Since the first director of the FBI, J. Edgar Hoover, used the bureau's pervasive surveillance network to monitor politicians, celebrities, and even ordinary citizens across the country and gained monstrous power for forty full years, the word "surveillance" has remained an extremely sensitive yet completely unavoidable topic in American society.
Many major political events in modern American history, from the Watergate scandal and the Lewinsky scandal to the PRISM scandal, all have inextricable connections to surveillance.
Monitoring others and obtaining their private secrets and weaknesses essentially meant possessing a form of power.
The reason no one dared challenge J. Edgar Hoover's position as FBI director throughout his forty-year career was simple: no one could be certain that if they stepped forward, some scandal involving themselves wouldn't explode the very next day.
The current U.S. President George Bush choosing the position of CIA Director during his political career was also an extremely shrewd move.
As for Simon.
The wiretapping incident at the Plaza Hotel a few years ago was enough to demonstrate the intense curiosity the outside world held toward this super-rich man who had risen like a comet.
Because his mind contained the life experiences equivalent to more than a dozen people, Simon's strict defense of his personal privacy in recent years was by no means unfounded paranoia.
It wasn't only politicians. The federal government also monitored the country's super-wealthy individuals.
The reasoning was actually quite simple.
In a capitalist society, money meant power. The wealthy controlled not only money. Media moguls like Simon also controlled media networks capable of influencing the direction of news and public opinion.
If someone could grasp Simon's private secrets or hold leverage over him that could not be revealed to outsiders, then on many occasions politicians could coerce him into acting according to their wishes.
There were clear precedents for this kind of thing.
The most classic example was probably Howard Hughes, who was also quite legendary in Hollywood.
This super-rich man, who had passed away just over a decade ago, had actually been under secret government surveillance ever since he made his fortune.
According to materials gradually declassified over the years, the FBI's surveillance files on Howard Hughes, including recordings, photographs, and handwritten letters, filled an entire room.
In the early 1950s, to warn Hughes to cooperate with him on a congressional bill, J. Edgar Hoover had all three years of the man's surveillance materials delivered to him, accompanied by a personally written card that read "With the compliments of Hoover."
The materials included wiretap recordings from every residence and hotel room Howard Hughes had used on both the East and West Coasts over three years, along with nearly day-by-day schedule information. Every Hollywood actress he had dated during those three years was also meticulously listed. It was thorough to an extreme degree.
This was how J. Edgar Hoover told Hughes: We know your every move. Be careful!
In his later years, Howard Hughes almost never left his private plane and eventually died alone. While the public explanation was that the super-rich man suffered from crippling obsessive-compulsive disorder, it was hard to say whether the government's long-term surveillance had also played a role in his complete loss of any sense of security.
However, although he himself was under long-term secret government monitoring, Howard Hughes was doing the exact same thing to others.
Anyone who had seen The Aviator would understand this point clearly.
Howard Hughes treated his countless lovers as personal property and dispatched numerous subordinates specifically to monitor every word and action of these canaries he kept.
The awkward part was that, due to this prolonged surveillance, more than once his lonely kept women ended up sleeping with the very agents Hughes had sent to watch them.
Simon's miraculous rise, accumulating Twenty of billions of dollars in wealth in just a few short years, with that number still growing rapidly, naturally attracted intense curiosity and other motives from certain people. This was completely normal.
The person who discovered that Simon was being monitored was the leader of an investigation team named Martin Dinham.
He was a candidate the Johnston family had recruited from Australia.
A genuine professional agent.
This once again proved the depth of the Johnston family's resources. Even with hundreds of billions of dollars at his disposal, Simon could not recruit the people he needed from federal authorities.
Even if he could find them, he would never dare to use them with full trust.
After Simon developed this idea, the old man personally helped select and send over eleven people, divided into two teams. one of five and one of six.
Of course, the couple had paid a very substantial sum for this.
The families of these eleven individuals could almost be considered supported by the Westeros system.
In fact, this was precisely what Simon valued most.
People with attachments were ultimately less likely to betray. This was why Simon had specifically requested people with families.
As long as these men truly proved their worth, Simon had no issue spending several million dollars a year on them.
After all, while agents seemed mysterious to ordinary people, it was ultimately just a profession. Normally they only earned salaries comparable to ordinary white-collar workers, a few tens of thousands of dollars per year at most, plus some special government benefits.
The base salary Simon offered, two hundred thousand dollars, was something government agents could never match.
Moreover, Westeros covered all family expenses for these men, including medical care and education.
After passing the one-year probation period, they could choose to immigrate their entire families to the United States. Westeros would provide a one-time one-million-dollar settlement fee. Their children could later attend designated top universities in Australia or America, with admission spots arranged by Westeros Company.
In addition, after completing their twenty-year service contract, each person would receive a one-time five-million-dollar bonus and subsequent pension benefits.
That's right.
Anyone who wanted to join had to sign a twenty-year employment contract.
Simon strongly believed in the principle that familiar people were better. The vases around him could be constantly replaced, but for these special service teams by his side, the longer they worked, the more reliable they usually became. Once humans grew accustomed to a certain way of life, even they themselves found it difficult to change.
Therefore, when enough time passed, something called loyalty would naturally form.
After Martin Dinham and his five-man team completed their investigation into the recent Ygritte portal hacking incident and reported their findings to Janet, he unexpectedly sensed that someone was following him after leaving the Point Dume estate.
Neither Simon nor Janet wanted their investigation team to be noticed by outsiders, and Martin Dinham had received similar instructions.
Upon realizing he was being tailed, Martin Dinham calmly arranged for his colleagues to conduct counter-surveillance. They eventually identified a man around thirty years old named Frank Breze.
According to the information collected afterward, Frank Breze was thirty-three years old (Dinham specifically noted that this age was likely fake). Thirteen years ago, Frank Breze had immigrated to the United States from Britain as a student. He was now an ordinary and somewhat down-on-his-luck plumber. Single, with no bad habits.
After team members infiltrated his residence, they quickly discovered direct evidence and installed listening devices.
The investigation was still ongoing, and they had also discovered two other "colleagues" of Frank Breze.
However, in his report, Martin Dinham had already reached a conclusion: these people held no malice toward Simon, and the intensity of their surveillance was quite low. It clearly gave the impression of someone only going through the motions, working three days and resting two.
"So far we have only identified three individuals. Besides Frank Breze, there are Luther Randolph, whose public identity is a bouncer at a nightclub in Compton, and Johnny Piest, a driver for a moving company in Koreatown. All three have relatively unstable occupations. They are all immigrants with very distinct characteristics. Although Johnny Piest is married, this is likely just a cover. It is very common for long-term undercover agents to enter into marriages. Based on current investigation materials, the three of them appear to be nothing more than foot soldiers. We are still tracing their superiors. Additionally, they give me a feeling of… well, 'abandoned pawns.'"
In a nondescript single-story office inside Universal Studios in Burbank.
Simon listened to Martin Dinham's briefing and asked, "Abandoned pawns? So you're saying they are not from the federal government?"
If it were the FBI, they obviously could not be treated as disposable.
Since Martin Dinham judged all three to be highly professional agents rather than ordinary informants, unless they were foreign spies, it would be impossible for them to be abandoned pawns.
Martin Dinham nodded. "My guess is that the three are either from the Stasi or the KGB. East and West Germany have merged and the Stasi has been dissolved, but that spy network has not disappeared. Just three months ago, the director of the Stasi's foreign intelligence bureau applied for political asylum from the Australian government because the West German government demanded he surrender the list of Stasi foreign agents in exchange for amnesty. The KGB is also a possibility. The Soviet Union is on the verge of collapse, and the country's current economic situation is extremely dire. It simply doesn't have the strength to maintain a large overseas spy network anymore."
Simon thought for a moment. "Judging from the three men's surnames, the possibility that they are abandoned Stasi agents seems higher."
Martin Dinham shook his head. "Names are just code names. They don't reveal anything."
Simon asked again, "Then do they have Slavic features?"
"Luther Randolph appears to have some Eastern European blood," Martin Dinham said, "but that still doesn't prove anything."
Hearing the middle-aged man speak, Simon suddenly asked, "Martin, is your name real?"
Martin Dinham shook his head directly and smiled. "It's fake. My real surname is Bedford. I've simply gotten used to Dinham. Many of my passports also use this name, so I didn't change it this time."
Simon also smiled. "A very classic surname."
Whether in Britain, America, or Australia, there were many towns and regions named Bedford. That alone showed how common this standard British surname was.
Since he intended to use these people, Simon had naturally investigated their backgrounds thoroughly. He knew Martin Dinham's real surname and more about the man.
Martin Dinham probably knew this as well, which was why he appeared so open about it.
Simon Westeros had given them more than enough. Martin Dinham did not feel entitled to receive it.
After a few words of small talk, Martin Dinham continued, "So, boss, what should we do next?"
Simon did not answer immediately. Instead he asked, "Besides this team, do you think there are others monitoring me?"
Martin Dinham shook his head. "I don't know. In the past few days we have only uncovered Frank Breze and the other two. We haven't even fully dug out this entire team yet."
Simon considered it for a moment and said, "In that case, have your team focus exclusively on investigating Frank Breze and the others for now. I want to know everything about them. As for anything else, I will arrange other people."
Martin Dinham was not aware that Simon had other personnel.
However, some things were simply obvious. If this super-rich man only had their one team in reserve, it would be far too pathetic.
Sensibly choosing not to ask any more questions, the two discussed some details before Martin Dinham took his leave.
Simon remained in the old-fashioned single-story office at Universal Studios. He slowly flipped through several scripts that Ira Deutchman had sent over while thinking about what to do next.
In recent years, Simon had only focused on ensuring that his private residences were not invaded by outsiders. He had overlooked surveillance in other areas.
The main purpose of monitoring super-wealthy individuals was to obtain private information they would not want made public.
To many people, a rapidly rising super-rich man like Simon might be hiding a very big secret.
In addition to capturing compromising material on him, some people probably hoped to obtain the great secret that had allowed him to amass hundreds of billions of dollars in just a few years. Few people could remain completely unmoved by such wealth.
Therefore, Simon fundamentally did not believe that only this one shabby team was circling around him.
The anti-wiretapping and security measures he thought were very cautious might not be as airtight as he believed.
There were also the people around him.
The beautiful vases.
The girls around him had all been actively scouted and selected by Janet through background checks rather than passively accepting resumes. This had largely prevented people from exploiting loopholes.
However, even if these girls had no problems initially, it did not mean they had no problems now.
Simon believed he had given them generous salaries and treatment. Still, human greed was never satisfied.
Perhaps this matter should also be investigated.
Simon did not want to become a paranoid person, but in this case he did not feel this suspicion was excessive at all.
To investigate whether there were other surveillance teams around him and thoroughly review the vases by his side, Martin Dinham's team plus the other six-person team was clearly not enough.
Thinking this over, Simon recalled that Sophia had also recruited a group of people in Europe. They were said to be retired Stasi agents. He had previously seen the background check reports they produced for the European maid team. From the professionalism and detail level of those reports, the people Sophia found were quite capable. Perhaps he could bring two more teams over.
As for recruiting teams from within the United States.
Simon had never even considered it.
He had cooperated with some professional detective agencies before. Now that he was going to establish his own intelligence network, he instinctively felt it was best not to recruit personnel locally from North America.