American tax officials

Chapter 54 The Chase

David took a sip of coffee and said, "Yes, if you can report illegal groups like yours and get us to pay taxes, then you can also get tax breaks."

McDonald looked slightly frustrated, but still asked, "As for reporting... I don't have a suitable target right now. If I do later, can I contact you anytime?"

"Of course! As long as the clues are useful, I'm always welcome!"

Having received David's words, McDonald made up his mind to spend more time interacting and exchanging ideas with fellow travelers in the near future, and see if he could make something out of it.

Anyway, he already knew that the IRS was required to keep taxpayer information confidential, so as long as he provided valuable clues, probably no one would know that he was the one who did it!

……

Two hours later, Dan seemed to have entered a heated phase. His hands were constantly striking the keyboard like he was playing a high-pitched piano piece, and he had entered a state of complete absorption.

David didn't want to disturb him, but a little too much time had passed, so he went up to Dan and asked, "How is it?"

Dan slowed down a bit, wiped the sweat from his brow, and replied, "This guy's skills are absolutely top-notch. I got several friends to 'hunt' him down, but he managed to escape using a 'rootkit'!"

Nissen, somewhat puzzled, asked, "Rootkit? What's that?"

"A rootkit is a tool used by attackers to hide their whereabouts and retain root access. Once an attacker gains root access to a system through a remote attack, they will install a rootkit on the target system to achieve long-term control!"

David and Nixon were completely baffled by this barrage of hacker jargon.

"If we can't handle it, then forget it."

I originally thought this would be a hot case, but I didn't expect it to not only waste so many days, but also cause so much trouble now.

He could use that time to solve other cases!

Hearing this, Dan became a little anxious and quickly replied, "No, no, no, I want to try again. Please give me another half hour!"

"Half an hour... okay!"

David thought for a moment, since he had already wasted so much time, he didn't care about another half hour.

Half an hour passed quickly.

Just as David was about to interrupt, Dan exclaimed, "Haha, we finally cracked your rootkit! Let's see where you run now!"

Seeing that things seemed to be making a breakthrough, David didn't interrupt anymore, but waited patiently.

Five minutes later, a string of code popped up on the computer screen, causing Dan, who had been quite excited, to suddenly fall silent. He cursed, "Fuck you! That damn bastard used a botnet!"

"Mixed chicken? So, we still haven't found him?"

Although Nissen didn't know what a "meat chicken" was, seeing Dan's exasperated look, he realized that things were going badly.

Dan didn't reply immediately. Instead, he opened a chat window on some software and chatted with a few unknown netizens for a while. Finally, he turned to Dan and said, "This guy's technical level is higher than I thought. I found seven friends with similar skills to me to gang up on him, but we still couldn't pinpoint his IP address. However, it wasn't a complete loss..."

David was slightly disappointed by the first few words, but the next few words cheered him up, and he asked, "So what did I gain?"

"The botnet he used was special; it was part of an integrated network within a school. To use this kind of network, the transmission frequency needs to be exceptionally high. This guy couldn't possibly be more than 500 meters away from the school, otherwise he wouldn't have been able to escape the pursuit trap we set."

"We've checked, and the only place that can supply this frequency and is within 500 meters of the school is the Constance residential area!"

After hearing Dan's words, Nissen replied with dissatisfaction, "The Constance residential area has 4 or 500 households!"

Dan was slightly embarrassed, but still replied, "With the IRS's investigative capabilities, finding that guy from these hundreds of households shouldn't be too difficult for me, right, Inspector David?"

David sensed the other person's boasting, but he didn't say anything more. Instead, he replied, "Okay, that's settled then!"

"Inspector David, what about my tax deduction...?"

"I will apply!"

Although they couldn't pinpoint the guy's exact location, Dan had done his utmost.

Moreover, finding such a general location is quite a rewarding achievement.

David didn't need to play any games of strategy that would discourage the group.

Dan's face lit up with joy, and she quickly said gratefully, "Thank you so much..."

The matter wasn't really settled. He had originally planned that if he couldn't get the 15% tax reduction as agreed, he would settle for 7 or 8%.

But to his surprise, David was so magnanimous and didn't use the situation to impose harsh tax rates, which delighted him.

"Alright, it's getting late. Get your money ready now and come to the IRS to complete the procedures!"

……

Back at the Lake District Precinct, David and Nissen immediately split up and got to work.

David was in charge of handling Camilla and others' financial accounting and deposits, while Nissen went to investigate the data of the Constance residential area.

Although this residential area has 4 to 500 households.

However, households consisting only of elderly people or those with no computer skills can be excluded.

After further screening using their IRS database, the workload might only be reduced to 2 or 300 households.

"Here's $186,120, please count it..."

"Here's $186,120, please count it..."

"here it is……"

"According to the tax breaks, here's my $49,800. Count it..."

Camilla and the others took out their respective taxes, but when it was Dan's turn, the other four had somewhat complicated expressions.

Each of them started with a tax payment of 10.

Weidu Dan only paid less than 5, which made the four of them envious.

David carefully checked the figures and, after confirming they were correct, nodded and said, "Alright, your taxes and documents are all filed. You can go now!"

After they left, David immediately called Mary over, pointed to the stack of cash, and said, "This is 749,800. Count it!"

Upon seeing such a large sum of money, Mary was initially taken aback, but quickly composed herself and began to count the funds.

After about ten minutes, she nodded and said, "The numbers are correct, then I'll go ahead and do the inventory work!"

(End of this chapter)