Synopsis of Program Sentinel
Program Sentinel
A rocket launched from a foreign country suddenly turned around one hundred seconds after liftoff, flew back, and destroyed the launch tower, killing nine people on the spot. The cause of the disaster pointed straight to China's 706th Military Industry Institute: the source code for its core guidance program had been stolen, and it contained a backdoor. The backdoor had not been closed when the code was taken. As a result, a "logic bomb" buried in the program was triggered one hundred seconds after launch: the parameters were altered, the rocket turned 180 degrees, and it destroyed the launch site.
Late one night, Wang Zhe, a programmer at the 706th Institute, was urgently summoned in. He saw an enraged spy assassin try to kill Qin Hai, the program's designer, but Qin Hai was saved by a special guard unit from the Security Service. Only then did Wang Zhe learn a shocking secret: Qin Hai was actually Qin Shan, the chief designer of the guidance program, who had supposedly "died" three years ago and had been living undercover ever since. He had stayed hidden to protect the program from being stolen. The programs that had been taken were all killer programs fitted with logic bombs.
The Security Service's special operations team steps in, and Wang Zhe is given the urgent mission of taking over from Qin Hai and tracing the leak to its source. A list of twelve names is placed before him: the people who had accessed the source code over the past three years. Seven of them are still at the institute. Qin Hai offers one suspicion, without any evidence: Director Zhou Mingyuan.
The mole is inside the institute, holds a position of some rank, can erase access logs, and can send assassins to silence people. Before the traitor realizes what is happening, Wang Zhe must identify the culprit among the seven. But the real danger is this: the mole already knows he is here.
This is a national security espionage novel set at a military industry research institute. There are no storms of gunfire, yet danger lurks at every turn; no clouds of smoke, yet every moment is nerve-racking.
