marburg virus]], [[ChekhovsVolcano activation of the Yellowstone supervolcano]], [[ColonyDrop a "dinosaur killer" asteroid or comet (>= 5 km) found on an Earth-impacting trajectory with less than 30 days lead time]], etc.) that are not addressable with current or near-term future technology and would render Daemon unexecutable. These are all low probability events. [[GoodOldWays Discontinuation by humanity of any data technology]] with more capacity than the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabulating_machine Hollereith Tabulator]] would also render Daemon unexecutable. [[HumansAreFlawed This is a VERY low probability event]]. Analysis indicates that a comprehensive campaign of [[KillEmAll removal of all human agents from the network]] as effective strategy, but highly risky, in terms of [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking resources, logistics and public relations]]. [[BringIt Nevertheless, Daemon is not invincible]], and certainly not boring.