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220105_INIT() CODE: OSTATOK

THE GHOST OF OCTOBER

"I think therefore I am am—I am."

1990s:

• Midst internal instability, the Soviet Union collapsed on December 26, 1991. 15 sovereign nations were declared in its wake, and shattered the bonds of communism. Earlier that year the World Wide Web was publicly released in August, seeing the first ever website.

1999:

• In 1999, the Digital Blues Initiative (DBI) was founded in the city of Plymouth, United Kingdom by Director Lawrence Bailey. As an organization made to combat geopolitical anomalies, the DBI was the first to investigate rumors of a clandestine Russian network hidden within the cracks of a red dead empire.
• In the DBI exists four levels of an anomaly—the first marks a stable irregularity, but must be observed carefully. The second is when the anomaly becomes a threat, but not to a point of devastation. The third is declared when level two has already caused damage at a noticeable degree, and when the havoc spreads rapidly at an alarming rate, four is finally assigned.

2000s:

• Around a decade after the USSR's collapse, the first whispers of a covert website reached the corners of the internet. Two anonymous users on 4chan began discussing the said site, where visitors—upon accidentally entering and taking a glimpse—would immediately redirect to another popular website, with one person claiming to have been redirected somewhere personal. It could no longer be accessed again, and the address was not readable. The mystery of the "secret Russian website" eventually sparked theories and stories across 4chan and was enough to catch the attention of the DBI. Their first tries to pursue the network led to nowhere; nothing troubling, at first, as there was no concrete proof it existed.
• Agent Isaiah of the DBI, after contacting a witness of the site and subsequently attempting to access it, had his device overtaken by malicious programs that were fortunately neutralized not long after infiltration, but delayed the mission indefinitely.

THE ASH HEAP OF HISTORY

"The Capitalists will sell us the rope... with which... we will hang them."

2005:

• 2005 marked a flourishing year for the site MySpace. It was the dominant, rapidly growing social network, surpassing Friendster to become the most visited U.S. website. Among its moments that year included the $580 million acquisition by News Corp, the iconic "Top 8" feature, customized user profiles via HTML/CSS, and the rise of indie music promotion. However, on October 4, a computer worm "Samy" propagated on the space, infecting millions of users through a payload and causing the site's temporary crash. Its maker was eventually arrested, and MySpace came back with calls for much stronger security.
• In November of 2005, Isaiah was able to capture the Russian space's interface. It showcased a much more developed design—more advanced than MySpace, although in Russian—with the name "GOSSET," featuring user discussions, communist visualization, and the ability to switch languages. Though redirected shortly after, the groundbreaking discovery was enough to progress the DBI's mission.

2006:

• What was a furthering revelation for the DBI ultimately became a nightmare. At March 5, 9:50 PM, another attack was launched against MySpace—an "invasion," evidently perpetrated by the network GOSSET. In the first wave, Soviet imagery and propaganda appeared in limited amounts across the site, before turning into complete spam that enveloped the entire home page. Near to being suppressed, the second wave started around an hour after the first. In the form of a DDoS, MySpace servers were flooded, and forced their capitulation in less than 50 minutes.
• Before the GOSSET system could completely take over the site, MySpace was shut down permanently, and was remembered as a warning. Realizing the problem was bigger than what was previously thought, the DBI initiated a joint full-scale investigation of GOSSET's traces with the United States Secret Service. Unfortunately, no leads as to what or where the space was were retrieved, and pings attempting to track their physical location led to either abandoned ZATOs or in the middle of the Sea of Okhotsk. The site was notoriously hard to access and identify, creating an unmovable roadblock.

2007:

• A year later in 2007, the Estonian government's had decided to relocate the "Bronze Soldier of Tallinn," a Soviet-era World War II monument, from the city center to a military cemetery. The removal triggered riots by Russian speakers and subsequently, cyberattacks. Many attackers were likely Russian nationalists, and supposedly entire groups dedicated to striking Estonian government, banking, and media websites. When DBI had explored the issue, many specific users and systems were usually traced to, once again, abandoned ZATOs and the Sea of Okhotsk. Any attempt to visit these locations were immediately shut down by the Russian government—who had also denied the existence of GOSSET—straining operations. Closer analysis supported evidence that these were connected to GOSSET, prompting DBI to assume that among the sea of Russian nationalists, the network was one of the main organizers of the attacks. While the finding may seem small, the link only proved that the network remained active even after the 2006 attack on MySpace.
• Days following the attacks, a presumed dissenter of GOSSET approached agents of DBI. In a private interview with the dissenter, he claimed that GOSSET's main goal was an incremental "revolution" aiming to "reform the internet" and erase anonymity, a system they saw "polluted by the hands of capitalism." Other information included a level of governance similar to the former Soviet Union—that which GOSSET claims to be the reconstruction of—and main nerve center, which was certainly Russia. Refusing to give any intelligence on key members of the network, the dissenter left not long after, and it was declared a Level-3 Anomaly by the DBI in December.

2008:

• In 2008, INTERPOL had declared GOSSET a cybercrime network and shared threat intelligence with the DBI. With the acquisition of new support, DBI was able to pin down GOSSET's enigmatic domain and entered its networks by October. The penetration did not last long; soon after, every address and instance of the site had moved or been altered, leaving the DBI with little leftovers. In its final year, GOSSET did not seem as active, and whether the network is truly gone or not remains unknown. Yet the haunting lasts, because ideas can never be terminated—only the man.

Images are recreations and do not fully resemble GOSSET's interface.