Lu Jue, a data engineer in Silicon Valley, has the Internet ID "Lao A" - a programmer who is good at deconstructing reality using Internet memes. At the celebration party for the launch of the Sky Eye project, the FBI broke in and he was accused of "stealing state secrets."
On the first day of his escape, he discovered that the algorithm he was working on was systematically monitoring Chinese people in the United States; the project he was involved in was part of the "Mirror Project"—the U. S. Government secretly cooperated with technology giants to build a digital surveillance system across the Pacific. Even more ironic: he is hunted by his own code. Every step is algorithmically predicted and every digital identity is tagged.
He fled from San Francisco to the East Coast, crossing the Nevada desert, the casino city of Las Vegas, the Colorado snowy mountains, and the Texas wilderness. Along the way, he met Echo, a member of the hacker organization "Prism", the hunted biologist Zhou Yan, and Chinese underground networks scattered across the United States. Together, they evade the encirclement and suppression by the FBI "Hound Dog" team and private mercenary "Scavenger", relying on three things to survive: an in-depth understanding of the surveillance system, the anti-tracking instinct learned from the Chinese health code thinking, and - in the unprecedented absurd situation, they can still tell Internet jokes and cold jokes.
This is not a man's escape. Behind him are all the ordinary people defined by the algorithm as "potential threats".
"Escape from America" - When technology becomes a high wall, when code becomes handcuffs, what you want to escape is not a country, but a system.
"Democracy, where you can't see it, can do anything to you and then say it's to protect you."
The oldest story in human nature is that when one man falls, another man reaches out. "
Lu Jue understands that burden. Not everyone can escape freely.
Is there any conscience in the code? Now the whole world is waiting for the answer.
The most dangerous corruption is not personal greed, but the systemic fusion of interests. When the goals of government, business, and law enforcement are completely aligned, checks and balances disappear.
Government motto: As long as the problem disappears, it is no longer a problem.
There is a kind of tenacity here. Some people are still queuing for food, still exchanging information, and still trying to figure out how to survive.
Like weeds growing in cement cracks, they look ugly, but they are indeed life.
From the moment Lao A first deconstructed reality and used memes to fight absurdity on the Chinese Internet, his life trajectory has been pointing to this damp and dark sewer.
The FBI must obtain the USB flash drive, crack the encryption, and delete the bomb code within six hours. Otherwise, the next morning, the headlines in the New York Times and the Washington Post would be 'U. S. Government's secret surveillance system exposed, targeting ethnic minorities'. "
Irregular arrest, taking to an abandoned dock, and directly asking for a USB flash drive. Something is wrong in every aspect of the FBI.
"Democracy, where you can't see it, can do anything to you and then say it's to protect you."
The oldest story in human nature is that when one man falls, another man reaches out. "
Lu Jue understands that burden. Not everyone can escape freely.
Is there any conscience in the code? Now the whole world is waiting for the answer.
The most dangerous corruption is not personal greed, but the systemic fusion of interests. When the goals of government, business, and law enforcement are completely aligned, checks and balances disappear.
Government motto: As long as the problem disappears, it is no longer a problem.
There is a kind of tenacity here. Some people are still queuing for food, still exchanging information, and still trying to figure out how to survive. Like weeds growing in cement cracks, they look ugly, but they are indeed life.
From the moment Lao A first deconstructed reality and used memes to fight absurdity on the Chinese Internet, his life trajectory has been pointing to this damp and dark sewer.
The FBI must obtain the USB flash drive, crack the encryption, and delete the bomb code within six hours. Otherwise, the next morning, the headlines in the New York Times and the Washington Post would be 'U. S. Government's secret surveillance system exposed, targeting ethnic minorities'. "
Irregular arrest, taking to an abandoned dock, and directly asking for a USB flash drive. Something is wrong in every aspect of the FBI.