by NANCY GONGLIKWANYEOHEEEEEEEH, Alternate Reality News Service Technology Writer
Johnny Darwin-Hippes was just an average Josephine trying to make a dishonest living at the intersection of Commerce and Criminality (formerly Dundas and Jarvis – Toronto may have gone a little overboard with the whole street renaming thing). He was a Product Sales Rep (formerly “drug dealer” – the illegal substance industry may have gone a little overboard with the whole corporate respectability thing) peddling crrnk – a powerful hallucinogenic laxative – to users from his corner. But on a bright summer’s day in February, Darwin-Hippes’ business was severely threatened.
Had the RCMP cut off his gang’s supply of the drug from Venezuevuvazela? Cha, right! Those losers? Had another gang member tried to muscle in on his corner? Puh leaze! Those losers? Had an oversupply of the drug caused prices to plummet? Are you out of your tree? Those lo – actually, that was always a possible problem, but the higher ups were careful to match demand with supply so that it never got too out of control. (Oh, and if you need help getting back into your tree, what do I look like? An anti-social worker‽)
No. The problem was that the supply of burner phones had dried up.
Burners are cheap phones that you use once and throw away (kind of like that boy toy you hooked up with last night, but with far less potential for regret). They enable the drug trade by making communications between gang members harder to trace than an image of a polar bear in a snowstorm using card stock paper in the middle of the night during a power outage.
Why would burner phones suddenly be so hard to get? Because the Canadian government wanted to fly close to the sun (in what must be the most colourful metaphor of my writing career). Six months ago, it bought Icarus, a piece of malware (not something you cook a casserole in) that quietly installs itself on phones and runs them when you’re not looking.
Hey! – was that Kim Mitchell going for a soda? When you turned your head to look, Icarus downloaded all of your contacts and location information, not to mention your current Angry Crustaceans stats, to one of its servers. Weary from the day to day struggle of existence? When you rubbed your eyes, Icarus turned on your phone’s camera to see what was going on around you. Did you…did you just blink? Boy, you’re really in trouble, now!
The programme was supposed to fight crime (sorry, Johnny!). However an investigation by an international consortium of journalists (and France) released last week showed that the software was being used to monitor social activists, journalists and bankers and corporate executives. Bankers and corporate executives! When it was revealed that they were targets, the bankers and corporate executives did what bankers and corporate executives do best.
They panicked.
They quickly gobbled up the available supply of burner phones. Then, they started buying and selling burner phone futures. Seeing the market heating up, investment funds began buying up burner phone futures. The frenzy was unprecedented (at least since last week’s TulipTM Mania). At one point, Elon Musk bought International Confabulation, a producer of cell phones, to ensure himself a steady supply of burners.
“It ain’t right!” Darwin-Hippes complained. “I got six mouths to feed – and a couple of kids! How’m I supposed to take care of those I tolerate when my lines of communication have gone kafluey! Man, I tell ya, it’s times like this that make me rethink my commitment to capitalism!”
Other drug dealers appear to agree. A consortium of gangs, mobs and sundry baddies has petitioned the federal government for relief. “They bailed out the auto industry,” pointed out Jackie O…noyoudint, who worked a corner three streets down from Darwin-Hippes. “I mean, cars, sure, they’re good for a lot of things. But, what we sell is far more popular!”
Republican Party lead – sorry, did I say Republican? I meant Plutocratic. Canadian Plutocratic Party leader Donald O’Toole said that while he didn’t generally favour corporate bailouts, this could be an exception. “We – small business – are the – small business – party of small business. And small business doesn’t get much smaller than a gangbanger – small business – and his crew trying to sell – small business – their product – small business – on a street corner!”
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau sighed and said, “We live in strange times, don’t we?”