Chapter 15 — The Last Ping

Epilogue: OngoingStatus, as of September 2024.The trial of Richard Hayworth began on September 9th, 2024, at the Old Bailey.He pleaded guilty on the first day to all charges. The plea was unexpected and was attributed, by legal commentators, to the completeness of the evidence against him — the DAGGER logs, the fabricated dental records, the financial documentation, and his own cooperation statement all made a trial a formality rather than a contest. The guilty plea was a mechanism for sentence negotiation, not a concession he had any alternative to.He was sentenced to thirty-one years.Thomas Webb's family was in the courtroom. His wife, Sarah Webb, made a victim impact statement. The statement was twelve minutes long. It is available in full in the public court record and is worth reading.Vayu Systems' trial in India is ongoing. Suresh Lal remains in custody. The government commission investigating KAVACH's domestic use has recommended compensation for twenty-three individuals identified as targets of illegal surveillance. Four of those individuals are deceased.The Japanese parliamentary inquiry resulted in new legislation regulating the import and use of commercial surveillance technology. The legislation passed in February 2024 and is known colloquially as the Watanabe provisions, though Kenji has publicly declined the attribution.Leila Haddad's organization published a full account of the Gulf state contract in January 2024. The Gulf state's government did not respond to press requests. Three journalists in that country were released from detention in March 2024. Their release was not officially connected to the Vayu exposure. Leila said it was. She is probably right.Philippe Mauret testified before a Swiss parliamentary committee in April. The testimony resulted in tighter regulations on corporate account management for security companies. He described it, in a message to Naina afterward, as "a satisfying but insufficient outcome." He is working on the insufficient.AMBER COAT — the source inside Vayu who had first approached CipherNet with concerns — was identified in the Indian proceedings as a junior software engineer named Dinesh Kumar, 29, from Mysuru. He had become uncomfortable with the DAGGER module and had tried to raise concerns internally, found no pathway, and gone external. He is currently employed at an unrelated software company. His lawyer has requested that his name not appear in press coverage. It appears here because the public record requires it and because his role was significant. He spent two years being afraid and continued anyway.— ◆ —