The richest man started taking advantage of loopholes after joining Alibaba.

At 9:50 a.m., outside a national-level conference center in Beijing.

The wind was extremely strong, and the temperature was approaching zero degrees Celsius.

A taxi was parked outside the police cordon.

Lin Che pushed open the car door, his leather shoes stepping onto the gray asphalt road.

The cold wind blew directly into the collar of the shirt.

He raised his head.

Ahead was a dense crowd of over three hundred people, completely blocking the entrance plaza of the conference center.

More than a dozen huge red banners were unfurled, with bold black lettering printed on them.

"Resist Weiguang Credits! Give me back my privacy!"

"Severely punish the data tyrant Lin Che!"

A middle-aged man wearing a black leather jacket stood at the front, holding a white megaphone in his hand.

"Weiguang Technology is setting up its own court! They're depriving us of our right to live!" the middle-aged man roared, spitting as he spoke into the megaphone.

The crowd raised their fists and shouted, creating an extremely noisy and deafening cacophony.

Lin Che looked at the man.

He recognized the face.

Last night, the data from the Abyss system included him. He was a loan sharking gang leader whose Ponzi scheme completely collapsed due to the devastating impact of Weiguangfen.

In order to generate public opinion, BAT (Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent) hired him, paying him 200 yuan a day as an extra.

Capital easily manipulates the anger of the lower classes.

Lin Che strode forward without hesitation, heading straight into the crowd.

He stood out among a group of protesters dressed in brightly colored down jackets, wearing a black suit.

A young man on the outskirts saw him.

The young man stopped shouting and stared wide-eyed.

"Lin...Lin Che!" The young man pointed at Lin Che, his voice trembling.

The crowd fell silent for a second.

All eyes turned to them.

The middle-aged man put down the loudspeaker and stared intently at Lin Che, his eyes bloodshot.

"That's him! Kill this vampire who invades our privacy!" the middle-aged man roared.

A half-empty mineral water bottle flew over.

"Bang."

The water hit Lin Che's right shoulder, splashing everywhere and wetting the black suit fabric.

Lin Che neither dodged nor stopped; he continued walking forward.

His eyes were extremely cold, devoid of any emotion, and he could see right through the person in front of him.

The protesters in front involuntarily stepped back, stepping on the feet of those behind them, and erupted in a chaotic chorus of shouts and curses.

The crowd was forced apart, creating a passage about one meter wide.

Lin Che walked in the middle of the passage.

On both sides were faces gritting their teeth at him, spittle and curses almost touching his ears.

A raw egg was thrown at me.

It flew past Lin Che's ear and crashed into the granite pillar behind him.

The eggshell cracked, and the yellow egg liquid flowed out, emitting an extremely unpleasant fishy smell.

Lin Che didn't even blink.

He walked up the steps and toward the glass door.

Two rows of armed police officers stood at the entrance.

They checked Lin Che's ID card, their eyes filled with undisguised scrutiny.

This is the data tyrant that caused such a huge mess.

Lin Che retrieved his ID card, walked through the metal detector, and completely shut out the noise outside.

……

Inside the closed-door summit.

The conference hall is extremely spacious, fan-shaped, with a very high dome and explosion-proof and soundproof walls.

There was no natural light; the cold white overhead lights were all on.

The venue was divided into two parts.

In front are three rows of curved genuine leather sofa seats, where the highest-level regulatory leaders, the presidents of the four major banks, and the top decision-makers of BAT (Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent) are seated.

On the mahogany table in the front row, there were blue and white porcelain teacups, with white steam rising upwards, and each person had a nameplate embossed in gold in front of them.

Behind them were rows of simple folding chairs, serving as the audience seating area.

Lin Che's seat was arranged in the last row, in the corner.

This is pure physical isolation, and it's extremely insulting.

Lin Che walked over and pulled out the iron folding chair.

"Squeak—"

The sound of metal scraping together was extremely jarring in the otherwise quiet meeting room.

The people in the front row turned around.

When Mr. Wang, the general manager of China Merchants Bank, saw Lin Che, his eyes twitched violently. He immediately turned around, staring intently at the teacup in front of him, his hands on his knees, unable to look at him any longer.

Lin Che sat down and placed his hands on his abdomen.

There was a person standing on the podium.

Sun Zheng, Senior Vice President of Alibaba Group.

Sun Zheng was wearing a tailored suit with an extremely close fit, his hair was combed perfectly, and his gold-rimmed glasses reflected a cold light.

Sun Zheng held the microphone with both hands.

"Distinguished leaders, fellow colleagues," Sun Zheng's voice resounded throughout the hall through the high-fidelity speakers, extremely deep and carrying a sanctimonious sense of pity.

"The development of Internet technology is for the benefit of society."

"Instead of turning every citizen into a transparent digital prisoner."

Sun Zheng reached out and pressed the page turner on the big screen.

A visually striking chart appeared on the screen, which read "Micro-light analysis overreaching capture list".

“Weiguang Technology,” Sun Zheng emphasized, “has crossed all the lines of commercial ethics in the past three months.”

"They have no regulatory licenses, yet they crawl users' food delivery orders everywhere. They analyze users' travel routes, and they even steal users' privacy records through illegal third-party interfaces."

The regulatory leaders in the front row frowned.

A central bank official picked up a pen and quickly drew a heavy horizontal line on the document in front of him.

Sun Zheng pushed up his glasses.

"This is no longer a typical business trial and error."

"This is a trampling on basic human rights, and it is shaking the foundation of trust in the whole society."

The venue was extremely quiet, with only Sun Zheng's voice amplified by a loudspeaker.

Lin Che sat in the last row.

He listened quietly.

A sharp, stabbing pain shot through his stomach; he hadn't eaten all day, and the hunger had triggered spasms in his ulcers.

Lin Che put his right hand into his trouser pocket and pressed it against his stomach through the fabric.

My fingers touched the cold metal USB drive, feeling the sharp edges on my fingertips.

He looked at Sun Zheng on the stage.

The brain is performing extremely rapid calculations of interests.

Sun is lying.

Alibaba and Tencent possess a thousand times more data than Weiguang, and they understand the value of data better than anyone else.

What they are afraid of is not privacy leaks at all.

What they fear is that Weiguang, with its extremely terrifying AI algorithm, has completely shattered their data monopoly.

Even more fatal is that Micro-Score has begun to possess attributes that define social class, such as "no deposit required" and "financial privileges," in reality.

This touched upon the core interests of the old giants.

They determined that the glimmer of light must die.

So they took the moral high ground, using "protecting privacy" as a weapon to kill people with the help of the state apparatus.

Sun Zheng on the stage pressed the page-turning pen.

A silhouette of an ordinary young man appeared on the big screen.

"Distinguished leaders, please take a look," Sun Zheng said, pointing to the large screen with a tone full of anger, "This is an ordinary college student. The Weiguang system used extremely malicious methods to capture his spending records at the internet cafe late at night, including his purchase of cheap e-cigarettes."

"Then, the system directly gave him an extremely low credit score."

"This made it so he couldn't even scan a single shared bike!"

Sun Zheng slammed his hand on the podium, making a dull thud.

President Liu of China Construction Bank shuddered.

"What is this? This is depriving a person of their right to live in modern society!" Sun Zheng shouted.

Sun Zheng's speech was coming to an end.

He left the podium and walked to the center of the stage.

He faced the highest-ranking leader in the front row and bowed deeply.

"For financial security, for social stability."

Sun Zhengzhi stood up, his eyes extremely sharp.

"We strongly recommend it."

"Weiguang Technology must unconditionally hand over the underlying risk control logic of the Weiguang Brain! And surrender all system control!"

"To be handed over to the state for unified management!"

"Otherwise, it must be completely banned and physically shut down immediately!"

These two options are presented.

The air in the venue seemed to freeze instantly, and the sound of the air conditioning vents became extremely jarring.

This is a decisive blow. Handing over control means death, not handing it over means being forcibly destroyed by the state.

The BAT executives in the front row erupted in thunderous applause, which was extremely enthusiastic and echoed under the huge dome.

In order to demonstrate to the regulators that they were distancing themselves from the situation, the presidents of China Merchants Bank and China Construction Bank also clapped vigorously, their hands turning red from clapping.

The Supreme Court leader did not applaud; he placed his hands crossed on the table, his expression extremely serious.

The central bank leader leaned back slightly in his chair, remaining silent.

Sun Zheng stood on the stage; he did not step down.

He turned his head, his gaze passing over all the dignitaries in the front row, and looked straight at the very back of the hall, at the darkest corner.

The applause gradually subsided.

All sound vanished from the venue, leaving a deathly silence.

The bigwigs in the front row, the leaders of the regulatory authorities, and all the security personnel all turned their heads.

Hundreds of eyes, icy cold, filled with condescending scrutiny and judgment, pierced Lin Che, who sat silently in the corner.

Lin Che did not move.

He sat in the iron folding chair, his right hand still in his pocket, holding the USB drive.

He met everyone's gaze with a blank expression.