Tony Stark did not take long. In just one morning, he breached the bank's mainframe, then took control of all its security systems and studied the surveillance feeds.
"Getting in was easy. I only needed a few hours without triggering the alarm, but I still don't know how to leave without a trace!" Tony Stark said as he got up, stretched, and looked at George Stacy.
George Stacy had been standing nearby the entire time, along with the department's two best computer technicians. They had watched from the side throughout, and both technicians wore expressions of admiration, fully acknowledging that they were no match for Mr. Tony Stark in technical skill.
"Mr. Stark, does that mean the other party's technical skills surpass even yours?" George Stacy's words were somewhat provocative. Tony Stark raised an eyebrow, then fell into thought.
"Not necessarily, but I need to try again!" Tony Stark was far too proud to accept such a claim. How could someone as arrogant as him admit defeat? "I'm developing artificial intelligence, though I haven't succeeded. I simply can't create true artificial intelligence—only pseudo-artificial intelligence. Comparatively speaking, it can handle many everyday matters and relatively ordinary tasks, but everything it does leaves a trail. Of course, it can help me breach a firewall too. After all, its computing speed is beyond anything humans can match."
After saying that, Tony Stark sat down again and connected to his mansion in California. "Jarvis, come help me complete a task."
Tony Stark's laptop speakers came to life. "Yes, Mr. Stark."
George Stacy and the other police officers were all stunned, then looked over curiously. Yet the laptop screen showed nothing but endless streams of data.
With a few rapid keystrokes, Tony Stark exited the bank's mainframe and restored the firewall before having Jarvis launch an attack. Just a few minutes later, it successfully breached the bank's mainframe.
"See? It's that simple. But I still need to figure out how the other party erased their traces. Even if they deleted the task logs, they should still be recoverable. So how did they erase everything completely?" Tony Stark got back to work. He devoted immense energy to questions that piqued his curiosity, and his interest in this bank robbery was growing stronger and stronger.
Time slowly passed. "Jarvis, can you completely delete all operation records?"
"At present, I cannot, sir. Some residual traces would remain on the hardware. Even after formatting, technical recovery would still be possible unless new data were used to overwrite the entire hard drive. But even then, new traces would remain." Jarvis's answer plunged Tony Stark into thought once more.
It was currently impossible to erase all traces from a computer completely. Overwriting a hard drive with new data would still reveal flaws, which was entirely different from the situation with the bank's mainframe. Furthermore, formatting would cause a certain degree of damage to the hard drive, and hardware forensic examinations could still uncover clues.
"Was the hardware inspected?" Tony Stark asked.
The police technician hurriedly replied, "Yes, Mr. Stark. There was no damage caused in a short period of time—only wear and damage from long-term use. The other party did not perform a formatting operation."
Tony Stark found himself facing a difficult problem. If someone had truly breached the bank's mainframe, then he genuinely had no idea how they had done it. It was like a ghost passing straight through the firewall wall, then using its magic to control everything here before passing through the wall again to leave. Terrifying.
"Impossible. How could such technology exist?" Tony Stark sank into his own world. After blurting that out in frustration, his hands kept striking the keys as he continuously had Jarvis work with him, trying to find a way to erase all traces completely.
George Stacy did not understand technology, but he had been observing Tony Stark's state the entire time. Gradually, he erased the last trace of suspicion he had held toward Tony Stark. This was not his doing.
George Stacy had confidence in his ability to observe people. Tony Stark was completely absorbed in it—yes, absorbed. He had merely proposed a hypothesis, something police often did. Investigating a case began with following clues, but if there were no clues, they had to change their line of thinking. Hypotheses were one such method.
After forming a hypothesis, they would test it and seek evidence to support it. This was a form of reverse reasoning. Based on his observations, Tony Stark had been completely drawn in by his hypothesis, and his artificial intelligence was not true artificial intelligence either.
The technicians had told him that. Although the intelligent system called "Jarvis" was quite... impressive, the technicians said it was not true artificial intelligence. It lacked emotion and flexibility, was exceedingly rigid, and was merely pseudo-intelligence.
George Stacy did not dwell on that point. After all, he had no conclusion as to whether artificial intelligence had committed the crime. But his purpose had now been achieved. First, he wanted to see whether Tony Stark was a suspect. The facts proved that he really could breach the bank's system, and very quickly with Jarvis's help, but observation had ruled him out. Second, he had found a free high-level technician. With Tony Stark's involvement, their technical capabilities had risen considerably.
But another problem had emerged. Tony Stark could not do it either, which meant his hypothesis was very likely to fail. Perhaps the other party had truly not used a technical breach.
Then, if it had not been a technical breach, it could only have been an enormous organization. They had the strength to carry out long-term, large-scale infiltration and bribery at the traffic surveillance center, with insiders at every level of the hierarchy. Only then could they have achieved complete control.
But that still did not make sense. How had they erased the operational traces on a technical level? Even with insiders, technical operations would still be required. And so the matter returned to his original hypothesis: a technical breach!
Tony Stark continued searching for a solution, while George Stacy found himself trapped in the case. The technical issue seemed like an unavoidable mountain that had to be climbed before they could solve this robbery.
George Stacy took out his phone and went to an empty corner. "Chief, Mr. Tony Stark has been cleared of suspicion, but the problem is even greater now. Even with his skills, he can't find the slightest clue. It now seems that he can't match the other party's technical level either."